Sunday, November 11, 1956
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
pe SA1/d.
rage even
Japanese arriages
All IIusbands Are Not Masters, All Wires Not Meek Servants
I
By HITROSIii WAGATSUMA additional item. a French mistress. tionally depends upon her. He.
() e. a student of anthropoog nd hs thus made the paradise may be willful to hero do a son z
pri narily interested in North to his nther. this pianern m
American Illitns and rather na- On the other hand, the tapa-i
ire hout Japan, cime up to mn nese tusband usually receives lit- look like a master-serant pattern
and said. "t J nno I have read le credit. He is arrogant, willful on the surface, but it is basically
Bn 'You know.kI ose Jasd toward his wifes. never helps hert different. There is a band of love
RuttsB Hedes bank on J itsar mp 'suc Isi ssien ebetshr etace hui isband and wife, anrd{
I thnk its n excellent, fasciat tust sits at horme and expects to he ite oten takes initirtie,
ing work." be served by her, like a master oherste o tiy ecause
I . repl , ?" ,i. He tie its her like a servant, a overtly or covertly, because her
domestic animal, or a tool, and husband is basically dependent
er ncomfortshle arnd susprcors abandons her like a worn-out ,hoe upon her. What she does for her
as I always do sren people seem if he finds her disagreeable. H husband is not a servant's serv-
to be "fasciniated" by that Ilahor-H
ion-, but acn r-edicyha nis r- must be the constant object of ice to master but something sirni-
ios, but very much misleading dread and contempt for American lar to a mother's warm care of
work. women and might be an object of her son Her attitude toward her
He continued. You know. I've the guilty envy of American men. husband's willfulness, if he shows
found a few questionable parts in Is this picture correct? it, is not a slavery obedience and
that book, though." submission but something like In-
I said "Yeah?" again, thirsin wonder how an American reader ternal acceptance.
he should find a lot of questions reacts to the following: "The A middle-aged college professor
rather than a few, way of woman is to obey others is one example I know. He hands
To my distress, he askted' "Would When she talks with her bus- his salary and payment for writin-
you really say (as Benedict says) band, she should be- courteous, to his wife, untouched. In Japan,
that most of you Japanese men humble and obedient in her ex- payment often comes in the form
have at some time visited geisha pression, manner, and tone of her of cash in sealed envelopes, which-
or prostitutes and such visits are voice. She should not be disobed- 1 are always opened by he wife. She
not in the least surreptitious, and ient or impatient . . , if her hus- - examines his purse every night,-
your wife dresses and prepares you band gives her a lesson, she should adds some money and keeps the
for your evening of relaxation and obey . . . if he is angry, she should sum constant. Not that she is
when the house you visit sends a be fearful and should not argue.., stingy (then she would be divorc-
bill to your wife. she pays it as a 'her hsrsd is heavin for her . . ed), but her husband leaves to
matter of course?" she should not be jealous . . , if she her such troublesome business as
is jealous, her manner becomes im- bookkeeping. During conversa-
y wife was also once asked by modest, will annoy her husband tions with him, I often felt ma-
a student of an Eastern wo- and she will be abandoned . . . ternal warmth in her sight direct-
man's college, this time with an She should never go anywhere ed towards her husband.
indignant tone of feminine protest, without the permission of her hus- My friend, a young college pro-
"HBow can you Japanese women j band. (Don't get discouraged, keep f essor, and his much younger wife,
ever tolerate such brutality and going.) is another example. My college
unfaithfulness in men?" It turned "There are seven bad acts-if a classmate, now a banker, and his
out that the same passage in Miss wife does any of them she should wife is a third. Perhaps I should
Benedict's book was responsible be divorced: one, being disobedient add that these husbands do not
again. to her parents-in-law; two, being always demand that their mother-
The mistake is that childless, because her husband wives take care of them. They are
h distae no t sat e y ao -utes married her to ha e csildren all modern hosbands. They never
and eish arenotthe ame nd(however, if her hush-and'o mistressl allow their wives to carry a suit-
shrould not be carelessly put to has children she does not have to case or heavy stuff when they go
geisha by "or," Althouh marry be divorced); three, being loose; out together. They never step in-
geisha have their patrons, be- four, being stingy; five, having a' to a bus before their wives. They
. bad disease; six, bemg loquatious, even wash dishes and cook meals'
though ti-e lowest rank geisha is
nho methan a prostitute the pribecause if she talks too much tho ugh only light meals) when
nomretanaprsit , th c--
Mary job of a geiha is to enter- -immodestly, she causes trouble; their wives painfully bruise their
- seven, being thieving . . . the wo- fingers or have a bad cold. They,
an gb seing ke and siasring man's mind has bad propersitiestake good care of their wives,
o toward disobedience, anger and re- somewhat like good sons.
