Japan is the healthiest country in the world so there is much we can learn from it.  Many local values fly in the face of American's.  We can be justifiably proud that we re-made Japan the healthiest country with a little rescue medicine at the end of World War II, and allowed its own values to re-surface.  Such pride would probably not be "wa" in Japan.

FAKING IT, JAPANESE STYLE

by Robert Levine

Americans typically think it dishonest when people change their presentations to please their audience-of-the-moment.  It smells of hypocrisy. American men, especially, think of self-consistency in moral terms. An honest person should act true to himself--the "I did it my way" school of thought.

To much of the world, however, the notion of an immutable self is considered rather odd. In Japanese society, for example, acting untrue to one's inner beliefs is not only accepted but is it's own moral virtue.  The most important of all Japanese social values is "wa," or harmony.  If achieving wa requires a bit of play-acting, then so be it.  The Japanese distinguish between "honne"--one's true feelings--and "tatemai"--the face one wears in public.  When your honne is at odds with the harmony of the group, a mature, virtuous person is expected to rise above his or her own selfish feelings and, for the welfare of the majority, put on a good face.  To "stick up for what you stand for" is not a Japanese ideal.  Most Japanese understand there's a difference between this public play-acting and reality, but nearly everyone is agreed upon its importance.  In other words, what Americans may perceive as hypocritical, dishonest behavior is not only tolerated in Japan, but esteemed as good citizenship.

It's interesting to compare Japanese and Western attitudes toward professional acting. In the West, actors try to appear informal and natural. They strive for the illusion that they're presenting reality. A good actor makes the audience forget its all fake. In Japan, it's the other way around. Ian Baruma, who has written extensively about Japanese arts and society, observes that Japanese audiences aren't "so much interested in 'real selves' and no attempts are made to hide the fake. On the contrary, artificiality is often appreciated for its own sake. Performers do not try to seem informal or real, for it is the form, the art of faking, if you like, that is the whole point of the exercise." Good examples of this are the stylized patterns (known as kata) in traditional Japanese arts, such as Kabuki theater, which leave almost no room for personal expression.

This tight choreography spills into real life in Japan. The virtuous Japanese person believes in the importance of playing different social roles, each according to script.

Baruma observes that, "Acting, that is, presenting oneself consciously in a certain prescribed way, is a part of social life everywhere.  But an increasing number of people in the West are so obsessed with appearing 'genuine' that they fool themselves they are not acting, that they are, well . . . real. Carried to its extremes, rudeness is seen as a commendably honest way of 'being oneself'.  In Japan, it is still in most cases a necessity to subordinate personal inclinations to the social form."  Cultural differences like these are, of course, ripe for intergroup misunderstanding.

 

Robert Levine is associate dean, College of Science and Mathematics, and professor of psychology, California State University Fresno CA http://www.psych.csufresno.edu/levine

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