Quoted: Holly on Interpretation of Culture
OK, I have a bunch of stuff I want to say about the infamous Japanese proverb “the nail that sticks up gets hammered down” that gives this post its title. And it is infamous ― it’s one of those sayings that has spread throughout the English-speaking world as a way of characterizing Japanese culture. I’m curious about your partner’s interpretation, and what I understood him to mean was that if any of those Asian-American kids were to try to survive socially alone, they would be like a lone nail standing out, a target for the hammer of white privilege without support of other “nails.” In a group, they’re safer ― maybe not from the hammer, but at least maybe it’s harder to get bashed down when you are amidst support and those like you.That’s actually a nice and positive spin on that saying ― valuable, even, in that you were help to connect it with the need for community support from people of shared experience, and share your thoughts in this post. At the same time… it’s very radically different from my own experience of that saying, which (in English) has been used for decades to other (and denigrate, subtly) Japan as a culture of conformity and group-think where being different or special is punished. If you google “the nail that sticks up” you will see plenty of examples of English-speaking “discussion about Japan” that basically amount to that. Most of the people that talk about this saying are not Japanese ― most of them are probably white. What I’m trying to say is, there’s a whole discourse about this “emblematic, characteristic of Japan” proverb that’s been foisted on Japan, in addition to and separate from what it actually originally meant. I understand that your partner had a different spin (and I actually kind of like it) but for personal as well as political reasons ― since this “saying” and associated ideas had a big impact on me culturally, racially, individaully ― I feel like it’s important to acknowledge those bigger contexts and history.
So, it’s a complicated subject and I decided to call an expert ― my mother, who has written on the topic in both languages and never gets tired of railing against American scholars and journalists who can’t stop essentializing Japan and using it as a bizzare opposite mirror to rationalize the Way That America Is. I talked to her for about an hour just now, as a sanity check because I know too many different, conflicting things about this saying. But she basically summed it up: “Japan ‘experts’ here use it to say that Japan is a conformist society, unlike America which is all about individualism and merit.”
What too many American ‘experts’ think this means: Don’t be different. Conform to the ways of the group, don’t stick out. Otherwise you will be crushed, and rightfully so. This is the way of Japanese society.This is actually what I was taught it meant ― how half of my cultural background was presented to me ― by white people, including members of my own family. When my mother caught wind of this, she just told me that they didn’t understand what it really meant, but left it at that. She has always despaired of raising me and my sister in a way that would allow us to be anything but “Americans,” here in this soil and culture. She didn’t really try to explain it all to me until decades later, when I was reading more about it and she was writing more about it.
There are 988,000 hits in Google for “the nail that sticks.” The original proverb was actually “the stake that sticks up” because there were no nails in Japan before the iron ships came. If you search on the actual Japanese phrases, 出る杭は打たれる or 出る釘は打たれる ― you get less than half the results. This is partly because it’s become magnified, exaggerated, focused on, and partly because the expression has gone out of vogue in Japan (maybe especially online…) It’s associated with an “old way of thinking” and is something a stern schoolteacher or group-minded boss would say.
What I understand it really means in Japan, in my limited half-breed way: You should not emphasize your own individual excellence or difference over group harmony (wa, 和) to avoid resentment and dissension. Think about a sports team with a star player, one whose talent and skills stands out over everyone else. If that player were always trying to be the one to take the shot at basket, to score the goal, even if they statistically have the greatest likelihood of success, teamwork and the group dynamic suffers. The individual may be outstanding, but the group suffers. This is what’s trying to be expressed.
In some ways it’s similar to the concept of “hubris,” but without the divine element. There’s actually a pretty good discussion here, with examples from different cultures. The “tall poppy” of New Zealand, the “high trees catch much wind” or “sticking your head above the mowing field” in Dutch, or “if you move you won’t be in the picture” in Spanish.
