10.21 「龙腾网」为什么日本人过于讲礼貌（下）

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原创翻译：龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.com 翻译：骑着毛驴到处走 转载请注明出处

Why is Japan so polite?

为什么日本人过于讲礼貌【下】

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原创翻译：龙腾网 http://www.ltaaa.com 翻译：骑着毛驴到处走 转载请注明出处

（回答二）Hazel Sarah Federico, living in Japan for 5 years, teaching the Japanese for 14

There are several reasons why the Japanese are considered polite:

Politeness is deeply ingrained in their culture. One of the first things I noticed during my first time in the country is the exchange of polite words between the restaurant staff and its customers. Aside from the usual dialogue to welcome customers, once they finish eating, the customers will say “Gochisousamadeshita!” It can be roughly translated to “the food was delicious.” The staff would then respond with thank you.

Even when I go to supermarkets, I noticed that the staff say a lot more to customers in Japan than they would in other countries. For an outsider who barely speaks Japanese, this can be daunting, which brings me to the next point..

日本人被认为有礼貌，我想有几个原因：

首先，礼貌在他们的文化中根深蒂固。在我第一次来这个国家的时候，我首先注意到的一件事就是餐厅员工和顾客之间的礼貌交流。

一进店门，店员会对顾客说些欢迎的话语，一旦顾客吃完饭，顾客就会说“Gochisousamadeshita！”它可以粗略地翻译为“食物很好吃”。然后店员会以“谢谢”作为回应。

甚至当我去超市时，我注意到日本的工作人员对顾客说的话比在其他国家的要多得多。

对于一个几乎不会说日语的外来者来说，这一点可能会让人望而却步，所以这就引出了我的下一个观点。

I understand that originally there was no Japanese word for thank you until the Portugese visited. The word for thank you is obrigado in Portugese. As the Japanese attempts to say it turned into arigato gosaimashta as they use phonetic symbols rather than an alphabet. Politeness was always infered in Japanese culture and reliant on body language.

They will also stack words to be ultra polite such as: Domo sumimasen origatogosaimasu.

There is a very old book regardingb the travel to Japan by Mortimer Menipes at the turn of the 20th century. It describes the Japanese culture and why they are like they are.

I was in a taxi in Tokyo (The cab driver wore white gloves and a cap) and he accidentally stoped on a pedestrian crossing and the people were forced to carefully move around the bonnet to cross the road. He sat with his head bowed as low as he could get it. Seeing his discomfort and disgrace, each person stopped briefly to bow in acknowledgement of his suffering. It reminded me of that very old book called Japan where Menipes describes a similar display of polite body language.

据我所知，在葡萄牙人到访日本之前，日语里没有“谢谢”这个词。“谢谢你”在葡萄牙语中是“obrigado”。由于日本人使用的是平假名而不是字母，所以他们的发音变成了arigato gosaimashta。

20世纪初，有一位美国人到日本旅行。他写了一本书描述了已经西方化的日本文化。

“我坐在东京的一辆出租车上，司机戴着白手套和帽子，他不小心将车停在了一个人行横道上，以至于每个带着帽子的行人都被迫小心地绕过车辆穿过马路。司机低着头坐着，尽量使自己的头低下去。不让人看到他脸上的不安和耻辱，而每个路过的行人都短暂地停下脚步，向司机稍稍鞠躬，表示谅解他所犯的错误

There was a time in our culture where it was polite to bow. This was replaced by the handshake in order to show that you were unarmed. Politness among Knights in armour where the lifting of the helmet visor to allow others to see your face eventually turned into the salute or tipping of a cap. Later came the removal of a hat with a flourish and bow in our polite society during Tudor and Elizabethan times. Of course all these things have all but disappeared in our society. Germany still bowed after a sharp click of the heals up to the end of WWI.

在我们西方的文化中，鞠躬也是表现礼貌的一种方式。只不过后来被握手礼代替。

握手是向对方表明自己没有携带武器，所以发展成为一种礼仪。

在穿着盔甲的骑士时代，掀起面部的盔甲，让对方看清你的容貌，被认为是表达礼貌的一种行为，这种礼仪最终演变成了敬礼或脱帽礼。

后来，在英国的都铎时代和伊丽莎白时代，鞠躬礼也出现了。当然，所有这些传统礼仪在现代西方社会中几乎都消失了。直到第一次世界大战结束时，就只剩下德国人还坚持使用鞠躬礼。

We had difficulty in understanding the Japanese culture during WWII. It was considered a disgrace to surrender. Hiro Hito was a living God and Bushido kept all soldiers true to its precepts. It was better to commit Sepuka than live with disgrace and the shame a family would inherit. It was agreat honour to be beheaded by a sword (Katana) and showed a return of respect for enemy officers. Europeans however are repulsed by the very though. We didn’t see it in quite the same way and thought it barbaric and cruel. However, many a nobleman and noble woman were beheaded in Europe for similar reasons in the 14th century.

So, it can be said that the West has undergone a lot of change. With that, we have lost a lot of our chivalry and manners. Japan on the other hand has maintained this. They also have great regard for age and revere the wisdom it carries. It is by no means a perfect society. Although there is little to no crime there is a seedy side to it that thankfully very few westerners will experience.