Unfortunately, from my point serstment, speaking ill of others,
of view, the traditional Japanese jealousy and grudging, imprud- y belief is that this mother-son'
pattern has been such that import- ence. Most women have them, pattern is found in overt form
ant business or political negotia-- therefore, thsey are inferior to men largely in the urban middle class
tion is conducted or prepared at a- A woman should reflect on herself while the servant-master pattern
sake party, where geisha are usu- ard try to correct them . . remains in the traditional upper
ally called in. Therefore, men in I can almost see the triumphant class and rural farming commiuni-
bersirsess and the politic 1ortd smile of the self-confident Ameri- ties, especially in South Kyushu
do visit, de facto geisha, if you can soran. h-oever, tis quot and Northeastern Honshu, where
ant to put it that say. It ts a comes from a book written in the the traditional social pattern is
part of a man s work (as business early 18th century for women's still strong. I said previousy that
and polities are work in Japan), education, Onna-daigaku. It was this mother-son pattern may or
just as o ng to a business n-t widely read in the feudal ages of may not look like the masrer-
theon or cckt party is work in the 18th and 19th centuries and servanitpattern on the surface. My
the United States. Ialso aiter' Japan was opened to friends cases certainly don't. But4
And Japanese wives do prepare Western civilization. I suspect that the reason is that even in such
their husrrands for going out on in the feudal ages, among aristo- cases which take entirely the out-
business. They will pay bills just crats, warriors, landowners and big look of master-servant pattern, the
as an American wife might pay merchants, there lived many wives husband being overtly arrogant, f
her husband's luncheon bill as a disciplined by Onna-daigaku, and dictatorial, the wife being overtly-
matter of ionrse many husbands who took advant- submissive, subservient, there
However, the men who can af- age of them. seems to be many "hidden" nmoth-
ford or have the privilege of vis- In pre-war Japan., the spirit of er-son patterns. I say this partly
itino geisha in this way are ex- Onna-daigaku was strongly advo from my own observation, and
ceptional. Of course, I am not say-i cated and kept producing the ser- pintly from a knowledge of scien-
ing that no men visit geisha fur varit-wives and master-husbands, tific investigations.
other purposes. They do. And the especially among landowners, big A Harvard anthropologist, using
poorer men visit prostitutes. Then businessmen and old, traditional a psychological gimmick called!
things are different. Japanese men families. But this was never as TAT, made a study on the Japa-
have to hide such dishonorable be- widespread as it appeared. I thmik nese Americans in Chicago and
haviour from their wives, just as that a general misconception, held found among the first generation
the men of any country must do. within and without Japan, is that C tion is supposed to be very tra-
such master-husband-servant-wife immigrants, whose value orienta-I
At any rate. the important impli- relationships were a predominant ditional, on the same line as the
cation in Miss Benedict's ob pattern of marital relations. Onna-daigaku, a strong tendency
servation is the same as that well1 However, that the doctrine towards the husband being emo-
known reputation of the Japa which called for master-husband tionally dependent upon his wife
nese wife-quiet and attractive and servant-wife was predorin- despite, or thanks to, the tradi-
(as a doll), subservient and self- ant may not necessarily mean that tionally prescribed dominant role
less (as a slave)- who, according such husbands and wives actually he plays. A husband may domin-
to Lafcadio Hearn, is the most predominated. ate his wife, she may be overtly
wonderful aesthetic product of Ja- And I think they itid not. submissive to him: but she does
pan, the ethical creation before not feel dependent on her hus--
which criticism should hold its hat, then, is another possible band.
breath, where no single fault s' ret tionship? One I would call
found save the fault of a moral the mother-son pattern. A wife lhe reader who still cannot be-
charm unsuited to any world thinks of her husband and takes liev my version of the mas-
where selfishness and struggle ex good care of him just as a mother r ter-servant pattern, is invited to,
1st. does for her son, Het busband listen to the conversation of two
The reader may know a joke like a son toward his mother, emo- Japanese women held about 201
about man's ram rcise on earth: years ago.
to have a Jopammse -ife, live in Mr. Wa'atsuma, a psychology A-A middle aged suffragette,
a Western-style '01sti rot gradbate If the Usiv-rsiy or graduate of a leading Japa-
cowboy) home and mat Chun T1ky, i - doing -rdumte wmrk i nese woman's college, MA
food. We Japarnee tushn ne m oiioura snehup tisy, ale is - from an American college,
the United States r -ironorably Pmeident if the Jainese Stu- ! certainly unmarried. Heavy
entitled to enjoy at Ci', ath dent Club on campvs. smoking h a b i t, wearing
someone has recently ut in u1!i' glasses, bob hair cut.
H-A middle aged wife of a col-
lege professor of English lit-
erature, mother of two
daughters and a son, cer -
tainly with no job, Always
wears kimono.
A: "For instance, if you want to
take something down from a
shelf, too high for you, how
do you ask your husband to
help you?"
B: "Well, what would I say? I
never ask for his help. I
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