All of these are a little different, of course. But I feel like none has been called out as an “essential descriptor” of a culture, at least in the US, as the Japanese example. And I believe that’s because of the “weird mirror” dynamic.
Some of these carry more of a “warning” dynamic ― hey be careful, you’re a target! And it can be used in Japanese that way too, which is maybe more popular now that the “prioritize the group above trumpeting your own merit” which is sort of an old fuddy-duddy thing. However, my mother wants me to say that in order to really understand what it means and the importance of this saying, you also need to grasp what wa (和, harmony) means in Japan (white guy tries to explain here) and also ’sekken’ (sp?) a word I don’t know. She claims that some article she wrote about this might be online some time soon, but doesn’t know how to find it, because she gets irritated with Google.
Atlasien and little mixed girl also commented on the dynamics around this proverb recently over at Racialicious on a post about the trans community in Japan, and the stereotypes of conformity.
If you read this long comment about hammering, thank you. It’s a bit of a tangent, but since it’s the metaphor of the post and important to me, I thought I should write it. It’s also really related ― for me at least ― to the kinds of white/POC/mixed-race dynamics that bint talks about. The simple “conformist” interpretation of the saying was taught to me by hegemonic American (i.e. white-centric) culture and white relatives as what the OTHER culture I was part of would do to me for being different. Because I was always different, the white side of my family positions itself as being very “different” and me more than the rest of them for being queer and trans, even when I was tiny. The idea was that although “oh no we wouldn’t want to say Japan is BAD per se,” special people would be taken care of properly in this country. (Yeah, right.) This really influenced my own relationship to Japanese culture when I went to live there at the age of 11, which is when I was feeling at a new peak of intense difference around race and gender especially, and like nobody could understand me. (Oh, adolescence.) So it’s taken me a long time to learn more nuanced lessons about it.
—”The Hammering,” Feministe
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Elton wrote:
The predominant white/Western interpretation of this phrase to imply that all Asians are the same, I think, is used to justify the way the West takes advantage of and subjugates the faceless masses of Asians, whether they be slaving away in factories in Asia or in kitchens in America. It has an insidious tone of victim blaming, because, hey, it’s in their culture and their nature to be a faceless mass to be taken advantage of. Sure do love exotic Asian women and cheap Asian labor, though! Do my math homework while I take your sister on a date.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 12:27 pm ¶
atlasien wrote:
It’s great to hear Holly commenting on the original Japanese proverb! I’m not equipped to do that, of course, but I do consider it my special duty to raise objections whenever someone starts regurgitating cliches about Japan.
- Japan is uniquely conformist
- Japan is uniquely WACKY (contradicts the first cliche, but that never holds people back from believing both at the same time)
- Japan is uniquely sexist
- Japan is uniquely racist
- Japan is cooler and more awesome than all other Asian countries
- Japan is nastier and more evil than all other Asian countries
It goes on and on! People appoint themselves as experts and build up the most fantastic, baroque symbolic structures to “explain” some sort of essence of Japan when the truth is so much simpler… Japan is a place full of regular flawed human beings just like everywhere else in the world, subject to forces such as history and geography and economics and religion and politics just like everywhere else in the world.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 12:31 pm ¶
sweeterjuice wrote:
This was really interesting! Thanks!
I have to say that I’m still confused by the imagery the saying uses. Having had woodworkers in my family, I’ve seen plenty of lone, sticking-up nails hammered back into place because of the problems they can cause. The saying doesn’t really introduce the notion of the nail causing pr0blems in a group, though–just creating a problem for itself by being out of place and thus making itself a target for hammering.
I mean, if the whole point of the saying is to teach that emphasizing your own individual excellence or difference over group harmony leads to resentment and dissension, I would expect the saying to be something like, “The nail that sticks up makes the table to fall apart” or something along those lines–kinda like the Western saying about the horseshoe nail, maybe.
As it is, the saying stresses the individual difference, and the consequences the individual faces for being different. The group is merely identified as something the nail is refusing to be a part of–hence the hammering.
