Description
Book SynopsisGabriella Lukács traces how young Japanese women's unpaid labor as bloggers, net idols, girly photographers, online traders, and cell phone novelists was central to the development of Japan's digital economy in the 1990s and 2000s.
Trade Review“Addressing crucial issues for our time, Gabriella Lukács brings an ethnographic perspective to young Japanese women who aspire to lucrative careers in day trading and beyond. Through a writing style filled with warmth and empathy, she portrays how these women often face disappointment in their entrepreneurial endeavors, and analyzes how these women's desires for better careers can sometimes be self-defeating. A deeply insightful and thought-provoking book.” -- Ian Condry, author of * The Soul of Anime: Collaborative Creativity and Japan’s Media Success Story *
“Stunningly powerful,
Invisibility by Design tracks the movement of young Japanese women into the digital economy where, ‘seduced’ into imagining its possibilities for meaningful work, most found instead that they labored too hard for little pay-off or gendered advancement. Indicting the capitalism that drove digital economy's rapid expansion in 2000s Japan by exploiting and invisibilizing women's affective labor, Gabriella Lukács has given us a book that is at once theoretically profound and ethnographically dense, dancing through the stories of women bloggers, net idols, 'girly' photographers, amateur traders, and cell phone novelists. A rich tour de force!” -- Anne Allison, author of * Precarious Japan *
“This book is valuable for what it tells us about how some women, by moving into digital careers, have tried to resist the discrimination and restrictions of Japan’s gendered labor market.... It is also a welcome contribution to our understanding of how capitalism operates in the digital age.” -- Kaye Broadbent * Journal of Japanese Studies *
“Gabriella Lukács’s stunning new book,
Invisibility by Design, examines online spaces that promise opportunities for women in particular.... Although the dynamics described within it focus on Japan, this book will be of interest to scholars working in many fields, including gender studies, labor, and communications.” -- Allison Alexy * Journal of Asian Studies *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments vii
Introduction. Labor and Gender in Japan's Digital Economy 1
1. Disidentifications: Women, Photography, and Everyday Patriarchy 30
2. The Labor of Cute: Net Idols in the Digital Economy 57
3. Career Porn: Blogging and the Good Life 81
4. Working without Sweating: Amateur Traders and the Financialization of Daily Life 106
5. Dreamwork: Cell Phone Novelists, Affective Labor, and Precarity Politics 132
Epilogue. Digital Labor, Labor Precarity, and Basic Income 155
Notes 167
References 207
Index 225
