The topic I was asked to present was gender inequality in the labor market in Japan. At the time I posted several new articles on these topics so the organizer may have thought this is my expertise. I would say I'm not the best person to give a talk on this, since my interests are more on consequences of gender inequality from a demographic perspective. But I do follow these gender literature as a background of my research, so I decided to present an intro of gender inequality in Japan in the first half and my own research in the second half. Also the audience of this lecture consists of both UTokyo undergrads and the alumni, so I also decided to have a small discussion session to share their thoughts on causes of persistent gender inequality in Japan.
It seems my talk went well. It was difficult to set the target of audience to be honest. Undergrads do not have much work experience and they may hesitate to share their ideas in front of the alumni, while for the alumni, especially women, what I was going to talk about may seem too basic. Both were somewhat true. 学部生は実感がないのか少し静かだった印象を持ちました。
I provided an overview of gender inequality in Japan in the first half, with a bunch of new articles reporting sexism at Todai or elsewhere to stimulate attendees' attention to this topic. The approach actually worked well, I guess. When I presented several news articles that documented gender inequality has been persistent even at Todai, some older alumni said it has been improved (そうはいっても改善してるよ、昔の理一は女性1人だったから), but other young folks did not agree with that. I think both perspectives are correct in some sense - it is a sort of the glass is half full or half empty. The purpose of the talk was to make different ideas explicit there and exchange those ideas with each other. After the small group discussion, in the second half I introduced my own research like later and less marriage, educational gradients in marriage, and spouse pairing patterns. Although I expected it before the talk, the audience shared what they discussed a bit too much. それは議論が盛り上がったことを示唆しているので、よかったと思います。後半はやや時間が足りませんでしたが I skipped a few slides and finished the talk on time.
Maybe my talk was too much related to their daily life, but I really appreciate many attendees' sharing their honest, based on their experience, thoughts. 私自身学ぶところも多く、こういった点をもっと強調すべきだったとか、こういう研究が求められてるんじゃないかとか、あとは些細なプレゼンの仕方から、非アカデミア向けのトークからも得るものは多いと思いました。The second point may be more critical in the future - I've been thinking about how to make my research contribute to the public, in a broader sense.
わずか7時間ばかりのニューヨーク滞在でしたが、思いもよらぬ人との出会いもあり、良いリフレッシュになりました。月1くらいの頻度で人と会ったり買い物するのがいいかもしれません。今の自分には、都会の喧騒は毎日だとtoo muchです。プリンストンは静かでいいところです。マリファナ臭くないし。
来てくださった皆さんありがとうございました。
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