An Anthropological Lifetime in Japan: The Writings of Joy Hendry

714 Pages·2016·7.21 MB·English

by  Joy Hendry

An Anthropological Lifetime in Japan

An Anthropological Lifetime
in Japan
The Writings of Joy Hendry
Edited and Introduced by
Joy Hendry
LEIDEN | BOSTON
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016960224
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isbn 978-90-04-30286-0 (hardback)
isbn 978-90-04-30287-7 (e-book)
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Contents
Introduction 1
Fieldwork
1 From Scrambled Messages to an Impromptu Dip: Serendipity in
Finding a Field Location 19
2 The Paradox of Friendship in the Field: Analysis of a Long-Term
Anglo-Japanese Relationship 34
Marriage and Some Early Theoretical Contributions
3 Is Science Maintaining Tradition in Japan? 49
4 The Modification of Tradition in Modern Japanese Weddings and
Some Implications for the Social Structure 60
5 Tomodachi kō: Age-Mate Groups in Northern Kyushu 67
6 Shoes: The Early Learning of an Important Distinction in Japanese
Society 80
7 “The Fix” in Japanese Society 89
8 Marriage and the Family in Modernising Japan 102
9 The Continuing Case of Japan 123
Child Rearing and Education
10 Becoming Japanese: A Social Anthropological View of Child-
Rearing 139
11 Kindergartens and the Transition from Home to School
Education 156
vi CONTENTS
12 Peer Pressure and Kindergartens in Japan 164
13 Children’s Contests in Japan 177
14 St Valentine and St Nicholas Travel Abroad: Success and
Internationalisation in Japanese Education 189
15 Individualism and Individuality: Entry into a Social World 201
16 Bags, Objects and Education in Japan 216
17 Material Objects and Mathematics in the Life of the Japanese Primary
School Child 226
Politeness, Housewives and the Wrapping Idea
18 The Use and Abuse of Politeness Formulae: Some Social
Implications 241
19 Respect, Solidarity or Contempt? Politeness and Communication in
Modern Japan 250
20 Humidity, Hygiene, or Ritual Care: Some Thoughts on Wrapping as a
Social Phenomenon 256
21 To Wrap or not to Wrap: Politeness and Penetration in Ethnographic
Inquiry 273
22 The Armour of Honorific Speech: Some Lateral Thinking about
Keigo 294
23 Politeness and Formality in Japanese Social Relations 302
24 Order, Elegance and Purity: The Life of the Professional
Housewife 321
25 Honorifics as Dialect: The Expression and Manipulation of
Boundaries in Japanese 338
CONTENTS vii
26 The Role of the Professional Housewife 352
27 Wrapping and Japanese Presentation: Is this Waste or Care? 368
28 The Sacred Power of Wrapping 383
Cultural Display
29 Gardens and the Wrapping of Space in Japan: Some Benefits of a
Balinese Insight 403
30 Nature Tamed: Gardens as a Microcosm of Japan’s View of the
World 412
31 Who is Representing Whom? Gardens, Theme Parks and the
Anthropologist in Japan 435
32 Pine, Ponds and Pebbles: Gardens and Visual Culture 450
33 The Whole World as Heritage? Foreign Country Theme Parks
in Japan 468
34 Foreign Country Theme Parks: A New Theme or an Old Japanese
Pattern? 476
35 The Japanese Tattoo: Play or Purpose? 496
36 Old Gods, New Pilgrimages: A Whistle-stop Tour of Japanese
International Theme Parks 511
37 Shakespeare on Show in Japan: An Anthropological Analysis of
Cultural Display 522
38 “The Past, Foreign Countries and Fantasy . . . They All Make for a Good
Outing:” Staging the Past in Japan and Some Other Locations 539
viii CONTENTS
Some Sundry Contributions
39 Nursing in Japan 557
40 Food as Social Nutrition? The Japanese Case 566
41 Drinking and Gender in Japan 573
42 The Ritual of the Revolving Towel 587
43 The Chrysanthemum Continues to Flower: Ruth Benedict and Some
Perils of Popular Anthropology 603
44 Building Bridges, Common Ground, and the Role of the
Anthropologist 618
Summing Up
45 Japan and Pacific Anthropology: Some Ideas for New Research 643
46 Learning that Emerges in Times of Trouble: A Few Cases from
Japan 657
47 Forty Years of Research and Teaching on Japan: A Personal
Trajectory 670
Joy Hendry’s Full Bibliography 693
Index 699
Introduction
Having spent more than half of my life working in and writing about Japan,
I was delighted when Paul Norbury asked me if I would like to bring together
some of my papers in this collected volume. Many of the articles I wrote as
a young, aspiring academic were not well placed for later access, and read-
ing them through for this project, I realised that I had often spent much more
time on them than I was able to do for papers I wrote once I had taken up
a teaching position. Those old papers may not break new ground in a world
that has moved on since then, but it is nice to place them in the context of the
changing arena that Japan has been, and also to have documented some of
the things that didn’t change, despite the expectations of convergence theo-
rists. The book also offers me the opportunity to show how apparently dispa-
rate subjects drew one on another as my time as a researcher (and an individual
moving through my own life) developed over the years. This introduction will
explain how I came to the field in the first place, how the Japanese side of my
life opened out into such a wonderful source of exciting topics to document,
and then how I have now moved on into looking at broader global issues.
Early Influences
Born in October 1945, a few weeks after the end of World War II, my life span has
coincided almost completely with Japan’s post-war reconstruction, although it
took me until adulthood to understand the significance of this coincidence.
I was delivered by caesarean section to a medical family, and understood from
an early age that as my older brother had also been born in this way, I would
not have existed without the modern techniques that enabled my mother to
survive such an intervention. This is probably relevant in that I chose to devote
my first degree to science, perhaps also inspired by the fact that the operation
was carried out by Dame Hilda Lloyd, the first woman gynaecologist to head
the Royal College of Gynaecologists and Obstetricians. That a woman should
have a career was taken for granted in my family then, but it was only later that
I came to discover the excitement of the study of language, anthropology or
even history!
My encounter with Japan was a little unusual, too, and this I will shortly
recount, but I think that one more story of my early childhood might help to
inform the approach I eventually chose. My father had served as a medical
officer in the British army in the war, including a period in Burma where he
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