Japanese Behavior

Many questions had to be answered, and the O.W.I. decided a cultural anthropologist would be best equipped to gain new insights into Japanese attitudes and behavior. As a cultural anthropologist, Benedict had an advantage over a traditional anthropologist because she could forego the usually obligatory field trip. Her focus would be on explaining Japanese culture by comparing it to other cultures.

Chapter one, entitled "Assignment Japan", explains the purpose of the book and some of the research techniques employed. Chapter two, "The Japanese in the War", covers the Japanese justifications of the war and highlights their attitudes about the spiritual vs. the material, and heir apparent preference for death over defeat or dishonor. Chapter three is called "Taking One's Proper Place" and, indeed, that is its subject. It provides an analys

. . .
ughout the book, and, indeed, seems to be necessitated by the subject matter. A society as full of well-defined institutions and codes of social interaction cries out for analysis along S-F lines. The elaborate explanation of the customs of "on" is an obvious example of this orientation in this work. The S-F orientation is also visible in the author's stated premise in chapter one, that isolated bits of behavior in diverse areas must have a systematic relationship to each other and form an overall, consistent pattern such that any change in one area of life leads to corresponding changes in the other areas. The pronounced C-P orientation can first be seen in another of Benedict's stated premises: that all human behavior "is learned in daily living," as opposed to being, perhaps, genetically determined.(p.11) The author also indulges in a good bit of psychoanalysis of the Japanese, but her conclusions seem glib and superficial, even though they may well be correct. She places an almost Freudian emphasis on the events of childhood, and she argues that the repressiveness of Japanese self-discipline has caused them to be self-righteous and "contemptuous of people with a less demanding ethic," and, thus, was one of the causes of
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
S-F C-P, Benedict S-F, Europe Allied, Human Feelings, Repaying One-Ten-Thousandth, Shinto Diet, Japanese VJ-Day, Child Learns, Dilemma Virtue, Meiji Reform, social structures, japanese culture, s-f c-p orientations, gimu giri, cultural anthropologist, c-p orientations, s-f c-p, chapters five eight, chapter twelve, theoretical orientations, japan west, social structural,
Approximate Word count = 2042
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

More Essays on Japanese Behavior