Gender Roles of Women in Japanese TV Advertising in 2001-2019: Critical Discourse Analysis

Abstract

The article examines the gender roles of women constructed through both verbal and visual text in the Japanese television advertising before and after Shinzo Abe’s Administration. It also examines whether the advertising represented the gender roles of women in the same direction as “Womenomics”, the government policy on the roles of the Japanese women in the present day, or not. It was found that before Abe Administration the text consists of 1) the discourse about working husbands and housewives, 2) the discourse about relationships between women and people around her, and 3) the discourse about that women are in the bottom of working society. After Abe Administration took the office, the discourses were found as follow: 1) men are professional but women are amateur in the working society, 2) women see her values through men’s eyes, 3) women’s job is child rearing, and 4) Confucius’s influence on the roles of man. These findings support Fairclough’s concept that discourse was hidden secretly in the text and need to be examined systematically. Moreover, the findings reflect that the media presents women’s experience in working society superficially.  On the other hand, the media in Japan reproduces traditional gender role of men and women intensively even in the present that Japanese Government try to enforce women’s workforce participation.