Japanese in the United Kingdom

Japanese in the UK
Total population
	UK residents born in Japan; 43,000 (2015 ONS estimate); Japanese nationals residing in the UK; 67,258 (2014 MOFA estimate);
Regions with significant populations
	Greater London and South East England
Languages
	Japanese and British English
Religion
	Mahayana Buddhism, Shinto, Protestantism, Confucianism, Roman Catholicism, Judaism, Anglicanism

The Japanese in the United Kingdom include British citizens or permanent residents of Japanese birth, ancestry or citizenship as well as expatriate business professionals and their dependents on limited-term employment visas, students, trainees and young people participating in the UK government-sponsored Youth Mobility Scheme.

Background

History and settlement

Settlement first began in the late 19th century with the arrival of Japanese professionals, students and their servants. 264 citizens of Japan resided in Britain in 1884, the majority of whom identifying as officials and students.^[2] Employment diversified in the early 1900s with the growth of the Japanese community, which exceeded five hundred people by the close of the first decade of the 20th century.^[2]

As tensions escalated between Japan and the United Kingdom in the buildup to World War II, some Japanese left their home country to settle in Britain while many more returned to Japan. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and assault on Hong Kong in December 1941, 114 Japanese men including expatriate businessmen and merchant seamen were detained as enemy aliens on the Isle of Man.^[3]

In the post-war era, new waves of immigration emerged in the 1960s, mainly for business and economic purposes. In recent decades this number has grown; including immigrants, students, and businessmen. Parts of the United Kingdom, in particular London, have significant Japanese populations, such as Golders Green and East Finchley in North London. In 2014 the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs estimated that there were 67,258 Japanese nationals resident in the United Kingdom^[1] For British nationals of Japanese heritage, unlike other Nikkei communities elsewhere in the world, these Britons do not conventionally parse their communities in generational terms as Issei, Nisei, or Sansei.^[4]

Students

The first Japanese students in the United Kingdom arrived in the nineteenth century, sent to study at University College London by the Chōshū and Satsuma domains, then the Bakufu (Shogunate). Later many studied at Cambridge University and a smaller number at Oxford University until the end of the Meiji era. The reason for sending them was to catch up with the West by modernizing Japan. Since the 1980s, Japanese students in the United Kingdom have become common thanks to cheaper air travel.

Demographics

The Nipponzan-Myōhōji temple in Milton Keynes

According to the 2001 UK Census, 37,535 Japanese born people were residing in the UK,^[5] whilst the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs estimates that 50,864 Japanese nationals were calling the UK home in 2002.^[6] In the 2011 Census, 35,313 people in England specified their country of birth as Japan, 601 in Wales,^[7] 1,273 in Scotland^[8] and 144 in Northern Ireland.^[9] 35,043 people living in England and Wales chose to write in Japanese in response to the ethnicity question,^[10] 1,245 in Scotland,^[11] and 90 in Northern Ireland.^[12] The Office for National Statistics estimates that, in 2015, 43,000 people born in Japan were resident in the UK.^[13]

Japanese is the primary language of Japan, and the 2011 Census found that 27,764 people in England and Wales spoke Japanese as their main language, 27,305 of them in England alone, and 17,050 in London alone.^[14] The 2011 Census also found that 83 people in Northern Ireland spoke Japanese as their main language.^[15]

Organisations

The Japan Society and Japan Foundation support cultural programmes about Japanese culture.^[16]

Notable individuals

Below is a list of notable British people of Japanese heritage. Temporary individuals and expatriates are not included and can be found at Category:Japanese expatriates in the United Kingdom.

British citizens born in the UK of Japanese ancestry

Iain Duncan Smith – politician, former Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, former leader of the Conservative Party, whose maternal great-grandmother was a Japanese woman living in China^[17]
Miki Berenyi – singer, of mixed Hungarian and Japanese ancestry
China Chow – actress, of mixed European and East Asian ancestry
MiChi (Michiko Sellars) – dance-pop singer in Japan
Andrew Koji – actor and martial artist of mixed English and Japanese ancestry, known for The Innocents and Warrior^[18]
Will Sharpe – actor of mixed English and Japanese

Japanese resident in the United Kingdom

Dame Mitsuko Uchida – pianist
Sir Kazuo Ishiguro – novelist, 2017 Nobel Prize in Literature winner
Togo Igawa – actor
Haruka Kuroda – actress
Eleanor Matsuura – actress
Matt McCooey – actor
Kaoru Mfaume – entertainment producer
Naoko Mori – actress
Sonoya Mizuno – actress, known for Ex Machina and La La Land
Rina Sawayama – singer
Diana Yukawa – violinist
Asami Zdrenka – member of British girlband Neon Jungle
Sarah Bonito – lead singer of South London band Kero Kero Bonito
Jōji Hirota – Taiko drummer
Taka Hirose – bassist, of the band Feeder

Other

Jun Tanaka – TV chef of Channel 4's Cooking It
Scott MacKenzie, darts player, born in Brazil to mixed Japanese and Scottish parentage
Yoko Ono – artist

Education

Primary and secondary schools

Many state and independent schools in the United Kingdom serve Japanese children. As of 2013, about 10-20% ^{[citation needed]} of Japanese school-age residents in the United Kingdom attend full-time Japanese curriculum-based international schools. These schools include the Japanese School in London, and the boarding schools Rikkyo School in England and Teikyo School United Kingdom.^[19]

The Shi-Tennoji School in Suffolk was in operation from 1985 to its date of closing,^[20] 17 July 2000.^[21] The Gyosei International School UK in Milton Keynes closed in 2002, after 15 years of operation.^[22]

Post-secondary education

Locations of day schools (nihonjin gakko and shiritsu zaigai kyoiku shisetsu) in England (grey dots represent closed schools)

The Teikyo school maintains Teikyo University of Japan in Durham at the Lafcadio Hearn Cultural Centre at the University of Durham.^[19]

A boarding college in Winchester, Hampshire, the Winchester Shoei College at the University of Winchester (formerly Shoei Centre at King Alfred's College), is an affiliate of the Shoei Gakuin. It opened in 1982.^[23]^[24]

Gyosei International College in the U.K. opened in 1989 in Reading, Berkshire on land formerly controlled by the University of Reading and its name later changed to the Witan International College. In 2004 the University of Reading announced that it took control of the Witan college.^[25]

Supplementary education

London

Derby

Canterbury

Cardiff

Edinburgh

Leeds

Manchester

Newcastle

Telford