I
jokingly suggested to friends that Ruth Benedict's famous book the
Chrysanthemum and the Sword was improperly named, it should have been
the Cherry Blossom and the Dove. What I was trying to say was
that the Japanese people have a religion based on worship of the cherry
blossom and that they are, almost tragically, a pacifist nation, since
WWII.
All of which led me to reread Benedict's book. Ruth
Benedict wrote this book starting in 1944, during WWII, commissioned by
the U.S. military to answer the question of how the Japanese would
behave after their defeat in the war. She was the greatest
anthropologist of her age, but she had never visited Japan, nor had any
other anthropologist (one exception was John Embree who had lived in a
small Japanese village for less than a year several decades earlier). Benedict
relied on books, films, interviews with Japanese Americans and with
Japanese prisoners of war.
I have visited Japan nearly every year for more than 37 years. I had read Benedict early in my visits.
It
is after 37 years that I can both appreciate her brilliant work and the
discipline of anthropology. Though I have read a few rotten
anthropology books (Bestor on the Tsukiji fish market was really bad) anthropology is
a powerful tool for understanding culture. Benedict learned in a few
short years, with nothing more than her experience and methodology
what I have carefully observed and confirmed in many decades of careful
intimate study. She got both the grand picture right and the details
right down to the attitude of mothers toward childhood masturbation
(approved).
I recommend Ruth Benedict to any and all
anthropologists, any and all people interested in Japan and any and all
people who wish to understand the world. Japan is still the second
largest economy and no other country is even close.