The Images of Boys and Girls in Modern Japan and Korea

Erika ImadaKyoto University 1. Introduction This report is intended to compare the images of boys and girls in modern-era (prewar) Japan and Korea. In this report, I will use the Japanese terms shonen and shojo to refer to the images of boys and girls, as they have a specific meaning as distinct from simple boy and girl. In pre-modern Japan, there was no such thing as shonen or shojo. As soon as children were able to feed themselves and use the toilet themselves, they entered the world of adults. This meant that there was no period between babyhood and adulthood. It was the modern school educational system that created a period between the two. The Educational System Order () was promulgated in 1872, when primary schools were formed for public education, and education was made compulsory. In other words, everyone in the country started primary education at a set age. This system then created a youth age, a special period during ones life when one was excused from labour. Furthermore, with the 1879 Education Order (), standard middle schools educated males and females separately. Boys were, as a rule, meant to go on to middle schools (), and girls to girls' high schools (). The children in their shonen or shojo youth years, or in other words, the children going to primary and middle schools, were fitted into the categories of shonen and shojo and given different images, by the magazines aimed at gir ls and boys. In 1888 the first boys magazine in Japan, Shonen-en () (Boys Garden, pub. Shonen-en) was published, and it was followed in 1902 by the first girls magazine, Shojo-kai () (Girls World, pub. Kinkodo Shoseki). These magazines spread the images of shonen and shojo (Imada, 2007). So then, how were shonen and shojo periods formed in Korea, and how were the images of boys and girls formed? In Korea, the office of the Resident General of Korea built basic elementary schools () in 1906. And in 1911 the Resident General Headquarter of Chosun created the First Chosun Educational Oridinance ( ) and the Basic Elementary Schools Regulations ( ), which meant that basic elementary schools were seen as primary education schools for public education. However, basic elementary schools were not compulsory education. So that meant that while the school education system was brought over by Japan, it was not the same as it was in Japan. The first boys magazine in Korea, Sonyeon () (Boys, pub. Sinmunkwan), was published in 1908, and in 1927 the first girls magazine, Jangmi ( ) (Rose, pub. Jangmisa) was published. Sonyeon was founded by a Korean who had studied in Japan, Choe Nam-seon (), and printed using a press he had bought in Japan. With this background, Sonyeon has been likened to the Japanese Shonen Sekai 1

( ) (Boys World, pub. Hakubunkan) (Otake, 2008). However, when compared with Japan, there were fewer magazines for girls and boys published in Korea. In this way, while we can say that there were a lot of similar points in the Korean school education system and the girls and boys magazines, there were also differences. Therefore we can imagine that there were major similarities between the images of shonen and shojo in Japan and Korea, but there were also differences. This report is designed to shed some light on the similarities and differences in the images of shonen and shojo in Japan and Korea. The period covered by this report is from 1924 to 1931. In Japan, the urban structure of Tokyo changed after the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake. And magazines for boys and girls also changed a great deal. Furthermore, in Japan, boys magazines changed a great deal again after the Manchurian Incident in 1931, with a lot of articles on the war. So that is why I have selected the period from 1924 to 1931 to look at. In addition, the boys and girls magazines that this report looks at are the following. From Japan, I looked at 99 magazines for boys: Shonen Sekai, Nihon Shonen ( ) (published by Jitsugyo-no-Nihonsha), Shonen Kurabu ( ) (published by Dai-Nippon Yuben-kai Kodansha). For girls, I looked at 242 magazines: Shojo Sekai ( ) (published by Hakubunkan), Shojo-no-Tomo () (published by Jitsugyo-no-Nihonsha), Shojo Gaho () (published by Tokyosha),and Shojo Kurabu ( ) (published by Dai-Nippon Yuben-kai Kodansha). For Korean magazines, since there were few girls and boys' magazines that were continually published over a given number of years, I was only able to research Shin-Sonyeon ( ) (published by Shin-Sonyeonsa). Finally, I would like to talk about how I analyzed the magazines. In this report, I analyze the covers of the magazines for girls and boys. The reason for that is the most dramatic representation of the imagery of boys and girls is shown on the cover. 2. Comparison of Shonen Modern Japan and Korea First, I will compare shonen, or boys, in modern Japan and Korea. Figures 1 and 2 show the frequency of depictions of Western clothing and traditional clothing on the covers of the magazines. When we examine these graphs, we can see that boys magazines in Japan and boys magazines in Korea both showed boys in Western clothing much more so than in traditional clothing. And when we compare boys magazines from both countries, we can say that girls magazines in Japan show girls in traditional outfits more than boys magazines in Japan and Korea. Figure 3 shows the frequency of boys and girls showing their teeth in smiles. According to this graph, Japanese girls magazines often showed girls showing their teeth in smiles on the covers. However, when we compare them, we see that both Japanese and Korean boys magazines seldom depicted boys showing their teeth in smiles on the covers. In other words, according to the results of figures 1, 2, and 3, the shonen on the covers of Japanese and Korean boys magazines were similar. 2

