Experience of entry into the workforce varies across societies (each offering a particular set of social conditions), and across social groups within a society. This article examines how urban Japanese working-class girls made sense of their first permanent full-time employment and conceived the transition to adulthood over the period 1989-92.…

This paper presents a narrative that explores the author's own life as a woman from a working class background who is now a professor. After situating her work in the small but growing research field about the intersection of social class and academics, the author presents her autobiography by providing a documentary through the three categories…