Buraku Red Hair

Introduction

In 1976, Nakagami Kenji won the prestigious Akutagawa Prize for literature for his text, The Cape, in which he considers these themes of alienation within the gendered outcastes in Japanese buraku society. The author’s narratives delve into taboo territories of violence, social discrimination, and human sexuality. Nakagami’s legacy as a child of the buraku community in Shinguu enables his exploration of abjection and exclusion in his works, particularly in Red Hair.

In Red Hair, young bachelor Kōzō enters a sexual relationship with an unnamed woman. The two characters remain in Kōzō’s apartment for the majority of the novella and unconsciously immerse themselves – and their relationship – in buraku-min social habits. Nakagami

This group represents around 3% of the total Japanese population. The word buraku basically means “small village,” or hamlet, and due to the characterization of this relatively small communal group. The “min” suffix at the end of the word means “the governed,” or “the controlled,” which in contemporary Japan still defines the immobility of this social order. The definition of buraku originated in the post-Meiji period (1868 – 1912), a time construed by the emergence of hierarchal societies. This separation of social class implies that the buraku-min hold a marginalized position within Japanese society, and will continue to do so for generations to

However, there is one mostly agreed upon theory as to how this community came into fruition. The buraku were initially made up those immigrating to Japan; these isolated immigrants include the Koreans, the Chinese, the native Ainu, and the Okinawans. Other members of the burau-min included prostitutes, artists, ex-convicts and street cleaners. The prevalence of ethnocentrism in the nation instilled a sense of racism against this group, due to claims that they were non-Japanese individuals and therefore could never insert themselves in Japanese