However, there are differences in the shonen imagery presented in both countries. Figures 4, 5, and 6 show the frequency of actions taken by boys and girls. When we look at these graphs, we can see that overall, there were more occasions when girls were shown in inactive play / still poses. However, the boys magazines from Japan and Korea were not using inactive play / still poses, but study / art activities and active play / sports poses. These results show that it was considered more desirable to have shonen (boys), more than shojo (girls), shown doing things like studying, art, or sports. However, there are differences in the depictions of boys in Japan and Korea. Japanese boys were often drawn in war / home-front defence poses, but Korean boys were never shown in these poses. Moreover, Korean boys were shown in labour poses, but Japanese boys were almost never shown in similar poses. When we examine these results, we can see that Japanese boys were expected to work for war, and Korean boys for labour. In addition, Figure 7 shows the frequency of national symbols. National symbols are things like national flags or crests. According to this graph, boys magazines in Japan frequently brought in national symbols in their cover illustrations. However, the cover illustrations for girls magazines in Japan had almost no depictions of national symbols. And boys magazines from Korea did not have even a single depiction of a national symbol. In Japan, by being depicted with national symbols, boys were seen as people who would eventually grow up to shoulder the national destiny. And in order for them to become these people, we can see how they were required to study hard, master high levels of artistic ability, improve their abilities through sports, and contribute to the war. However, in Korea, depicting boys associated with national symbols, and in particular associating them with war, was avoided.

3. Comparison of Shojo Modern Japan and Korea Second, I will compare shojo, or girls, in modern Japan and Korea. However, in this report I have not been able to analyse girls magazines in Korea. The reason for that is because while in Japan multiple publishers produced a wide variety of girls magazines, this was not the case in Korea. In Korea, the only girls magazine we know of published during this time period was Jangmi, or Rose. So what sort of magazines were girls reading? In fact, we can know that both girls and boys were reading boys magazines. The reason for this was that boys magazines in Korea also depicted girls along with boys, and, along with serialized novels for boys, also contained novels for girls. Figures 8 and 9 show the frequency of girls or boys being paired with the same sex and age on the covers and how often they were paired with the opposite sex. According to these, in Japanese magazines for boys and girls, even if people the same age of the same sex were shown, it was very rare to show two the same age but opposite sexes. Yet in Korea this was quite common indeed. In other words, girls were depicted along with boys. This is worth noting as the largest difference between childrens magazines in the two countries. That is, in Korea, we can say that girls were included in the shonen category. In Japan, too, until the category of shojo spread through boys and girls magazines, both boys and girls were included in the category of shonen (Imafa, 2007). For example, in Shimazaki Tosons The Broken Commandment ( ) (Hakai, 1906), there is the phrase shonen (young boys and girls) were now hurrying towards school, with the word shonen applied to both sexes. So why were both girls and boys included in the category of "shonen in Korea? In Korea during this period there was only a tiny percentage girls going to primary and middle schools, or in other words, girls in that period of their lives when they were excused from labour. Therefore there were few readers for girls magazines. In other words, there were not many girls to fit into the category of shojo. The basic elementary school attendance rates for boys in Korea was around 5% in the 1910s, and over 25% in the late 1920s. However, the attendance rates for girls were less than 1% in the 1910s and even the late 1920s were stagnant at a bit over 5% (Kim, 2005). In Japan, the primary school attendance rates for boys in 1911 was 98.8% and 97.5% for girls (Imada, 2007).

