ABSTRACT
This essay explains first how women’s history developed in Japan, referencing early research on the topic. Then, it will discuss the arguments about the shift from women’s history to gender history, the necessity of which has been loudly insisted on since the middle of the 1990s. Third, it will explain the organizational development as observed in the establishment of the Gender History Association of Japan in which I myself participated and served as the second president from 2008 to 2010. The fourth point considered in the essay is the realignment of the Science Council of Japan to include more women and the resultant efforts on the part of practitioners of women’s/gender history to change history textbooks for high school students to accommodate gendered viewpoints. Finally, the essay will discuss the task of gendering contact zones, colonialism and empire with particular attention to the issue of ‘comfort women’.
