Redirecting Social Change: Intersections of Multiculturalism and Sexual Diversity in Contemporary Japan

Post-World-War-Two Japan has experienced various waves of social change that challenged previous notions of Japanese homogeneity in aspects of culture, race and ethnicity. A dominant majority group with a coercive "Japanese identity" has been rejected through different approaches, revealing a more complex reality of contemporary Japan. Japanese society today is portrayed as diverse, heterogeneous, and multicultural. Multiculturalism not only recognizes plural minority groups by incorporating their sociocultural experiences into a common historical narrative of Japan, it also reveals internal diversity among these groups, thus complicating concepts such as majority and minority, "Self" and "Other," and "Inside" and "Outside." Another form of social change that portrays contemporary Japan as diverse is the one that is centered on sexuality. Today, sexual diversity in Japan questions the "normative" and the "non-normative," and exposes sexual identities that transcend gender and sexuality. This thesis is concerned with the general assumption that multiculturalism and sexual diversity in Japan are mutually exclusive categories. In other words, multiculturalism in Japan is still heterocentric and sexual diversity is still dictated by the ethnocentricity and monoculturalism of Japanese homogeneity. This thesis therefore analyzes the intersections of multiculturalism and sexual diversity in Japan, and discusses the perspectives and experiences of non-normative Japanese with non-normative sexual identities. Understanding such complex identities (e.g. queer Buraku outcastes or queer ethnic Koreans) facilitates an understanding of the matrix of domination, power and privilege that controls everyone in society. Various examples of initiatives and organizations introduced through this thesis illustrate how some activists are beginning to relate intersectional identities, multi- and transcultural interactions to the holistic change in Japanese society. New waves of social change are redirecting the course of change and redefining the diverse image of contemporary Japan.