An excerpt from “Enabled by the Internet: A Multicultural Mother and Daughter in Japan” by Suzanne Kamata
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After my daughter graduated from high school, she decided that she would like to try living in a supported environment in Kyoto. Although the historic city is about two hours by car from our home, I wanted to encourage her desire for independence. After all, I had traveled halfway around the world from the United States to make my home in Japan. So, although some people in Japan have wondered why we, her parents, allow her to live so far away, her father and I are excited that she has the opportunity to develop further independence.
She has now lived in Kyoto for three years. We continue to keep in touch and communicate via the LINE app, and through video chats in JSL. On her own, using the internet, she has successfully located someone to fix a punctured wheelchair tire, searched for recipes, found a maker of kimonos adapted to wheelchair users, and researched tourist sites and events. She also keeps up with current events via her smartphone.
In the summer of 2019, she was shocked and saddened by the deadly fire set by an arsonist at the venerated Kyoto Anime Studio. We had seen one of their productions at the movie theater together – Koe no Katachi (A Silent Voice), a story about a relationship between a deaf girl and a bullied hearing boy. My daughter expressed her desire to pay her respects to the dead anime creators and lay flowers at the shrine which had been erected temporarily near the site of the fire. She investigated the details via her smartphone, and we took the train to the site.
When we arrived on that very hot summer day, several reporters from various Japanese newspapers were on the beat. They were expected to file stories related to the tragic fire daily. There were few other visitors, and we were no doubt conspicuous – a foreign mother, and a young biracial woman in a wheelchair. They were eager to interview us. Although in the past, I had often written about my daughter (and am doing so here), I know that she is capable of sharing her thoughts on her own. As she was twenty years old, and therefore a legal adult in Japan, I encouraged her to speak to the reporters, with an understanding that her words would appear in the newspaper. Using their respective smartphones, one of the reporters interviewed my daughter. She managed to convey both her sadness, and the empowerment of seeing a young deaf woman represented in a popular anime movie. I was proud of her, knowing that other young deaf Japanese women living in another era, without the internet, may have gone unheard. However, thanks to modern technology, she has been able to exercise her independence and connect with the world.
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from the book Parenting/Internet/Kids: Domesticating Technologies edited by Fiona Joy Greene and Jaqueline McLeod Rogers (Demeter Press, 2022)
For Suzanne on the novella, Ichigensan, see here. For her piece on ‘The Baby Shower’, click here.
American Suzanne Kamata has lived in Tokushima Prefecture for over 30 years. She is the award-winning author or editor of 15 books, including, most recently, the novel THE BASEBALL WIDOW (Wyatt-Mackenzie Publishing, 2021) and the story-in-verse WAITING (Kelsay Books, 2022). She is an associate professor at Naruto University of Education. Her homepage can be accessed here.
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