[Anthropgrad] Pre-Field Seminar by Jamie Coates on FRIDAY, 31 Oct 08

[Sin Wen Lau]

Anthropology Friday Seminar Series, Semester 2, 2008
Milgate Room, AD Hope
Friday, 31 October 2008, 3 pm

'Being-with Others: Chinese Student-Worker Migrants in Tokyo, Japan'
Pre-Field Seminar by JAMIE COATES, PhD Candidate, Department of 
Anthropology, RSPAS

Over the past 25 years a wave of mainland Chinese students have flocked 
to other countries for study and work. Japan, as seen as a 
linguistically and geographically proximal neighbour, has been a popular 
destination for this new wave. However, Japan is also a difficult 
location for Chinese students, due to the unique historical, cultural 
and economic tensions found in the relationships between the two 
countries. One result of this are the paradoxical positions Chinese 
students’ find themselves in. In Japan they are often seen as both 
“desirable” foreign students and “undesirable” illegal workers, whilst 
in China they fit well with recent discourses surrounding the 
cultivation of “cosmopatriot” citizens. Such pressures shape the 
experiences of Chinese student-workers and influence their global and 
local imaginaries. Found within their intersubjective narratives, 
memories and hopes for the future, such imaginaries provide a unique 
example of how people negotiate a sense of their life projects in 
complex, and at times hostile social environments. I am interested in 
the inter-subjective aspects of being a foreigner in Japan from the 
perspective of Chinese student-workers. In this paper, I will present 
some initial research findings, hypotheses, and propose research 
questions for long term fieldwork to be undertaken in early 2009.
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Lau Sin Wen
Department of Anthropology
Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies
The Australian National University
Canberra ACT0200
Australia

Telephone : +61-2-6125-3271
Fax	 : +61-2-6125-4896
Email	 : sinwen.lau at anu.edu.au
Website	 : http://rspas.anu.edu.au/anthropology
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