This historical ethnography draws attention to the range of cultural and social practices that exist within contemporary Okinawa. The narrative problematizes both the location of identity and the processes involved in negotiating identities within Okinawa.

The keystone of U.S. security in East Asia, Okinawa is a troubled symbol of resistance and identity. In this perceptive ethnography, Matthew Allen draws on extensive fieldwork, interviews, and historical research to provide an original exploration of identity construction. The author argues that identity in Okinawa is multi-vocal, ambivalent, and still very much 'under construction.' With its interdisciplinary focus, anthropologists, sociologists, and historians alike will find this book an important source for understanding broad questions of identity formation in the contexts of national, ethnic, cultural, historical and economic experience.