This event is suspended until further notice in line with the University’s new guidance on the Coronavirus situation.

Join International House as it welcomes Harvard Professor of Sociology, Mary Brinton, for this year’s Najita Distinguished Lecture in Japanese Studies. Professor Brinton’s lecture “Disappearing Japan? Few Marriages and Fewer Births in 21st-Century Japan” will address questions about Japan’s economy and its aging population through a discussion of Japan’s history from the 20th century to present day.

The Japan of 2020 is far different from the Japan that astounded the world with record economic growth rates from the late 1950s to the 1980s. Today’s Japan is known not for its high economic growth rates but for other, far less salubrious distinctions. It has the highest ration of public debt to GDP of any postindustrial nation. It is the most rapidly aging country in the world and indeed, in history. Since 2013, sales of adult diapers have exceeded sales of baby diapers in stores across the country. The implications of these trends are ominous. How has this happened in the world’s third largest economy, and what if anything should be done about it? This talk will address these questions. 

This event is free and open to the public.

This program is presented by International House Global Voices Performing Arts & Lecture Series and the University of Chicago Center for East Asian Studies