Japanese Vagueness
Japanese vagueness is NOT found in formulaic greetings!! I just finished the monthly test for the 6th (and final) book in the advanced Japanese language series offered to JETs by CLAIR. The test went by pretty quickly, mostly due to the fact that no writing was necessary. It was straight multiple choice. One thing that caught my attention was the content of the blurbs about which we had to answer questions. This happens frequently. This time, I decided to post about it.
よく「日本人はあいまいだ」と言われる。本当にそうだろうか。
「お元気ですか」と聞かれても、「最近どうですか」、「仕事は」、「もうけは」と聞かれても、返事のほとんどは「まあまあです」であるというのだ。「まあまあ」は確かにはっきりしない。とりあえず悪くはないようだが、どのぐらい満足しているのか、質問したほうにはよくわからない。
でもこの「まあまあ」に「あいまいだ」と注目するのは外国人だけである。日本人はそれほど気にはとめない。日本人にはすでに「まあまあ」の意味が「はっきり」わかっているのである。日本人にとってこれらの質問は、形式的なあいさつであり、こまかく答えるひつようはなく、また反対に細かく聞くのもスマートではないのである。プライバシーというほどの考えはないが細かく答える義務はないと考えるのだ。また、ここには日本人の一つの価値観を見ることもできる。多くの日本人は「そう簡単に最高と言うべきではなく、上には上がある」と考えることを「最高」だとしているのである。
そして、同じようなことは他の国の人たちにも見られるではないか。英語でも「How are you?」に対して「Not so bad.」とか、「Quite good.」とか言ったりする。あいまいなのは、その文化に対してそう思う人のりかいがあいまいなのではないだろうか。**Some kanji were intentionally avoided due to test questions that I don’t want to blow. It’s merely the content that I want to discuss.**
I think it’s kind of ridiculous to charge that foreign people believe Japanese people to be vague due to their habitual greetings. As the author mentions, greetings are sort of formulaic and ritualistic in other cultures too. That’s why it’s funny to answer the telemarketer seriously. (”Hi, Mr. ALT, how are you doing today?” “Well, I’ve got a raging headache, my landlord won’t stop complaining about garbage separation policies, my kids don’t know my name, I’m thousands of dollars away from home, blah blah blah blah blah make up more sob story material here.”) You get the picture. If you don’t, call my uncle. He’s good at this joke - uses a really whiny voice, too. My point is that we say “fine” or “doing well” or whatever phrase we throw out there - whether or not it’s true, most of the time. It’s mistaken to claim that greetings are being used by foreigners who are building their “Japanese people are vague” cases. I think there are some concrete examples. (Try the foreign media’s coverage of Mr. Koizumi and now Mr. Abe’s treatment of the Yasukuni shrine issue. Or the admittedly really warped coverage of Mr. Abe and the comfort women. The problem with these examples, which probably really do contribute to this perceived air of vagueness, is that they have very little to do with Japanese character and a lot to do with thin-ice politics. I think we’d find equally mystifying positions amongst their American [or pick another nationality and insert it here] counterparts on certain issues, no?) It’s true that Japanese people are sometimes referred to as being vague or indirect. I just think this blurb is pretty far off the mark by suggesting greetings as a case in point. I submit that in most cases where Japanese people are considered vague, it’s more of a cultural misunderstanding. I tell other students of Japanese sometimes that frequently what you don’t say in Japanese can be more important that what you do say. If you think Japanese people are vague, can you come up with a better example?
Bottom line: Formulaic greetings cannot be used as an example of evidence for why foreign people think that Japanese people are vague. It’s a mislead notion. 
ポイント： 形式的な挨拶は、「日本人があいまいだ」と外国人が考えている証明にはならない。つまり、誤解された概念でしょう。