Claiming Japaneseness: recognition, privilege and status in Japanese-Filipino ‘mixed’ ethnic identity constructions

The intensification of migration between Japan and the Philippines since the 1970s has contributed to an increasing number of relationships and children born to Japanese men and Filipino women. In the Philippines, numerous children have grown up in the absence of their fathers and with limited social and cultural ties to Japan. Frequently, they are raised by their maternal families in cultural environments that are no different from environments in which other non-Japanese Filipino children from similar socio-economic backgrounds grow up. Nevertheless, the offspring of Japanese fathers in the Philippines often lay claim to their ‘mixed’ Japanese backgrounds. This paper discusses the processes of ethnic identity formation among Japanese-Filipinos based in the Philippines and argues that claims for Japaneseness, which develop against the background of popular conflations of ‘mixed descent’ with wealth and a history of highly gendered migration from the Philippines to Japan, are intertwined with concerns over social status.