I appreciate what you are saying about the decentralisation of education. I myself have a similar preference.

I hear that the French system too did, at least at some stages in the past aim towards centralisation.

It doesn’t sound all that nice, but at the same time I can see reasons why one might want to have more of it. There is a balance, which I will come back to.

I think that perhaps the education ministers “artificial country” statements may find their origin in the nihonjinron, the “American civilisation theorey (and thus Japanese civilisation theory)” of Ryoutaru Shiba. He argued that American society is codified, whereas Japanese society is more experiential. This maybe the book in which he wrote about it. To be honest I have only read the theory second hand but I have heard it bandied about and I think that there is some truth in it.
http://tinyurl.com/3d3pdr

While I think that perhaps you are right, that the “artificial country” expression may be used with a negative nuance, I think that the theory in its origin was ostensibly value neutral. The theory meant to say that both ways of transmitting culture/civilisation/morality — that is to say through codification/contracts/manuals/constitutions and through experience/example/apprenticeship — are equally valid.

As a Japanese I guess that Ibuki probably wants to say at least “our way is just as good” or even “our way is best for our society,” and this entails a degree of relativism, and hence non-out-and-out-positivity, and therefore ‘negativity’ towards ‘the other system.’

Speaing of our children, I think that my child is not in a sense ‘really’ Japanese. He is a mixture of Japanese and British. That is okay by me. I am not sure, but I don’t think it is racist of me to think so. I don’t want him to be really Japanese, or really British. Hopefully he will be a good hybrid.

Similarly, I would like to see my country learn things from Japan and Japan learn things from the West. I am into ‘wayousecchuu,’ into hybridisation.

At the same time I think it is very difficult. Good things do not always mix all that well. At the very least, I think, that one has to be aware that hybridisatioin is going on, and aim to hybridise well and not aim to simply import other ways of doing things wholesale.

In a climate where “oubeika” Westernisation is very popular and positively valued, in a climate where people have a tendency to have a bit of a cultural “Michael Jackson complex,” I can see why an education minister might want to at least temper that tendency, by a degree of central administration.

Perhaps one of the reasons why France too does, or did, exert more central control over education and other means of cultural transmission, is also to combat the prevalance, power, in-vogue-ish-ness of anglo, USA culture.

And now I have contradicted myself. Above, I compared anglo culture with Japanese culture and then pitted it against that of the USA. OOps.

My own view is that ‘artificial’ is not the right word. Personally, I see the ‘dichotomy’ as more to do with language vs. visuality. Language allows for and gives rise to ‘codification,’ visuality (valuing visual media of expression) allows for and gives rise to a preference for experience/example/apprenticeship. In fact the latter is just as artificial in my view. Boy de Menthe talks of “kata.” I like that idea. I think that Japanese have a tendency to transmit their culture through “kata”…which are a bit like bills of rights except they can’t be written down, so easily, so statementially, except in a narrative voice.

I like to think that Ibuki may be attempting to give the Japanese some space to excercise the narritive voice, to recount to each other instances of behaviours that are models/kata for what is a good way to behave.

I have written too much.

Tim

Thank you for your comments which were long and thoughtful. That is appreciated.

First –

1. The term “artificial country” is often used towards Iraq in the western press. In the Japanese press, the term “jinkou-teki kuni” is often used towards Iraq. This was one of the reasons I translated the term “jinkou-teki” as artificial in this instance. Another influencing factor was Ibuki seems to be using the term with a negative nuance, which I thought would better come across using artificial. Man-made can have a positive nuance, depending on the context.

2. As far as kihan-ishiki, I felt this was a really hard term to translate. I looked around and saw others were translating it as “normative consciousness” and decided to go with that. You’re comments on this were very interesting.

I just came across the following link today, you might want to have a look at it:

Ibuki Bunmei’s romantic racialism

It’s very helpful, giving one an idea of what Ibuki is saying.

As you specifically asked, I don’t agree with Bunmei Ibuki’s statements.

I think education should be as decentralized as possible putting the burden on what is considered moral on the local community or directly upon the parents (through school choice or home schooling). Ibuki wants to place the burden on centralized authorities is Tokyo.

He thinks he *knows* what the real Japanese values are, but I would argue there is no such animal. Japan has always been diverse and the drive since Meiji has been to reduce this diversity. This is a sad tragedy.

An interesting author to check out in this regards might be Alex Kerr. I don’t agree with everything he says, but was impressed with both of his books, in particular his first one Lost Japan.

