An Essay on Education
I looked past the crumbling gravestones to the maples beyond. Below the trees, the prickly pear cactus and the lady's slipper rambled among the scattered graves. I sat in the warm grass next to a wild pansy and began to sketch. The stamen, the anthers, and the pistil were all a part of the drawing and their odd little shapes interested me almost as much as the vibrant purple and yellow of the petals. A few sketches later I realized all flowers contained those little parts. And so my learning progressed.
From kindergarten through fifth grade, my mother taught me at home. Although money was tight, mom cut her work hours to do what she felt was right. Her top priority was mothering and teaching my sister and me. My mother encouraged, helped, and sat beside us while other kids hid behind their desks at the public elementary school a mile away. For me, learning became a way of life, not an institution. Interactive learning boosted my seven year old imagination and turned the pursuit and application of knowledge into child's play.
Our learning methods varied from book-work to building life-sized teepees in the living room to exploring the natural world. I learned throughout the day and loved every minute of it. I never heard a high school student say that. I never heard and elementary student say that. Slowly throughout my public school career, I have come to find learning a chore. The subject matter usually isn't the problem. While I have trouble keeping my eyes open during physics lectures, the moment I get home and begin discussing how engineers have used simple scientific laws to create air conditioners and brake lines, the subject comes alive and fascinates me. I have learned more by discussing things with my mother in most subjects than I have in the classroom.
While I was in home school, summer was one of those things that was pleasant because it was warm outside, not because school was out. Now summer is a release, freedom. School shouldn't feel like a prison to me because I love to learn. Something is wrong.
The problem is our schools are inhumane standardized institutions where teachers and students alike are trapped by bureaucracy. Teachers feel trapped by strict curriculums and textbook learning. Personally, I believe if a teacher depends entirely on a textbook then there is no reason to have a teacher. Forced to please bureaucrats, teachers lower their expectations. Lower expectations lead to lower performance. Take Asian-American students, for example. They excel at math and science because our stereotype requires them to. Also, teachers and principals are limited by monetary guidelines that often leave some areas short and others overcompensated. This invariably occurs in a standardized system of schools because each has different needs. This affects our entire country. The first ones to be affected by it are the kids themselves. Too many fall between the cracks. A boy named Herman in New York City, for example.
Herman was convinced he was stupid. His family believes that one reason he held that dispairing self-diagnosis so long has to do with the fact that he knew no English when he first entered the New York City school system. During Herman's first two years in that system, his teacher, knowing no Spanish, put Herman's desk in a corner, gave him crayons to keep him busy, and ignored him entirely. In any case, by the time he was in fifth grade in another school, Herman suddenly decided that, dumb or not, he wanted to learn to read. He began taking books home and reading them over the weekend, but by the end of the school year he had only scored a 2.9 on city-wide tests.Luckily, Herman found a place where they wouldn't let him fall through the cracks. John Simon runs an alternative classroom in the basement of a church for kids who don't fit into the system, those the district school is doing nothing for and cannot handle. Simon believes all kids can learn no matter where they come from. With his faith and close contact, these kids learn and gain self confidence. "After all, if I can accept failure from any of our kids, I will get failure. But I do not accept failure," he said referring to an incident where he had to keep going out of his way to keep one of his kids from joining a gang and dropping out of school (Hentoff, 146).
This class cites success story after success story. In a few months, Herman raised his score to a 6.0 on the same test. One youngster named Mikey had cut nearly every day at the district school. He said, "I used to get mad, all right, and I beat up a lot of people when they started with me. They really got hurt. But then I had to grow up, you know. I can't be doing what I did when I was small. That's why this place is so important to me, you know. If I wouldn't be here man, I don't know where I'd be."
The key to this school is not lots of teacher-theory education. Simon has no teaching degree. The key is recognizing where the kids come from and tailoring the education and treatment around their individual needs. Mikey had come from a home where his mother was epileptic, although since no one told him he never knew why his mother behaved the way she did. The only way his father knew how to communicate was through violence.
Unfortunately, kids like Herman and Mikey don't survive at traditional schools. They may be smart, but because they have been convinced they are dumb because or the school doesn't know how to deal with them, they never will be able to remain in that environment. They become the Americans who are oppressed, poverty stricken, and commit crimes to stay alive. They cannot contribute to the democratic process because they believe they have nothing to contribute. This, in turn, affects the whole country. But there is more to it than that.
School is a major part of the socialization process. When children attend school they are taught common values and they learn who they are and what they stand for. In school they react to how others see them and what is expected of them, good or bad, and they react generally how they are expected to. Therefore their teachers have a profound effect on how the kids are shaped. The classes they enjoy will also lead to their future careers. Quality teachers and staff unity on values and mission can do wonders for a young child's image.
In school students learn to think. This, in turn, will affect every employer who hires a student from a public high school. This will affect every professor who teaches a student from a public school. This will affect every co-worker of a person who attended a public school. The problem solving and social skills learned in school will affect every person who ever deals with a public school student.
