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Fiona Graham

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Fiona Graham
Graham as Sayuki playing the yokobue Japanese flute in January 2013
BornFiona Caroline Graham
Melbourne, Australia
NationalityAustralian
Other namesSayuki
EducationKeio University
University of Oxford (M.Phil., D.Phil.)
Occupation(s)Anthropologist, geisha
Websitewww.sayuki.net

Fiona Caroline Graham (born in Melbourne, Australia) is an Australian anthropologist working as a geisha in Japan. She made her debut as a geisha in 2007 in the Asakusa district of Tokyo under the name Sayuki (紗幸), and as of 2016 was working in the Fukagawa district.

Early life

Graham was born in Melbourne, Australia, and first travelled to Japan aged 15 for a student exchange programme, where she attended high school and lived with her host family.

Academic career

Graham first graduated with degrees in psychology and teaching at Keio University. She completed an M.Phil. in 1992, followed by a D.Phil. in 2001, in social anthropology at the University of Oxford, with her specific focus being Japanese corporate culture.

Graham has lectured at the National University of Singapore, and has lectured on Geisha Studies at Keio University and Waseda University since 2008.

Graham has published three volumes of anthropology; in Inside the Japanese Company (2003) and A Japanese Company in Crisis (2005), the fictionalised account of Graham's time spent working in a large insurance company post-graduation, Graham focuses on the "uneven erosion of the commitment of salary men to an overarching corporate ideology", with the subjects of her study being employees who joined the company at the same time she did.

A reviewer for the journal Organization of Inside the Japanese Company found the book insightful and rewarding, though found the uninformed nature of Graham's interviewees to be troubling, and raised questions of the quality of Graham's quantitative survey. A review in the British Journal of Industrial Relations for both books found her portrayal to be favourable, but thought that it " not adequately address wider issues of structure and power relations".

Her third publication, Playing at Politics: An Ethnography of the Oxford Union (2005) followed her 2001 documentary The Oxford Union: Campus of Tradition, made for Japanese television; in both the book and documentary, Graham focused on the ambitious nature of students looking to improve their future career prospects through the status of having been President of the Oxford Union. A reviewer for the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute found the book to be a "witty examination of British political processes", recommending it to students studying politics and tutors of the subject.

Geisha activities

Sayuki (on the left) and one of her trainees in January 2013

Graham initially entered the profession whilst directing a documentary project for the National Geographic Channel; however, after completing her training as a part of the film, she was given permission to continue working full-time as a geisha, and formally debuted under the name of "Sayuki" (meaning "transparent happiness") on the 19th of December 2007.

Graham debuted in the Asakusa geisha district of Tokyo, and her training before this lasted for a year; this included lessons on dance and tea ceremony, Graham also played shamisen since her debut. Graham specialises in yokubue (the Japanese side-blown flute), having played the flute for a number of years before coming to Japan. As of 2013, the documentary itself remained unfinished.

After working in Asakusa for four years as a geisha, Graham applied for permission to take over the okiya her geisha mother was retiring from due to illness, but her request was denied on the grounds of her being a foreigner.

In 2011, Graham left to operate independently of the Asakusa Geisha Association, though she continued to work within the area, opening a kimono shop in Asakusa in the same year. In 2013, Graham was running an independent okiya in Yanaka, Tokyo with four apprentices, and as of 2019, has been running an okiya in the Fukagawa district of Tokyo, also with four apprentices.

Graham has travelled internationally to demonstrate the traditional arts employed by geisha, visiting the United Kingdom to perform at the Hyper Japan festival in 2013, Dubai in the same year, and Brazil in 2015.

Wanaka Gym court case

In December 2010, a company owned solely by Graham, The Wanaka Gym Ltd., was fined a total of NZ$64,000 and ordered to pay NZ$9,000 in costs, following a conviction relating to an unsafe building used for tourist accommodation. The building had been declared "dangerous" in June 2008, but continued to house paying residents in the two months after. Graham and her company were convicted on 14 charges.

