Over the last few decades, symbolic meanings, knowledge of subsistence, and social orders of Japanese rural space have been the subject of controversy in human geography, folklore studies, cultural anthropology, and rural sociology. In human geography, a text analogy approach was introduced to elucidate the spatial system of these semiotic topics. The characteristics of rural space as text, however, have not been sufficiently examined either theoretically or empirically. This review article, based on a re-examination of the problems encountered in previous studies on Japanese rural space and society, synthesizes the various interdisciplinary traditions in order to gain a new perspective on rural space as text.
The four key points of the text analogy approach can be identified as follows. The first is the semantic unit of space and its actors: the functions and range of the rural community or 'basic region', the spatial relations among various cooperative groups within the community, regional integration of communities, and boundaries of the village territory. The second is classificatory and the deep structure within space: folk categories or taxonomies, symbolic and social systems of 'place', and semiotic structure of the total space. The third is the socio-spatial dialectic of the village: relations between spatial structures as well as material resources, such as irrigation, common forests and plains, or fishing grounds, and social structure of the community. The fourth is the diversity of spatial cognition based on social attributes of the village people: people's perceptions and activities in the subsistence space, knowledge of small names over the total space, and social representations of the village.
The concluding remarks given in the review on the above four points can be summarized as follows. First, we need to introduce a socio-spatial system perspective which consists of the following four elements: spatial structure and material conditions of the rural settlement, its internal social structure, multi-scales of folk classifications from cultivated strips to the total settlement space, and lastly multi-levels of spatial cognition from subsistence knowledge to social identities of the village people. Second, rural space as text should also be examined through an analysis of the intertwined economic, political, social, and cultural factors of change in the interacting scales between a micro-village and the global society.

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歴史学と地理学は互いに異なってはいるが, しかし相互に補い合う世界の見方を提示してくれるものである。歴史地理学は, これまで歴史学と地理学が結び合うことによって産み出された私生児として否定的に考えられてきたが, 私は歴史学と地理学との親密なる関係が, ひとつの全く嫡出として認めうる健全な混血児を結果として産み出して来たということ, そして, こうした混血の持つ真の強さは, 過去の地理学に対する多様で, しかも首尾一貫した様々の分析方法にあるということを, より積極的に論じたいと思う。過去の地理学の範囲には, 分布と伝播の歴史地理学, 歴史環境地理学, 歴史的景観地理学そして歴史地誌などを含めることができよう。こうした分野が歴史地理学という家族の主要な成員を構成することになるが, しかし, そのいくつかのものは, 別の時代に, あるいは別の場所では異なった名前を与えられてきた。そのために各々の (異なった) 子孫を残してきたように思える。本編は, この地理学と歴史学という拡大家族の中で, 地理歴史学と地理的歴史学の役割を考察しようとするものである。

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The main purpose of this study is to identify the spatial patterns of commuting flows in the Tokyo metropolitan area. Using census data classified by industry and occupation, the author examined these patterns from 1975 to 1995. Recent studies have demonstrated that the spatial structure of the Tokyo metropolitan area is divided into several sectoral zones. For example, Chiyoda ward has been regarded as the center of Tokyo in name and in reality. However, the volume of commuting inflow to the newly-developed city centers such as Shinjuku ward has rapidly increased over the past 20 years. As a result, Chiyoda ward has come to be just' one of the centers' of Tokyo. In this way, the mono-centric structure of the centers of Tokyo has been transformed into a multi-nucleation one.
First, the author examined commuting patterns of each of these 11 wards, calculating "an index of daily migration for work (DMW)". In this paper, the author calculated this index for each industry and occupation. Comparing the distributional patterns of the largest DMW classified by industry with those by occupation, concentric patterns were shown in some wards from the former result, and sectoral patterns in almost all of the 11 wards from the latter. Professional and technical workers who lived in the northeast zone of the Tokyo metropolitan area commuted more to Minato, Shinjuku and Shibuya wards, and managers and officials who lived in the southwest zone commuted more to Chuo, Taito and Sumida wards. In this way, professional and technical workers, and managers and officials who live in outer suburbs commute less to an adjacent core. On the other hand, sales workers and service workers who live in the inner suburbs commute more to an adjacent core. For example, sales workers who lived in the northeast zone commuted more to Chuo and Taito wards, and service workers who lived in the southwest zone commuted more to Shibuya and Toshima wards.
Second, using cluster analysis, the author classified the 11 wards into several groups in 1975 and 1995. For that purpose, the author calculated a location quotient for six major industrialand occupational groups in each ward. As a result, the wards were classified into five clusters in 1995. Comparing the results of this analysis in 1995 to that for 1975, the former result corresponded to the group of commuting patterns classified by occupation.
In conclusion, the author subdivided the Tokyo metropolitan area into six commuting zones. Each zone includes one of multiple urban cores. A commuting zone of workers living in the same area varies depending on the occupation. For example, the commuting zone of professional and technical workers commuting from Saitama Prefecture to Tokyo was different from that of sales workers. These results showed that the traditional spatial subdivision of Tokyo termed "Shitamachi and Yamanote" has become less clear-cut and more complex.

