Oku Mumeo
Mumeo Oku | |
---|---|
Born | Fukui, Japan | October 24, 1895
Died | July 7, 1997 Tokyo, Japan | (aged 101)
Occupation | Politician |
Citizenship | Japanese |
Spouse | Eiichi Oku |
Children | Kyoichi Oku Kii Nakamura |
Mumeo Oku (奥 むめお, Oku Mumeo, October 24, 1895 – July 7, 1997) was an important Japanese
Biography
Life and activism
Oku Mumeo was born the eldest daughter of a third-generation blacksmith on October 24, 1895, outside of
In late 1919, she received a visit from Hiratsuka Raichō who asked if she would be interested in co-founding a new organization, the New Women's Association, with the intention of petitioning the 42nd Diet on reforms to Article 5 of the
Oku Mumeo would go on to dissolve the New Women's Associate on December 8, 1922, and form the Women's League on the seventeenth of that same month.[12] With her growing fame in the women's activist circles, she was asked to move to Nakano in order to assist with the Nakano Consumer Union Movement in 1926.[13] Working in the consumer movement she found the area of activist work that would drive her, but she would go on to lead, or at the very least be associated with, various women's activist movements and organizations, such as: the Association of Households, forming the Cooperative Women's Consumer Union, opposing the dissolution of the proletarian parties, and starting women's settlements with the Women's Settlement Movement.[14]
Marriage and children
Oku Mumeo married a man named Oku Eiichi, a poet who never really had much success and was employed in the translation department of Sakai Toshihiko's Baihunsha.[15] She is survived by her son, Kyoichi Oku, and her daughter, Kii Nakamura, who, like her mother before her, served as chairman of the Housewives' Association.[2]
Death and afterward
Oku Mumeo died on July 7, 1997, living to be a hundred and one years old. Due to her numerous contributions to activism in modern Japan, Japanese women are able to run for and hold public office and her Housewives' Association was able to improve the overall quality of life in Japan.[16]
References
- ^ "Mumeo Oku Japanese Politician". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved December 8, 2015.
- ^ a b Pollack, Andrew. "Mumeo Oku, Japanese Pioneer in Women's Rights, Dies at 101". The New York Times. Retrieved December 8, 2015.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 32.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 34.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 35.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 37.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 40.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 43.
- ^ Loftus 2004, pp. 49–50.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 56.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 57.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 59.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 66.
- ^ Loftus 2004, pp. 67–75.
- ^ Loftus 2004, p. 48.
- ^ "Mumeo Oku, a rare woman in the politics of Japan, died on July 7th, aged 101". The Economist. Retrieved December 8, 2015.
Bibliography
Loftus, Ronald (2004). Telling Lives: Women's Self-Writing in Modern Japan. Honolulu, Hawaii: University of Hawaii Press.