The skills learned have the ability to make a person capable of carrying out the responsibilities of citizenship and exercise their rights. People who are uneducated generally feel alienated from the system because they have probably been told they are dumb. They do not know their rights. Unfortunately, some people who have attained high school diplomas cannot even read them. Many more don't know what the first amendment entails. Most of the country doesn't know how to be heard in a democracy. In today's global market, people from other countries are taking our jobs because they are better educated.
Education in the United States has not always been public. While Jefferson and other founders of our country believed in mass education to break down social boundaries, the free public school system was not established until the nineteenth century. Even then the majority of students went to private schools. Public schools began with the teacher at the head of the institution, but they quickly lost their autonomy. By the mid-nineteenth century, superintendents were introduced and soon became the most influential figure in the system.
School systems are ideally locally operated. For a while they were. School boards, teachers, and administrators decided what to teach, how to teach, and where the money would go. Beginning in 1850, things changed. The state began to regulate teacher qualifications, curriculum, and compulsory attendance. Education slowly became more centralized pulling power away from the people who worked with children. In 1900, there were 100,000 school districts. After numerous consolidations to increase efficiency and create uniformity, 40,000 were left in 1960. In the mid-eighties only 16,000 remained. Funding was also taken out of local hands. In the 1970s, the state began regulating school budgets. Teachers unions and collective bargaining agreements made it nearly impossible to fire teachers, no matter how little students learned in their classes. Now that everything is under state control, it is the students who have little representation.
The problem now is that the people who know most about what schools should be, those who work in and with them, have the least control over how things are done. Parents have no say in how or what their kids are taught, and for the most part cannot choose where their children go to school. Teachers cannot choose what is important to teach. Administrators cannot choose how they are going to spend the money they are given by the state or who they want out of their school system. The legislators have absorbed our powers of choice, legislators who do not work in schools or have education degrees or know what an individual school needs help with.
Thus, local control has almost disappeared from the American school system. This disintegration of choice may lead to the disintegration of the diversity in our country and the success of those who would otherwise find it impossible to succeed. It seems that throughout history when times are good and culture is flourishing, educational choice is at an all-time high. As soon as one group gets too much power, it is the disadvantaged who suffer.
Take ancient Greece, for example. Athens was a center of culture. Sparta was a center of war. The difference in the educational systems of these two Grecian cities was phenomenal. In Athens, teaching was open to anyone who wanted to teach. Choosing a teacher took days of deliberation. While girls and slaves received little or no education, most parents, no matter how poor, sent their boys to school for some time. Wealthy parents, since schools were private, could afford to send their children to school longer, but even poor children were not uneducated. Many of them went on to apprentice tradesmen and the man would only be paid if he taught the child the skills he and the parents had decided the child would learn.
Education in Athens was highly practical in Athenian life. Children studied gymnastics which gave them stamina and agility for war, music which made them culturally literate, and literacy which not only enabled them to read but also taught them their history through the epic poetry they studied. The schools used many games to teach the children skills and keep it fun.
Athenian culture blossomed and schools multiplied. Academies were established, some free and some for profit, but all schools were under local control: there were no state regulations or standards. Many teachers called sophists traveled the country and people gathered from all over to hear their lectures. Even a female, Aspasia, opened a school because the majority could not stop her. Wealthy families sent their girls to school there. Athens remained a center for diversity, in part because schools were allowed to be diverse.
Sparta, however, was anything but diverse. Their entire culture revolved around war and schools were the center of conformity. Students were sent to live in dorms. They were expected to behave appropriately or be subject to corporal punishment. Academic subjects were limited and, in fact, innovations in the academics were prohibited. Schooling consisted of fighting and athletics. Answers to questions were expected quickly otherwise the child was considered stupid. An institution known as "kryptia" gave them experience in war by taking them into the countryside to attack peasants and steal from them in order to survive.
Time and time again history proved that when choice was given to the teachers and consumers, more people were well educated and had a better chance to contribute to society. While Athenians were the most literate people in the Western World in their day, Spartans were not literate at all. Spartan economy was basic and its cultural contribution was almost nil.
The evidence of success of school choice was also demonstrated by Germany in the sixteenth century. When the church had control of the schools, they were taught in Latin and only the well-to-do sent their children to school. When the emerging middle class and the printing press gave more people the chance to teach and learn, private schools were developed and people from many classes were able to learn in their native tongue. This lead to widespread literacy and more people could participate in governmental proceedings and allowed German culture to flourish. With the return to Latin schools, once the government took over schooling, German culture and literacy once again diminished.
The same thing occurred in England a century later. With government control and funding, schools lowered their standards and taught fewer subjects. Standardized testing only brought about teach-to-the-test methods and children learned even less about the culture and society they lived in. Yet when private schools emerged, illegal as they were, students flocked to them to learn subjects as diverse as surveying, naval studies and anatomy. The teaching methods were innovative and used telescopes and many hands-on activities just as the Athenians had used games.
