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Monsicha Hoonsuwan Language and Culture B Professor Machida 8 July 2010 Japanese Culture as Reflected in the Japanese Language Recently, the world has seen the surge in popularity of a relativism theory, as opposed to the universalism theory. Relativists generally call for an acceptance of cultural differences and believe strongly that the others shall not infringe upon ones culture due to these differences. In the field of linguistic relativism, scholars believe that the differences in language reflect the different views of different people (Stafford). A prominent theory associated with this view is the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, named after an American linguist Edward Sapir and his student Benjamin Lee Whorf. They stressed linguistic determinism or the idea that a language one speaks affects ones cognitive process; thus, influencing a worldview distinctive to others who speak a different language. Although this paper is inspired by Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, in no way does it claim that language influences culture or vice versa, as making such statement would be controversial and require more than casual, superficial observation of the native Japanese speakers. Yet, it does not deny that language and culture are deeply intertwined; understanding a culture may ease the process of learning the language, the language itself also reflects the cultural value held by the speaker. Thus, this report attempts to briefly explain the fundamental aspects of Sapir-Whorf hypothesis and its applicability using examples from the Japanese language. Many scholars believe that the differences in thoughts and experience of human beings originate from the differences in language. In their perception, each language embodies a worldview, leading people who speak different languages to think about the

world in varied waysperhaps through the lexicon and grammatical structure. This is the essence of Sapir-Whorf hypothesesor sometimes known merely as Whorf hypotheses because Whorf, seen as the main proponent of the hypothesis, had published his observations on the way he perceived linguistic differences as having an effect on human cognition. His idea has, of course, been widely criticized, generating as many supporters as oppositions; they argue that human beings are capable of perceiving things that are not listed in their lexicon, and that language is not the main attribution to the differences in worldviews. Fundamentally, the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis can be summed up into two claims: linguistic diversity and linguistic influence on thought. According to Swoyer, linguistic diversity refers to the fact that languagesespecially from different language familiesdiffer significantly from one another. The second claim, which is the controversial one, involves the belief that the grammatical structure and lexicon of ones language influence how one sees the world (Swoyer, 2003). However, the hypothesis is not entirely discredited, as there are two ways in which it can be interpreted. The more radical way suggests that a language determines how one sees the world through linguistic categorization, which then works in concurrent with ones cognition. There is, yet, little empirical evidence that support this view, although it is highly appealing. Whorf is a strong proponent of this view, although his teacher, Sapir, frankly rejected such pure linguistic determinism. On the other side of the spectrum lies a more moderate interpretation states that linguistic categorization and usage influence thought and certain non-linguistic behaviors. It is this moderate view that this paper is based upon. Although there is no clear evidence to show that language does influence thoughts, there is certainly a relationship between both. As Maynard described: Because our understanding of language depends on the characteristics and the use of language, different languages bring different issues to the fore (Maynard, 1997).

To understand how speakers of different languages with different cultural backgrounds acquire different mental modelspicturesof the world, Lamb investigates the neuro-cognitive interplay between languages and thought and introduces unity fallacy as a part of semantic mirage. This unity fallacy is the illusion that a concept represents a unified object, which must be either present or absent as a whole in a given situation, rather than a (sometimes haphazard) collection of phenomena of the kaleidoscopic flux (Lamb, 2000). Since infancy, a persons mental model is constructed based on the strategy of simplification; therefore, it involves imperfection. As a person grows up through socialization, the mental model is further distorted according to the culture it is in. Hence, one can appreciate how people who grow up in different cultures can have totally different views of the world, and the different views are reflected in the language structures. Again, however, language spoken may not be the main reasons for the varying views, though one cannot deny that language and culture are almost inseparable. This mental model theory and Sapir-Whorf hypothesisits most basic claim: No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached (Sapir, 1929). Based on the studies of Imai and Gentner (1997) and Imai (2000), there are syntactic differences between the English and Japanese languages. In English, there is a concept of countable and uncountable nouns, which cannot be directly modified by numerals. For example, native English speakers do not say a beer or a bread but instead use classifiers such as a glass and a loaf to modify these uncountable nouns respectively. Countable nouns, on the other hand, will be preceded by articles a, an, the for singulars and the will be pluralized for plurals. In contrast, Japanese people do not necessarily use classifiers to express quantities, as there is no concept of countable and

uncountable nouns. Therefore, it is common for Japanese people to say here is book or here is water. When quantity is expressed, all nouns in Japanese behave like uncountable nouns and are modified by numerals plus classifier. (Cook, Bassetti, Kasai, Sasaki, & Takahashi, 2006). Japanese speakers fall back on material responses as a default in the absence of a syntactic distinction between mass and count nouns, whereas the English speakers have to constantly decide whether something is an object or a substance in order to apply the correct mass/count noun distinction (Cook, Bassetti, Kasai, Sasaki, & Takahashi, 2006) Such is a difference between the noun concept acquired by native Japanese speakers and native English speakers. This difference is emphasized by an experiment conducted by Cook et al., which attempted to investigate whether acquiring English influences Japanese speakers categorization of objects and substances by shape or material. The research shows that, although there was a stronger bias towards either shape or material for 10 objects used in the experiment, the subjects overall conformed to the expectation: Japanese speakers would prefer material responses for simple objects and substances but not for complex objects (Cook, Bassetti, Kasai, Sasaki, & Takahashi, 2006). This result seems to suggest that speakers of different languages categorize differently in terms of simple objects, although there was no indication that language causes this difference. Nevertheless, there is a strong correlation that mass/count distinction is the source of differences in the classification of simple objects. Another interesting aspect is the speakers viewpoint (Obana, 2010) embodied in the Japanese language. According to Obana, the speakers viewpoint is the way a speaker observes phenomena when describing them in the linguistic terms (Obana, 2010). In other words, the speakers viewpoint is the point of reference the speaker uses to describe a

