Concepts of Japan, Japanese culture and the Japanese

Abstract

Reams have been written to question, explore and define 'Japan', 'Japanese culture' and 'the Japanese', both by Japanese scholars and by foreign observers of Japan. Most of it is based on an unwitting existential assumption that 'Japan', 'Japanese culture' and 'the Japanese' are 'things' out there, whose objectively verifiable forms need only be ascertained. Much of the discussion has centred on the specificities of these forms. I submit that this is not a productive approach: that at best, all these discussions and pronouncements of what 'Japan' is, what 'Japanese culture' constitutes, and who 'the Japanese' are, vary in accordance with innumerable and variegated experiences in changing historical circumstances. In mid-20th century sociology and anthropology, facile assumptions were made that society, culture, people, polity and territory were coterminous such that their respective boundaries perfectly coincided. This assumption was created and reaffirmed by structural-functionalist theory which pervaded social sciences of the time. It was thought that each society possesses a unique culture and that society and culture are contained in the political boundaries of the state. Japan was described and analysed on the basis of such a static theory in the early days of postwar Japanese studies.

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