I suppose it’s too much to expect a saying to make sense, especially when it’s removed from it’s culture and translated into another language. At the same time, though–assuming the translation correctly communicates the imagery–I have a hard time blaming non-Japanese folks for their interpretation of the saying, given it’s imagery. The nail isn’t where it’s supposed to be, so it gets put back in place, and forcefully so. It strikes me as a bit of leap to get from that to “wa is disrupted and therefore the other nails are ticked off”.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 1:55 pm ¶
BSK wrote:
FWIW, I have never heard this phrase, and any somewhat seemingly similar phrases I have heard were not discussed in relation to Japan. In my studies of differing education models, we have looked at how Japan (and *some* other East Asian countries) place a stronger value on interdependence, where as many Western nations stress independence. This was not done in an us-vs-them kind of way, but rather looking at the ways in which different cultural contexts can greatly impact educational practices. I feel that thinking of it in this context is far more informative and far less value-laden than terms such as “conformist”. However, I’d be curious to hear what others think of this approach, particularly those who may hail from a culture that might be (rightly or wrongly) described as stressing interdependence.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 1:59 pm ¶
Chabas wrote:
The Dutch phrase is actually rather double in meaning. On the one hand, it implies a culture where excellence – or at least being *noticeably* excellent – is actively discouraged. Dutch culture has had this tendency, though it is lessening. The Dutch used to be firm believers in “be normal, that’s crazy enough”. Stick to the norm, don’t feel or act better than/different from the rest, or you’ll be “weird” or “arrogant”. (How does this match up with a country that has one of the most tolerant drug policies in the western world, most active and extravagant gay populations etc? By having large cultural differences between major cities and small town life).
The other actually implies an admiration – “sticking your head out above the mowing field” implies sticking your neck out for something important. It shows a recognition for that being better and deviating from the norm is a risk – you could, and likely will, be mowed down – but also considers doing so admirable.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 2:07 pm ¶
Persia wrote:
It goes on and on! People appoint themselves as experts and build up the most fantastic, baroque symbolic structures to “explain” some sort of essence of Japan when the truth is so much simpler… Japan is a place full of regular flawed human beings just like everywhere else in the world, subject to forces such as history and geography and economics and religion and politics just like everywhere else in the world.
THIS, a million times over. I’ve been working on a blog post about myths about manga, and keep stumbling over ridiculous stereotyping.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 2:08 pm ¶
Anonymous Commenter wrote:
Not being ethnically Japanese, I’m not equipped to comment directly on this, but the distaste for hubris has a similar ring to my own Chinese American upbringing.
Reading the phrase again, I feel the more accurate part of the “nail” proverb seems to relate more to the first half about the protruding nail, and less about the hammering. sweeterjuice seems to see this the same way. If this is the case, why is the hammering part even there, or is there something about the connotations of the phrase before translation that subtract the image of violence from the word “hammering”?
The distaste for hubris, however, does (from my Asian American, but never having lived in Asian before perspective) seem to have very specific implications for differences in the expected relationship between leaders and followers in Asia and the West. I feel cultural Asians have a teacher/student relationship with their leaders, in the sense that promotion and recognition is expected to reflect accurate observation and judgement by the leader. In white cultures, the leader is expected to be more oblivious of the achievements of the followers, and thus more self promotion is necessary for promotion. This seems to be a real cultural difference between the white folks and asian folks. Does anyone else sense this?
