Male Dominance In Anne Allison's Research

Male dominance is formally defined as, “A constellation of behaviors and attitudes that grant men access to role of prestige and reward and deny the same to women” (Bonvillain, 2013, p. 257). This issue of male dominance is depicted in multiple ways within Anne Allison’s ethnography. First, she demonstrates the concept’s prevalence by describing the reactions she received when the men within the club heard of her work as an anthropologist. They thought it was silly of an anthropologist to be doing research on the hostess club because they didn’t see it as part of their culture (Allison, 1994). The fact that Japanese men felt the work of the hostess clubs was insignificant to the culture of Japan demonstrates the way they think about woman as their subordinate. The insignificance of women because of

Allison argues that with this highly materialistic form of entertainment, companies are purchasing fiction of masculine privilege and superiority which helps the employees to overlook the price they are paying as a result of the demands of work, such as the loss of intimate personal relations and the loss of identity outside of work. As a result, this nightlife entertainment produces an image in the mind of the sarariiman as "a male who is tough, in control and entitled to have his pleasures and desires satisfied by a woman who is not his wife" (Allison, 1994, p. 190). This formulated image demonstrates the inequality of men and women due to the fact that women are to be portrayed as servicing the men, whether it is at home or in the hostess club.

In Japanese culture, socialization of male dominance begins at the early age when children begin to learn how to read. Anne Allison describes a commonly read children’s book that depicts how a “normal” Japanese family operates in everyday life according to the culture of the society. “The