The Geisha
Geisha (芸者), Geiko (芸子) or Geigi (芸妓) are traditional, female Japanese entertainers whose skills include performing various Japanese arts such as classical music and dance.
Terms
Geisha (pronounced /ˈɡeɪʃә/), like all Japanese nouns, has no distinct singular or plural variants. The word consists of two kanji, 芸 (gei) meaning "art" and 者 (sha) meaning "person" or "doer". The most literal translation of geisha into English would be "artist" or "performing artist". Another name for geisha used in Japan is geiko, which is usually used to refer to geisha from Western Japan, including Kyoto.
Apprentice geisha are called maiko, literally "dance child" or hangyoku, "half-jewel" (meaning that they are paid half the wage as opposed to a full geisha), or by the more generic term o-shaku, literally "one who pours (alcohol)". Maikos' white make-up and elaborate kimono and hairstyle is the popular image held of geisha. A woman entering the geisha community does not have to start out as a maiko, having the opportunity to begin her career as a full geisha. Either way, however, usually a year's training is involved before debuting either as a maiko or as a geisha. A woman above 21 is considered too old to be a maiko and becomes a full geisha upon her initiation into the geisha community. However, those who do go through the maiko stage can enjoy more prestige later in their professional lives.
Tokyo geisha are more likely to start at 18 years old for hangyoku, so on average, Tokyo hangyoku are slightly older than their Kyoto counterparts.
Throughout history, geisha often began the earliest stages of their training at a very young age, sometimes as early as at 3 or 5 years. The early shikomi (servant) and minarai (watching apprentice) stages of geisha training lasted years, which is significantly longer than in contemporary times.
It is said that geisha and courtesans inhabit a separate reality which they call the karyukai or "the flower and willow world." Modern geisha continue to use this term. The courtesans were referred to as the colorful "flowers" and the geisha were the "willows" because of their modest, strong, and resilient nature.
Origins
In early seventeenth-century Japan (long before the word geisha was ever used), the predecessor of the geisha was a combination of actress and prostitute and worked on the stages set in the dry riverbed of the River Kamo in Kyoto. The line between actress and prostitute was blurry, as the women would perform erotic dances and skits for their audiences. This new type of performance was dubbed kabuku, meaning "to be wild and outrageous". The dances were called "kabuki," and this was the beginning of kabuki theater.
Traditional Japanese views of sex were very relaxed. It was a society that embraced sexual delights and where men were not constrained to be faithful to their wives. In fact it was socially acceptable to be in love with one's wife, but only when she was considered a "professional" woman.[vague] For sexual enjoyment and romantic attachment, men did not go to their wives, but to courtesans. In order to maintain this profession, the Japanese government created "pleasure quarters" where the courtesans could reside and work and men could go to relax and enjoy the entertainment.
These pleasure quarters quickly became glamorous entertainment centers that offered far more that just sex. The highly accomplished courtesans of these districts entertained their clients by dancing, singing, and playing music. Some were even renowned poets and calligraphers. Gradually, they all became specialized and the new profession, purely of entertainment, arose. It was near the turn of the eighteenth century that the first entertainers of the pleasure quarters, called geisha, appeared. The very first geishas were men, entertaining customers waiting to see the most popular and gifted courtesans.
Around 1760, women began to join men in the art of the geisha and very quickly outnumbered the men. The first woman to use the term "geisha" was an Edo prostitute named Kikuya and became a full-time entertainer. Soon, many women, whether they sold sex or not, began using the term geisha. Doing so was a way of acquiring respectability and proving that they were professionals. The geisha who worked within the pleasure quarters were essentially imprisoned and strictly forbidden to sell sex in order to protect the business of the courtesans. Geisha who worked outside the pleasure quarters, however, could do as they pleased. Eventually, the gaudy courtesans began to fall out of fashion and the geisha were seen as the chic and desirable entertainers they are in modern Japan.