You could say the same thing is occurring today. Standardized tests have spread across the nation taking control of some school curriculum. Grade levels are by age, not by skill level. Where money goes is controlled by the state regardless of what a unique, individual school system needs. School districts are large and uniform. Textbooks rule classrooms standardizing classes. Minority groups continue to have high drop-out rates and a low percentage of college degrees. Students are disenchanted with the system and most say work is more enjoyable than school. The teen crime rate is highest during school hours. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, employers regard one fifth of their workers as being less than proficient. College remedial math and reading programs have high enrollments. Dissatisfaction with the system seems to be at an all-time high.
At the same time, parents and educators are pushing for choice. Now students can "open enroll"e; to any school they want to, although there may not be room for them in the school system. Home-schooling, parents teaching their kids at home, is now legal in every state in the nation. Charter schools, autonomous from state regulation, have opened in several states thanks to some states providing state legislature. Corporations have taken over schools to make a profit from their resources, keeping any excess money that the state provides. This change indicates one thing: dissatisfaction with the public school system as it stands.
The problem of poor school systems directly stems from the little choice that parents have leading to schools that do not have to meet their needs. Also, the little choice that educators have over how to spend their money causes excess in some areas and lack in others. Different school systems have different needs because of the different populations they serve. The state cannot possibly know each school well enough to allocate funds.
It may only be a coincidence that voter turnouts are low and many people feel democracy is falling apart and yielding to socialism in our country. I believe this is directly related to the disillusionment of our society as a whole. Politicians and lawyers are seen as the most dishonest, corrupt people in the country and they protect our rights and shape our laws. I believe the disillusionment begins with the disenchantment with the first major governmental institution we are exposed to: school. People are not learning their civic responsibilities or how to function in a democracy or a multi-cultural society. I believe if this problem continues, democracy will cease to exist. The number of young people involved in crime will continue to soar and the American Dream -- starting with nothing and working your way up -- will disappear because only in the rich neighborhoods will students have the chance to survive and gain a good education.
Many different people have proposed many different solutions to the problem. Some solutions are as simple as paying teachers more. Others are as complex as establishing all-male Afrocentric academies, letting corporations run schools for profit, establishing different educational themes, and opening charter schools. Studies have shown that not paying teachers more doesn't have an impact on how well students do. In fact, some of the nation's most expensive teachers turn out the nation's most illiterate students.
To improve the African-American dropout rate, some experts suggest Afrocentric all-male academies. These schools would reduce distractions caused by females and allow them to see the African race as the originator of all culture and the entire human race. Ideally, this would boost self-esteem, give students a sense of identity and heritage, and help them realize they can make something of themselves if they want to. After all, advocators say, schools have been Eurocentric for years. They also say males should teach males because it is only a man who can make a man of a boy, women only turn out sons.
While the intentions of these schools are good, I believe they create more problems than they correct. The problem with males is not female teachers, otherwise most men in our country would not really be men at all. While reducing the distraction of girls may be beneficial on one level, we may want to keep in mind women and men must work with each other in every day life whether it be in the home or on the job, so maybe all-male academies are not the answer. Also, African-Americans have been in Western society for hundreds of years. Western society stems from Europe which is why much of our education is Eurocentric. While it is important to recognize African culture in the spirit of cultural-pluralism, I believe putting it before all others will only increase the racism in our country. It will only give people an excuse to say, "Those blacks think their culture is better than any other."
For-profit schools are schools run by corporations. In most cases they result from a poor unsuccessful school system turning over their funding and students to a corporation to manage. The deal is if they can teach the kids well enough for them to get decent test scores they can keep any excess money that results from their bottom-line experience. They also make money through text book, supply, and equipment sales. They use their resources to supply kids with computers and all the latest in technology. They often cut staff and teach via TV screen. The best lectures can then be heard simultaneously in many different schools. The salaries of the teachers they do keep are often lowered drastically. This results in highly efficient, technologically advanced, commercialized schools with underpaid teachers, little adult-student contact, and transmission of consumeristic values. Obviously this type of school has major drawbacks. On to solutions I believe, when combined, will make our school system more effective and efficient.
In his The End of Education, former teacher Neil Postman said the only thing wrong with our school systems is that we lack a continuity of themes that work. "Our genius lies in our capacity to make meaning through the creation of narratives that give point to our labors, exalt our history, elucidate the present, and give direction to our future," he said (Postman 4). He says now the "gods" that schools serve are Economic Utility, Consumership, Technology, and Multiculturalism.
None of these narratives have succeeded. Economic Utility has been limiting and made school and unenjoyable way to make us more productive and get a better job. Consumership has taught us that we are what we accumulate and go to school to make more money to buy more. Technology ignores the fact that only individuals can respond to social problems. Multi-Culturalism has ignored teaching Americanism, the American values that can tie us all together so we can live with cultural pluralism.
