This document summarizes a workshop on national education policy and identity formation in Japan. The workshop will discuss MEXT's 2014-2020 plan to reform English language education by focusing on traditional Japanese culture to increase youth's awareness of their Japanese identity. Specifically, it will examine how this policy may affect multicultural students, promote gender bias, global citizenship vs. ethnocentrism, and principles for faculty training. The presenter's background in gender representation and intercultural communication will inform an intervention strategy drawing on work analyzing the canonization of Noh plays and their influence on gender roles. Case studies of the Noh play Oimatsu and approaches integrating local identity will also be discussed.

1. National Education
Policy and
Identity Formation
Gerry Yokota, Osaka University
gyokota@gmail.com
@JALT 2016
Saturday, November 26
6:15-7:15, Room 1204

2. 1. Questions for Discussion
2. My Background
3. The MEXT 2014-2020 Plan
4. Intervention Strategies (Sunderland 2004)
5. Noh and the Invention of Tradition
6. G30 Course on Traditional Japanese Culture
with a Focus on Noh at Osaka University
7. New Noh as a Point of Intervention for
Reconsidering the Meaning of Tradition
8. Case Study: The Canonical Noh Oimatsu
9. Glocalization and Mindfulness (Kadota &
Kawaguchi 2015, Murphy-Shigematsu 2016)
10. Sources
Workshop Materials

3. Questions for Discussion
MEXT’s 2014-2020 plan to reform English language
education in Japan includes a focus on teaching
traditional Japanese culture in order to increase
Japanese youth’s awareness of their Japanese identity.
In this workshop, I propose that we begin by focusing on
the following questions about the social implications of
this policy.
Q1. How will it affect students from diverse multicultural
backgrounds?
Q2. Could there be a hidden gender bias?
Q3. Which is it more likely to promote, global citizenship or
ethnocentrism?
Q4. What principles should guide professional faculty
development, including training in materials
development, in order to prevent stereotyping and
promote respect for diversity?
Q5. What interventions might we devise to minimize any
potential damage?

4. • 27 years teaching at Osaka University
• PhD and publications in Japanese literature with
a focus on the representation of gender and the
role of traditional culture in intercultural
communication
• 10+ years teaching Japanese culture to
international students in junior-year abroad and
G30 programs
• 10+ years teaching Open University courses for
high school teachers, and publishing in the
textbook
• 10+ years in professional development, including
harassment seminars and diversity training
My Background

6. Intervention Strategies
Sunderland 2004:203

7. Percentage of supreme masculine deities in
current canon of first-category deity plays
(waki-noh), in hierarchical order by dance
Kamimai: 8/9 (88%)
Hataraki: 12/12 (100%)
Gaku*: 8/9 (88%)
Shinnojonomai: 3/4 (75%)
Chunomai: 0/3 (0%)
*There are actually ten gaku plays, but one
(Tsurukame) features animals, not humans,
and so is excluded from this study, which is
concerned with the orthodoxical influence
of the gendered representation of deities on
human gender roles.
Major feminine deity plays (nyotai kami-noh)
demoted in rank or excluded from the canon
Kureha (demoted to chunomai)
Seiobo (demoted to chunomai)
Ukon (demoted to chunomai)
Kazuraki (demoted to third category)
Hatsuyuki (demoted to third category)
Makiginu (demoted to fourth category)
Miwa (demoted to fourth category)
Murogimi (demoted to fourth category)
Tatsuta (demoted to fourth category)
Taema (demoted to fifth category)
Furu (excluded from canon)
Hakozaki (excluded from canon)
Unoha (excluded from canon)

8. Condensation and Intertextuality
Attachment and Detachment
Performance and Narration
The House System
Literature and National Identity

11. Mindfulness and Local Identity

12. Hall, S. (1993). Encoding, Decoding. In The Cultural Studies Reader, ed.
S. During. Routledge, 90-103.
Hobsbawm, E. (1983) Inventing traditions. In The Invention of Tradition,
ed. E. Hobsbawm & T. Ranger. Cambridge UP, 15-42.
Kadota, L. & Kawaguchi, L. (2016). Integrating Elements of Local
Identity into Communication Activities. 松山東雲女子大学人文科学部
紀 要 24, 153-63. Retrieved from http://iyokan.lib.ehime-
u.ac.jp/dspace/bitstream/iyokan/4857/1/24-11.pdf
マーフィ重松 スティーヴン. (2016). スタンフォード大学マインドフルネス教室. 講
談社．
MEXT. English Education Reform Plan corresponding to Globalization.
Retrieved from http://www.mext.go.jp/en/news/topics/detail/
__icsFiles/afieldfile/2014/01/23/1343591_1.pdf
文 部 科 学 省 『 グ ロ ー バ ル 化 に 対 応 し た 英 語 教 育 改 革 実 施 計 画 』
http://www.mext.go.jp/a_menu/kokusai/gaikokugo/__icsFiles/afiel
dfile/2014/01/31/1343704_01.pdf
Sunderland, J. (2004). Gendered Discourses. Palgrave Macmillan.
Yokota, G. (1998). Conflicting authorities: the canonisation of Zeami
and Shakespeare. Shakespeare and the Japanese Stage, ed. T.
Sasayama et al. Cambridge UP, 159-75.
Yokota, G. (1997). The Formation of the Canon of Noh: The Literary
Tradition of Divine Authority. Osaka UP.
ヨコタ ジェリー．(2015). ジェンダー・リテラシーで読み解く文学．『ジェンダー・ス
タディーズ—女性学・男性学—』牟田和恵編著．大阪大学出版会，18-39