Aizawa Shinichi

This article addresses topics related to Japanese sociology of education over the past three decades. The main academic interests of Japanese sociology of education have been educational choice and socialization in secondary education, topics also discussed in Durkheim’s masterwork, L’Évolution pédagogique en France. The interests of Japanese researchers in the sociology of education were aroused because of drastic changes in the youth labor market in the mid-1990s and national curriculum reforms influenced by international educational evaluation, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment, in the 2000s. Though the number of empirical studies has increased substantially over the past two decades, this field must make efforts to develop its theoretical sophistication in order to connect to worldwide research on sociology of education.

&emsp;This paper addresses the following two research questions: What role does senior high school choice play, in terms of the choices between public and private and between academic and vocational education in Japan and Taiwan? How do senior high school students matriculate to tertiary education in Japan and Taiwan? Japan and Taiwan have both experienced a rapid expansion of upper secondary education in the process of late industrialization. In these two societies, senior high school tracking decides students&rsquo; educational careers. In addition, people living in these two societies have been inclined toward the belief that national and public schools are more prestigious than private schools. Therefore, the role of private senior high schools is different in these societies than in Europe or America.<br>&emsp;In both Japan and Taiwan students with higher grades tend to attend public academic senior high schools, whereas students with lower grades tend to enroll in private senior high schools. During the educational expansion in both societies, private senior high schools have provided opportunities for students of lower grades as well as lower social status. This research con

The aim of this paper is to unravel the change in the functions of the high school diploma using time-series variation in the structures of intra-generational mobility.<br>First, we try to set demarcation lines between birth years by examining intra-generational mobility, occupational structure based on the first job, and enrollment ratios in the institutions of higher education. Exploring these three aspects for every birth year between 1932 and 1965, five different phases are inductively suggested. Second, the five different phases are compared with 10-year demarcations to verify the former by analyzing chances for advancement to managerial level. We find that using 10-year phases only shows static and limited results. But result using time divisions developed in the exploratory phase produced results that clearly shown the changing impact of academic attainment depending on the period.

This paper examines the Japanese concept of gemba from the angle of sociology of knowledge. The concept of gemba has been widely used in Japanese schools, factories and offices, which can be literally translated to "the real scene" in English. However, the term gemba often suggests a sense of distinction between "we as powerless workers who know better about the situation" and "they as management or outsiders who do not know what really happens in the scene." Without referring to the social actors who use this concept under specified situation, it is very difficult to pinpoint down exactly what kinds of matter belongs to in a particular gemba. Delineating how this concept was actually used in different social settings, like high school, kindergarten and convenience stores, it suggests that, on the one hand, the concept's intension and the contents it connotes are often ambiguous, on the other hand, its extension often denotes a well-defined and clear boundary of what should be included within a particular gemba. The article thus discusses how the use of this concept may actually relate to group dynamics and thus it may reveal the power structure in contemporary Japanese society.

This paper investigates the issue of whether Japan Teachers' Union's (JTU) independent practices of aiming to improve(Kaizen) the method of Japanese mathematics teaching in the late 1950s to 60s succeed as an school policy to include students of various abilities. Two cases are chosen. One is the teaching of Functions, and the other the teaching of Demonstration of Figures in mathematics. Results of analyses show that JTU's independent practices were slightly, though not dramatically, successful when compared to worldwide trend toward higher standards of mathematical contents and greater popularization of mathematics teaching in that era. However, "slight success" only means that the number of students who failed mathematics did not really increase, despite the raise in standards. It is also true that, in the midst of historical conflicts between JTU and the Ministry of Education, there was an inclination to criticize some of the JTU's independent practices for the sake of criticism, and to deem some practices as too radical for school implementation. While Japan has done well in past international achievement tests, there are needs to conduct new researches to historically investi

The aim of this paper is to investigate when and how the meaning of high school diplomas changed during the era of educational expansion in two senses:(1) ubjective and (2) objective. More concretely, it examines:(1) how people recognized high school diplomas and (2) how high school diplomas functioned in the achievement of occupational and economic status. To examine these points, the authors focus on postwar Japan, when the high school enrollment rate rose dramatically under the new educational system. The data used in the analyses are Social Stratification and Social Mobility (SSM) data collected every ten years since 1955.<BR>Three cohorts, divided according to the high school enrollment rate, are compared. The high school enrollment rate is 50% to 65% among the first cohort, 66% to 89% for the second, and more than 90% for the third. The enrollment rate increased continuously during the first and second cohorts, so the former is named the &ldquo;early phase&rdquo; and the latter the &ldquo;later phase.&rdquo; The enrollment rate reaches a plateau in the third. &ldquo;Desired educational level&rdquo; and &ldquo;desired occupation&rdquo; are used in the analysis of subjective me

This paper investigates the issues of students' ability to learn and the necessity for educational knowledge from 1957 to 1969, using the specific example of English teaching. With a special focus on discourse in the movement of the Japan Teachers Union, this paper examines the manner in which teachers dealt with these issues by constructing their own discourses and practices. Several points emerge from the analysis of educational movement discourses in English teaching. People, including educational participants, initially tended to believe that learning English served no purpose, and students found it extremely difficult to master the language. In the movement of the Japan Teachers Union, however, teachers indicated that the aim of learning English was not only to master the language but also to build the learner's character; therefore, it would be useful for all students to learn English. This idea is embodied in the "Four Goals," which seek the solidarity of nations and the deepening of students' understanding of their own languages rather than the acquisition of English. Consequently, two concrete attempts to attain these goals are notable. The first is independent practices b

This paper probes teachers' images of intelligence and ability in the 1950s, with its main focus on discourses that were related to intelligence tests in the movement of Japan Teachers' Union (JTU). The paper suggests that intelligence tests functioned as apparatus at schools in three aspects during that time. The first function was as an apparatus for distinguishing intelligence, while the second an apparatus for measuring the correlation of academic achievement with potential ability. Finally, the third function was as an apparatus for measuring hereditary or environmental influences on learning achievement. From the viewpoint of these three functions, it can be said that teachers in the 1950s possessed images of intelligence and ability different from those in the pre-war era or after the 1960s. The uniqueness can be summarized into two points. One is that these images were constructed through examination of the teachers themselves on the educability of students, a practice which was different from the 1960s. Another point is that schools filled a major role in measuring intelligence, a phenomenon not observed in the pre-war era. In conclusion, this paper proposes hypotheses on