ABSTRACT
Gender cannot be overlooked in any discussion of selfhood. As anthropological and other research has repeatedly shown, gender categories and identity exercise a deep and often determining influence on role, status, language, and behaviour; and this process begins from the very earliest age. Gender has certainly been of great social and cultural significance in Japan during the 150 years since the country opened its doors to the Western world, with changes or threats to dominant gender statuses, roles and identities often leading to debate and controversy. Education has perennially been one of the central means used to try to reshape or maintain such gender identities, and it is therefore important to examine the ways in which Japanese children learn to become gendered selves within the school environment.
