‘Japanese culture’: An overview

Summary

An unacknowledged paradigm shift appears to be underway in contemporary Japanese culture, with public discourse suddenly focusing upon internal divisions and variations in the population. At the beginning of the 21st century, the nation has observed a dramatic shift in its characterisation from a unique and homogeneous society to one of domestic diversity, class differentiation and other multidimensional forms. The view that Japan is a monocultural society with little internal cultural divergence and stratification, which was once taken for granted, is now losing monopoly over the way Japanese culture is portrayed. This transformation has resulted not so much from intellectual criticisms levelled at the once dominant model as from public perceptions of structural changes that have been in progress since the late 20th century. Part of the perceptual shift results from the accumulation of observations that point to the notion that Japan is a multi-ethnic society, comprising a considerable range of ethnic groups. Ethnic diversity has rapidly expanded and formed a seemingly irreversible trend, with the influx of an increasing number of foreign migrants into Japanese society.