On the tangent of self-obsession, what is up with gadget reviewers commenting about their fat fingers making it hard to type on a gadget keyboard, or about car reviewers commenting about how their “bulk” does or does not fit in the back seat of a car? 6′2″ is not *that* tall. And you should get a look at itzhak perlman’s hands as he plays the violin – that guy has sausage fingers but it sure doesnt trip him up. Maybe I am reading into it too much, but has anyone else noticed how white males constantly compare and comment on the size of body parts in a manner that seems just a hair too frequent? What gives with that? I’m not talking about penis comparison, either.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 5:15 pm ¶
Afro-chan wrote:
Oh Persia, (#6) thank you! People are people. They are nice, funny, serious, uptight, laid back, quiet, loud and the list goes on. I want to scream every time a fresh group of English teachers comes along. They are “experts” of books not real life. People act as if Japanese people are just like manga characters or machines. A portion of the foreign population here treat all Japanese people like a stereotype regardless of the reality of the situation. It is so annoying and degrading.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 6:21 pm ¶
method wrote:
This reminded me of something I’d read about a similarly “telling” Chinese saying, and when I googled for it it turned out to be Nietzsche:
http://books.google.com/books?id=1dLQ-XiilEIC&lpg=PA406&ots=u1kmbEo4S6&dq=%22make%20your%20heart%20small%22&pg=PA406
About the Japanese saying, I understand what the writer is saying about this phrase not being some kind of *key* to Japanese culture. On the other hand, doesn’t calling it part of the old fuddy-duddy culture imply that it is part of a culture of cohesion and compromise, which Japanese post-war modernity has partially dismantled? So the phrase is partly irrelevant today, just as it would be irrelevant to cite Benjamin Franklin to show that Americans believe in saving money; but couldn’t it help to understand where Japanese culture *has been*?
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 7:47 pm ¶
Erika wrote:
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU.
Throughout college, I’ve had many (white) professors tell me that to be Asian is to conform — and whenever I objected to that sentiment, they told me I was being biased. It was annoying.
I agree with atlasien, too; the stereotypes people have about Japan and Japanese culture are very inaccurate and ignorant. What annoys me when people mention this is that when I object to the stereotypes, they tell me that Japanese people have the same stereotypes about other cultures and show a lot of racial caricatures on TV — which is true, but it’s a total derailment of what I was trying to talk about, and a completely different issue in its implication.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 8:52 pm ¶
Restructure! wrote:
Great catch, Latoya!
I’m not Japanese, but I’m East Asian (living in a Western country), and only heard/read that saying from white Westerners talking about the difference between Eastern and Western cultures.
Unfortunately, there appears to be some sort of industry of academic papers studying “the nail that sticks up gets hammered down” (”Asia”) versus “the squeaky wheel gets the oil” (”The West”). Strangely, these are coauthored by Chinese or Japanese researchers, in addition to the Western ones with English names. I don’t find those papers convincing, but then again, essentialist characterizations are never convincing to me. I wonder if there is a publication bias in these studies which are trying to find the essences of “the East” and “the West”.
Another unfortunate thing about the “nail that sticks up gets hammered down” proverb is that it’s often used to teach white people about Asian cultures. In other words, racial/ethnic stereotypes become the basis for cultural sensitivity training, which is not that uncommon.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 9:41 pm ¶
atlasien wrote:
@Erika: I try to argue back by giving the following reverse analogy.
Let’s say you (i.e. theoretical white person using stupid argument) are not a white person at all, but a member of a minority in Japan…
You’re having an argument with a privileged ethnic Japanese person. You list some ways in which your life is affected by prejudice in Japan and say you don’t like the way your culture is stereotyped. Your listener responds: “Well white people in America are racist and treat Asian-Americans really badly. That’s the REAL problem and white people are the REAL racists.” You say “umm, whatever, but last time I checked we both live in Japan, not America, so why are you derailing and ignoring everything I just said?” and that’s when they start calling you a reverse racist who hates Japanese people…
Wouldn’t that be really, really annoying?
It’s kind of a complicated setup though, and relies on an appeal to empathy and imagination that might or might not exist.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 9:46 pm ¶
jstele wrote:
I never really took the Western interpretation to be racist because I have seen examples of it in the news. I know that when some Korean children wore their traditional costumes to school in Japan, their Japanese classmates cut their costumes with scissors. Their classmates used the “nail” proverb as an explanation.
