Japanese Etiquette and Manners

As with the French, the Japanese believe in promoting good manners, social skills and etiquette at an early age.— “Little girls of 10 will one see here, whose finish of breeding would have awakened the envy of a Duchess at the Court of Louis XIV at Versailles. Female servants one will encounter, at a dinner in the house of a Japanese gentleman, whose grace, charm and dignity are the quintessence of lady-like refinement.”— Meme fromThe Free Thought Project.com

Etiquette Has Become Second Nature In the Land of the Mikado

Given a highly imitative people like the Japanese, and let one undeviating standard be set before them. Then, generation after generation, will no change be witnessed. The standard will act like that of the French academy on the language of France. Now, at home, in America, we have 50 standards of manners—the reserved and reticent New England manners, the slap you on the back far western manners, the demagogue’s manners, the drummer’s manners, the cut and dried business man’s manners—these and dozens of others might be specified. And it must be admitted by even the most patriotic, that the man who should try to model his deportment on all these schools at once would come to a somewhat mixed result. Nothing of this bewildering complexity has ever existed in Japan. 

From Mikado at the top to cooly at the bottom of the social scale, one undeviating standard has always prevailed. Originally an importation from China, it has been elaborated through centuries of study of the most elaborate ceremonial etiquette ‘til at last, through constant practice, it has become second nature. No one ever saw anything else, ever dreamed of anything else. There was one way of saluting a superior, one of saluting an equal, one of saluting an inferior, and one’s head would have been cut off had he departed from it. No Japanese child ever saw a drummer—saw only prostrate artisans saluting samurai, samurai saluting daimios, daimios saluting shoguns. The whole ceremonial became organized into them as much as their instinctive habits into our setters and pointers, perhaps the best mannered of our population. 

Little girls of 10 will one see here, whose finish of breeding would have awakened the envy of a Duchess at the Court of Louis XIV at Versailles. Female servants one will encounter at a dinner in the house of a Japanese gentleman whose grace, charm and dignity are the quintessence of lady-like  refinement. “Trifles make perfection, but perfection is no trifle. ” The simple fact is that the young woman of 20 has been doing the thing for a thousand years. — Christian Register, 1894

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

French Manners vs American

Comparing the French family reunions with similar affairs at Thanksgiving and Christmas time with us, he said: “There is greater restraint with them than with us, and they do not exhibit the same freedom in throwing off this restraint. There is, however, no cudgeling of brains to find out what to do next, and games are not substituted, as with us, to fill in unoccupied time, of which they are ignorant.” 

Synopsis of a Lecture Recently 
Delivered in New York

“French Manners” was the subject of the lecture by W. C Brownell recently in the Columbia College Saturday morning lectures. The eastern lecture-room in the law school building failed to accommodate the audience. “French conversation,” said Mr. Brownell, “is really conversation, and is practiced for what it is, and not to pass away the time. It is made up of interruptions, and is thus full of epigrams and repartee, is artistic, not utilitarian, and far freer than ours, and is outspoken without being brutal.” 

The speaker, in treating the much discussed question as to the real sincerity of the French people, said: “All are agreed that the French are charming and agreeable, but as to their sincerity we draw the line. They are, however, as sincere as any nation, but it is in a different manner, and includes compliment which never means more than it says, while with us much is inferred from a compliment that is not expressed.” He then spoke of the politeness of the French, and said: “The well-bred man is born, not bred, if the paradox may be permitted. The mass of men have no innate ability for breeding.”

Comparing the French family reunions with similar affairs at Thanksgiving and Christmas time with us, he said: “There is greater restraint with them than with us, and they do not exhibit the same freedom in throwing off this restraint. There is, however, no cudgeling of brains to find out what to do next, and games are not substituted, as with us, to fill in unoccupied time, of which they are ignorant.” — New York Times, 1887

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia