PAPER
The Types and Different Crying Meaning Between West Culture and East Culture (In This Case West Culture is Representatived by England and East Culture is Respentatived by Japan).
By
Putu Agus Bratayadnya
Chapter I
Introduction
1.1 Background
The cognitive scenario (Which is readily translatable into any other language) is presented in the meaning of this English word as typical rather than necessary, for one can say in English for example, “I feel sad-I Don’t why” (cf. Johnson-Laired and Oatley 1989). What this shows is that by describing my feeling as “sadness” I would be saying, in effect, That I feel like a person who actually thinks some such thoughts. One of the cognitive scenarios “single out” by the English lexicon and encoded in the word sad.
Some aspects Japanese Culture ethos Embedded in nonverbal communicative behaviour should be always kept in mind that translation is not simply a matter of language, but also of cross cultural transfer. Today, many works in one language are translated into other languages. A translator must be versed in the cultural traits such as attitudes, values, beliefs, and social rules that are shared by a group of people in the cultures of both source and target languages. This because, without information on these cultural traits, the reader will find it extremely difficult to obtain a complete picture that a given novel in a foreign language intends to present.
This also applies to the translation of nonverbal behaviour, because nonverbal communication pattern are to a large extent, culturally determined. Although the actions of crying or smiling, for example, are universally performed, in what situation, in what manner, for what proposes, and with what meanings people cry or smile determined by their culture.
This paper will consider the nonverbal behaviour typical of Japanese people and culture. The focus of discussion will be those patterns which often appear incomprehensible or inscrutable from the eyes of non-Japanese, paying special attention to the gestures of eye-movement, crying and smiling. The study of these patterns will clarify the important characteristics of Japanese people’s psychology and socio-cultural norms/needs/values in society.
The primary purpose of this paper is to examine if these psychological and socio-cultural aspects associated with Japanese nonverbal behaviour can be translated into some concise and explicable form which would be accurately comprehended by non-Japanese people. This is because simply using English terms for explaining Japanese concepts or norms will lead English readers to interpret Japanese behaviour through the prism of their own culture. Wierzbicka clearly articulates this problem of explaining non-cultural specific concepts in term of English words (e.g. Wierzbicka 1991 a:1991b). Although they are useful as a first approximation, they are English words, and they do not accurately present the Japanese point of view.
If we want to define concepts or norms of Japanese culture in a way which is truly free of ethnocentrism and is explanatory, we must do so by means of explicit semantic formulas, such as those offered by the “semantic primitives” approach proposed by Wierzbicka (See e.g. 1991a; 1992; 1995; In press) In this approach, a “natural semantic metalanguage(NSM)” is used as a tool. These NSM words are “maximally clear, maximally simple and maximally universal” in the sense of having absolute equivalents in all the languages in the world, and thus are intuitively understandable to people any culture. This metalanguage enables us to explicate cultural concepts attached to Japanese nonverbal behaviour in simple words and grammar which are understandable to anyone in a non-ethno-biased way. Continue reading »
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