The Changing Culture of Fatherhood and Gender Disparities in Japanese Father's Day and Mother's Day Comic Strips: A 55-Year Analysis

LaRossa, Jaret, Gadgil, and Wynn (2000, 2001) conducted a content analysis of 495 comic strips published on Father’s Day and Mother’s Day in the United States from 1945 to 1999 in order to determine whether the culture of fatherhood and gender disparities in the media had changed over the past half-century. Drawing on their research, I conducted a similar kind of analysis of 246 comic strips published on Father’s Day and Mother’s Day in Japan from 1950 to 2004. By comparing and contrasting the results in the two studies, I show how comic portrayals of families have changed in Japan and in the United States, and demonstrate the value of analyzing comic strips in cross-national research. INDEX WORDS: comic strips, Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, cross-national research, humor, the culture of fatherhood, gender disparities, Japan THE CHANGING CULTURE OF FATHERHOOD AND GENDER DISPARITIES IN JAPANESE FATHER’S DAY AND MOTHER’S DAY COMIC STRIPS: A 55-YEAR ANALYSIS