ibunka TB_U7

References and further reading • Carroll, R. (1988), Cultural Misunderstandings : the French-American experience , Chicago : University of Chicago Press • Bateson, G. (1972), Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology . University of Chicago Press • Vannieu, B. Furansujin kara mita nihon no danjō kankei , in Fujita, T and Doi, I (eds.)(2000) Onna to Otoko no Shadō Wāku , Nakanishiya Shuppan. (in Japanese) In the same vein, when couples invite friends to their home they naturally Yind themselves in the same place, meeting the same people and having a common experience. This experience is one of the forces that molds relationships because they bring the partners into a symmetric interaction, even if their lives are by and large in a complementary dynamic. In the Ibunka Survey, a number of foreigners married to Japanese people have admitted their frustration with not being able to invite friends to their homes and thereby socialize “naturally” together with their spouse. Symmetrical and complementary relationships This points to another cultural dimension of couple relationships which could be described as the level of symmetry or complementarity which is viewed as desirable. Gregory Bateson introduced this continuum in his book Steps to an Ecology of Mind. He suggests that symmetric relationships, in which partners adopt the same type of behavior, can become explosive as symmetry implies competition. On the other hand, complementary relationships, in which partners adopt separate but complementary roles (“You take care of this, and I take care of that”, “You go there and I’ll stay here”, or “I’ll guess your needs and you guess mine”), naturally generates difference. Bateson notes that sometimes even a touch of symmetry brings balance to otherwise heavily complementary relationships. He gives the example from Medieval England, with its extremely top-down societal hierarchy, in which lords dominated the masses, who had very few rights and many burdens. In some areas, lords and commoners would meet for an annual soccer game, in which all of them would play in the mud, following the same rules and doing their best to win. He hypothesizes that those rare events had a strong effect in keeping the system stable, by introducing a touch of symmetry, therefore making the prevailing complementarity more bearable.

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UNIT 7 | CULTURAL COMMENTARY