Ruth Benedict’s The Chrysanthemum and the Sword provides an interesting
and insightful glimpse into Japanese culture through a discussion of “on,” “giri,” and the hierarchal formation of Japanese society. The most entertaining (and humorous) topic that is discussed, I think, is the Japanese love for sleep (See 180). Benedict describes sleep as “one of
the most accomplished art of the Japanese” (180). To be honest, I nod in
approval to this claim, as I recall witnessing tired salary men and women
sleeping—standing—in a crowded train as they head to work. I guess, as
a Japanese, I still need to perfect my skills in the art of sleep and being
able to “rela[x] a in any position, and under circumstance [of] sheer impossibilities” (180). All jokes
aside, considering the time that The Chrysanthemum
and the Sword was written, I find Benedict's writing style modest and humble as she tries rationalize
and make sense of a culture and its people that is foreign to her, albeit from the comfort of her
own homeland. She is conscientious of her role as the cultural outsider and
draws attention to the limitations and implications of her project as well as
its potentialities. (See “Assignment Japan”). Ian Buruma, writes in the
Forward, “this book could not possibly offend a Japanese reader” (xii) and I partially
agree with this statement. On the one hand, I can appreciate Benedict's attempt to remain politically neutral through her tone/language such as when she is comparing Japanese values
to American ones (ie. Japanese notions of aggression (173), and suicide (166))
without ever privileging one culture over the other. While on the other hand,
she does point out cultural differences in a way so that “Japanese-ness” is
understood specifically in Western terms.
Moreover, according to Benedict, Japan is represented as a singular
nation and she fails to capture the nuance of Japanese values and traditions. Also,
as mentioned in the article by Sonia Ryang, Benedict’s study of Japanese
culture and history is anything but complete as it omits Japan’s “role as the
colonial empire” (9) which is incredibly significant!!!
In relation to Ryang’s
article, she provides a useful overview of the reception of The Chrysanthemum and the Sword in Japan and
I find the critical debates that were spurred by Japanese scholars quite
fascinating. Personally, I tend to agree with the Kawashima school (See section
on Post War Reactions).
The excerpt from Newman that was
assigned was not very interesting, but useful in providing a framework to begin interrogating (video)
game culture in Japan. Like Manga Studies, (which is my area of research and
interest), I feel that the study of games must also endure a process of justification in order for it to be taken with “serious, scholarly
attention” (but is it really necessary?! Let us end the resistance to
videogames and other forms of popular media!”) The excerpt from Prasol’s Modern Japan sheds light on the Japanese
as re-inventors of
things rather than inventors of things. (Refer to 3 cycle model). Ig Noble Prize list is also amusing to
read. [note to self: The significance of Adaptations]
Videogames and Cultural Stereotypes: From Geisha and Samurai
to the Land of Tomorrow*
It has been a half a century since the publication of The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, and since
then Japan as undergone significant changes: from democratization, to urbanization,
to becoming a technocratic state. While cultural stereotypes of the geisha and
samurai, for example, are still commonly
used, reproduced and disseminated in both Japan and
the West, in an age of global and rapid technological advancement,
new cultural stereotypes emerge, rendering the Far East as exotic, but in different ways than before (Japan is not a land of robots and electronic toilets).
Drawing on the work of Bell hooks, Sara Ahmed in Strange Encounters explores the notion of the exotic. Ahmed posits
Consumer culture involves the
production of the stranger as a commodity fetish through representations of
difference [. . .] hooks suggests that, ‘Within commodity culture, ethnicity
becomes spice, seasoning that can liven up the full dish that is mainstream
white culture’ (qtd in 1992: 21). In other words, ethnicity becomes constructed
as ‘the exotic’ through an analogy with food: black people are spicy and different.
The white consuming subject is invited to eat the other: to take it in, digest
it, and shit out the waste. The exotic and strange foods are incorporated into
the bodies of Western consumers as that which is different but assimilable.