My children, perhaps yours as well — if you have some and reside in Japan, will be attending school in Japan. I want more control over what they will learn in school, especially when it comes to morals. I don’t want this determined by a central authority in Tokyo that has nationalistic leanings. That is my main problem with Ibuki.

According to Ibuki, my children aren’t even *really* Japanese. This is racism pure and simple.

Best regards,
Matt

Kihan ishiki (規範意) You translate this as “normative consciousness”, which seems to suggest that the kihan(規範) modifies the consciousness, since you are using an adjective, normative for “kihan”. Is that indeed your interpretation?

I was under the impression that the kihan “規範” is the object of the consciousness. It seems to me that it is used in as the object of the consciousness at least one psychology paper on the “kihan ishiki” of juvenile delinquents, to mean “awareness or consciousness of standards.” As such it is not so far from “moral awareness” except, perhaps it suggests something globular. That is to say an awareness of right ways to be have in all sort of situations. Perhaps “an awareness of standards” with a nuance of “a sense of proprietary” and a touch of “ettiquette”?

As you know, X-ishiki (X意識) is often used with X meaning the object of ishiki/ consciouness in “美意識” or aesthetic/sense of beauty, Jiko ishiki (自己意識) self consciousness.

So what he is saying is that in some countries people have a sense of what it is right and wrong to do in various situations based perhaps upon a tradition. But that in other countries due to the interaction and conflict between a number of different etiquettes a more analytic approach has been taken, attempting to boil the etiquettes down to a smaller number of “human rights” which are perhaps the common denominators of the various etiquettes. Presumably this analytical process has advantages and drawbacks.

The final step that in Japan’s case since there is this sense of standards, why it needs to be put into expression, is not entirely clear to me but perhaps:
1) To counter the shift towards an analytical human rights approach to morality
2) To continue the tradition and the sense of etiquette
If that is his intent I think that he is quite likely to be unsuccessful, and the verbalisation of the 規範意識 is likely in fact to result in a more boiled down to the common denominator approach. But perhaps on the other hand he will simple create classroom time for students and teachers to discuss, enact, and recount moral issues that will indeed result in the transmission of Japanese moral sentiment.

Your choice of title seems to suggest that the education minister is somehow mistaken in some way. But there does not seem to be anything striking about the assertions he is making here.

I think that to an extent the same sort of thing might have been made in Britian, where there is also a more convergent sense of tradition and etiquette.

Can a comparison be made between law and education? Until Britain joined a federation, the EU, it had no constitution nor bill of rights. AFAIK/IANAL British common law was based more upon precedent. Legal precedent is of course very important in the US, but courts have also a constitution and bill of rights to turn to. This has advantages and disadvantages and implicates a somewhat different procedure for carrying out the law. I guess that in US courts bills of rights will be used. I think also perhaps that in British courts more time will have to be allotted to *discussion of precedent*.

So in the case of education, more time might be allotted for “discussion of precedent,” where precedent in this case is not legal precedent, but the bundle of experiences, maxims, soothes, examples that make up a tradition or “sense of standards/etiquette.”

“Artificial country” was perhaps an unfortunate expression. But its unfortunate-ness lies also perhaps in the translation. 人工 (jin kou, human and work, or even human and engineering) is also
http://tinyurl.com/28ms35
“man-made.” I think that he is trying to capture the sense of the USA having been created deliberately, as the product of human deliberation, rather than as a result of a more random, natural, evolutionary tradition. This sentiment it seems to me is often aired by those from the USA (we could do a survey of the use of ‘this country was founded…’ ‘this country was forged…’) and is indeed perhaps embodied in the “declaration of independence”

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Yeah. A man made nation, a nation that was founded, conceived and dedicated.

I am not saying that in Japan and Britain too there was not also a lot of founding and deliberation going on, but the process by which the creation too place, and the way in which it is recorded is different.

I do not understand the problem you *seem* to be having with what the education minister had to say.

I am British by the way

Tim

Great to hear from you!

Best,
Matt Dioguardi

It’s been years, literally. I was reading a post on Arudou Debito’s site and saw your name. I’m pleased to see that you are so fully engaged with the Japanese language. Many years ago, you gave me a Japanese-English dictionary for my computer. Believe it or not, I still have the computer and still use the dictionary. (Which reminds me: There is a handy online dictionary with lots of sample phrases and sentences at ) Unfortunately, it seems like foreigners here who invest time and energy into understanding Japanese are more the exception than the rule.

These days, I play with a trio (sometimes it’s a quartet) once a month at Bumphy’s Irish pub in Kakuozan. Our regular night is the second Saturday of the month. Please join us sometime.

All the best,
William Matheny