Seen/Unseen: A photographic comparison of Japanese women on 'BeBop' dancefloors and in 'jazu kissa'

Despite jazz being “associated with maleness” and “evidently male-dominated in terms of both audiences and musicians” (McAndrew & Widdop, 2021), Japanese women have long been involved in their country’s rich jazz culture. Using two distinct bodies of my photographic research – Bebop Tokyo and Tokyo Jazz Joints – alongside primary interviews, this paper explores the relative presence and absence of women in two intrinsically Japanese music subcultures: Tokyo’s unique UK Jazz Dance (or ‘Bebop’) scene, inspired by the underground jazz-funk clubs of 1980s London, and the culture of jazz listening spaces – known in the vernacular as jazu kissa – the popularity of which exploded in post-WWII Japan. By comparing images from Bebop Tokyo and Tokyo Jazz Joints, and combining this analysis with interviews, this visual paper gives visibility and voice to women whose experiences in these scenes challenge gender stereotypes in both Japan and wider jazz culture.