Stages of Training
Traditionally, Geisha began their training at a very young age. Some girls were bonded to geisha houses (okiya) as children. These girls were referred to as hangyoku and were as young as nine years old. This was not a common practice in reputable districts and disappeared in the 1950s with the outlawing of child labor. Daughters of geisha were often brought up as geisha themselves, usually as the successor (atotori, meaning "heiress" wink or daughter-role (musume-bun) to the okiya.
A maiko is essentially an apprentice and is therefore bonded under a contract to her okiya. The okiya supplies her with food, board, tuition fees, kimonos, obis, and other tools of her trade. Her training is very expensive and her debt must be repaid to the okiya with the earnings she makes. This repayment may continue after the maiko becomes a full-fledged geisha and only when her debts are settled is she permitted to move out to live and work independently.
A maiko will start her formal training on the job as a minarai, which literally means "learning by watching". Before she can do this she must find an onee-san ("older sister": an older geisha acting as her mentor). It is the onee-san's responsibility to bring her to the ozashiki, to sit and observe as the onee-san is at work. This is a way in which she will gain insights of the job, and seek out potential clients. Although minarai attend ozashiki (banquets in which guests are attended by geisha), they do not participate at an advanced level. Their kimono, more elaborate than a maiko's, are intended to do the talking for them. Minarai can be hired for parties but are usually uninvited (yet welcomed) guests at parties that their onee-san attends. They only charge a third of the usual fee. Minarai generally work with a particular tea house (minarai-jaya) learning from the okaa-san (literally "mother," the proprietress of the house). From her, they would learn techniques such as conversation and gaming, which would not be taught to them in school. This stage lasts only about a month or so.
After a short period of time the final of training begins, and the students are called maiko. Maiko (literally "dance girl" wink are apprentice geisha, and this stage can last for years. Maiko learns from their senior geisha mentor and follows them around to all their engagements. The onee-san and imouto-san (senior/junior, literally "older sister/younger sister" wink relationship is important. Since the onee-san teaches her maiko everything about working in the hanamachi, her teaching is vital. There are 5 different hairstyles that the maiko wear, that mark the different stages of her apprenticeship. She will teach her proper ways of serving tea, playing shamisen, dancing, casual conversation and more. The onee-san will even help pick the maiko's new professional name with kanji or symbols related to her name.
There are three major elements of a maiko's training. The first is the formal arts training. This takes place in special geisha schools which are found in every hanamachi. The second element is the entertainment training which the maiko learns at various teahouses and parties by observing their onee-san. The third is the social skill of navigating the complex social web of the hanamachi. This is done on the streets. Formal greetings, gifts, and visits are key parts of any social structure in Japan and for a maiko, they are crucial for her to build the support network she needs to survive as a geisha.
Maiko are considered one of the great sights of Japanese tourism. They appear very differenty from fully-qualified Geisha. They are at the peak of traditional Japanese femininity. The scarlet fringed collar of a maiko's kimono hangs very loosely in the back to accentuate the nape of the neck which is considered a primary erotic area in Japanese sexuality. She wears the same white makeup for her face on her nape, leaving two or sometimes three stripes of bare skin exposed. The effect of this style of makeup is essentially to tease, much like cleavage in western society. Her kimono is bright and colorful with an elaborately tied obi hanging down to her ankles. She takes very small steps and wears traditional wooden shoes called okobo which stand nearly ten centimeters high.
When a girl is around 20-22, the maiko is promoted to a full-fledged geisha in a ceremony called erikae (turning of the collar). This could happen after two to five years of her life as a maiko or hangyoku, depending on at what age she debuted. She now charges full price for her time. Geisha remain as such until they retire.