Of course, every culture has individuals, but some cultures do value conformity more than others. I don’t think it’s racist to acknowledge that. There are harsh social consequences for going against the norm in the Japanese workplace, society, etc. Because if you follow the rules, then you are in harmony with society. If you don’t, then you are seen as working against that group harmony. One does not have the freedom to dress and act as one can in Western countries.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 10:17 pm ¶
x0x wrote:
Thanks a lot for the post. I’m a Japanese major at UMass, I’ve heard several professors (most of the white) use this phrase often, but it was usually in context of discussions on conformity in academic settings (for example, proper dress in schools).
As a light-skinned mutt of European decent (with a hint of Syrian and Lebanese thrown in with some Blackfoot heritage) from a poor family that grew up in a rural farm town with little exposure to the rest of the world, I have to say that there has been plenty of ethnocentrism and “essentializing” that I’ve struggled to understand myself based on my experiences and how I was taught to see things. This sort of stuff pops up everywhere, including discussions with my family and friends about my studies (I’ve heard it all, almost), and I’ve come across a lot of generalizations of, racism towards, and ignorance about Japan that pops up in ways that seem on the surface non-threatening. The easiest to confront are sexist attitudes about Japanese women being more sexually aggressive (I’ve met several people wearing 日本人彼女募集中 (looking for Japanese Girlfriend) tee-shirts), 0r the insistence that Japanese are naturally more humble than others (or so it would seem around here anyway, in this eat or be eaten neighborhood), but others are so subtle that I’m usually accused of being over-sensitive or I’ve got a bad case of white guilt (or I want to be Japanese, but that’s another topic).
The issue is pertinent enough that majors are required to read Said’s Orientalism among other text for a required junior year writing course and write several essays on the topic, but that’s not to say that everyone understands the necessity for constant and continual self-evaluation so as to avoid the pitfalls of Orientalism and ethnocentrism in their studies (and in some case they don’t even care to try). It’s been a slippery slope for me, but I try to remain as open-minded and objective as possible in my approaches to studying the language and culture that I find I know less and less about the more I study. I have no trouble accepting that quantification of “Japanese-ness” in itself is impossible (and in’t even something people in Japan can agree on), rather than focusing on the “otherness” of Japan and perpetuating ideas about an entire country of people that have their roots in 19th century colonialism.
Japan is a place full of regular flawed human beings just like everywhere else in the world, subject to forces such as history and geography and economics and religion and politics just like everywhere else in the world.
Amen
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 10:50 pm ¶
BSK wrote:
Do we feel that this situation is unique to American interpretations of Japanese cultures? It is unlikely that any country’s culture could be summed up in a singular quote. Yet we see this done all the time. It is never right, but I don’t know that this situation represents a specific anti-Japanese bias in the way in which many Americans come to understand other cultures, and rather the general laziness in how we understand anything different from our own. I also wonder if this is unique to Americans or if there are people in Japan who have equally short-sighted/mis-guided senses of American culture based on tidbits of information such as this.
I am not doubting the reality of the situation as outlined by the original poster. Rather, I am attempting to look at what may be the driving force behind this situation, and whether it is more widespread than the post implies and requires a deeper solution.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 10:53 pm ¶
luckyfatima wrote:
restructure: we have a lot of these papers in my field of ESL, also co-authored by East Asians. I also agree that it is BS, even based on my own teaching experience. But the stereotype is so strong it feeds the industry with pedagogical theory on how to get Japanese, Chinese, and Korean students to open up and participate more in class to enhance their ESL education. (cuz you know they are all the same, the Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans).
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 10:57 pm ¶
Danny wrote:
It is hard to be objective and “see things as they really are” in any society. I really agree with the comment how some of these individuals that “interpret” culture are relying a lot on many so called book studies and I’ve seen plenty of Academians who do this, both Western and Non-Western “experts”. Any type e of judgement of an entire community, whether it’s based on studies or personal experience/observations, is going to have some type of flaw or have cases that are exceptional to the standard.
