Having often been told by the Japanese that he would "never understand" their culture because he was not one of them, American cartoonist Tim Ernst decided to embrace this notion and deploy it creatively.

With decreasing salaries and eroding job security, it may seem as if little has improved for instructors working in Japan's eikaiwa (English conversation) industry. Full-time contracts, which are needed for enrolment in the shakai hoken (health and pension) program, remain elusive. However, there was a ...

In September, Tokyo-based Jibun Mirai Associe Co. (JMA) announced it would adopt Nova as its official corporate name — 19 months after it acquired the eikaiwa (English conversation) school chain from its previous operators, and almost six years after its well-publicized downfall. It has been ...

In February 2012, a small band of sacked workers in Japan took on one of the world's biggest investment banks, Goldman Sachs, unionizing in a bid to keep their jobs and win a better deal from a firm they believed had treated them unfairly. It ...

This year marked the fifth anniversary of the collapse of English language school giant Nova, which filed for bankruptcy protection on Oct. 26, 2007. Under the guidance of Nagoya-based G.Communication, the cram school and restaurant operator that initially bailed out the company, Nova was able ...

Throughout most of the 2010s, the meteoric rise in popularity of Hokkaido's ski resorts among foreign visitors was widely documented in both the domestic and overseas media. In particular, the quiet town of Niseko in southwestern Hokkaido, 100 km west of Sapporo, quickly and somewhat ...

While the media both in Japan and overseas reported on a perceived exodus of foreigners in the immediate aftermath of the March 11, 2011, disasters in Tohoku, the reality is that very few actually left for good. As was highlighted in our July 3 column ...

Before instructors became embroiled in a fierce legal battle with Berlitz Japan, there was a time when the English language school chain's robust image made it a top choice among foreign job-seekers. In particular, it was the company's good reputation over competing language chains that ...

Now fraught with job insecurity and low pay, there was a time when the work was steady and salaries were high for those who taught English in Japan. One only has to contrast the birth of the eikaiwa (English conversation) business in the late '80s, ...

Although more than a year has passed since the magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami struck Tohoku on March 11, 2011, Ivan Stout's memory of the moment when the Shinmarunouchi building in Tokyo's Chou Ward began to tremble is as vivid as ever. While Stout, 33, ...