1、 The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus Volume 11 | Issue 32 | Number 3 | Aug 08, 20131Separate and Unequal: The Remedial Japanese LanguageClassroom as an Ethnic Project 日本補習言語教育市民権 民族的課題第二言語教室Robert MooreheadThe economic downturn of the Great Recessionhas largely brought an end to the wave ofethnic
2、 return migration of Japanese SouthAmericans to Japan, a wave that began in thelate 1980s. By 2012, the number of SouthAmerican residents in Japan had dropped bymore than a third, contributing to the shrinkingof the foreign resident population in Japan tothe lowest level since 2005 (Ministry of Just
3、ice2013). This emigration wave from Japan hasbeen encouraged by growth in the Brazilianeconomy and by financial incentives from theJapanese government for Japanese SouthAmericans and their family members to leavethe country. However, despite these changes,the number of non-Japanese children inJapane
4、se public schools who require remedialhelp in Japanese remains high. While thenumber of Portuguese- and Spanish-speakingchildren in Japanese-as-a-second-language(JSL) classes has dropped, the number ofChinese- and Tagalog-speaking childrenreceiving these classes has increased (MEXT2013).Thus, Japane
5、se public schools, like theircounterparts in other countries, continue toface the responsibility of preparing immigrantchildren for their futures in Japan. This projectof citizen-building is occuring in a Japaneseclassroom setting that emphasizes the equalityof all students, and a strong sense ofcol
6、lectivity and mutual interdependence(Tsuneyoshi 2001). Professional norms inJapanese education further dictate that schoolsmust provide all students with similareducation until they enter high school, at whichtime students are sorted into academic andvocational schools with differing curricularempha
7、ses and degrees of prestige (LeTendre,Hofer, and Shimizu 2003; Shimizu 1992, 2001;Shimizu et al. 1999; Tsuneyoshi 1996, 2001).However, the presence of immigrant children ischallenging this Japanese educational model ofequality and inclusion.To meet the needs of immigrant children,Japanese public sch
8、ools have created separateJSL classrooms for students who requireremedial language training. These classroomsbreak with Japanese educational practices bypulling students out of their homeroom classesfor remedial lessons, instead of having allstudents complete the same lessons together.Teachers conte
9、nd that the JSL classroomsprovide more than remedial instructiontheyalso serve as sites of refuge for immigrantchildren, providing them places to relax fromthe challenges of adapting to the Japaneselanguage and culture.I examine the JSL classroom at ShiroyamaElementary School,1 a public school in ce
10、ntralJapan that has more than 50 immigrantstudents. The great majority of the schoolsimmigrant families come from Peru, withsmaller numbers from Bolivia, Brazil, China,and the Philippines. The schools Peruvian,Bolivian, and Brazilian students are the third-and fourth-generation descendants of Japane
11、seemigrants who settled in South America in theearly twentieth century.2 Nearly 60 percent ofthe immigrant students at ShiroyamaAPJ | JF 11 | 32 | 32Elementary attend remedial JSL classes, whilethe other 40 percent are deemed to havesufficient Japanese language capacity to bemainstreamed. Asking how
12、 the JSL room hasbeen integrated into the educational and socialfabric of the school, I examine the connectionbetween the JSL room and the schoolshomeroom classes, and the schools plan for,and delivery of, JSL instruction, including thepreparation of JSL teachers, the content of JSLlessons, and teac
13、hers reactions to the JSLprogram. I also analyze the impact of theschools JSL instruction on immigrant studentsacademic development, and the implications fortheir future ability to integrate into Japanesesociety.My analysis reveals that the dominant practiceof Japanese public education and the new(s
14、ince 1992) practice of the JSL classroom arecompeting ethnic projects that reflectparticular conceptualizations of the childrensfuture lives as members of Japanese society. Iam thus amending Omi and Winants (1994)concept of the racial project, which they defineas “an interpretation, representation,
15、orexplanation of racial dynamics, and an effort toreorganize and redistribute resources along racial lines” (p. 56). I substitute the termethnicity for race to better fit the Japanesecontext, where notions of group membershipextend beyond race, to include shared ancestry,culture, and nationality. In
16、 so doing, I amforegrounding the role of ethnicity in thedistribution of school resources and inteachers explanations of group dynamics (cf.Omi and Winant 1994:56). I also highlight theclassrooms role in the construction of Japanesecitizenship and the co-construction of Japansethnic others.This anal
17、ysis serves as a cautionary tale of therisks of failing to educate Japans immigrantchildren. The outcomes of the schools JSLprogram likely foretell the future lives of theJSL students who choose to remain in Japan asadults, since the school is the primary sitewhere these children learn to read and w
