ABSTRACT
Their children may not acquire a high level of Japanese or become integrated into the Japanese education system (and hence society) either, despite living long-term in Japan (Chiavacci 2008). Although the Ministry of Education and local boards of education began to provide special Japanese second language assistance for the children of foreign workers (nikkeijin and others) from the early 1990s in form of guidebooks, workshops, assistant instructors, and extra language classes (Tsuneyoshi 2004; MEXT 2008), the provision that does exist is often inadequate (see e.g. Himeno’s 2004 study of junior and senior high schools in Kanagawa Prefecture). The fact that up to 75 percent of nikkeijin school children do not attend high school, compared to the 99 percent of Japanese school children who do (Chiavacci 2008), indicates that there is still a long way to go. One problematic aspect of such provision is highlighted by Tsuneyoshi. She found in her study of schools in Kawasaki that the newcomers (children of foreign, mainly South American, immigrant workers) were placed in the same withdrawal classes for Japanese and other subjects as a very different category of children, the returnees (kikokushijo – children of employees returning from being transferred abroad for a few years), in spite of their very different linguistic, socioeconomic and family backgrounds, and their very different needs (Tsuneyoshi 2004: 72-3; Kanno 2004; Maher and Nakayama 2003). This lack of differentiation reflects the simplistic dichotomy between Japanese and “other” described by McVeigh (2002) and fits the idealized image of Japanese language and society as being homogenous rather than the more complex reality that has always existed. The numbers of these children are significant: around 10,000 children of elementary, junior high and senior high school age returned from overseas stays of a year or longer in 2006, and approximately 73,000 foreign children were enrolled in Japanese public schools in 2007, about 25,000 of whom needed Japanese language instruction (MEXT 2008: 59, see also Himeno 2004). Both categories of children may resort to private provision if appropriate provision is not available within the public system. Returnees have brought influences from other languages and attitudes from their experiences living in other countries that affect their own language use and may have wider impact in the longer term. It has been suggested, for example, that returnees who become television newscasters are a source of changes in word accents and stress patterns (Carroll 2001: 86). Honorific language (keigo) usage is another key area. A recent article in the Japan Times highlighted the problems faced by returnees:
Envied for their ability to speak in a foreign language, kikokushijo often encounter problems in the workplace due to their shaky command of keigo. Even national icons like singer Utada Hikaru (born 1983 in New York and also raised there) have been criticized as “arrogant” and “childish” for not speaking keigo to older people. While many kikokushijo are fully functional in keigo, some find it so cumbersome that they mainly use English despite knowing both languages.
