Conclusion: Community through Nomenclature Revisited

What was the process by which the Kodaira Seven (shinden ) were transformed into the Kodaira Thirty-three (cho )? In 1962 the city's steering committee for boundary reorganization and renaming decided on a general plan of action, which met with the assembly's approval. The plan spelled out several objectives, not all of which were realized. They are presented below, along with the supporting arguments for their implementation.

1. Boundaries are to be clearly delineated by railroad tracks, roads, canals, and other artificial landmarks. The historical boundaries are not precise. The lack of precision has not posed problems for natives—for whom the border between Ogawa-mura and Ogawa-shinden is still designated as "X' s house" or &ldquo,'s tea bushes"—but this essentially mnemonic system of demarcation is extremely inconvenient for newcomers. Moreover, words like shinden and X-gumi are rustic and uncitylike (KCH, 1 July, 1 September 1960; 1 February 1961; 20 February 1962).

2. Cho size is to be determined by the character—commercial, industrial, or residential—of the area in question. According to guidelines established by the construction ministry, commercial cho should measure about six hectares, industrial cho about thirteen hectares, and the residential cho about ten hectares.

3. Cho names must be easy to learn and remember and should be endearing. Redundancies, as exemplified by Bunkyo ward's sixteen toponyms containing the name Komagome, should be avoided. Moreover, place-names should reflect each cho' s "peculiar characteristics."

Place-names were solicited from among the resident public at large, and the new city divisions were introduced formally on 1 October 1962, on which date Kodaira became a city. Map 6 shows the former shinden sections, together with the newly designated cho. The names were selected for the following reasons:

Nakashima-cho Since the area already was called East/West Nakashima, it was most convenient to keep that name.

Josui Hon-cho. Josui Shin-machi, and Josui Minami-cho:Josui, or canal, was selected to unite, toponymically, three separate shinden sections (Ogawa Suzuki, and Nonaka Zenzaemon-gumi ) located south of the Tamagawa main canal.

Takanodai: Since the rather complicated character for taka (hawk, falcon) was not among the ideographs designated by the government for daily use, it instead was written in cursive syllabary. The name Takanodai alludes to the fact that the area was part of the Tokugawa's falconry reserve. Between the years 1620–1692 and 1717–1866, the southern portion of Ogawa-mura was incorporated into the takajo, falconry reserve, of the Owari province branch of the Tokugawa ie The reserve eventually encompassed 170 villages in

Map 6.
Boundaries of new and old divisions.
New divisions: NK = Nakashima-cho;
JS = Josui Shin-machi; TD = Takanodai; OG1 = Ogawa-
cho 1-chome; OG2 = Ogawa-cho 2-chome; SK = Sakae-cho;
ON = Ogawa Nishi-machi; OH = Ogawa Higashi-cho; JH = Josui
Hon-cho; JM = Josui Minami-cho; KH = Kihei-cho;
TS = Tsuda-machi; GN = Gakuen Nishi-machi;
GH = Gakuen Higashi-cho; NM = Naka-machi;
MS = Misono-cho; MG = Megurita-cho;
MY = Miyuki-cho; SZ1–2 = Suzuko-cho
1–2-chome; TJ1–2 =Tenjin-cho
1–2-chome; ON1–2 = Onuma-cho 1–2-chome;
HM1–3 = Hanakoganei Minami-cho
1–3-chome; HK1–6 = Hanakoganei 1–6-chome.
(Old divisions): (OM) = Ogawa-mura; (OS) = Ogawa-shinden;
(NS-Y) = Nonaka-shinden (Yoemon-gumi); (NS-Z) = Nonaka-
shinden (Zenzaemon-gumi);
(SS) = Suzuki-shinden; (MT) = Megurita-shinden;
(ON) = Onumata-shinden. (Adapted from KK 1983,
244)

the region northwest of Edo. During the period 1731–[1741] and 1759–1793, the reserve was supervised by the Ogawa household, which gained much prestige from this coveted position. Supposedly, only households with a samurai pedigree were selected to supervise the falconry reserve, a point used to validate the samurai-origins thesis of the Ogawa ie. The position warranted a modest stipend, but the strict rules under which the reserve was to be administered made it more of a bane than a boon. Hunting, raising poultry, and erecting scarecrows within the precincts were forbidden; and the permission of domain officials was needed in order to stage a festival or to install a water wheel, on account of the potentially disruptive noises generated. Also, villagers were obliged to equip and entertain the falconers, in addition to bearing the cost of maintaining the reserve (KC 1959, 82–85).

Ogawa-cho (1- and 2-chome), Ogawa Nishi-machi, and Ogawa Higashi-cho: The name Ogawa was left intact to memorialize both Kurobei and the earliest shinden village.

Sakae-cho: Sakae, which means "flourishing or thriving," was selected for this peripheral cho to reflect a desire for prosperous relations between Kodaira and the neighboring town of Yamato (Higashiyamato City since 1970).