18、rite inJapanese. Success could enable the students tobe mainstreamed into their homeroom classes,where they could participate more fully in theschools citizen-building project. However,failure could isolate the students in the JSLclassrooms, limiting their ability to improvetheir command of the Japa
19、nese language and toclose the academic gap between them and theirJapanese classmates. Such a project wouldprepare these immigrant children for life onJapans social and economic margins, wherethe childrens parents are already firmlyentrenched.In the following section, I provide an overviewof my field
20、 site, including details onShiroyamas foreign population and on myresearch methods. In subsequent sections, Iexamine the ethnic projects of Japanese publiceducation and the JSL classroom, and provide asummary analysis.BACKGROUNDShiroyama is a working-class district of a city of75,000 people in centr
21、al Japan. The districtsprimary industry consists of auto parts andelectronics factories, which employ thousandsof workers, including Shiroyamas immigrantpopulation of roughly 700 people. Many ofthese immigrant workers are Nikkei,3 orforeign nationals of Japanese descent. Nikkeiimmigration to Japan w
22、as made possible by theImmigration Control and Refugee RecognitionAct of 1990. This law created a long-termresident visa specifically for the Japanesediaspora, with whom the Japanese state hassustained ties through decades of support forethnic associations and cultural institutions(Takenaka 2004, 20
23、08). Since the lawspassage, hundreds of thousands of Nikkei havemigrated to Japan from South America. By2007, the number had peaked at nearly394,000 residents, up from only 3,600 in 1985(Statistical Research and Training Institute2010).APJ | JF 11 | 32 | 33In Shiroyama, the Nikkei population ispredo
24、minantly from Peru. It is estimated thatroughly 70 percent of the Peruvian Nikkei inJapan are entirely of Japanese descent, and 30percent are of mixed ancestry (JapanInternational Cooperation Agency 1992).Japanese emigration to Peru started in 1898and lasted until World War II, with reducedlevels of
25、 migration in the postwar era. SomeNikkei can directly trace their Japaneseancestry back through multiple generations,with no history of out-marriage since theirfamilys migration to South America. Thispopulation is phenotypically indistinguishablefrom native-born Japanese, however, when theyspeak, t
26、heir non-native accents quickly revealtheir foreign status. Other Nikkei have weakerties to Japan, with only one spouse havingJapanese ancestry, at times through a singlegrandparentthe minimum degree of Japanesedescent required for a long-term resident visa.Whatever their ancestral ties to Japan, ma
27、nyNikkei find that Japanese treat them ascomplete foreigners, or gaijin, a largelyunassimilable other who is a permanentoutsider to Japanese society (Takenaka 1999).Many of Shiroyamas Peruvian familiesmigrated in 1990 with plans to return to Peruafter several years of work. They have sincedecided to
28、 settle in Shiroyama for theforseeable future, attracted by low-cost publichousing and the presence of other Peruvianfamily members. The fact that the childrenhave acculturated to life in Japan, and oftenspeak Japanese better than Spanish, furtherencourages the families to remain. However,the curren
29、t global economic recession hasreminded the Nikkei of their precariousposition in Japan, as their contract positionswere among the first terminated at the start ofthe recession in 2008 (Higuchi 2010). By theend of 2012, the recession had prompted morethan 140,000 South Americans to leave Japan,reduc
30、ing the population of South Americanresidents in Japan to 253,000 (Ministry ofJustice 2013). This mass exodus wasaccelerated by growth in the Brazilianeconomy, and by a Japanese government offerof 300,000 (approximately US$3,000 at thetime) for each Nikkei adult and 200,000(US$2,000) for each spouse
31、 or dependent toreturn to South America (Ministry of Health,Labour, and Welfare 2009; Ministry of Justice2010). Those who received this paymentbecame ineligible for long-term resident visasfor a period of three years (Ministry of Health,Labour, and Welfare 2009). When able to findemployment in Japan
32、, the Nikkei are often inlow-skilled positions with no opportunities foradvancement (Higuchi and Tanno 2003;Takenoshita 2006; Tsuda, Valdez, andCornelius 2003). Like labor migrants in manycountries, the Nikkei also have fewopportunities to transfer their skills to thebroader labor market, as they ar
33、e held back bytheir limited command of the language and bydiscrimination, from which Japanese law offersfew protections (Gurowitz 2006).Chart 1.1 Number of children requiringremedial JSL instruction in public schoolsSources: Kanno 2008a; MEXT 2013.Alongside the rise of Nikkei immigration, thenumber
