<論文>生活研究の社会学的枠組み : 生活構造論と生活の概念

Abstract

The term "life" (seikatsu) is indispensable concept for describing today's sociopsychological trends of Japanese people. People tend to take interests in their residential conditions or leisure "life" rather than their occupational conditions: it is a contrast to the "workaholic" in the past few decades. Some people are interested in environmental problems or reconsider the system of their consumption "life". In Japanese sociological tradition, Life Structure Approach (Seikatsu Kozo Ron) has often treated these human life problems. Reviewing studies from this perspective, we find four focuses in this approach: (1) family, (2) social stratification, (3) community, and (4) total society. Many findings have been obtained through this approach, but there is little general framework for synthesizing these findings. In this article, a framework for empirical studies of human life in social conditions is examined. This framework is constructed on following three main aspects. (1) Life sphere: total life is divided into occupational life, residential life, and leisure life. (2) Dimension of life: human life consists of behavior, material condition, institutional condition, and consciousness. (3) Time and space: these are indispensable factors controlling all person's behaviors. This framework can be of used not only to put several findings about human life structure in order, but also to analyze life problems (seikatsu mondai) in contemporary Japanese society.