As Jan Walls says in his foreword to this instructive and entertaining book, Andrew Horvat provides "a new way of looking at language . . . a guide to communicative competence based upon a holistic view wherein communication is seen as a combination of speech and behavior."
Competence in a foreign language, says Horvat, involves much more than knowing the proper words, and it takes place in contexts far other than that of the classroom. It takes place in the office, the home, the street itself. It involves not only what you say, but how you say it, how you dress, how you move, what you do, what you don't.
The author gives the example of his taking a visiting editor to meet a senior official in the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. All went well until the editor started playing with the official's business card. Holding it in one hand and his ball-point pen in the other, he nervously slipped the card back and forth between the pen and its clip.
"The muscles of our host's face stiffened. It became evident that the pain caused by my editor's behavior was so great that the official was no longer listening to anything being said." The reason, of course, is that the card is an extension of its owner. Any violence offered it is taken personally. It must be studied and if possible exclaimed over. To pocket it at once is tantamount to an insult and it ought be kept visible and respected during the meeting. To put it away is indication that the meeting is over.
None of this has anything to do with language and everything to do with communication. Take bowing, for example. One should know not only how to do it but also when. It is an indication of relationship, not of rank or status. The depth of the bow depends upon how indebted the bower feels to the bowee. There is a subtle sense to it, something that a superior of Horvat's did not appreciate.
The tall author, used to stooping in low-ceilinged Japan, automatically lowered his head upon entering his boss' office only to be screamed at: "Don't bow. Don't you know that white men don't bow!"
Communication theory points out that if a speaker's nonverbal apparatus conflicts with his or her verbal message, the former will cancel out the latter.
Horvat's example is a brown, double-breasted suit with a loud tie worn when visiting a Ministry of Finance official and asking for a retail license. The verdict is likely to be a polite refusal: "Your application is still under consideration." The author points out that "on Wall Street the effect of such fashion may not necessarily be negative."
Learning how to read all the various negatives is important to the successful foreigner. We all know now that "hai" does not mean "yes," and that "iie" (no) is never used. But not all of us are familiar with pains taken to avoid such a complete negative as an absolute refusal. For example, Japanese government offices consistently discourage all applications except those that are certain to be approved, so that bureaucrats can say they have never said no to an applicant. Refusal remains a problem in Japan. Horvat writes of the difficulties of invitation giving and receiving. Japanese perceive American-style invitations as something like a sales pitch. The proper response is to agree and then not go. To an American such behavior is insincere, but in Japan saying positive things about something someone else is planning is considered good manners.
Such problems are reflected in the language itself: Take, for example, the careful exclusion of responsibility-laden pronouns. They exist, but one must know how to use them. Standard texts tell us that "anata" means you, but it doesn't -- at least not in the way that "you" means you in English. That the dictionary can list, after "you," the further meanings "dear," "darling" and "honey" hints at the size of the tip of this iceberg.
Actually, although conversations still collide, meaning does get through. As Horvat states in one of the most elegant formulations of this grammatical situation that I know: "The essence of Japanese-style communication consists of avoiding the equivalents of English pronouns as much as possible and configuring other parts of speech, such as verbs, nouns, adjective and adverbs -- even interjections -- so that these other parts of speech transmit the clues as to who is talking to whom and about whom."
Courteously but firmly, Horvat (member of the Japan Foundation's advisory committee on the teaching of Japanese and resident representative of The Asia Foundation) leads us through the intricacies of communicating in Japan.
There is much more in this information-packed book. It is, as Edward Seidensticker has said, "a witty, intelligent and practical guide to one of the world's less practical languages." And, as the subtitle of the book promises, it does indeed teach "how to walk and talk like a native speaker."
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