There’s quite a few issues regarding work of scholars to begin with but that’s a different story.
Sometimes it is hard looking from the outside. Depending how much one wants to know about a particular demographic group, it might involve a little bit of absorbing yourself into that community for a bit. Not assimilating but very close. For example, I’m of Asian descent but very interested in Middle Eastern-Jewish culture. Learning some of the language and other cultural aspects was very intellectually rewarding for me, but my understanding grew almost expotentially as I saw the people I wanted to learn about as regular people who also have dreams, flaws, personalities and mundane moments like me.
At least from my perspective, trying to put myself in other people’s shows along with recognizing everyone has a mother (this term work better for me than saying recognizing the humanity of everyone) along with only some books probably help a lot in interpreting another culture. I don’t really have to explain it in a way that conforms to what the experts say yet I know just enough to not romanticize or ignore the realities of different cultures. It’s not perfect but I’m human and open to change.
It’s quite honest to say that some cultures appear to value conformity more but it’s not the acknowledgement that makes it racist more like the individuals who use this knowledge as a tool to put others down or putting some type of limits in viewing people. Sort of like how some people take statements like “if it weren’t for our people for doing such and such you all be back in the stone ages” and rub it in the faces of people. That’s just an extreme example but I hope most readers get my point.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 11:02 pm ¶
Danny wrote:
I hope people don’t misunderstand my statement of downgrading the sholars. The main thing is other than the very obvious, you all don’t have to take everything the Academian, the traveller or any expert says as aboslute face value. In fact, as one professor mentioned to me, arguing it pretty much part of the job. It’s tough to gain accurate knowledge even for those guys, so there’s no need to feel too bad for not “knowing it all”.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 11:10 pm ¶
x0x wrote:
@BSK: I wouldn’t say that this perspective is necessarily anti-Japanese, but it reeks of ethnocentrism and white supremism when
Japanese people are used as the platform for the validation of the ideas they have about their own individuality and experience as American (or other non-Japanese).
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 11:24 pm ¶
Katie wrote:
Every culture has sayings, many of which contradict each other. It’s very telling what we pick to highlight about other cultures, or all-out MAKE UP to highlight.
I immediately break out in hives when I read “an ancient Chinese proverb states that…” because I know it’s going to be some goddamn misappropriation.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 11:36 pm ¶
Lxy wrote:
A large part of this “Japanese/Asian conformism” meme is motivated by the predictable Orientalist attempt to cast the West as the embodiment of individualist freedom and the Orient as the negative opposite (conformist collectivism).
The irony, however, is this: America is nowhere near the “rugged individualist” nation that it likes to imagine itself.
The USA likes to promote a pseudo-individulism that is largely based upon lifestyle choices–as if getting a tribal tat or nose ring makes you an individual.
But in terms of more important issues of politics, the USA is extremely conformist and homogenous.
Just check out the non-differences between the Democrat and Republican parties, which are increasingly indistinguishable from each other.
As saying goes, American politics runs the gamut all the way from A to B.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 12:23 am ¶
BSK wrote:
xox-
Valid point, and I agree. But is ethnocentrism, and ideas that result from it, uniquely American?
On a different point, whether or not Japanese culture promotes conformity or interdependence or whatever other values held there is not so much the issue; rather, I think it is the way in which we discuss the potentially divergent cultural values held by other peoples. I am not downplaying the importance of having an accurate understanding of other cultures. Instead, I think it is important that we realize that *IF* these other cultures hold values different than our own, that does not make them inherently and objectively inferior or negative. There is obviously room to disagree on contrasting values and hopefully room for discussion. But the notion that any cultural value different than our own is negative or inferior is possibly the most worrisome implication of this type of thinking.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 12:40 am ¶
x0x wrote:
@BSK: True, but I can only speak from my own experience and infer from the what I hear and see from my peers (and sometimes read). Didn’t mean to be too general
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 1:19 am ¶
atlasien wrote:
@BSK:
Complaints about stereotyping don’t lead to inability to talk about cultural differences. Stereotyping/projecting/observer bias is simply the line between bad sociology and good sociology (and the social sciences in general).
