Nine Circles of Goodness

DOI Open Access

Bibliographic Information

Other Title
  • 移住者の暮らしにおける消費財
  • ――Consumer Goods in the Lives of Russian-speaking Migrants in Japan――
  • ――在日ロシア語圏女性と消費財への態度・感情、消費財との関係を巡って――

Abstract

<p>This study draws on interview data and visits to the informants’ homes in Japan. The aim is to analyze the changing trajectory of the relations that female Russian-speaking migrants have developed with consumer goods in their new country of settlement. The 1990s, when many informants in this study left Russia and other post-Soviet countries for Japan, were marked by political and economic turbulence in those places of origin. Even for people who moved to Japan later, memories of the shortage of consumer goods – experienced by them directly or by their parents, relatives, and friends – still constituted one of the core memories of the pre-migratory past. The paper examines how initial sentiments of denouncing the lifestyle one had before migration and euphoria about “limitless” consumer choices in the receiving country have changed as the women’s lives in Japan unfolded. These new sentiments were infused with such values as living modestly, getting by with little, being attentive to Earth, and maintaining gender and health consciousness. Some informants reported psychological discomfort over the overabundance of consumer goods, often as a result of inconclusive negotiations with family pertaining to consumer practices, gift exchanges, and the presence of items at home. Ultimately, the study explicates how lived experiences regarding consumer materiality in a migrant context lead to embodied critiques of consumer lifestyles and to the discursive construction of moral selves by these women.</p>

Journal

Related Projects

See more

Keywords

Details 詳細情報について

  • CRID
    1391975831238160000
  • NII Article ID
    130007973646
  • DOI
    10.32262/wsca.21.0_77
  • ISSN
    24346926
    1346132X
  • Text Lang
    en
  • Data Source
    • JaLC
    • CiNii Articles
    • KAKEN
  • Abstract License Flag
    Disallowed

Report a problem

Back to top