At a Tangent to Belonging: “Career Progression” and Networks of Knowing Japanese Multinational Corporations

Abstract

This article describes multisited ethnography at a Japanese multinational corporation, in progress for more than two decades. The focus of the fieldwork was the cross-cultural experiences of Japanese salarymen with non-Japanese coworkers.The author discusses what it meant for him to grow older along with Japanese salarymen informants working in factories in Thailand and France in an evolving political economy. He argues for shifting from a focus on place to one on relationships in multisited fieldwork. [long-term fieldwork, multisited ethnography, Japanese salarymen, multinational corporations]