He encourages the use of narratives like The Spaceship Earth, The Fallen Angel, The American Experiment, The Law of Diversity, and the Word Weavers/The World Makers. Each of these provides a reason for learning that provides consistent American values and harmony that, if learned well, can make the world a better place. The Spaceship Earth stresses the dependence of everything on everything else on this planet. We must know we are all in it together, for better or for worse, and whatever we do to the Earth will affect us. Because we are all living together, we must attempt to get along just like the creatures from different planets to on Star Trek. Also, we must all do our part to take care of the planet so we may survive here. This is our home. We have no other.
The Fallen Angel narrative points out that humans are, by nature, mistake makers. Through every mistake we learn something new. Postman suggests encouraging students to find mistakes in lectures or illogical arguments as a means of increasing logic skills and helping them learn from history's mistakes. In this way future politicians and citizens know what to avoid to prevent history from tragically repeating itself as is so often does.
The American Experiment defines ongoing arguments that keep our democracy alive. By portraying America as a social, political experiment that only works through constant arguing about different issues, classrooms can teach students how to participate in democracy and keep it from turning into an authoritarian country. This narrative stresses that if we stop arguing, we will turn to violence.
The Law of Diversity incorporates every subject area to create a value of the diversity we have in our country. This stresses the diversity of the religions, cultures, and ethnicities found in the United States and shows how they fit into the American culture. In this way we appreciate all people and welcome differences instead of fearing them.
Word Weavers/World Makers demonstrates the role of language in our perception of the world. By learning another language and studying Plato, we can see how words and definitions can create laws, beliefs, and justifications. It teaches to question definitions. Where did it come from? Why was it produced, for whom, by whom? What context was it used in? In this way we can adapt to the changing world by constantly redefining everything we see and hear. This also shows us how people with different languages think differently on different subjects.
By adapting these narratives as reasons for learning and ways to teach different subjects, I believe our schools can be more productive and better prepare people for life in our country. In combination with this, I believe we need to release schools from the state's hands by letting them decide how they need their money to be spent. The structural answer, I believe, is charter schools.
Charter schools are essentially free private schools which are not religiously affiliated. Any individual or group can open one and any existing school can apply for charter status. To do so, they must create a plan that includes curriculum, mission statements, financing, and goals to meet such as test scores, etc., that must meet or be above the state average. In return for promising to meet their own guidelines, these schools are granted independence from state guidelines generally including curriculum and state established budgets. They must still meet national standards such as health and safety laws and also they receive the money per student granted traditional schools. If they do not meet these goals or if their plans do not work after a specified time, their status is taken away. The freedom given to charter schools allows them to run them like a business, but not as a business like a corporation would run them. It allows them to cut incompetent teachers, bureaucratic waste, administrative costs, and to redesign ineffective curricula.
So far a limited number of states have passed laws that allow schools to achieve charter status. Some schools have failed and been shut down, but many, many more have achieved impressive successes. Take, for instance, Celena Longherin who lives in Minnesota. She is that daughter of a disadvantaged welfare mother. After her best friend was killed in a gang, Celena tried to commit suicide. She was placed in City Academy, a charter school which only has 4 to five students per class, and now she enjoys writing short stories. She has hopes of attending college.
The Principal of Vaughn Learning Center in California, Yvonne Chan, said "The charter takes the handcuffs off the principal, the teacher, and the parents -- the people who know the kids best. In return, we are held responsible for how the kids do." Parents have much more involvement in charter schools. To save money, charter schools often have parents sign contracts pledging to volunteer to perform janitorial and cooking services. Often these schools will opt to hold classes for adults as well. The schools are able to become a center of community.
Charter schools also allow educators to form a network of schools, if they so wish, that each specializes in different areas so kids can find their area of success whether it be art, music, science, or computers. By encouraging individual talents to flourish, charter schools build self-esteem and help kids to enjoy their studies. In this way the schools can develop each individual to be the best he can be and contribute to the country.
Charter schools often have older children help with the younger one's education. Not only does this produce a sense of accomplishment in the older child, but reduces the stress on teachers and insures that children have individual attention.
Currently, most charter schools often serve those whose needs are not met by the traditional public school system: at-risk kids and those with disabilities. By creating separate schools for these children, they do not have to feel inferior to students they attend school with. Also, they achieve better scores than the average student because of the extra attention and tailored learning. In this way we educate all people, not just those who can be taught by traditional methods.
Charter schools also offer competition needed to make traditional schools better. Some traditional schools were shut down in New York when a few charter schools came in because no one enrolled there anymore. Others improved and kept their enrollment up. By offering parents the choice of where their kids go, schools compete and the best survive creating better educated children.
