Recreating feminist studies of religion in Japan

在过去的20年里，日本社会对性别问题的认识发生了很大的变化，这自然也影响了学术界。宗教一直是日本女性主义和性别研究的一个不太频繁的话题。对许多女权主义者来说，宗教是父权制的工具，用来压迫和排斥妇女。不仅在日本，而且在欧洲和美国，宗教领域对性别问题和女权主义的抵制比其他领域更强烈。宗教研究一直是抵制女权主义思想的学科之一。在日本，这种倾向甚至更强烈，宗教学者经常将妇女的宗教生活作为一个主题，但引入女权主义或性别的概念被认为是在研究中暗示特定的政治设计。这被认为是一种不受欢迎的立场，缺乏学术中立性。总之，在日本，女性主义研究一直被认为与宗教研究处于一种尴尬的关系中。女性主义思想可以影响女性的宗教实践，并使其发生变化。近年来，日本的宗教界也受到女性主义的影响，出现了对宗教团体进行改革的运动。我们的立场与那些非西方族裔和种族背景的女权主义宗教学者的立场一致，这些学者近年来一直声称在欧洲和美国的宗教界存在。因此，本研究试图矫正日本学术界宗教研究中普遍存在的男性中心结构和性别盲视

The consciousness toward gender issues has undergone considerable change in Japanese society during the past two decades, and this has naturally influenced scholarship as well. Religion has been a less than frequent topic for Japanese feminist and gender studies. For many feminists, religion is a tool of patriarchy that is used to oppress and exclude women. A similar resistance to gender concerns and feminism was felt more strongly in religion than in other fields, not only in Japan but in Europe and America. The study of religion has been one of those disciplines resistant to feminist thought. This tendency was even stronger in Japan, where, scholars of religion frequently took up women's religious life as a topic, but introducing concepts of feminism or gender was seen as insinuating a particular political design into research. This was viewed as an undesirable stance that lacked scholarly neutrality. In short, feminist studies have been viewed as existing in an awkward relationship with religious studies in Japan.Feminism, however, does not only criticize religion. Feminist thought can influence women's religious practice itself, and transform it. The religious world in Japan has been informed by feminism in recent years, and movements to reform religious organizations are emerging. Our stance is consonant with the stance of those feminist scholars of religion who are of non-Western ethnic and racial backgrounds and who have been claiming a presence in the religious communities of Europe and America in recent years. Thus, our research has attempted to redress the in-built male-centered structure and gender blindness prevalent in the studies of religion in Japanese academy