Unit 2

English 203:  Literature of the NonWestern World

Introduction: 

Read:
Chinese Book of Songs,
Norton Anthology, pp: 527-45.

Self: You may think that the sense of self is universal.  Actually the "self" is both a bio-developmental accomplishment & the product of a specific culture that defines or offers various identities.  Strangely, one cannot develop a self without having developed a social identity that is largely defined by the culture in which one grows up.  You might be interested in how different the Japanese sense of self is, being largely based on Confucian ethics. Follow the link to read selections from Ruth Benedict's study of Japanese culture:

Japanese Identity

Actually these distinctions are more true of Japan than of China where 50 years or more of Communism has erased the institutional & visible forms of Buddhism.  In Japan the mixture is little different.  Shinto takes the place of Taoism.  Although both outlooks are very much concerned with nature, there are significant differences.  Confucianism is such a pervasive and historically lengthy cultural influence that most Chinese & Japanese people will scoff at the question, "are you Confucian?"  When you ask this, they have in mind a very old-fashioned image of ritualized Confucian life.  It would be somewhat comparable to asking a Westerner if he is a Catholic monk, thinking that this is the contemporary form of Christian life.  If a person  is Chinese or Japanese, he is also Confucian, because Chinese & Japanese culture are Confucian in a way similar to how Western culture is Christian.  Whether a Western belongs to a Christian denomination & regularly goes to church is not the test of being a (Christian) Westerner, in this sense.  Westerners are characterized by being concerned about human rights, believing in the sanctity of the individual ego/person, & believing in universal standards of behavior.  These are historically grounded in Western Christianity.

Here is a kind of anecdotal illustration of how identity is constructed from a Confucian view.  Imagine that we are all monkeys swinging in the trees.  One day a few monkeys climb down to invent new games.  This is not a command from God, nor a brilliant perception of scientific truth.  The attraction is that the new games are more sophisticated.  They offer a more elegant life than that of swinging in the trees.  Let's image that the game they invent is basketball.  We sketch out a court, erect a hoop, & bicker with each other as we play.  Then one day Michael Jordan shows up.  Now we really know how to play the game, because his performance is authoritative.  Once again, what he does is not prophetic, nor is it an announcement of some truth or theory.  Jordan's authority is purely performative.  He is elegant.  That is why we want to "be like Mike."  That is why many young people adulate him, following his every gesture.  His formal performance establishes a ritual (li) that others seek to imitate before imagining that they might creatively surpass it.

The Confucian hierarchy is not democratic.  It sketches a meritocracy.  The only person worth listening to (for example, when you are physically ill) is someone who has demonstrated that they know what they are doing (such as, in this example, a licensed physician).  The contemporary world offers thousands of games to play.  Most of these are complex enough to foster subcultures or expert communities.  Ancient China specified 5 games that distinguished human beings from monkeys:

• Parent/child relationship.  A child respects its parents, being deferential, grateful, & obedient.  A monkey knows only it own immediate desires.
• Emperor/citizen.  Like one's parents, the Emperor has invited you to play sophisticated, elegant, & interesting games.  You have been given the benefits of civilization without earning them.  Patriotic gratitude characterizes the human being above the monkey who is only interested in "what's in it for me?"
• Spouses.  Remember that almost all marriages are arranged.  Marriage is not very much about your feelings.  It is about fiscal, social, & political alliance.  It is about prestige.  Naturally it is about children.  Above all, it is about family continuity & heritage.  You owe your parent, grandparents, etc. healthy, educated children who will carry on the legacy of the family.  How you romantically feel about your spouse is your own private feeling.  No one else is much interested.  Do your duty.
• Elder brother.  He was being groomed to become "boss" or custodian of the extended family.  Today much of this relationship has shifted to one's employer.  In Japan, twice a year you give your boss/supervisor presents to express your gratitude for being taken care of, for being given the opportunity to earn a living.
• Age.  Most people are illiterate & there is not a great deal of scientific or abstract theory.  Age & accomplishment should have some association.  The idea is that older people are usually worth listening to for advice, guidance, & history.

