Table of Contents

Acknowledgements 
Note on Japanese Names 
1. Introduction: Recasting Women in the U.S. Occupation of Japan 
2. Feminism, Nationalisn, and Colonial Genealogies: Women's Enfranchisement and Constitutional Revision 
3. Feminism, Domestic Containment, and Cold War Citizenry 
4. Women, the Cold War, and the Question of Resistance 
5. Making the Body Respectable: Cold War Containment and Regulation of Sexuality 
6. Conclusion 
Notes 
Bibliography 
Index

Promotional Information

A new look at democratization, women's rights, and the Cold War in Post- WWII US-Occupied Japan

About the Author

Mire Koikari is an Associate Professor and Director of the Women’s Studies Program at the University of Hawai`i at Manoa.

Reviews

"Just when one thought the occupation of Japan had been thoroughly covered, along comes this excellent study... Koikari presents her evidence with verve and flair, clarity and even drama (the chapter on Beate Sirota Gordon is remarkable, fascinating and spellbinding). She handles the full complexity of heir analyses with outstanding research presented in accessible prose... Highly recommended." CHOICE "Focusing on the intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality, Koikari reexamines and, she asserts, rewrites postwar occupation studies, Cold War cultural studies, and feminist colonial and postcolonial studies. She argues convincingly that Japanese women were a central concern for U.S. And Japanese occupation policy makers, for Japanese and American feminists, and for Japanese leftists... Koikari debunks various myths about the 'masculinized and virile' American emancipation of 'victimized and passive' Japanese women, as she restores subjectivity to several populations in Japan: middle-class feminists, union organizers and Communist activists, and working women and occupation-era prostitutes." The Journal of American History "Koikari shows persuasively that hierarchies and differences among women and men, and the bridges built over these differences, shaped the occupation of America's cold war status." -Contemporary Sociology March 2010 "[Koikari] draws on recent studies of the Cold War and on postcolonial and feminist theoretical perspective, and thus is able to paint a complex picture of the gendered, classed, racialized, and sexualized dynamics of the occupation... Thanks to such studies as Koikari's we are able to discover a more complex picture of the Allied occupation of Japan, and there is now the potential to link this specific period of Asia-Pacific history with other colonial situations and sites of military occupation." - American Historical Review