Comparative study on Japanese and Chinese women and their living environments -Comparative study conducted in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in China, and Japan-

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in China lies just halfway between Europe and Japan. We aimed to conduct investigations on the actual conditions of Uygur women and their lives. Because the population of Uygur people is the largest among the forty-seven minor ethnic groups in the region. In conducting investigations, we were divided into groups according to each one's specialty, such as families, gender, clothing, dietary culture and living environments, and we decided to compare a city and its surrounding area (a rural community), tradition and changes, and South Xinjiang and North Xinjiang. In order to comprehend the situation of the region, we invited the cooperation of researchers in the Center for Research on Women at Xinjiang University as our counterparts.In 2000, we visited Urumchi and Turfan, and investigated the roles of the female staff of educational organizations, differences in the lives among typical ethnic groups, the labor of women who engaged in traditional industries, their tasks at home. In 2001, we visited Kashgar and Hotan, recorded the conditions of deeply religious lives connected with Islamic culture, and conducted a study on them. In 2002, in order to compare lives in South Xinjiang and North Xinjiang, we visited Yining, adjacent to Russia (the former Soviet Union) and investigated mostly farmers' lives. As a result, we witnessed remarkable affluence due to trade with Russia and other regions, and westernized freedom for various aspects, of then-lives, such as their home interiors and preferences for doming, unlike South Xinjiang. As the results of our comparison between the city and its surrounding area, and South Xinjiang and North Xinjiang, it was learned that close family relations common among Uygur people continued, but religious characteristics changed drastically in some regions. There were also problems, such as difficulty in the coexistence of international aspects with ethnical aspects.