phenomenon. One always looks at a social phenomenon with a certain perspective. If a person considers himself or herself a part of the social phenomenon, he or she will describe it in relation to oneself; therefore, it seems subjective. However, if a person doesnt consider oneself a part of the situation, he or she will describe the occurrence from a condescending point of viewas if one is God looking at what is happening from the skymaking the description seemingly objective. To apply this concept with the Japanese language, the examples concerning the usage of (iku) and (kuru) will be used. These two Japanese words are translated as go and come in English respectively, and are commonly used in daily conversations. However, the usage of and are not limited to the situations involving movements of a person or an object, but also extended to the movement of actions. This may seem a little incomprehensible in English, as in English, come and go are used as a lone verb describing the action itself. For example, I will come here after finishing my report is commonly used in English conversations. However, in Japanese, one can say This sentence can be literally translated by incorporating the word come as I will return come after I finished my report This translation is somewhat inaccurate as the word here does not literally mean come per se, but instead means back. Therefore, it is important for Japanese language learners to thoroughly understand that the concept of come and go, which are used to describe the movement toward and away from the speaker respectively. In contrast, an English sentence may go somewhat like this: The teacher told me to come to her class.

This is the actual sentence expressed by a native English speaker when trying to explain the particular situation. However, to translate this sentence into Japanese, the word come would be replaced by the world which, as mentioned, is the equivalent of go because the action isnt toward the speaker. Therefore, it can be concluded that the speakers of Japanese and English stand at different places while observing social phenomena. In English, a speaker describe the situation as come because a speaker is looking at the phenomena from a third-person point of view as she narrated the storyalthough the situation involved her. Of course, looking from a third person point of view does not mean a person is looking from a completely separate view, but in fact means that a person is looking from a third-person view that is flexible and can be assimilated with the rest. In this case, a speaker is talking from a view of a teacher; therefore, come is used. However, in Japanese, this flexible view does not exist. One always has to use oneself as a reference when trying to describe a phenomenon in Japanese. That is, everything happens in relation to the speaker. If the teacher tells to a Japanese speaker to visit a class, a speaker will imagine oneself going toward the teachers class while recollecting the story, leading the speaker to choose the word go over come. Many learners of Japanese who have prior experience in English often struggle with trying to select the appropriate usage of and . Same goes for and which indicate the same meaning in English givebut embody different directional nuances. (ageru) is used when a speaker is the main subject of the action and is giving something toward the other person. Meanwhile, when the other person switch roles and become the main subject of the sentence, and a speaker becomes the receiver, the word (kureru) is used to indicate that the other person is giving a speaker something. For example:

1) (watashi wa samu ni hon wo ageta) I gave a book to Sam. 2) (samu ha watashi ni hon wo ageta) Sam gave me a book. In example 1, the use of shows than the direction of giving is moving away from the speaker, while in example 2, the direction is moving toward the speaker. Thus, it is another example of how Japanese people place their viewpoints on when describing the situation. One may argue that it is natural for a speaker of any language to place his or her own viewpoint on the I-person. Yet, in English, it is possible that a speaker to describe a situation without imposing oneself on the I-person. As given in the example 1 and 2, the translations of both sentences are the same in grammatical structure and word use. The word give is still the main action. The unchanged grammatical structure suggests that the speaker is looking at the situation from an outsiders point of view, therefore, the direction of giving is not dependent on where the speaker is in the situation; thus, no significant structural changes in word use and grammar. In Japan, the speakers view follows the I-person, and so does grammatical construction (Obana, 2010). Nevertheless, this does not indicate that Japanese people are more subjective than English speakers, as subjective comments are expressed through different word usage and grammatical structure. These examples merely suggest that the perspective of a Japanese speaker when looking at a social phenomena is different than that of the English speakers. From these reasons, it is possible to argue that a language does reflect some cultural aspects of its speakers. This cultural aspect is the way in which one conceptualize the objects and situations around them. Considering that Japanese language does not distinguish between countable and uncountable nouns, one can carefully assume that when Japanese people talk

about particular objects, they do not contemplate the countable or uncountable characteristics of the objects. Moreover, Japanese people also place themselves within a situation when describing social phenomena instead of outside the situationas English speakers may do. This, of course, does not suggest that Japanese people are more subjective than English speakers, or that language affect their cognitive process and their conceptualization of the world. Instead, it suggests that the Sapir-Whorf theory is applicable to a certain extent, in terms of relations between language and culture. The more moderate interpretation of the Sapir-Whorf states that the categorization encoded in a particular language may influence thought and some non-linguistic behaviors. As thoroughly explained in this paper, there is a slight relationship between the way language is expressed and the conceptualization of the objects and social phenomenon. Therefore, it would be incorrect to entirely discredit the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.

Bibliography
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