I have nothing against non-stupid Japan experts, not matter what race or national origin, who make cross-cultural comparisons. Non-stupid experts tend to do things like collect and analyze statistics, examine historical data in context, conduct interviews, work in the field, recognize and try to account for the effects of observer bias.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 9:03 am ¶
Pickly wrote:
@Lxy: Just check out the non-differences between the Democrat and Republican parties, which are increasingly indistinguishable from each other.
This particular example is iffy to use, though, since the mechanics of how elections in the U.S. work will encourage big coalitions inside parties (as opposed ot lots of medium sized parties), and will push to candidates ot be relatively similar. (So it would be hard ot say whether this reflects a larger culture or an accident of how the government was designed.)
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 9:21 am ¶
little mixed girl wrote:
I can’t remember where I first heard “the nail that sticks up gets hammered down”.
It was probably in some book I checked out of the library in high school about doing business in Japan.
It might have come up once in my Japanese class, when we had to do short presentations on proverbs.
So, after reading this post, I tried to do a little research on the meaning of the proverb.
My Japanese isn’t as 1337 as I want it to be, but, with the help of my Japanese dictionary, it seems that the phrase is directed at meddling people and the like.
People that butt into others business, or people that are too show-offy are going to be put in their place (hammered down, perhaps?).
There certainly seems to be an element of conformity, but it also seems to cover a variety of things that are related to thinking about others before you act, and not just drawing attention to yourself for the heck of it.
Living in Japan as a foreigner, it’s quite easy to think of Japanese people as “them” who are all the same. I know I’ve fallen into that from time to time…especially when it feels like no one understands you.
Where am I going? I don’t know.
But, I do know that conformity isn’t limited to Japan (obviously).
Just look around at our political groupings.
If you identify as liberal (or conservative) and don’t agree with a laundry list of ideals, you’re effectively pushed out of the circle and rejected. We do more than enough pushing for conformity here…
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 9:53 am ¶
BSK wrote:
atlasien-
Great point. Your comment about the line between good sociology and bad sociology is spot on. I was thinking less about “experts” in the field (both good and bad) and more the common people. I’ll here people say, “Well, their culture encourages conformity.” My response usually is, “Well, not really, but, even if it did, so what? Is that necessarily a bad thing? It’s different than what ‘we’ do, but does that make it worse?” They usually respond that it does and that is generally where the conversation breaks down. That is entirely ethnocentric (getting back to xox’s point), but I feel it has more to do with individual’s own tendency to perceive their moral superiority and less of a specific inferior view of the other culture (though this is certainly a factor as well).
As a teacher, I was really inspired viewing the ways that Japanese schools I studied promoted interdependence. I would personally prefer to encourage more of that with my students, while also promoting the independence that I, and we as a country for the most part, value. Unfortunately, most colleagues see it in much the same way others have pointed out here, making it difficult to do.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 10:48 am ¶
method wrote:
@atlasien, I think everyone is agreed that essentialism = bad, and that one doesn’t have much of a grasp on reality if one thinks that “the West is about individuals, and the East is about the collective”. Isn’t there a space, however, between lazy essentialist thinking and collecting statistics and analyzing historical data? There’s a point at the end of the sociological study where the researcher has to make some kind of general claim, no matter how qualified. That’s the point when, as BSK says, you have to accept that other people have different values or a different worldview. Sometimes I feel we make the mistake of arguing that “X is good (in the West), so to say that another people is (tends to be) not-X is racist.”