Female Dominance in Geisha Society
“The biggest industry in Japan is not shipbuilding, producing cultured pearls, or manufacturing transistor radios or cameras. It is entertainment”. The term geisha literally translates to mean “entertainer.” Around the world, the term geisha has many different connotations; some western countries think that geishas are high-class prostitutes or escorts. Even some Japanese citizens see geisha in that way because of the lower class geisha who do sell their bodies and work as prostitutes. The biggest misconception of geisha is that they have sex with their male customers, however modern day, true geisha do not. Their sex life and love life are the most personal parts of a geisha’s life, rarely involving their professional lives. They entrance their male customers with their traditional skills of music and dance. Men pay high prices for geisha, and in return expect to be like the masculine and powerful men that they see themselves as being. Geisha are entirely different than the men's wives who stay at home and care for the family, and must retire from the profession if they get married. “Geisha are not submissive and subservient, but in fact they are some of the most financially and emotionally successful and strongest women in Japan, and traditionally have been so”. There is currently no western equivalent for a geisha- they are truly the most impeccable form of Japanese art. Geisha learn the traditional skills of dance and instruments to perform for public and private groups. They hold the highest social status in Japan. Before the twentieth century, geisha training began when a girl was around the age of four. Now, girls usually go to school until they are teenagers and then make the personal decision to train to become a geisha. Before World War II, young geisha sold their virginity to the highest bidder in order to fund their geisha debut, but this became illegal in 1959. Geisha are single women, though they may have lovers or boyfriends whom they have personally picked, who support them financially. World War II brought a huge decline to the art of being a geisha because most women had to go to factories or other places to work for Japan. The geisha name also lost some status during this time because prostitutes began referring to themselves as “geisha girls” to American military men. During Japan's rebuilding, only a few geisha went back to their districts to rebuild their culture to bring it back to completely traditional ways.
Relationships with male patrons
Japan is viewed as a very male-dominant society, so the world of geishas is both surprising and intriguing as it is strictly matriarchal. Geisha are meant to be completely different from wives. Wives in Japanese society are expected to be more submissive to their husbands. They typically don't work so that they can stay at home with their children. Men look for wives who will provide them with healthy children, not necessarily women whom they love. Men look for their wives to be good mothers and child-bearers, whereas they want their geisha to make them feel like more of a man. Geisha will remain unmarried, but if they choose to become a wife, they must retire from their profession. For men, geisha are everything in a woman that their wife is not. Geisha are meant to be entertainers whose main goal is to make their male customers feel more dominant and masculine. Men pay for geisha to be entertained at a teahouse or private party. They are paying for the experience and company that they desire, which they don’t receive from their wives. Geisha offer pleasure to men by their classical entertainment and overall femininity, not by having sex with them. “The cultural style of masculinity in Japan tends to demand female subservience, and many things contribute to an ideology in which men are the sources of authority”. Men aren’t meant to experience the behind-the-scenes work of geisha, because one of the main goals of geisha is to make the man feel more dominant and masculine.
The relationships that geisha have with their male patrons are one of the most interesting aspects of their lives. They basically withhold sex through graceful seduction, which is one of the reasons the men keep coming back for entertainment. In a way, not having sex with their patrons puts the women in a more powerful position than the men because they are more in control. Their years of apprenticeship teach the women how to keep men infatuated with their entertainment. They act as every man’s fantasy and learn to adapt to different male personalities.
Matriarchal society
Women in the geisha society are some of the most successful businesswomen in Japan. In the geisha society, women run everything. Without the impeccable business skills of the female teahouse owners, the world of geisha would cease to exist. The teahouse owners are entrepreneurs, whose service to the geisha is highly necessary for the society to run smoothly. Men are also needed, but in contingent positions such as hair stylists, dressers, and sometimes accountants. In an interview with the Boston Phoenix, Mineko Iwasaki, reportedly the most successful geisha of all time, stated, “The geisha system was founded, actually, to promote the independence and economic self-sufficiency of women. And that was its stated purpose, and it actually accomplished that quite admirably in Japanese society, where there were very few routes for women to achieve that sort of independence”. The majority of women were wives who didn’t work outside of their familial duties. Becoming a geisha was a way for women to support themselves without submitting to becoming a wife. The geisha women live in a strictly matriarchal society. Women dominate. Women run the geisha houses, they are teachers, they run the teahouses, they recruit aspiring geisha, and they keep track of geishas’ finances. The only role that men play in the society is that they are the people being entertained. Sometimes men work as hair stylists or kimono dressers, but their jobs are hardly ever long-term. Men aren’t meant to see the behind-the-scenes workings of geisha to ensure the mystery behind the women.
