The Historical Consumer Consumption and Everyday Life in Japan, 1850-2000

This book explores the rise of consumerism and the expanding variety of goods available in Japan. Japan is placed within the comparative context of the 'consumer revolution' in Europe and North America, contributing to the analysis of the ways in which consumption and everyday life change in the course of economic development.

Introduction: Japan's Consumption History in Comparative Perspective; J. Hunter & P. Francks PART I: GENDER, THE HOUSEHOLD AND CONSUMPTION The Role of Housework in Everyday Life: Another Aspect of Consumption in Modern Japan; M. Tanimoto Like Bamboo Shoots after the Rain: the Growth of a Nation of Dressmakers and Consumers; A. Gordon Building up Steam as Consumers: Women, Rice-cookers and the Consumption of Everyday Household Goods in Japan; H. Macnaughtan PART II: TRADITION, MODERNITY AND THE GROWTH OF CONSUMPTION Japanese Modernisation and the Changing Everyday Life of the Consumer: Evidence from Household Accounts; S. Nakanishi & T. Futaya Sweetness and Empire: Sugar Consumption in Imperial Japan; B. Kushner Kimono Fashion: the Consumer and the Growth of the Textile Industry in Pre-war Japan; P. Francks Reviving Tradition: Patients and the Shaping of Japan's Traditional Medicines Industry; M. Umemura PART III: SPACES AND PATHWAYS OF CONSUMPTION Getting on a Train: Railway Passengers and the Growth of Train Travel in Meiji Japan; N. Nakamura People and Post Offices: Consumption of Postal Services in Japan from the Late Nineteenth Century; J. Hunter Mail-order Retailing in Pre-war Japan: a Pathway to Consumption Before the Mass Market; I. Mitsuzono From Corporate Playground to Family Resort: Golf as Commodity in Post-war Japan; A. Lockyer Conclusion: History and the Consumer: an Historian of the West Looks to Japan; B. Lemire

PENELOPE FRANCKS Honorary Lecturer in Japanese Studies, University of Leeds; Research Associate, SOAS, London, UK TOMOKO FUTYAMA JSPS Fellow ANDREW GORDON Lee and Juliet Folger Fund Professor of History, Department of History, Harvard University, USA JANET HUNTER Saji Professor of Economic History, London School of Economics, UK BARAK KUSHNER Lecturer in Modern Japanese History, Faculty of Middle Eastern and Asian Studies, University of Cambridge, UK BEVERLY LEMIRE Professor & Henry Marshall Tory Chair, Department of History & Classics and Department of Human Ecology, University of Alberta, Canada ANGUS LOCKYER Lecturer in the History of Japan, Department of History, SOAS, London, UK HELEN MACNAUGHTAN Lecturer in International Business & Management (Japan), Department of Financial & Management Studies, SOAS, London, UK ISAMU MITSUZONO JSPS Fellow, Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology, University of Tokyo, Japan NAOFUMI NAKAMURA Associate Professor of Business History, Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo, Japan SATORU NAKANISHI Professor, Graduate School of Economics, Nagoya University, Japan MASAYUKI TANIMOTO Professor of Economic History, Graduate School of Economics, University of Tokyo, Japan MAKI UMEMURA Sasakawa Lecturer in Japanese Studies, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, UK