While I believe forming charter schools and teaching through narratives will greatly improve the public school system, there is one more form of choice I would like to add. In addition for forming charter schools, I believe we should for resources for home-schoolers so that those parents who prefer to educate their children at home can easily get the resources. These centers can use the tax money that would be given to the schools these children would otherwise attend and use it to buy equipment, software, books and extra instruction that home-schoolers can use. This center can also become a center for all extra learning. Children could go there after school to type reports, play on the Internet, do research and adults could go there extend their learning or, if needed, take a literacy class. In this way learning becomes interesting, a lifetime occupation, and a center for all of America to come together.
I have taken all the footnotes out. If you are interested in a bibliography or want to know more about my views on the subject, email me at sea_goddess@geocities.com.
Samurai wander restlessly across the hillsides of Tokugawa Japan, occasionally stopping to test their swords on some unsuspecting, soon-to-be-dead peasant. Only the samurai have the legal right to carry swords and a licence to kill without explanation. Samurai alone have the privilege of using family names. Aside from the government, the samurai top the social ladder. Theoretically, that is. Despite the freeze on social mobility, another class holds the power. The lowest class. The despised city merchants: the chonin.
They look innocent enough, building restaurants and inns along Tokaido Highway and setting up shops in the castle towns and warehouses in Osaka. No one suspects the financial status they will gain as agriculture advances and rice grows in abundance. No one knows of the financial power they will hold over the nation. What the people often call the "age of the samurai" was, in reality, the "age of the chonin."
The age didn't begin well for the samurai. With the end of the civil wars came the end of the samurai giving their lives for their masters without a second thought about reward. When the wars ended, many landlords, or daimyo, lost their land leaving their samurai masterless. Those who retained their masters still could never fight again. Bushido values dictated that samurai develop selfless loyalty to their masters, and after the wars ended samurai knew not what to do with their loyalty. Many committed the ultimate sacrifice, suicide known as hara-kiri, to defend their masters' good names. These meaningless deaths became so numerous they were outlawed (Hane 144). Warriors had lost their place in society.
Now that peace had set into the nation, the government became more stable. Daimyo needed officials to collect taxes and other bureaucratic positions also needed to be filled. The samurai took these posts. They ranged in rank from those who were the daimyo's close advisors, to those to whom the daimyo would give no audience. A high ranking samurai got as much as thirty-three times as much rice as a low ranking one (Lehmann 82). His exact rank dictated how much rice he would receive, and this amount was fixed through the entire era. Therefore the samurai were completely economically dependant upon their daimyo. In return for the loyalty the samurai gave the daimyo, the daimyo was benevolent and gave the samurai his stipend. This benevolent-loyal relationship was the essence of the daimyo-samurai relationship and was the essence of bushido.
Bushido failed to help the samurai enough as time went on because their stipends were fixed. During the Tokugawa, since they were not off fighting wars, peasants made great agricultural advances. They grew more rice than ever before. As the abundance of rice grew, the value of the rice, and of the samurai's stipend, shrunk. This was fine for the peasant because they were able to grow cash crops on the side, but many samurai became very poor.
Samurai also lost authority during this age. The peasants soon sickened of being taxed to death and became brave and disobedient to the samurai. They often rose up against the samurai. While these uprisings failed most of the time, they were sometimes so strong that the daimyo had to fight the peasants as well. The samurai were losing their power as well as their money.
Some warriors refused to become part of the bureaucracy. These masterless warriors, or ronin, lived a very difficult life. After so many samurai were unemployed after Sekigahara, the last real battle in the Tokugawa era, ronin became a national problem. Five-hundred thousand samurai were unemployed (History 32). Many ronin, missing their warrior life, kept their violent tendencies. The government, striving for constant peace, saw the ronin as a threat and set up many regulations regarding their behavior. Daimyo were told to eject any ronin that came looking for work in their fief. Ronin who lived in the city and didn't have regular employment and a family were expelled. These masterless samurai lived by their wits knowing that any mistake they made would result in death.
Although samurai had the power of bureaucrats and some of them were rather wealthy, most were poor and virtually powerless. The merchants benefitted most from the new way of the Tokugawa era. The age that began with the end of war, also began with urbanization. With the rise of cities came the demand for merchants to sell city dwellers food and clothing. Although society viewed the merchants as the scum of the earth because they created nothing but profit for themselves, therefore not fitting into the perfect daimyo-samurai relationship in which loyalty is rewarded by a beneficiary. The merchant was loyal to nothing but his profit and himself. Society regarded the merchants as so inferior that the daimyo would not even tax commerce. While this was meant to demonstrate the inferiority of the merchants, it did nothing but increase their wealth and therefore their power.
This was not the only policy that inadvertently helped the merchants rise in financial power. The policy of sankin-kotai greatly benefited the merchants. To keep the daimyo from having too much power in their lands, they government required them to live one year on their fief and one year in Edo, the capital. The double-residency was known as sankin-kotai. The trip was lengthy and elaborate, a parade of sorts, because the elegance and size of the parade demonstrated the prestige of the daimyo. Over the course of the trip the daimyo and his many samurai and family would have to stop along the way to rest and eat. Towns sprang up along the main highways, Tokaido highway in particular. The merchants who owned the restaurants and inns there prospered and artisans moved in to sell their goods. The merchant's revenue was tax free as well, adding to the merchant's wealth.
