{{short description|Female pink-collar employee}} {{redirect|Office ladies|the podcast|Office Ladies}} thumbnail|A Japanese woman in work uniform ({{Circa|2000s}}) An '''office lady''' ({{langx|ja|オフィスレディー|Ofisu Redī}}), often abbreviated '''OL''' ({{langx|ja|オーエル|Ō Eru}}, {{IPA|ja|o̞ːe̞ɾɯ̟ᵝ|pron}}), is a female office worker in Japan who performs generally pink-collar tasks such as secretarial or clerical work. Office ladies are usually full-time permanent staff, although the jobs they perform usually have relatively little opportunity for promotion, and there is usually the tacit expectation that they leave their jobs once they get married.{{cn|date=November 2020}}<ref name="womansword" /><ref name=":132">{{cite book |last= Ogasawara |first= Yuko |title= Office Ladies and Salaried Men: Power, Gender, and Work in Japanese Companies |location= Berkeley, Calif. |publisher= University of California Press |date= 1998 }} - [https://archive.org/details/officeladiessala00ogas Read online, registration required]</ref><ref name=":0">Lynn Peril: ''Swimming in the Steno Pool''. Kapitel ''Single Secs, Married Secs, and the Looping Shadow of the Office Wife''. Ebook-Position 2515.</ref>
Due to some Japanese pop culture influence in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, the term is also in common usage there. However, the meaning of the word is slightly different. The term is also sometimes seen in Anglophone countries.<ref name="womansword" /><ref name=":132" /><ref name=":0" />
==History== The rise in OLs began after World War II, as offices expanded. They were first known as "'''BGs'''" (for "Business Girls"), but it was later found that English-speakers used a similar acronym, '''B-girls''', to refer to "bargirls". ''Josei Jishin'', a women's magazine, ran a competition to find a better name for the business girls. OL was chosen in 1963 from the entries.<ref name="womansword">{{cite book |last=Cherry |first=Kittredge |title=Womansword: What Japanese Words Say about Women |year=1987 |type=paperback |edition=First mass market edition, 1991 |publisher=Kodansha International Ltd |location=Tokyo |isbn=4-7700-1655-7 |chapter=Office Flowers Bloom: Work Outside the Home |page=103 }}</ref>
In the 1980s, being an OL was the most common job for Japanese women, and OLs made up approximately one-third of the female work force.<ref name="womansword"/>
OL stock characters are frequently found in josei manga and anime, often portrayed as attractive, clever, and wistful individuals bored with their jobs, over-pressured by their families, and facing psychological issues.{{Citation needed|date=November 2021}}
== Sex discrimination == Especially in the late 20th century, OLs were often depicted as passive and submissive because they did not seem to care about strong sex discrimination against them in the workplace. Many OLs were well educated, yet they were still treated as low-skilled clerical workers, and the fact that OLs were usually responsible for serving tea to office leaders and male employees in the workplace indicates the existence of sexual discrimination against OLs in major Japanese corporations.{{citation needed|date=August 2024}}
OLs were expected to leave the company after they married. The employers, therefore, are reluctant to spend extra money to train OLs.{{citation needed|date=August 2024}}
However, many OLs are content with their position and wages in the company because a great number of them live with their parents and do not have to worry about their daily expenses. Thus, they can spend all their salaries on travelling or luxury goods.<ref name=":02">{{Cite book|first=Thomas P. |last=Rohlen |year=1974 |title="The Office Group," For Harmony and Strength: Japanese White-Collar Organization in Anthropological Perspective |location=Berkeley |publisher=University of California Press}}</ref><ref name=":13">{{cite book |last= Ogasawara |first= Yuko |title= Office Ladies and Salaried Men: Power, Gender, and Work in Japanese Companies |location= Berkeley, Calif. |publisher= University of California Press |date= 1998 }} - [https://archive.org/details/officeladiessala00ogas Read online, registration required]</ref>
== Employment == The Japanese female labor force participation rate has been increasing since 1960. In 1995, almost 40 percent of people in the labor force were women. The age patterns of employed males and females differed vastly. 75 percent of females in their early twenties are employed, and the percentage drops significantly after they reach their late twenties and early thirties, when most of them get married and start raising a family. (The percentage dropped to 55 percent for females in their early thirties.) There is also a tendency for women older than 34 to return to the labor force in a part-time job, which makes the labor force participation rate increase for females after their mid thirties. Males, on the other hand, are attached continuously to the labor market after they get a job in their early twenties. Therefore, the labor force participation rate for males remains high (95%) in their 30s, 40s and early 50s.<ref name=":13" />
It is noteworthy that almost one third of all female employees in 1995 had clerical jobs; most of them were OLs. But the proportion is much smaller for males: only 15 percent of all employed males had clerical jobs. Although many women work in offices, they still have many fewer opportunities for promotion than males. Only 1% of female employees are managers or officials; in contrast, this figure is almost one-seventh for males.<ref name=":13" />
== Hierarchy structure and tension == {{refimprove section|date=August 2024}} In Japanese companies, tenure is crucial: it determines not only employees' wages but also their positions in the company. Employees with shorter tenure have to show respect to those with longer tenure.
The word ''doki'' is used to describe the relationship between those who enter the company in the same year or have the same length of tenure. If two employees are ''doki'', they are assumed to have equal position. Similarly, ''senpai'' (one's senior) and ''kohai'' (one's junior) are also commonly used to show the hierarchy in Japanese companies.
A junior female employee has to use polite terms such as ''desu'' and ''masu'' when she speaks to her ''senpai''. ''Senpai'', on the other hand, can speak casually with their ''kohai''.
If tenure is the only standard that determines one's position in the group as well as in the company, everything will be straightforward. However, the difference in education that OLs receive causes tension between them. OLs who are college graduates may have higher official ranks than those who are high school graduates, even if the latter have longer tenure.
Sometimes, due to the difference in their education, a ''kohai'' may have a higher official rank, as well as wage, than their ''senpai''. As a result, the ''kohai'' is unwilling to be deferential to their ''senpai'', while the ''senpai'' feels it unfair that they receive lower pay. In her 1998 book ''Office Ladies and Salaried Men: Power, Gender, and Work in Japanese Companies'', author Yuko Ogasawara argues that if OLs do not get along with each other in the workplace, they cannot unite together to fight against gender discrimination.<ref name=":13" />
==See also== *Salaryman *Kyariaūman *Women in Japan
==References== {{reflist}}
==Further reading== *{{cite journal |url= http://wrt-intertext.syr.edu/vi/forrest.html |title= The Office Lady in Japan |first= Jean |last= Forrest |journal= Intext |publisher= Syracuse University |location= Writing Program |date= 2001 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20070418015545/http://wrt-intertext.syr.edu/VI/forrest.html |archive-date= 2007-04-18 }}
{{Japanese social terms}}
Category:Female stock characters in anime and manga Category:Japanese business terms Category:Women in Japan Category:Employment in Japan Lady Category:Wasei-eigo Category:Gendered occupations Category:Women and employment