34、of foreign children officially tallied asneeding remedial JSL instruction has alsoincreased. From 1991 to its peak in 2008, thisnumber grew by more than 400 percent, fromAPJ | JF 11 | 32 | 345,463 to 28,575 (Kanno 2008a; MEXT 2009)(See Chart 1.1).4 Thus, in 2008, 38 percent ofthe 75,043 foreign stud
35、ents in Japanese publicschools, including Nikkei and other foreignchildren, had a sufficiently poor command ofthe Japanese language as to require remedialinstruction (MEXT 2009).5 At ShiroyamaElementary, the number of foreign students hasincreased steadily in recent years, includingduring my fieldwo
36、rk, when it rose from 43students in 2005, to 48 in 2006, to 56 in 2007.6(See Table 1.1.) Nearly all of these childrenwere born in Japan, and all but a few attendedJapanese preschool or kindergarten prior tostarting elementary school. Nonetheless, in the2006-07 academic year, 28 out of the 48immigran
37、t students were scheduled to leavetheir homeroom classes to attend pullout JSLclasses for at least one class period each week.Table 1.1. Japanese and foreign children atShiroyama Elementary School (2005-2007)by parents countries of originParentsCountry ofOrigin2005 2006 2007Total Foreign 43 48 56Per
38、u 33 34 38Bolivia 5 5 7Brazil 3 5 5Philippines a 2 1 4China 0 3 2Japan 749 772 804a These totals include two children who haveone Filipino and one Japanese parent and whopossess Japanese citizenship.From November 2005 to April 2007, Iconducted participant observation at theschool. Funded by a Fulbri
39、ght fellowship, Ivolunteered full-time as a Japanese-Spanishinterpreter, translator, and assistant teacher. Iinterpreted during parent-teacher meetings,translated messages between teachers andparents, and fielded direct calls to my cellphone from parents who needed to contact theschool. I also taugh
40、t remedial Japanese andmathematics, led free Spanish classes onSaturdays, and accompanied immigrantfamilies in social gatherings. I also conductedintensive interviews with 31 Peruvian andBolivian parents, and informal interviews with16 teachers and administrators. I recorded andlater transcribed the
41、se interviews, with aresearch assistant performing the Japanesetranscriptions.In the following section, I first examineJapanese public education, and then the JSLclassroom, as competing ethnic projects. Iexplore Shiroyama Elementarys JSL programin detail, including the use of the JSL room as aplace
42、to relax, the implementation of JSLinstruction, and teacher resistance to theprogram, before concluding with a summaryanalysis.TEACHING JAPANESE AND IMMIGRANTCHILDRENThe principles of egalitarianism (bydshugi)and collective communalism (issei kydotaishugi) guide Japanese public education.Egalitarian
43、ism directs teachers to treat allchildren equally and to instill the same desireto learn in each of them (Shimizu 1992;Shimizu et al. 1999; Shimizu and Shimizu 2001;Tsuneyoshi 1996, 2001). This approachconceptualizes all students as equal membersof the classroom, entitled to a similareducation, with
44、 little distinction for studentsindividual needs or desires. Inherent to thisethnic education project is a connection to thechildrens imagined futures as Japanesecitizens who are equal members of the nation-state, and who possess similar rights andresponsibilities. Thus, the school seeks to bothprov
45、ide children with human and culturalcapital (Becker 1964; Bourdieu and Passeron1990; Schultz 1961) and inform their sense ofmembership in the larger society.Following the principle that all students are toreceive the same education, Japanese publicAPJ | JF 11 | 32 | 35schools offer no separate cours
46、es for giftedstudents and little remediation for studentswho are not performing at grade level.7 Twoexceptions to the rule of no separate coursesexist, as students with developmentaldisabilities attend classes in a separateclassroom, and immigrant students who needremedial JSL instruction leave thei
47、r homeroomclasses for JSL lessons. All homeroom classes ineach grade progress at the same rate, and fromelementary school through junior high, schoolsautomatically promote all students to the nextgrade, regardless of the students academicprogress.The second principle, coordinatedcommunalism, concept
48、ualizes each class as asingle, comprehensive, cooperative body (Cave2007; Takato 2006; Tsuneyoshi 1996, 2001). AsTsuneyoshi (2001:45) notes:This communalism is at thefoundation of the “Japanese schoolmodel.” Coordinated communalismassumes a tight-knit, self-sufficient,and homogeneous type ofclassroo
49、m/school community, andplaces central importance on thesharing of communal experience,empathy, mutual interdependence,and other communal values Itdictates, moreover, thateveryone engage in the same kindof communal activity together.Pulling students out of class for JSL lessonschallenges this sense of collectivity. However,teachers justify this practice by claiming thatthe JSL students cannot fully participate inclassroom activities, and, as I discuss later, thatthe students need a break from attending class.The focus on class cohesion encouragesim