Sankin-kotai cost the daimyo a considerable amount of money. The cost of travel was almost insignificant compared to the cost of keeping up two lavish residences. Often it strained the daimyo's finances completely. Since the Tokugawa era never promoted frugality, the daimyo found themselves struggling for resources. The merchants came to the rescue. They set up banks and many used the capital they made on their own investments as loan money. With high interest rates, this became a merchant's easiest way to make a fortune. Samurai also often took advantage of the availability of credit in order to live a lifestyle suitable to a man of respectable rank.
The daimyo demonstrated their rank by promoting the economy in their castle towns. They invited artisans to come in and produce goods, and summoned wholesale merchants to take their specialized goods to other parts of the country. The daimyo began to compete with each other for trade (History 111). Competition caused different regions of the country to have certain specializations and the wholesale merchants began to prosper along with the loan sharks. Since the daimyo could not sell all their tax rice in their area, they stored rice in warehouses in Osaka and hired merchants to run the warehouses (Crawcour 194).
The merchants had no way to spend their money, however. Barred from spending it on silk clothing or by showing their wealth in any external fashion, merchants looked for creative outlets for their cash. The outlets they discovered and developed became the culture of the Tokugawa era.
A bright, dynamic culture began to thrive in the cities. Kabuki theater, unlike the dark, somber morality plays of Noh theater, lit up the stage with a colorful array of costumes and lively themes. Prostitution thrived in the city and sex, both homosexual and heterosexual, became a pastime indulged in even by the supposedly sexually reserved samurai (Lehmann 85). Books about love and lust also became popular. Woodblock prints sold as artwork and Geisha girls entertained their crowds with fine conversation, humor, and dancing. These art forms grew especially prevalent in Osaka, a coastal city nearly every daimyo had to pass through. Osaka traded goods from all over the country as well as trading goods with the outside world despite the closed country policy sakoku. Osaka became the center of earthly pleasures. As a German doctor visiting Osaka put said:
Even what tends to promote luxury, and to gratify all sensual pleasures, may be had at as easy a rate here as anywhere. For this reason the Japanese call Osacca the universal theatre of pleasures and diversions . . . . Hence it is no wonder, that numbers of strangers and travelers daily resort thither, chiefly rich people, as to a place, where they can spend their time and money with much greater satisfaction, than perhaps anywhere else in the empire. (Hane 172)
The merchants owned all of these frequented businesses. The whole nation loved to purchase Osaka's pleasures. The merchants were despised for their money making endeavors, but they continued to make money as their goods became popular. The merchants didn't like being called immoral, however. To counteract this they developed their own moral way that mirrored the bushido ideal.
A samurai's child is reared by samurai parents and becomes a samurai himself because they tech him the warrior's code. A merchant's child is reared by merchant parents and becomes a merchant because they teach him the ways of commerce. A samurai seeks a fair name in disregard of profit, but a merchant, with no thought to his reputation, gathers profit and amasses a fortune. This is the way of life proper for each. (Hane 149)
The merchants also mimicked the daimyo-samurai relationship in their own businesses. Samurai often took on apprentices, or deshi. For a period of time, in return for the assistance of the deshi, the merchant would show him the trade. During this time the deshi had no rights, but was loyal and obedient to his master. After this he became an employee and was guaranteed job security with the exception of seriously breaking the rules. Since the merchants were not allowed surnames, often it was their business which they used to identify themselves (Lehmann 78).
The merchants gained money and identity as the market economy grew more complex. The merchants alone could understand it. The daimyo could not, and even their samurai advisors could not help them. As a result, merchants began to be hired in positions traditionally held by samurai. The daimyo rice warehouses in Osaka once had samurai attendants, but the position was transferred to the merchants who could sell the rice for them and loan them money while they were at it. The daimyo, who had become quite in debt, hired merchants as financial advisors and for assistance in administration. The importance of the merchant's financial knowledge was such that with these typically samurai roles often came samurai privileges. Merchants were allowed to carry swords and use surnames (Lehmann 71).
Meanwhile the samurai lost jobs to the merchants and became increasingly in debt because the value of their stipends kept dropping while their living became more extravagant. While the government didn't like the merchants, they were dependent on them to help them run the economic side of the country, as well as dependent on the money the merchants could loan them. While the government and samurai got poorer, the merchants only became richer because of the incredible consumer economy of the nation. The Tokugawa era benefitted the merchants, it was the "age of the chonin."
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The smoke clears revealing toppled buildings and smoldering corpses. People get up from the ground, disoriented, burned, blinded by the flash. Hiroshima and Nagasaki lie in ruin; they have become cities of the past. Japan surrenders, a bittersweet moment. Victory forfeited, lives saved, a country changed forever. Differences in government, economy, and mentality -- the basic after shocks of war -- are to be expected. But much more than that changed.
