Re-reading the Salaryman in Japan: Crafting Masculinities

In Japan, the figure of the suited, white-collar office worker or business executive ‘salaryman’ (or, sarariiman), came to be associated with Japan’s economic transformation following World War Two. The ubiquitous salaryman came to signify both Japanese masculinity, and Japanese corporate culture, and in this sense, the salaryman embodied ‘the archetypal citizen’.

This book uses the figure of the salaryman to explore masculinity in Japan by examining the salaryman as a gendered construct. Wh...