Geishas also embody a type of feminism. "We find our own way, without doing family responsibilities. Isn't that what feminists are?”. These women leave their families at a young age to immerse themselves in their art. They believe that men can make a life for themselves, always being in control, so why can't women? Also, they "have grown adept at using their silken charms to wind their men around their little fingers... [to] manipulate the dumb, unsuspecting male of the species... to make a man think that he is the one who has the brilliant ideas".
Misconceptions
There are many misconceptions over what a geisha truly is because the tumultuous past of artisans, prostitutes, and pleasure quarters in Japan. “The world of the geisha, the "flower and willow" world, are very separate societies that are shrouded in mystery. The myths that have been created by outsiders about the environment and the lifestyle of the geisha world have, for the most part, been able to grow unchecked. And because it is a very private,elite world, most people would be uncomfortable speaking about it”. Other misconceptions are derived from true prostitutes in Japan, confused with the word geisha. During World War II, some prostitutes referred to themselves as geisha girls to the foreign military men who they spent time with. However, prostitution was legal in Japan until the turn of the twentieth century, which is another reason that people may be misinformed about geishas not offering sex to customers.
History
The first geisha were men during the 1600s. They entertained as comedians and musicians. It wasn’t until 1751 when a female geisha surprisingly emerged. “The profession originated in the 17th century in response to male demand for cultured female company. According to Confucian custom, most marriages were loveless affairs arranged purely to produce heirs. While licensed courtesans existed to meet men's sexual needs, geisha carved out a separate niche as artists and erudite female companions”. By 1800, being a geisha was considered a female occupation. There were many different statuses of geisha to represent what type of business they conducted. Some women would have sex with their male customers, whereas others would strictly entertain with their art forms. Prostitution was legal up until the 1900s, so it was practiced in many quarters throughout Japan, also fueling the misconception between geisha and prostitution. World War II brought many changes to the world of geishas. In 1944, everything in the geisha’s world was forced to shut down, including teahouses, bars, and houses. About a year later, they were allowed to reopen, after the women had been working laboriously in factories every day. The very few women who returned back to the geisha areas decided to reject western influence and revert back to traditional ways of entertainment and life. “The image of the geisha was formed during Japan’s feudal past, and this is now the image they must keep in order to remain geisha”. World War II resulted with most of the laboring geisha not returning to their previous occupation. It was up to the few women who did return to change the thwarted view of geisha back its traditional ways. Because of the devastations of the war, people post-war wanted to bring nationalism back to the country through a reinvention of traditional values and the arts. Another major change after World War II was the absence of a young geisha’s mizuage, or selling their virginity to the highest bidder. This reform was also in the form of a feminist movement, because the girls wanted control over their bodies, especially sexually. “There is no doubt that coerced sex and bidding on a new geisha’s virginity occurred in the period before WWII…After Japan lost the war, geisha dispersed and the profession was in shambles. When they regrouped during the Occupation and began to flourish in the 1960s during Japan’s postwar economic boom, the geisha world changed. In modern Japan, girls are not sold into indentured service, nor are they coerced into sexual relations. Nowadays, a geisha’s sex life is her private affair”. In her book, Geisha, a Life, Mineko Iwasaki said, “I lived in the karyukai during the 1960s and 1970s, a time when Japan was undergoing the radical transformation from a post-feudal to a modern society. But I existed in a world apart, a special realm whose mission and identity depended on preserving the time-honored traditions of the past”
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