2. Thinking about Culture Assignment

1. If traditions are not "direct cultural legacies", what are they?
They are contemporary terms that describe "social desirable institutions and ideas".

2. What does it mean to say that "familiar emblems of Japanese culture" are modern?
It means these "ancient" traditions are actually made, imported or modified in the recent centuries.

3. Distinguish, in your own words, the two ways that social scientists "have conventionally used tradition".
First, they use it to construct a framework for the society using traditions to define and distinct modern and past. Second, tradition is used to connect separated continuous actions and build a model of the society as a whole.

4. Identify the crucial sentence on page 5.
To say that all tradition is invented is still to rely upon a choice between invention and authenticity, between fiction and reality, between discourse and history.

5. Marilyn Ivy's "Important point" is too complex to deal with on this course, but what pitfall in the invention of tradition debate does Arif Dirlik identify?
The ignorance of social conditions of the production and reception of invented traditions.

6. The first paragraph of page 7 delineates a puzzling phenomenon. Can you think of any illustrative examples, perhaps from your own country?
The ancient Chinese emperors force historians to exaggerate or make up the emperors' contributions in official history books.

7. What problems did onjo-shugi pose to management?
It constructed a frame for the management style so that even onjo-shuki is rarely used anymore, the framework still fixed the management style.

8. Identify the crucial sentence in paragraph 1 of page 12.
The point, rather, is that cultural traditions are "chosen," not inherited.

9. What re-invented traditions can you think of from your own countries? Even trivial examples can be illustrative.
One of Chinese traditional operas -- Sichuan opera is famous for face-changing. To increase their income and make the Sichuan opera more popular, the troupe highlights the face-changing action and uses western instruments. The Sichuan opera now is rather different from before.

10. What does Vlastos call the book Mirror of Modernity and relegate Invented Traditions of Modern Japan to a subtitle?
Japan is a modern country that with its "original culture" alive while the modern western cultures are detached from theirs. The mirror is between Japan and other western countries which are all modern nations but different in their relationship with their traditions, which is also why Japan is pointed out in the subtitle.