著者

小山 静子

出版者

実践女子大学

雑誌

実践女子大学下田歌子記念女性総合研究所 年報 = The Annual Bulletin of the Shimoda Utako Research Institute for Woman (ISSN:24342718)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.7, pp.(71)-(86), 2021-03-15

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Shimoda Utako (1854–1936), a renowned female educator, was severely criticized in the socialist daily newspaper The Heimin Shinbun in 1907. The newspaper insulted her and printed as many as 41 serial articles between February 24th and April 13th where she was referred to as “the vamp.” This paper examines the logic and background of the Shimoda-bashing in relation to contemporary insults directed at female students, and considers their historical meaning. The results are the following. First, Shimoda, along with female students, was sexualized, and baselessly slandered in the media as being sexually “corrupt.” Second, both Shimoda and female students were perceived as threats to the conventional gender order, who challenged the traditional idea of femininity, since Shimoda was active in a male-dominated area and female students were considered to be getting secondary education that was supposed to belong to men. Third, Shimoda, in particular, was seen as an “enemy of the working class” by socialists in the context of class conflict. The relentless personal attacks on Shimoda were based on a two-fold antipathy toward her, induced by class politics as well as gender politics.