Kihei-cho: This place-name derives from the bridge of the same name, which in turn was named after a local celebrity of yore.

Tsuda-machi: Tsuda Women's College is the namesake of this cho.

Gakuen Nishi-machi and Gakuen Higashi-cho: Kodaira Gakuen, the "academy town" housing tract established in the 1920s in what is now Gakuen Higashi-cho, was the inspiration for this place-name.

Naka-machi: As I already have noted, the place-name of this centrally located cho was selected to signify intracity harmony and neighborliness.

Misono-cho:Misono, which means "beautiful park," ostensibly was chosen to symbolize Kodaira's "garden citification," although the presence of the municipal cemetery was probably the more influential factor.

Megurita-cho: Megurita-shinden is the namesake of this division.

Miyuki-cho: This place-name memorializes Emperor Meiji's delighted admiration—miyuki means "august delight or pleasure"—of the blossoming cherry trees dotting the area. In April 1883, Emperor Meiji and his entourage journeyed to Suzuki-shinden to view the

cherry blossoms, about which he later composed several haiku. The Suzuki-shinden head commissioned and in 1902 gave to Kaigan-ji a stele commemorating the imperial visit. Two thousand cherry trees were planted in the 1730s along a six-kilometer stretch of Itsukaichi Road under the orders of the local magistrate (KK 1983, 76–78; Kodaira kyodo kenkyukai 1983, 41–42; Yamazaki 1983, 23). The precedent set by the local magistrate was followed in 1980, when the Rotary Club donated seventy cherry trees for planting in Hanakoganei 6-chome as part of the "(re)making of historical Kodaira" campaign inaugurated in 1977 (KSH, 5 April 1980).

Suzuki-cho (1- and 2-chome ): The name is that of the former shinden, although both cho together constitute a smaller area than their namesake village.

Tenjin-cho (1- and 2-chome ): Tenjin Hollow is the subject of several folktales and the inspiration for the name of this cho. In the folktale "The footprints of Daidara, the Boy Giant," the three hollows in Kodaira (Tenjin, Heian, and San'o) are said to have been formed when Daidara passed through the area en route to build Mount Fuji. Thus, the hollows (i.e., the giant's footprints) are all the same size and point in the direction of Mount Fuji (Kodaira minwa no kai 1981, 54).

Onuma-cho (1- and 2-chome ): Although this cho was named after Onumata-shinden, the appellation was shortened to the presumably less rustic, and allegedly more easily pronounced, Onuma.

Hanakoganei (1–6-chome ) and Hanakoganei Minami-cho (1–3-chome ): As part of a place-name, hana (flower) is analogous to the "pearl" in "Hong Kong, Pearl of the Orient." Hanakoganei has uptown overtones and suggests a cultured, residential area. It was a name much preferred to the comparatively boorish Nonaka Yoemon-gumi. Although Koganei is a historical place-name, and the name of the city sharing Kodaira's southwest border, the cho supposedly was named after Hanakoganei Station (KCH, 5 September 1962).

Each municipal mass-housing and high-rise project was provided both with proper names, such as Sakurajosui, Nobidome, and Hitotsubashi, and with impersonal names, such as Nos. 3, 6, and 7 Toei Jutaku. Somewhat ironic, in light of the rationale for the renaming campaign, is the presence of several municipal housing tracts bearing such "tabooed" names as Ogawa-shinden and Onumata-shinden. These mass-housing

units bear the names of the shinden villages originally peopled by newcomers, whose initial status was not unlike that of the residents of the municipal housing tracts. Perhaps the newness of the units was thought enough to offset the backwardness of these historical names.

The proposed boundary and name changes generated both scorn and legitimate worries among natives: scorn because of what they regarded as the wholly cosmetic rationale for the new cho names; worries because of their fear that the territories of neighborhood associations and shrine and temple parishes would be altered drastically, spelling the potential division of hitherto intact neighborhoods. City administrators assuaged such fears by adopting a compromising posture with respect to the geographic correspondence of jichikai and cho. The partial inclusion of Tsuda-machi within the territorial scope of the Gakuen Nishi-chokai was one such compromise (KCH, 20 February 1962). Shrine and temple parishes retained their native constituency, although their physical boundaries were disrupted by the changes.