Duty: As you know, the Western outlook starts with the premise of inherent rights.  Much of our social experience prompts us to be concerned about safeguarding our rights & freedom.  No one has any innate rights in Asia.  As in our basketball game, one learns to play social roles.  Apart from these, identity cannot be construed.  It makes no sense to imagine that you have some primal identity that precedes learning language & other social games.  What would such an identity be?  It could not have a form.  All forms/games are the product of socialization.  In any case, the emphasis in Asia is on duty, not rights.  The moral person is the one who struggles to do his duty & meet his obligations.  The monkey who simply enjoys himself is contemptible; not entirely human, much less elegant.

Status: Naturally money offered a scale to measure status in Asia.  But it is a crude, peasant measure that ignores elegance, skill, charm.  Our text says:
In contrast to other ancient literary cultures, which begin with epics, prose, legends, or hymns to the gods, the Chinese tradition begins with lyric poetry (534).
These poems were prized, not because they offered simple, lyric innocence or charm, such as the Nefrus/Mehy Egyptian poem (47) -- even though most of the poems in the Book of Songs are love poems.  The Book of Songs offered a game.  One must first memorize it, then analyze it, because:
Citation of one of the poems was often used to clinch a point in an argument or, more subtly, to express an opinion that one would rather not say openly.  As with Homer's epics in early Greece, knowledge of the Book of Songs was considered an essential part of cultural education in early China.
This is still not blunt enough.  One dominated others in elite social situations by being deft & creative in making exactly the right allusion or quoting the most apt line for the Book of Songs, somewhat like the Western "game" of quoting the most appropriate passage from the Bible.  There is still a difference in focus.  With the Bible, attention is fixed on God or the Word of God.  The Book of Songs is more like a deck of cards.  Attention is fixed on the skills of the mandarin who plays a winning hand.  He is respected, deferred to, honored.

Exams: Perhaps the 2 oldest & longest social institutions are the Buddhist sangha (monastic brotherhood) & the Confucian exam system.  By 300 bce the Chinese curricula had codified a number of Confucian classics.  Advanced degrees were awarded somewhat comparable to our BS., MS., Ph.D./M.D./M.Div. degrees.  What is surprising for Westerners is to learn that these degrees were essential qualifications for any fairly prestigious white-collar job.  If you parents were rich, you could enjoy the benefits of their money.  But you would not be given a prestigious job without having earned the degree.  The immense respect for education of almost any kind persists throughout Asia.  Indeed, the exam system persists in somewhat different form.  In India it takes the form of an entrance exam to the science or management schools.  In Japan the entrance exam for Tokyo university literally transforms the lives of those gifted enough to pass.   The point of this is not only to recognize how much prestige education has in Asia, but to further impress upon you the idea of gamesmanship; that culture is game & the one who plays it best has the most prestige.  In comparison, The West is much more decentralized.  One's status & accomplishment are usually restricted to specialized communities.  Money offers something of a rude universal scale, even if it doesn't prove adequate to take the measure of people like Dr. Martin Luther King or Vincent VanGogh or Herman Melville.  We may find it strange that in ancient China, the elegance of quoting exactly the right line from a Confucian classic or being able to elegantly invent the poetically apt solution to a problem -- these were the performances that distinguished the most accomplished members of society.  Would they impress the peasants?  Of course not; no more so than if Ilya Prigogine told them about contemporary physics.  The peasants would probably laugh at his incomprehensible language & ask him how much money he had.  Nonetheless, Dr. Prigogine is a Nobel Laureate acclaimed as perhaps the greatest living physicist.  If you change the medium of creative accomplishment from physics to music, poetry, & fashion or etiquette, then you may begin to understand why the poetry that we study in this lesson was so important in China.

 By the way, did you know that Dr. Prigogine is a Texan?  See http://order.ph.utexas.edu/people/Prigogine.htm 

Click on the next section: Background above.