Sasaki KEIKO (佐々木 啓子)

This article explores the Japanese history of women’s adult
social education after the Second World War and presents
a case study of the women’s classes held in Chofu City. Under the Allied Occupation following the war, the democratisation of Japan was urgent, and developing women’s adult education was indispensable. The newly established Women’s and Minors’ Bureau and the women’s affairs sections of local governments played, as promoters, a pivotal role in enlightening Japanese women and encouraging them to put their own ideas into action. In Chofu City, the women who completed the women’s courses or classes became the leaders of a variety of voluntary grassroots movements and learned skills related to progressive action, life improvement and creative activities. In the 1980s, there was an international trend towards gender equality in society. At long last, the open classes for women turned into adult education classes including males.

In the early Meiji period, many missionaries were sent to Japan by American evangelist groups. These missionaries established mission schools particularly for girls. At these girls’ mission schools, female missionaries conducted education on Christian principles. At the same time, at schools such as Kobe College, they also promoted women’s entrance to higher education and study abroad. Upon returning to Japan from their studies abroad, they became teachers or professors at institutions of higher education. In addition, in the first half of the Meiji Period, when women could not receive formal medical education nor obtain a license to practice medicine, some women studied abroad in the United States or Germany seeking to obtain a Doctor of Medicine (MD) from a foreign university. Further, private hospitals spearheaded studies abroad for the discipline of nursing in order to achieve nursing of the same quality as that of Europe and the United States.
This phenomenon can also be observed in the study-abroad behavior of European and American women from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century.

In the early Meiji period, many missionaries were sent to Japan by American evangelist groups. These missionaries established mission schools particularly for girls. At these girls’ mission schools, female missionaries conducted education on Christian principles. At the same time, at schools such as Kobe College, they also promoted women’s entrance to higher education and study abroad. Upon returning to Japan from their studies abroad, they became teachers or professors at institutions of higher education. In addition, in the first half of the Meiji Period, when women could not receive formal medical education nor obtain a license to practice medicine, some women studied abroad in the United States or Germany seeking to obtain a Doctor of Medicine (MD) from a foreign university. Further, private hospitals spearheaded studies abroad for the discipline of nursing in order to achieve nursing of the same quality as that of Europe and the United States.
This phenomenon can also be observed in the study-abroad behavior of European and American women from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century.

The book, The History of the Ouinkai, was published in 1940 as a coemorativeprojectforthe60thanniversaryoftheTokyoHigher 10Normal School for Women (THNSW). The purpose of this article is to illustrate the type of data collected in the surveys and their findings, to explore some of the activities of the association, and to discuss how the Ouinkai alumni association, in collaboration with THNSW, worked with female teachers nationwide. The paper traces some of 15the multi-norms and multi-roles for female teachers that THNSW promoted and their relation to norms thought to characterise ‘ideal’ Japanese women. The publication of The History of the Ouinkai was a milestone in Japanese women’s education because it demonstrated the Ouinkai’s successes in respect of Japanese educa20tional policy for women as well as the leadership that the Ouinkai provided to female graduate teachers, whom it organised with skill