"Is your Dog your Child?: Negotiating Pet Parenting."

Fujita, Noriko

Annual Conference 2024, Association for Asian Studies

Association for Asian Studies

Seattle, USA

Increasingly in Japan, pets are becoming family members. Yet for some owners, pets are more than that: they are children (Yamada 2004). Given this rhetoric, this paper discusses through what consciousness and practices people see and treat their pet as a child. Volsche’s US study (2018) indicates that some childfree pet owners do identify themselves as “pet parents,” while at the same time being aware of the differences between raising children and raising pets. To put it otherwise, such owners oppose the view that pets are children or child substitutes. For them, pets are pets. While Japan’s population is seriously shrinking, the number of newly adopted pets is increasing and the pets-related market is expanding even throughout the COVID epidemic. Relationships between domesticated animals and human beings seem to be fostered in different ways since almost two decades ago when Yamada Masahiro carried out his study. This paper uncovers dog owners’ views and attitudes toward their pets in their everyday lives. I argue that dog owners in Japan foster incomparable, specific relationships with their furry families.

査読あり