Written by Mio Taguchi, a Japanese Moraine Valley International student who has a thirst for knowledge in a variety of subjects. Mio says he wrote this essay through the lens of cultural anthropology in search of better understanding.
When people try to acquire a new language at the beginning, most of them tend to think and translate it to their native language. I had always wondered that when I thought about the word, “responsibility.” Translating from English into Japanese did not make sense. Responsibility is called sekinin in Japanese. I asked my American host mother to give me some examples of how the word responsibility is used.
She said, “It is your responsibility to brush your teeth as an adult.” This sentence becomes a strange meaning when translating to Japanese with sekinin. Japanese do not use sekinin in that case. They would say it is usual or common sense to brush your teeth as an adult. I asked her for another example. For instance, I ask you where the library is, but you tell me the wrong direction, and I could not find the library. In the Japanese case, we can say it is your (the person who told me the way’s) responsibility, (sekinin) although it depends on our relationship because strict hierarchy exists in Japanese society. However, the host mother said, “No, it is your responsibility. Because you were going there, you had to search by yourself.” Of course, if when I made a mistake in my job, I can say it is my responsibility in American culture and sekinin in Japanese culture also. The two words have totally the same nuance in that case such as work places. However, when Japanese use sekinin, we always include or assume others. Put another way, there are always more than two people or one community, and if you do not carry out your responsibility, this will influence them badly. That is indicated by the example of the library when you consider it in Japanese culture. On the other hand, when Americans use responsibility, often, they do not include others, and that is proved by another example-brushing your teeth which includes only one person.
I call American responsibility “not included-responsibility” and call Japanese responsibility (sekinin) “included-responsibility”. These two different things appear in our national character. Americans’ opinions and ways of expression are stronger than Japanese. In short, they tend to cherish themselves. Differently, Japanese are taught from birth how to behave, be polite and kind to others, and implicitly doing self-sacrifice. Moreover, most Japanese feel that paying attention to others’ eyes is very stiff and painful although these behaviors are often praised by foreign people. Japanese people will feel that they are ashamed or be excluded from a community if they do not consider whether their behaviors influence others before they do anything. Americans live their lives, based on individualism (not included-responsibility). Unlike Americans, Japanese live their lives, based on groupism (included-responsibility).
These examples are from small perspectives, but I can state the same thing from big perspectives: country or state level. Often, Japan and American are contrasted as a big government and a small government. Japan is called a welfare state also. In Japan, anyone can receive high-quality medical care with a cheap cost or without any cost. Differently, in the U.S, the cost that they actually pay for medical care is the most expensive in developed countries (OECD Health Date 2016). Moreover, in the U.S, there is a big gap between the people who have a lot of money and the people who do not. Also, sometimes, the people who are adept can obtain more benefits. For instance, the students in the U.S. who have high GPA scores can obtain some scholarships that they do not have to pay back. Regarding the differences between the Japanese government and the American one, I could state the former is “the implicit democracy country”, and I could state the latter is merit-based or “As you sow, so you reap”.
When I consider from micro and macro perspectives like the second to the fourth paragraph, I can recognize a kind of consistency in both perspectives, and these attributes appear in only one word, responsibility and sekinin. In other words, this shows the strong and profound relationship between a culture and a language. Nowadays, we can take advantage of developed technology for translating, and some people say that we do not have to acquire a new language because we can search and translate words that we do not know free with some machines. However, if we hope to communicate and interact with foreign people, not only literally, but also deeply and profoundly, learning a new language has wonderful significance. More importantly, we never appreciate one culture and one foreign person without its language.
Finally Thank you very much for reading this until the end. I appreciate how important learning a language is through this writing. I would like you to share consider about: what are words or expression which represent American personality or English speaker’s’ personality. Secondly, like the title, Why We Cannot Understand Each Other, this is also my question. Do you think having a common language is an important or crucial factor for humans to empathize with each other and unite? and why or why not ?