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Japan's educational system was overhauled during the American Occupation. Like their American counterparts, Japanese children from the late 1940s on
went to primary school for 6 years, middle school for three, and high school for three--the so-called 6-3-3 system. (Even though the States has now moved largely to 5-3-4 rather than 6-3-3, Japan still rigidly follows the 6-3-3 model.) Virtually all Japanese secondary schools required uniforms. Those primary schools requiring school uniforms in the 20th century have usually required short pants for boys. After World War II a style of short short pants based on European boys clothes were commonly adopted. It was widely worn by the early 1950s and continues to be commonly used in many primary schools. Even at schools with no uniform requirement, mothers mostly sent boys to school in the short shorts that were commonly worn. In contrast to secondary schools, primary schools that required uniforms were in the minority in the postwar years. Thus, while a discussion of secondary schoolboy fashions and secondary schooboy uniforms is almost the same discussion until the last few years, for primary schoolage boys, uniforms and regular wear require separate treatment.
From the immediate post-war years through the late 1980s, Japanese primary school boys were set off from men and older boys by one overwhelmingly obvious fashion characteristic: they wore short pants. In this, Japan matched and even surpassed European countries where the fashion originated. Shorts for men and older boys were strictly athletic wear, but the great majority of younger Japanese boys wore short pants in winter and summer, for play and for school, and for every conceivable cermonial occasion. And while longer baggy styles prevailed in the 1940s and the 1950s, by the early sixties, hemlines began to climb; by the early 1980s, short pants were as short as they could possibly be, leaving not just the knees but pretty much the entire thigh bare. The one concession to cold weather was knee socks. Exceptions to the ubiquity of shorts were the colder parts of northern Japan where the wearing of shorts would actually have invited frost bite, and in some rural areas. (See school uniform discussion below.) As a long archipelago in roughly the same latitudes as the east coast of the United States, Japan has comparable weather patterns. Thus northern Japan has cold winters similar to those of New England; Tokyo's climate is much like Washington's--winters perhaps a bit milder with typical January weather ranging from around freezing at night to 9-10 degrees C-- upper 40s--at mid-day; Osaka/Kobe more like Atlanta.)
Not only was the wearing of shorts nearly universal, but the transitions into and out of them happened at just about the same ages. Preschool boys might wear jumper suits with long tights, but once the boy went into kindergarten, he was expected to bare his knees until he entered middle school. To enter first grade in Japan; one must be 6 years old. To enter middle school, one must be 12. Thus the transition to long trousers happened at age twelve. The year-round wearing of trim short pants by Japanese boys was often noted in reports on Japan by typically parochial American journalists, unaware that until fairly recently, boys in many other countries besides Japan (as HBC clearly shows) wore short pants in the winter and for dress-up wear. Nonetheless, the fashion prevailed in Japan so long after it pretty much died out in the countries where it orginated that it requires some explanation.
Unlike secondary schools which nearly universally required uniforms until the 1980s (and an overwhelming majority still do), only some primary schools required uniforms. Primary public school uniforms are pretty
much the same throughout Japan:
Cap: Almost all uniform schools require a cap. Primary boys
generally wear a round soft safari type cap of navy blue, red, or yellow depending on the school.
Suit jacket: Boys and girls wear a simple navy blue suit
consisting of a lapelless jacket. Jackets are not usually worn from
June 1 through September 30. Some schools require that children wear the suits whenever they come to school. Others insist on it only on certain days.
Pants/skirts: Boys wear short pants and girls skirts. The boys shorts are usually quite short.
Shirts/blouses: Girls are expected to wear white blouses with round Peter Pan collars under the jackets, but boys can wear almost any kind of open-necked white shirt. Ties are not commonly worn.
Athletics: Many schools have an athletic uniform as well--T shirt or sweat shirt and white or blue athletic shorts (bloomers for girls).
There are some exceptions to the standard uniforms described above.
chools in rural Japan often permit children to wear the athletic uniform to school; rural schools often have long sweat pants as well as gym shorts as part of the athetic uniforms. Rural schools seem much less strict about enforcing uniform requirements, and children go to school in any combination of the athletic uniform and regular clothes, saving the standard uniform for special occasions. Notably Japan is a highly urbanized country. Rural schools serve a very small proprtion of Japanese children.
Some public primary schools in the colder parts of Japan have a formal long pants uniform as well as a short pants uniform, but I don't have information on numbers. The Japanese population is centered
in the central and southern islands. The northern island of Hokkaido has a relatively small population.
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