The Allied Commander, American General McArthur, rewrote the Japanese constitution giving rise to more rights for women and a liberal birth control policy. The American occupation in the years that followed seemed to enforce these new codes -- all of this in a period of rapid technological advancement. Japan could never be the same. Even marriage changed. Not the ceremony, but the process, the meaning, and the attitude toward the Western idea of romance were altered drastically.
Before World War II, marriage began with an investigation. When a man reached an eligible age, a go-between, someone who knew the family and its expectations, would propose a marriage meeting, or omiai, between the man and a woman that the go-between believed was suitable for him. First the go-between would ask the neighbors about the woman. Is she obedient? Does she keep a clean place? Who were her ancestors? As long as all went well and the families agreed to the match, an omiai would be arranged. During this time the bride would serve her suitor tea while keeping her eyes down at all times. Even a peek at the man could ruin her chances for marriage as this was a sign of a disobedient woman. If the two approved of each other after the meeting, they would see each other again at the wedding. If either side objected, usually the marriage would not take place.
After the marriage, the woman would move into her husband's house and live with his family. The mother-in-law was often extremely controlling, and the wife's only comfort in this was that one day she would be able to control her own son's wife. The wife would stay at home and cook for her husband and have his children and raise them and obey him in public and in front of his parents. As confining as this may seem, the wife was the queen of her household. She controlled the financial decisions and disciplined the children. She made the domestic decisions.
Since the marriage was not registered until after the first year, if a couple was not compatible, the marriage could easily be dissolved. But if the marriage went badly after that, the families pressured the couple and they would stay together. The man was rarely unhappy in the marriage because he only needed the woman to provide him with children, a clean house, and food. The wife had no choice or she would be scolded by the mother-in-law and sometimes even beaten. The man could always have extramarital affairs if he were so inclined. The wife's happiness did not really matter since she could not legally initiate a divorce. As a result, the divorce rate before the war was almost zero.
The only acceptable type of marriage before World War II was an arranged marriage. The only way to meet someone of the opposite sex was via a go-between since boys and girls were separated from age seven (Allen 39). However, couples did sometimes meet and fall in love. While this was tolerated, a marriage between the two was not acceptable. Marriage was considered an entirely societal concern, not to be left to private whims. Romantic love was no basis for marriage. Any couple who insisted on a romantic marriage was immediately disowned and ostracized from any community that knew of their sin. The only real choice for couples of love marriages was shinju, double suicide. According to a Japanese proverb, "Life is duty. Only in death does one find the freedom of unobstructed love (Smith 147)."
The Japanese believed that love should be kept in check at all times and could not take precedence over any social duties or loyalties. Beginning in the twelfth century when the family developed into the basic social and economic unit, love had little to do with marriage. During the Muromachi period, lords kept close watch over marriages to make sure land never passed into the wrong hands (Sansom 364). Daughters were sent to marry into certain families to stop family feuds. Love was a destructive force in the practical world.
While in the West love was idolized and women were seen as love goddesses, Japanese feared the aphrodisiacal qualities of women. Confucian ideals said that lust only leads to weakness. The aphrodisiacal qualities of women were despised. Nothing was more important than social stability, and love often led to disloyalty and disruption of society. In the West love has been idolized for centuries; in Japan, romantic love has been despised (Allen 39). As soon as Japan surrendered to the United States, however, and the United States changed Japan's laws and policies, attitudes toward romantic love and marriage began to change.
Marriage from this point onward was only to occur if there was mutual consent. Women also gained some independence and freedom with the right to vote and to initiate a divorce. Surprisingly, one of the most influential policies the Americans initiated was a liberal birth control policy (Nordmann 100). Abortions were made legal and easy to have and contraceptives were also made readily available. Japanese couples began to have fewer children (Nordmann 102). At the same time, there was a great urbanization movement because of Japan's industrial revolution. Urbanization was facilitated by the drop in the birth rate. Couples who only had one or two children could afford to move into the city and the husband could get a job with a good company. The only drawback was that they had to leave his parents behind because housing was becoming increasingly expensive. This led to the establishment of the nuclear families and the disintegration of extended ones. There was less pressure to put up with an intolerable husband. This fact combined with the recent legalization of divorce initiated by women led to a higher divorce rate (Nordmann 101).
Technology also affected Japanese marriages. After the war, American films came pouring into Japan, most of them idealizing romance and love. The new generation of Japanese liked the idea, and soon love marriages became acceptable. Now a girl could meet a boy at school or in the neighborhood, fall in love, and get married instead of committing the ritual shinju. Love marriages soon grew in popularity until today when over half of all marriages are considered love marriages.
Meeting people of the opposite sex, however, continued to be a problem. Although coed schools became popular, men and women remained a little uncomfortable around each other, and their friendship circles were limited to their own sex. Therefore, omiai is still an important part of most Japanese engagements.