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 12:41 pm ¶
johnjihoonchang wrote:
I stick up and get hammered down a lot here in the US.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 12:55 pm ¶
atlasien wrote:
@method: Why do you think I’m arguing against all generalizations of cultural difference? Communication is pretty much impossible without generalizations. I don’t hate generalizations. I just hate stupid generalizations.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 1:30 pm ¶
Lxy wrote:
This particular example is iffy to use, though, since the mechanics of how elections in the U.S. work will encourage big coalitions inside parties (as opposed ot lots of medium sized parties), and will push to candidates ot be relatively similar. (So it would be hard ot say whether this reflects a larger culture or an accident of how the government was designed.)
The bottom line is that the acceptable spectrum of political opinion in the USA is laughably narrow, as particularly embodied by the Republicrat party.
Other examples include the uncritical Mainstream acceptance of the American Establishment’s political line on things like the USA’s War on Terrorism (which is not about fighting terrorism) or the curious events of Sept. 11th.
That’s all a reflection of an American political culture and system that hypocritically never fails to promote itself as the epitome of fearless individualism and political pluralism.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 9:30 pm ¶
Christie wrote:
Good article – thanks.
@Atlasien – I also get really sick of the pervasive attitude that Japan is so wacky & “different”. The Western media work to spread this viewpoint, for whatever reason. I guess it sells(?), or they think it does. My parents have been to visit me here in Hokkaido numerous times, so they now know that Japan is not wacky, and they are able to give their views to their acquaintances back in Oregon – thank goodness, a little progress at a time.
The “nail that sticks up gets hammered down” saying is mentioned frequently on message boards of Westerners (usually white men) living in Japan. I usually find that whatever they say doesn’t ring true with my own experience and that of my husband or children.
Incidentally, in my own family’s experience, my older son is the type of kid that tends to stick out in a not-so-good way, and he had an equally hard time in 3 different grade schools — a white one in England, an international one in Japan, and a Japanese one in Japan. My younger son stands out sometimes, in his own way, but is much more socially skilled. He has done well in all the 3 aforementioned schools. I have not found any difference really between the environments of the 3 schools, in their reactions to my two children. I love my sons’ Japanese school. There *is* quite a lot of focus on working together as a group, but I think that’s really valuable. The kids are also being taught to give their opinions in front of the class, come up with their own ideas for how things work, etc., etc.
A good article I found about Japanese elem. school education is here:
http://www.childresearch.net/RESOURCE/RESEARCH/2000/MEMBER18.HTM
Another one:
http://www.ed.gov/pubs/ResearchToday/98-3038.html
Posted 23 Jul 2009 at 6:59 am ¶
dan wrote:
It’s pretty crazy how memes about Asian cultures can be started, even completely bogus ones. To this day I still see people take seriously that article where “mothers openly masturbate their sons in public” or where a mother saw her son masturbating and told him to use her body.
Posted 24 Jul 2009 at 6:10 am ¶
Jha wrote:
I’ve heard that proverb before, and knew that it was associated with conformity of some sort, but I don’t know if I ever really took it that way. Mostly because growing up, we were shown lots of pictures of how, if we stepped on a nail sticking out of a piece of wood on the ground wearing our thin slippers, we would get tetanus and die. So, hammering down a nail that’s sticking out is really just bloody common sense for the general safety of others because nails are dangerous, ya’ll.
Also, nails are pretty utilitarian. They’re supposed to hold things together, right? So, a nail that’s sticking out isn’t doing its job.
Not sure how conformity fits in here.
Posted 24 Jul 2009 at 6:17 pm ¶
Nick wrote:
The idea of individuality being a threat to social order is fairly old, and not restricted to any particular race, culture or ethnicity.
That said, I did tread on a nail when I was a toddler, and it hurt, as did the tetanus injection afterwards.
Not sure if you can extrapolate anything based on personal experience, but I never did walk on piles of wood without checking first.
Posted 26 Jul 2009 at 9:27 pm ¶