Health Care Migration in Japan Immigration Policy in Terms of Language

This thesis argues the necessity of new standards for Japanese language teaching in Japan, responding to diversifying social needs. The current situation for foreign workers in Japan is a pressing issue in the light of declining fertility rates and a rapidly aging population. The focus of chapter 1 is this paper particularly focuses on issues regarding acceptance of nurses and certified care workers under the scheme of Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between Japan and Indonesia in 2008, as a new policy to import more foreign skilled workers into Japan. This chapter demonstrates the nation's passive attitude toward accepting foreign workers as well as the growing demand for more consistent immigration policy in terms of language. Chapter 2 discusses the validity and accountability of the current major influential assessment tool in Japan, Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT). It includes a discussion of how linguistic `proficiency' is understood in the JLPT and reveals its problems, comparing JLPT with other influential measurement tools in the world such as the American Council on the Teaching Foreign Language-Oral Proficiency Interview (ACTFL-OPI) and the Common European Framework of Reference for languages (CEFR).