A go-between, sometimes a boss or a mutual friend, will set two compatible people up and they will meet in a coffee shop, hotel lobby, or some other public place. The couple is not required to decide whether to marry right away or not. Often they will have several dates before becoming engaged and several more before going through with the marriage. Even dating services, both commercial and on the Internet, are also called omiai in Japan.
While marriage in Japan seems to have become Westernized, it is still very Japanese. Japanese still do not believe love is enough to make a successful marriage. Love isn't the only thing that matters. Parental approval remains very important. Couples must still consider each other's social status. Matchmaking is very class-conscious. Because go-betweens can make sure that the man is successful enough to someday buy a house and give the woman high status, omiai remains important. Many couples still marry only with concern for status compatibility and ignore this Western idea of romance. While Western ideas have filtered into the Japanese marriage system, Japanese practicality remains.
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Out of the Tang Dynasty's Confucian practicality comes fanciful legends of dragons, beautiful women, power, love, drinking, justice, morality and violence. These tales become a window to the lifestyle of Chinese officials and often describe their rise to their power. These tales speak of individuals, love relationships, the supernatural, and customs of the Chinese in general.
The heros of these tales are by no means perfect. Chunyu of Governor of the Southern Tributary State is a drunk who has what seems to be a hallucination at the edge of a river one day. The young man in Story of a Singsong Girl spends all the money his father gave him for exams on a woman whose mother makes her leave him. In The General's Daughter, Yinniyang is not the obedient wife the other tales say a woman should be, but roams the country looking for extraordinary men to join forces with. The Prince of the Quiantang River of The Dragon King's Daughter was over zealous and ruled so badly he caused many floods and was eventually kept from ruling. Ren the Fox Fairy's husband Zheng does not listen to his wife when she warns him she should not travel west and she ends up dying as a result.
These weaknesses allow the men to be role models for all: if they can achieve success, so can the average Joe. Most of the women in the stories are much more perfect than their male counterparts. They obey, love, support, and are eternally faithful to their husbands. While the Singsong Girl leaves her lover, this is only because her mother convinces her to. She takes him back when she finds him sick and beaten and penniless. She nurses him to health and helps him to study for his exams and soon produces one of the most successful men in the country. Ren the Fox Fairy is beautiful and could have any man, but she remains faithful to her socially inept, dorky husband despite the strong advances of his suave friend. In the end, she obeys him, traveling west with him although she knows she will die, and dies for him. The Dragon King's daughter meets her husband and although he marries many other women who die before their time, she waits for the right time when she can marry him.
These general traits, flawed men and obedient, faithful women, define the relationships that they possess. I thought it was interesting that love was so important in these stories since Confucianism generally regards romantic love as leading to disloyalty to the state. Nevertheless, romantic love existed in every story and often resulted in success. Although the Singsong girl left her lover at first, she nursed him back to health, made him study, and supported him so much that he rose as quickly in government as was possible. It is easy to see why these relationships benefited the men so much: the men were imperfect but with the perfect support of their women, they could go far.
The supernatural was often used to emphasize the morality of being a spouse. The Prince of the Quiantang River destroyed 300 miles of crops and killed 600,000 people because a man treated his niece badly. Although Ren the Fox Fairy had phenomenal supernatural beauty, she was able to resist the super suave Wei and remain faithful to her man. But the morals in these stories portrayed by the supernatural aren't limited to relationships.
The supernatural enforces the Chinese moral code by warning that justice will be enforced. Even the dragon Prince of the Quiantang River was taken out of power when he behaved badly causing nine years of floods and the flooding of five mountains. The general's daughter Yinniang demonstrated justice by decapitating any unjust men she encounters. The witch teaches her magical techniques to use.
The supernatural is used in the story of Governor of a Southern Tributary State to teach a moral lesson as well:
"His reputation reaches to the skies,
His influence can make a kingdom fall,
And yet this pomp and power, after all,
Are but an ant-heap in the wise man's eyes."
In other words, don't get carried away with worldly affairs and power because really it means nothing. Better to know you are a just, fair man and be good to all just for the sake of being good.
With all the practicality of Confucianism, it seems that the supernatural would play little role in Chinese lives. These stories contradict that, however. They stress the importance of the supernatural and show that what some may term superstition can be truth. Ren the Fox Fairy dies because her husband would not believe the witch who said if she went west she would die. The General's Daughter makes extensive use of premonitions Yinniang has. She saves Governor Liu's life many times by listening to her premonitions that someone would be after him.
Overall, the Tang Dynasty stories portray the Chinese as males studying to take exams and women serving and protecting their men. They show how if you study hard and behave justly you can become a government official or the governor of a state. They also show that the government can work well if there are good Confucian people as the Southern Tributary state did well under the competent people appointed to minister, chief councillor and minister of finance. Most importantly, they show the importance of love and the supernatural in a practical Confucian society.