A beautifully written examination of the organic relationship between the women living near the US bases in Okinawa as well as the servicemen who are stationed there

On the southern end of the Japanese archipelago lies Okinawa, sponsor to a vast complex of US army bases. A legacy of Globe Battle II, these bases have already been a fraught concern in Japan for decades-with tensions exacerbated from the frequently volatile romantic relationship between islanders as well as the armed forces, especially following the brutal rape of the twelve-year- about Night time in the American Community: Women in the Shadow of the US Armed service Bases in Okinawa outdated woman by three servicemen in the 1990s.

However the situation is more complex than it appears. In Night in the American Village, journalist Akemi Johnson will take readers deep in to the “boundary towns” encircling the bases-a globe where ethnic and political mistake lines compel individuals, both Japanese and American, to constantly renegotiate their personal identities. Concentrating on the ladies there, she follows the complicated fallout of the murder of an Okinawan girl by an ex-US serviceman in 2016 and talks to protesters, to ladies who day and marry American men and groups that help them when problems arise, also to Okinawans whose family members survived World Battle II.

Thought-provoking and timely, Night time in the American Village is usually a vivid look at the long lasting wounds of US-Japanese history and the cultural and sexual politics from the American armed forces empire.