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The purpose of this paper is to elucidate the annual and daily activity of round haul net fishing fleets. The results of the research in the Shimanoura area of Nobeoka City, Miyazaki Prefecture, are described below.
The fishing industry in the Shimanoura area has flourished as a result of increase in the sardine catch through the introduction of the stick-held dip net during the mid Edo Period and the introduction of the round haul net in the early Showa Period. In recent years, the percentage of farm-raised yellowtail has increased substantially in monetary terms, and production has peaked through the use of the round haul net. While the pilchard catch has declined, the anchovy catch has increased through the use of the round haul net.
Examination of the seasonal changes in fishing grounds in recent years shows fishing operations being carried out in the waters adjacent to Shimanoura from January through May, the waters off Miyazaki City in June, and the various areas of Hyuganada thereafter, making it difficult to determine a regular pattern. Conditions restricting the activities of fishing fleets include: (1) the capability constraints of the fishing boats; (2) authority constraints, such as administrative arrangements relating to fishable waters and catch weight; (3) coupling constraints, such as the presence of an offshore estuary or strait in the fishing ground, the nearness of the fishing ground, the establishment of a system for obtaining fresh sources of fish and the like and coupling constraints among fishing boats.

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In recent years, a three-stage mono-polar concentration of higher functions into Tokyo, regional capitals and prefectural capitals has been under way in Japan. This trend is considered to have arisen as a result of the changing spatial organization of major enterprises, exemplified by their head/branch office locations. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the national urban system of Japan by focusing on the horizontal and vertical growth of the spatial organization of major enterprises and their temporal changes during the past two decades. A total of 2, 499 listed enterprises is examined here, and the data used were obtained from the Directory of Executives of Major Enterprises (kaisha shokuin roku) and Handbook of Organizations and Establishments (soshikizu jigyosho binran) published by the Diamond Inc.
The findings can be summarized as follows:
First, an analysis of the spatial organization of four enterprise categories based on the number of cities with branch offices reveals that the more branch offices a category has and the larger it is, the greater the concentration of head offices in Tokyo. In this situation, regional capital cities as administrative centers tend to preside over local cities. This suggests that growth of enterprise is generally accompanied by a process of concentration of head office functions into Tokyo, horizontal growth of the branch office network and vertical/hierarchical growth of administrative functions.
Second, the Japanese urban system exhibits a hierarchical structure consisting of three stages: Tokyo as a strategic center, regional capital cities as administrative centers and prefectural capital cities as local business centers. However, a distinction is also observed in the case of regional capital cities; specifically, the system shows signs of differentiation between the higher rank cities of Sendai and Fukuoka and the lower rank cities of Sapporo and Hiroshima. Additionally, the growth of Omiya as a significant center in the northern portion of the Kanto region and the stagnation of Nagoya and Takamatsu are noteworthy. This movement has contributed to the collapse of a clear-cut hierarchical structure and the reorganization of the previously established urban system in the country.
Third, an analysis of temporal changes in the spatial organization of the major enterprises under consideration reveals that, in the 1980s, the prefectural capital cities were chosen as the new locations of branch offices and the regional capital cities experienced an expansion of administrative functions in the form of rank elevation to unify the prefectural capitals. In the recessionary years of the 1990s, however, the closure/withdrawal of branch offices and the absorption of smaller ones into large ones generally increased, suggesting a restructuring of the spatial organization of the enterprises.
In future research, we will proceed to a more detailed study of the Japanese urban system by devoting attention to differences according to industrial sector as well as studying a variety of affiliated enterprises.

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