[A response to Nobuhiro Hiwatari's post of 17 Oct 95]

Hiwatari-san requested the following:
>However, since all this is based on impressions I'd like to hear from those
with different impressions. Also it would be interesting to hear from those who
can read European or
Asian
>papers.

20 years ago I did a study of Japanese newspaper editorials compared with US
editorials concerning the same event. The study was not published but the
methods and diagrams used in it were included in a book GLOBAL QUALITY, 1993,
ASQC and Irwin Professional Publishing). Macro-structure diagrams, applying
Walter Kintsch's cognitive research were used to show the number of main points,
their names, and the principles upon which they were ordered. In short, the
Japanese editorials, were "gutaiteki", that is, largely inductive with a
narrative story fragment giving way to an impression giving way to a related
(somewhat free association) story fragment giving way to its impression, till
finally some overall point was "named" at the end. The US editorials were
diagrammatically the opposite--name of main point, example or subcomponent one
named, relevant story fragment, example or subcomponent two named, relevant
story fragment, and so on.

There is a general inductiveness to Japanese language syntax (see Susumu Kuno's
excellent books) and Japanese meeting rituals (including conversations) that
goes from percept very very incrementally if at all to concept. Anyone attending
the staff meetings in the Japanese companies for which I have worked would spot
topics being treated from the start by handling one tiny detail after another,
rather than setting out some broad guidelines or principles, then getting more
concete after consensus was reached. The blurred "lap dog" border with the other
"dogs" seems less nefarious (that is, less due to willing collusion to hide
between journalists and politicians) when one takes into account the general
inductiveness of cognitive styles and forms in Japanese culture, I believe.
Though long term historical perspective on whence commeth this inductive
cognitive style raises the question (only as a question, not a theory or fact)
of rulers monopolizing initiative and denuding many other actors in society from
spontaneous initiative-taking, resulting after hundreds of years in
percept-driven non-conceptual cognitive styles.