Shame society

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In cultural anthropology, a shame culture, also called honour-shame culture or shame society, is the concept that, in a given society, the primary device for gaining control over children and maintaining social order is the inculcation of shame and the complementary threat of ostracism. A shame society is contrasted with a guilt society in which control is maintained by creating and continually reinforcing the feeling of guilt (and the expectation of punishment now or in the hereafter) for certain condemned behaviors.

China

The concept of shame is widely accepted due to Confucian teachings. A quote from Confucius in the book The Analects:

“Lead the people with administrative injunctions and put them in their place with penal law, and they will avoid punishments but will be without a sense of shame. Lead them with excellence and put them in their place through roles and ritual practices, and in addition to developing a sense of shame, they will order themselves harmoniously”

Japan

The society of traditional Japan was long held to be a good example of one in which shame is the primary agent of social control.^{[citation needed]} The first book to cogently explain the workings of the Japanese society for the Western reader was The Chrysanthemum and the Sword by Ruth Benedict. This book was produced under less than ideal circumstances since it was written during the early years of World War II in an attempt to understand the people who had become such a powerful enemy of the West. Under the conditions of war it was impossible to do field research in Japan.

Without being able to study in Japan, Benedict relied on newspaper clippings, histories, literature, films, and interviews of Japanese-Americans. Her studies came to conclusions about Japanese culture and society that are still widely criticized today, both in America and Japan

Western society

Contemporary Western society uses shame as one modality of control, but its primary dependence rests on guilt, and, when that does not work, the criminal justice system.

Paul Hiebert characterizes the shame society as follows:

Shame is a reaction to other people's criticism, an acute personal chagrin at our failure to live up to our obligations and the expectations others have of us. In true shame oriented cultures, every person has a place and a duty in the society. One maintains self-respect, not by choosing what is good rather than what is evil, but by choosing what is expected of one.

Personal desires are sunk in the collective expectation. Those who fail will often turn their aggression against themselves instead of using violence against others. By punishing themselves they maintain their self-respect before others, for shame cannot be relieved, as guilt can be, by confession and atonement. Shame is removed and honor restored only when a person does what the society expects of him or her in the situation, including committing suicide if necessary. (Hiebert 1985, 212)

Romani (Gypsies)

See also: Lajja

To the Roma (Gypsies), though living as local minorities in mostly Christian or Islamic societies, the concept of lajav ("shame") is important, while the concept of bezax ("sin") does not have such significance. This concept probably stemmed from millennia of living on the edges of other civilizations.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• Guilt society
• Honor
• Shame
• Face (sociological concept)

Culture-specific

• Lajja
• Namus
• Seppuku
• The Arab Mind

Further reading

• Ruth Benedict, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, 1946.
• Hiebert, Paul G., Anthropological Insights for Missionaries, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1985
• Christopher Shannon, "A World Made Safe for Differences: Ruth Benedict's The Chrysanthemum and the Sword," American Quarterly 47 (1995): 659-680.