In Search of Futures in Fukushima: An Anthropological Study on Coastal Fishing Families

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 17K13590
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Cultural anthropology
• Research Institution: Hosei University
• Principal Investigator: Takahashi Satsuki 法政大学, 人間環境学部, 教授 (50791084)
• Project Period (FY): 2017-04-01 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: 文化人類学 / 災害 / 環境 / 漁業 / 日本 / 未来

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Through conducting ethnographic fieldwork for multiple times in Ibaraki and Fukushima Prefectures, I was able to grasp various forms of the future, which coastal fishing families imagined and searched for, as they muddled through in the aftermaths of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident. In addition, through engaging with existing anthropological literature, I was also able to advance my theoretical understanding on how the future, environment, and disasters are entangled in the time of the Anthropocene.

Free Research Field

文化人類学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究は、今後も生業の場として原発事故後の福島沿岸で生き続けようと奮闘する漁業者を対象に、彼らが模索する「未来」について検討する。福島原発事故という国際的な注目を集める事例において、「試験操業」という未来が不確定な期間に詳細な人類学的現地調査を通して「未来」を模索する実践と変容過程を具体的に明らかにする本研究の意義は学術的だけでなく社会的にも大きい。