This incorporation allows ‘difference’ to be associated with something that
simply livens up the ordinary or mainstream diet. Of course, some differences
cannot be assimilated…” (117)
If we substitute
hooks’ idea of food with videogames, then, I wonder to what extent cultural difference
is assimilated through Japanese videogames. (Before you discovered that
Nintendo, for example, was a Japanese product what did you “know” of Japan?”).
.........
........
[I realise the transition to the next paragraph is not as strong as it could be... But I would like to explore ideas of nation, identity, and game culture. . .anyway **\(^o^)/**]
........
[I realise the transition to the next paragraph is not as strong as it could be... But I would like to explore ideas of nation, identity, and game culture. . .anyway **\(^o^)/**]
Given Japan’s history, as a powerful imperial nation suddenly
subjugated by a 20th century war, it is not surprising that scholars of
Japanese cultural studies have identified an inherent paradox in Japanese
culture. Critics such as Jennifer Robertson, Nishihara Daisuke and
Richard Minear, are but three of those interested in examining “Japanese
orientalism” which they see as different from the general definition of
orientalism used in the West subsequent to Edward Said’s definition of that
term given the fact that Japan can be positioned simultaneously as both a
coloniser and a “colonised” nation. In the words of Robertson, Japanese
orientalism deviates from Said’s orientalist thinking because Said insists upon
the ways in which the “presentation of the ‘Other’ (the non-West) [is]
absolutely different from the West” (98). Such revisionary orientalist
argues that orientalism is not homogenous, but nuanced in different cultures.
For example, Japan blurs the cultural boundaries between the ‘Empire’ and
‘subaltern’ because its history encompasses both. Minear argues that Japan
demonstrates “Orientalist attitudes even in the absence of a
[long-standing] domination” (515), suggesting the country’s inferiority complex
as a driving force to be more like the West even as it struggles to be
different from it. This idea reflects Nishihara’s proposition that “[t]here is
no doubt that the country (Japan) is geographically situated in what is known
as the Orient, but in a political sense it has tried to become a
“Western” nation” (244). In effect, Japan’s identity is threefold, and built
upon tiers of contradictory dispositions made manifest in its conflicted
identity as ‘Asian’ and ‘Western’ while trying to maintain its ‘Japanese-ness’.
(Okabe 9-10)
Has Japan achieved equal standing as the West through its technological
developments? Or has Japan found alternative ways of resurrecting and promoting
its colonial enterprise by selling game consoles? In what ways have (video) games redefined a
Japanese cultural identity and how does it, if at all, affect discourses of
nation and identity? Of course, over the
course of this semester I hope to explore some of these questions since they
are rather broad and generic, but nonetheless, important, when conducting a
cross-cultural examination of Japan’s relationship with the West.
*Reference to the Simpsons episode. lol.
Works Cited
Ahmed, Sara. Strange
Encounters: Embodied Others in Post-Coloniality. London: Routledge,
2000. Print.
Benedict, Ruth. The
Chrysanthemum and the Sword: Patterns of Japanese Culture. Boston:
Mariner Books, 1946. Print.
Miner, Richard H. “Orientalism and the Study of
Japan.” Journal of Asian Studies. 39. 3. (1980).
JSTOR.Web.
12 June. 2012. Print.
Nishihara, Daisuke. “Said, Orientalism, and Japan.”
Journal of Comparative Poetics. 25 (2005):
241-253. JSTOR. Web. 12 June. 2012.
Okabe, Tsugumi. “From Sherlock Holmes to
“Heisei” Holmes: Counter Orientalism and Post
Modern Parody in Aoyama Gosho’s Detective Conan Manga Series” (2012) Collection of Brock University, St. Catharines.
Robertson, Jennifer. “East Asian
Bouquet: Ethnicity and Gender in the Wartime Japanese Revue
Theater.” Internationalizing
Cultural Studies an Anthology. Eds. Ackbar Abbas and John
Nguyet Erni. 117-31. Print.
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