Argument Culture and Harmony Culture--a study of phatic communication in Japanese-- (Draft--comments appreciated)

Japan has been perceived by many researchers as culturally unique, where people behave abiding by the principle of verticality (Nakane 1970), collectively and harmoniously. This view has been challenged in recent studies (e.g., Krauss, Rohlen and Steinhoff 1984 and Rosenberger1992): There are many social phenomena that the harmony view cannot explain. Most of the existing studies of Japanese culture have been based on the personal observations and anecdotes from direct or indirect experiences of researchers or on the Japanese words and phrases seemingly expressing a uniquely Japanese way of thinking. In the present study I attempt to show that more empirically founded studies of culture are not only possible but also very useful and necessary particularly if we are to understand how the culture of hannony and hierarchy has been produced and reproduced and where in the Japanese life conflict exist: I will first summarize the points of my previous work, claiming that Japanese, unlike languages such as English, is a hyper-phatic language; Next, I will discuss some of the features of the phatic communication in more detail placing them in the perspective of recent theories of conversational and discourse analysis. The findings support the characterization of Japanese culture as a harmony culture and show exactly what kinds of linguistic strategies are utilized to maintain harmony. I will suggest in the conclusion that harmony is nevertheless only one dimension of the Japanese culture