The Development of Vocational Education for Women and the Emergence of “Working Women” in Interwar Japan

Abstract

Research on prewar Japanese technical education is an area where education history and business/economic history have interacted considerably in the twentieth century. The key historical findings that have emerged, however, are distinctly “his”-tory—centered overwhelmingly on men. This paper, drawing inspiration from gender-aware research in business and economic history, attempts to examine both the rapid expansion of vocational education for women in the prewar period (1920s–1930s) and the emergence of new service-sector occupations for women, referred to at the time as “working women.” In aiming to bridge these two developments, the paper offers a foundation for future studies of the relationship between high-speed growth in vocational education for women and the diversification of female clerical employment in company settings during the period.