Japanese Mothers and Obentos

1. Japanese Food as Cultural Myth

1.1. A young child is likely not interested in the intricate aesthetics of the food in the lunchbox Japanese culture says food should first look good (smallness, separation, fragmentation), and then taste good. Container is as important as what is contained Naturalization of food – transformed from messy natural to aesthetic ‘natural’ of a different form (apples carved into roses)

2. School, State, Subjectivity

2.1. Purpose of school is to shape children into proper (gender) roles Obentos are a part of this Obedient to the well-trained and screened teachers means one is obedient to the state

3. Nursery School and Ideological Appropriation of the Obento

3.1. Makes child comfortable, committed mother, No obentos after 1st grade

4. Precision, balance, and aesthetic of Japanese children’s school lunch boxes (obentos) take planning, time for mothers to prepare. The preparation time is interpreted by author as a form of ideological control by the state over mothers to produce proper Japanese citizens

5. Structures of Power

5.1. Symbols of culture – are also ways people live their lives

5.1.1. Ideological State Apparatuses – Althusser’s term for institutions that educate entertain, inform and in other ways produce ideas that indoctrinate people into a particular way of seeing the world