ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the first two years after departure from high school, andwill be followed by chapters examining specific domains: employment (and unemployment), relationships and friendships, marriage and divorce. I decided to study this period separately since it was in many ways distinct; the young adults were shocked by the sudden change from the protective environment of high school, where teachers softened the harsh realities of the outside world and where the students shared a relatively homogeneous working-class family background (Okano 1993). The young women began by comparing their new encounters in the wider world with the familiar world of school, but this point of comparison gradually receded over the two years. This chapter asks the following questions. How did 18-20 year olds make sense of their departure from 12 years of schooling and entry into the adult world? How did they learn to see themselves in this process in terms of class, gender and ethnicity? Six months prior to graduation, when each student’s job was finalised, they
had mixed feelings. There was a sense of relief to know where they were going, but this was accompanied by a feeling of anxiety. Many wanted to stay at school longer, preferring the life they had as students. They saw that being a student meant a carefree existence with minimal responsibility. At the end of their second year out of school, 17.3 per cent of Imai Tech
High School graduates who entered employment and 9 per cent of those from Sasaki High had resigned from their first jobs. Their teachers stated that these figures were comparable with those of preceding years. Nationwide, 35 per cent of 1990 high school graduates who entered the workforce had left their first jobs by the end of their second year of employment, and this figure remained stable in the 1990s (Yajima and Mimizuka 2001: 107). Of the 21 women in the study, five had already resigned from their first jobs. Three were married, one with a one-year-old child. At the time all but two of the unmarried women lived with their parents and families.