4. Anti-School Culture In addition, after the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake, girls magazines in Japan started to carry idealized imagery of artists rather than the previous good wife and wise mother ( ) that the girls higher schools promoted as an ideal. That is to say, the shojo in Japan were an anti-school culture. For example, the editors of Shojo no Tomo were aware that girls who contributed material to that magazines readers' column were called bad girls ( ) by their schools and criticised by those around them (Imada, 2007). Looking at Figure 6, we can see that from 1924, depictions of inactive play / still poses on magazine covers decreased and depictions of study / art activities and active play / sports poses increased. In other words, the image of shojo was changing to doing study, art, and sports. And these images of girls were connected with the image of women as artists. That is, shojo in Japanese girls magazines changed from the image of girls 7

connected with the good wife and wise mother image of women to one connected with the artist image of women. However, the shojo on the cover of Shin-Sonyeon were not images of girls studying, playing sports, or being artists. The ideal image of women in basic elementary schools was, in Korea, that of the good wife and wise mother (). The Korean good wife and wise mother image of women emphasized the roles of the wife and the mother, which was the same as in Japan. In particular, from 1925, criticism of images of women as new women (), designed to help liberate them, arose in female education theory, and the image of the good wife and wise mother started to be glorified (Kim, 2005). In other words, the shojo in Koreas Shin-Sonyeon were not in contrast to the image of good wife and wise mother of the basic elementary schools. 5. Conclusion In this report, I have looked what sort of images of shonen were depicted on the covers of boys magazines in Japan, what images of shojo" were depicted on the covers of girls magazines in Japan, and what images of shonen and shojo were depicted on the covers of boys magazines in Korea. First, we have seen that there were some common areas in shonen in both Japan and Korea. The shonen of both countries were dressed in Western clothing rather than traditional clothing, and were depicted studying, playing sports, and creating art. However, Japanese shonen were also additionally depicted as taking part in wars. The Japanese boys magazines also desired boys who would grow up to be good nations. Second, the depictions of shonen and shojo in Japan were done separately, but in Korea, girls and boys were both included under shonen. In other words, shojo in Korea did not yet have a clear image. And in Japan, shojo were, from 1924, depicted in associations with the image of women as artists rather than the good wife and wise mother ideal that the girls higher schools promoted. That is to say, the shojo in Japan were an anti-school culture. However, the shojo in Korea were depicted associated with the good wife and wise mother that the Korean basic elementary schools promoted. Therefore, the Korean shojo was not an anti-school culture. Works cited IMADA Erika, A Social History of the Shojo (Shojo no shakai-shi), Keiso Shobo, 2007 KIM Puja, Education and Gender in Colonial Korea: Authority relationships dealing with school attendance or non-attendance (Shokuminchi-ki Chosen no kyouiku to jendaa: Shuugaku wo meguru kenryoku kankei) Seori-shobo, 2005 OTAKE Kiyomi, Colonial Korea and Childrens Culture: A study of childrens culture in modern Japan and Korea and literary relationship history (Shokuminchi Chosen to jidou bunka: Kindai Nikkan jidou bunka / bungaku kankei-shi) Shakai Hyoron-sha, 2008.