| 内容 |
Kamagasaki , also known as Airin-chiku , is a district in the southern part of Osaka experiencing a change in image by inflows of foreign investment. This district now includes new kinds of pubs and snack bars managed by ethnic Chinese , mostly from the Fujian province. Kamagasaki has been recently recognized as an affordable place to stay among tourists and backpackers from overseas , and it also seems an attractive place for external capital to do business. Though there are many studies focusing on this district , they do not closely examine their internal environment. Through the use of participant observation and interviews with stakeholders , this thesis focuses on Kamagasaki snack bars to analyze the internal interactions between staff and their customers , as well as the challenges they face such as their businesses’ financial problems or cross-cultural interactions. I found that these bars create an open space for everyone regardless of their social backgrounds , which comes in high contrast to typical Japanese snack bars that are more exclusive. In short , these snack bars provide stakeholders with unique fluidities which I define as “Spatial Fluidity” and “Socio-cultural Fluidity” in this thesis. On the other hand , they also face financial problems of their staff along with migration to Japan , and confrontations with local communities because of radical expansion of such external capital. Overall , this thesis showcases how a traditional laborer’s district is currently undergoing a transformation driven by external capital. |