The Masculine and the Feminine in Japanese Women: Expressions in Sandplay and Myth

Abstract

Since Hayao Kawai (1976), the first Jungian analyst in Japan, asserted that Japanese society still contains many residuals of matriarchy, most Japanese Jungians have discussed the Japanese psyche in this way. Indeed, Shintoism, Japan’s original religion, has a goddess named Amaterasu no Oho kami (Heaven-Shining-Great-August-Deity) as its main deity. However, does this mean that Japanese society is matriarchal? For the past three decades, many feminists’ works in Japan have offered considerable proof that Japanese modern society is very patriarchal (Ueno, 1994). Although I have identified myself as a Jungian-oriented psychotherapist, I have started to be suspicious of Kawai’s idea, as my clinical practice and research into eating disorders have led me to be interested in relationships between women’s psyches and their social contexts. Consequently, I come to this topic as both a Jungian and a feminist. In previous works (Nakamura, 2005, 2006, 2010), I have dealt with difficulties of individuation of women, linking those difficulties to their positioning in a patriarchal society characterized by Eastern Asian traditions. I have focused on the social status and spiritual backgrounds of Japanese women. The purpose of this chapter is to explore how archetypal images of both masculinity and femininity have been expressed in a patriarchal society, and how they function in women’s psyches in contemporary Japan.