CAR-CLUB

CAR-CLUB Moga: An abbreviation for ‘modern girl’. It represented the coming together in the twentieth century of ideas of gender equality, a cosmopolitan culture and a developed economy. The new middle-class families enjoyed new forms of travel and entertainment. Transport in cities improved with electric trams, public parks were opened from , and department stores began to be built. In Tokyo, the Ginza became a fashionable area for Ginbura, a word combining ‘Ginza’ and ‘burbura’ (walking aimlessly). The first radio stations opened in . Matsui Sumako, an actress, became a national star with her portrayal of Nora in the Norwegian writer Ibsen’s A Doll’s House . Movies began to be made in and soon there were a dozen companies making hundreds of films. The period was one of great vitality and the questioning of traditional norms of social and political behaviour. The novelty of electric goods: a rice-cooker, an American grill, a toaster. Women’s car-pool. P ATHS TO M ODERNISATION T HEMES IN W ORLD H ISTORY