我们很难理解二战期间的日本文化。

投降被认为是一种耻辱。裕仁天皇是一个活着的神，武士道让所有的士兵都遵守它的戒律。与其个人和家族背负着耻辱生活，不如自我切腹。

被(武士刀)斩首是一种巨大的荣誉，也是对敌军军官的尊重。然而，欧洲人对此却非常反感。我们并没有以日本人的方式看待它，我们认为这是野蛮和残忍的。然而在14世纪的欧洲，许多贵族和贵族妇女，也将被斩首当做荣誉的象征。

可以说西方已经经历了很多变化，我们失去了很多骑士时代的礼仪传承。

另一方面，日本坚持着自己的传承。他们也很重视年龄，并且敬畏年龄所承载的智慧。

日本绝不是一个完美的社会。虽然这里几乎没有犯罪，但也有其肮脏的一面，值得庆幸的是，很少有西方人会经历到这些。

For example, in the workplace and educational settings, Japanese people are expected to conform to Joge kankei (superior-inferior relationships), where juniors and lower ranked persons use polite or formal language and manners, while superiors get away with more informal language. The classic example of this is a first year university student using desu/masu form (polite verb endings) when talking to a second year university student. The second year student outranks the first year student by one year, and so will use plain form (informal verb endings). The fact that this culture has survived to the present day is mind-boggling.

However, as this workplace survey shows, the majority of Japanese people experience significant stress in their personal relationships at work as a result of this superior-inferior system of rigid socio-linguistic culture.

Second question: if they don’t like it, why don’t they change? Why not just be more relaxed and behave more informally?

It is simply fear. The pressure to conform makes Japanese people intensely self-conscious and anxious about what others are thinking of them. This partly explains the prominent hermit (hikikomori) trend in modern Japan, where people who do not fit in simply hide themselves away. There are around 5 million of these hermits.

例如，在办公室和学校中，日本人被期望遵循“上下级关系”，下级对上级通常使用礼貌正式的语言和礼仪，而上级对下级说话时则较为随意。

举个典型的例子是，一个一年级的大学生在和一个二年级的大学生说话时必须使用敬语。二年级学生的级别比一年级学生高一年，因此他们可以使用非常普通的语气对晚辈说话。这样的文化居然能够流传至今，实在令人难以置信。

然而，正是由于这种上下级分明的，僵化的社会语言文化，使得大多数日本人在工作中感到了来自人际关系方面的巨大压力。

那么既然日本人不喜欢这一点，为什么不做出改变?为什么不放松一点，表现得更随意一点呢?

答案是恐惧。从众的压力使日本人非常自觉，并对别人对他们的看法感到焦虑。这在一定程度上解释了现代日本著名的“宅”现象，很多人将自己藏起来，拒绝与社会接触。据估计，在日本大约有500万人过着“宅”生活。

Conformity has traditionally been emphasized in Japan. Bullying at primary school and high school reinforces the importance of conformity from a young age. Bullying at school is the reason why suicide is now the leading cause of death among children aged 10–14 in Japan. It’s higher than cancer.

But bullying doesn’t stop at school. It extends even into the upper echelons of politics. A party member who takes a critical stance against the prime minister could be bullied by fellow lawmakers in an indirect, passive-aggressive manner for months or even years afterwards. Such behavior drives home the undeniable fact that politeness in Japan is often a superficial presentation that helps avoid externally visible friction, but is not necessarily an expression of genuine kindness.

Conformity across society creates harmony in the respect that it reduces conflict. But conformity stifles individual expression. Conformity is not fun. And the pressure to conform creates fear.

日本传统文化强调与大众保持一致。

在日本，小学和高中的校园欺凌现象强化了从众的重要性。在日本，校园欺凌是导致10-14岁儿童死亡的主要原因。远高于不治之症。

但是欺凌并不仅仅局限于学校。它甚至会延伸到政治层面。一个对首相持批评态度的议员，可能会在接下来的几个月甚至几年里被其他议员以一种间接的、消极的攻击方式欺凌。

这样的行为也说明了一个不可否认的事实:在日本，礼貌往往只是表面的客套，有助于避免人际交往之间的矛盾和摩擦，但不一定是真正善意的表达。

虽然社会的趋同性创造了和谐，减少了冲突。但一致性扼杀了个人的表达。一味地从众并不会让你感到快乐，而且从众的压力会产生恐惧。

K Ken Nakamura, studied at University of California System

Japanese may be very polite but it has many downside compare to the US. For example:

In the US, if you arrive the hotel early (for example after the red eye from West coast to the East Coast) many hotel will let you check in at 8AM for example. That is not possible in Japan. They will take your luggage but you must wait until 2PM or 3PM, what ever the check-in time and use your room facilities.

In the US, if the item you bought in the store happen to be defective, you can return to the store and they are happy to exchange it. In Japan, in most cases, that is not possible. The store usually tells you to contact manufacture to fix the problem.

日本人可能很有礼貌，但与美国相比，依然存在很多缺点。例如：

在美国，如果你提前到达酒店(例如从西海岸到东海岸)，许多酒店会让你在早上8点登记入住。这在日本是不可能的。他们会拿走你的行李，但你必须等到下午2点或3点，才能办理入住手续，使用房间。

在美国，如果你在商店买的东西碰巧有瑕疵，你可以返回商店，店主很乐意更换。而在日本，在大多数情况下，这是不可能的。商店通常会告诉你联系产品制造商来解决问题。