Ogawa Eight natives have had altogether less to worry about in either case. First of all, in the area encompassed by the former Ogawa-mura, Oume Road was not designated a cho boundary (as was Itsukaichi Road) but was retained as the organizational nexus of the natives' society, thereby contributing to the overall integrity of the Ogawa Eight. Second, as noted in chapter 4, the parishes of both Shinmei-gu and Shosen-ji remained as they were prior to the 1962 reorganization, and their constituent divisions continue to be called by their historical names. Although the internal organization of these parishes has grown more complicated since their original twofold division in the seventeenth century, the former Ogawa-mura itself remained a distinct entity until 1962. The newly designated Ogawa-cho, on the other hand, crosscut these historical boundaries, effectively fragmenting the territorially intact shinden -village units and creating, virtually overnight, new geographic entities. To circumvent the disruptive influence of cho -level identification, the parish boundaries of Shinmei-gu and Shosen-ji were retained by those institutions as they were before cityhood. These are the same borders—the parishes and the bangumi, as opposed to the cho or school districts—that are maintained collectively by Kodaira natives through religious (e.g., the Yagumo lantern-float procession) and secular (e.g., neighborhood association) activities. The borders also are demarcated symbolically by memorial steles and signboards, just as they were demarcated in the Edo period by small shrines and religious statues.

The fluidity of contact in everyday life—commuting to school or work, shopping—almost ensures that natives and newcomers engage in a broad dialogue on place identity. It is a dialogue that gravitates toward collective representations which have credence to both groups (Suttles 1972, 51–52). Of course, dialogue is not just a modulating activity, for it also constitutes a means by which to highlight and rationalize that which differentiates one interlocutor from others. Thus, it may serve as a process by which diverse groups and individuals arrive at agreements and disagreements about the meaning(s) of a given place, such as Furusato Kodaira (cf. Erickson 1980, 50, 94, 104). This dialogue may assume dramaturgical proportions, as represented by the Yagumo lantern-float procession in April and the citizens' festival in October, or it may assume the more literal form of a mayor-citizens roundtable discussion. The boundary reorganization and renaming campaign of 1962 and the ongoing reformulation of land use constitute yet other modes of dialogue.

Generally speaking, whereas local-person and local-place identity among natives emerged from and continues to be generated by historically structured modes of consociation, this identity among newcomers is a recent by-product of voluntary, obligatory, and/or solicited relationships. Writing in the late 1950s, the editors of the Kodaira choshi claimed that, although newcomers were not incorporated into the historical (native) neighborhood divisions and consociations, such institutions were not necessary for the "urban lifestyle" embodied by the newcomers (KC 1959, 761). City hall has since retracted that allegation, for the romanticized notion of an agricultural-like lifestyle as inherently neighborly motivates both the production (and reproduction) and the consumption of furusato-zukuri rhetoric.

The entity "newly reclaimed Kodaira" suddenly was acclaimed in the industrializing 1960s. Reclamation does not denote an end state but, rather, involves a continual effort to remedy something and make it fit, and ultimately to contemporize it. In the 1650s and 1720s, barren land was made fit for cultivation, and villages were built; in the early postwar period, farmland was made fit for commercial, industrial, and residential use; and in the 1970s, the reclamation of Furusato Kodaira from urban sprawl was initiated. The version of the "newly reclaimed Kodaira" salient in the 1960s was but one episode in the ongoing contemporization of the city. While "progressive" newcomers were lauded by city hall and in the local press, Kodaira natives were gearing up to redress their threatened place through such reparative strategies as par-

ish exclusivity and the formation of a local-history and conservation society, whose publications commemorate the intrepid shinden pioneers and their descendants. These strategies have, in effect, contemporized the "living history" of the native sector, for through them history has become historicism: an appeal to a cultural genealogy that distinguishes even sarariiman -ized natives from newcomers. It is a historicism that serves well city hall's recent furusato-zukuri campaign and earlier efforts to "reclaim" Kodaira. The names selected for the cho created in 1962, for instance, effectively redistributed the local color and historicity formerly locked up within each shinden name. Stripping an area—Nonaka Zenzaemon-gumi, for example—of its nominal patina exposed a surface dotted with symbolic landmarks (e.g., Tenjin Hollow) and exotic flora (e.g., Hanakoganei, or Flower of Koganei), ripe for nomenclatural exploitation.

Furusato Kodaira may be conceptualized as a relationship of past, present, and future, in which the present is a staging ground for imagining the future by remembering (re-membering) the past. The paradox remains that the promotion of Furusato Kodaira has also had the effect of emphasizing sectoral differences, because the "authentic" community to be reclaimed conceptually and nomenclaturally amounts to a tenuous compromise between the city's natives and newcomers mediated by city hall. Were it not a tenuous compromise, repeated references in the local media to such oppositions as "then" (past and future) and "now" (present), "traditional" and "modern," and "farm household" and "nonfarm household" would not be necessary. Cities, villages, neighborhoods, associations, and consociations are not isolable, transcendent entities; they are the mental and material constructions of identifiable individuals and groups operating under certain sociohistorical conditions. Like overworked palimpsest, these constructions bear the indelible imprint of the beliefs and ideas, whims and cogitations, pettifoggeries and values of those individuals and groups. The making of Kodaira is a perpetual task, and Furusato Kodaira is the latest contemporized version of a "newly reclaimed Kodaira."