What makes for a meaningful life? In the Japanese context, the concept of ikigai provides a clue. Translated as "that which makes one''s life worth living," ikigai has also come to mean that which gives a person happiness. In Japan, where the demographic cohort of elderly citizens is growing, and new modes of living and relationships are revising traditional multigenerational family structures, the elderly experience of ikigai is considered a public health concern. Without a relevant model for meaningful and joyful older age, the increasing older population of Japan must create new cultural forms that center the ikigai that comes from old age.
In Making Meaningful Lives, Iza Kaved-ija provides a rich anthropological account of the lives and concerns of older Japanese women and men. Grounded in years of ethnographic fieldwork at two community centers in Osaka, Kaved-ija offers an intimate narrative analysis of the existential concerns of her ac