Books by Graham

References

  1. Ng, Adelaine (1 August 2011). "A glimpse into the secret world of geisha". Retrieved 13 May 2013.
  2. "The Sayuki Geisha Banquet service Starts!!". Niseko Japan. Japan: Niseko Promotion Board Co., Ltd. 7 January 2013. Archived from the original on 30 June 2013. Retrieved 13 May 2013.
  3. Bissoux, Bunny (14 October 2017). "A Day in the Life of a Geisha". Tokyo Weekender. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  4. Brooks, Harrison (25 October 2018). "Keeping a tradition alive, from the outside in". Bangkok Post. Retrieved 19 January 2019.
  5. "Fiona Caroline Graham". Library of Congress. 2015. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 16 March 2015. ... studied at Keio Univ., worked in the Japanese life insurance industry; later, Master's degree, management studies and Doctorate in social anthropology, U. of Oxford; her exper. and production of a film documentary for NHK form the basis for the fieldwork in the book ... data sh.
  6. Ryall, Julian (9 January 2008). "Westerner inducted into mysteries of geisha". The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group Limited. Retrieved 6 June 2011.
  7. Grunebaum, Dan (June 2016). "Sayuki: Being a gaijin geisha isn't easy but it can be fun". Metropolis Magazine.
  8. Graham, Fiona (1992). Aspects of a Japanese organisation (Thesis). Thesis MPhil--University of Oxford.
  9. Graham, Fiona (2001). Ideology and practice: an ethnology of a Japanese company (Thesis). Thesis DPhil--University of Oxford.
  10. "Past Departmental Seminars". March 2019. Retrieved 16 March 2019.
  11. "2012-2013 Keio University: International Center Courses" (PDF). Retrieved 29 October 2015.
  12. "Course List (Spring Semester)" (PDF). April 2014. Archived from the original (PDF) on 7 June 2014. Retrieved 29 October 2015.
  13. ^ Tony Elger, "Japanese employment relations after the bubble", British Journal of Industrial Relations 44 (2006): 801–805, doi:10.1111/j.1467-8543.2006.00524_1.x. (Review of Graham's Inside the Japanese Company and A Japanese Company in Crisis and of Ross Mouer and Hirosuke Kawanishi's A Sociology of Work in Japan.)
  14. Leo McCann, "Lives under pressure: Exploring the work of Japanese middle managers", Organization: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Organization, Theory and Society 12 (2005): 142–144, doi:10.1177/135050840501200111. (Review of Graham's Inside the Japanese Company and Peter Matanle's Japanese Capitalism and Modernity in a Global Era.)
  15. ^ Margaret Taylor, untitled review of Playing at Politics, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 12 (2006): 983–984, doi:10.1111/j.1467-9655.2006.00372_25.x.
  16. McNeill, David (24 January 2008). "Turning Japanese: the first foreign geisha". London: The Independent. Retrieved 8 July 2011.
  17. Martin, Alex (3 June 2011). "Geisha cuts into kimono market". The Japan Times Online. Japan: The Japan Times Ltd. Retrieved 8 June 2014.
  18. ^ "The Western woman who became a geisha". Tokyo: The National. Retrieved 14 November 2014.
  19. Grunebaum, Dan (3 June 2016). "SAYUKI Being a gaijin geisha isn't easy, but it can be fun". Metropolis. Retrieved 19 January 2016.
  20. "花柳界初　外国人芸者　紗幸　好きこそ物の上手なれ". jukushin.com. Retrieved 5 December 2014.
  21. Wallace, Rick (6 June 2011). "Aussie Geisha Fiona Graham rejects reports she's split with Asakusa Geisha Association". The Australian. Australia: News Limited. Archived from the original on 10 October 2014. Retrieved 29 June 2011.
  22. Novick, Anna (7 June 2011). "Foreign Geisha's Future Uncertain". The Wall Street Journal: Japan Realtime. Dow Jones & Company. Retrieved 14 July 2011.
  23. "Sayuki The First Western Geisha Appears at Hyper Japan 2013" (PDF). Hyper Japan. 2013. Archived from the original (pdf) on 22 April 2014. Retrieved 9 November 2015.
  24. Lucas-Hall, Renae. "Sayuki Ushers the Japanese Geisha into the 21st Century". cherryblossonstories.com.
  25. Beech, James. "Gym owner fined $64,000". Otago Daily Times. Allied Press Limited. Retrieved 30 November 2019.

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