Rough Draft of My Essay

 Such a comment as “a Japanese ‘Yes’ means ‘No’ and vice versa (opposite)” is too exaggerated or contains but half-truth. (Haneda, Shima)
It is true that Japanese expressions are often confusing to Americans because communication style and social context are very different between them.  However, since modern technological advances have made the world a much smaller place, promoting increased interactions between peoples of different nations and cultures (McDaniel), the intercultural communication is unavoidable. In fact, there were 5,784 students from America in Japan from 2008 to 2009, and 29,264 Japanese students were in America at the same time (Opendoors). Even the number of Japanese students who go to US has decreased 50 percent in recent 14 years as Clinton said (Japan Times), the scale of student exchange between the two countries is not small. Also, all the Japanese live in America including non-students was 384,411 and American in Japan was 52,149 in 2009 (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan). It means that there are many encounters of mutual culture in both countries, and almost everyone has chances to meet them. However, such intercommunication sometimes creates small conflicts because of misunderstanding and less understanding of each other. In order to overcome such struggle and to communicate effectively, both American and Japanese should study about their culture and it is better to set rules among people.  

 First, Americans tend to speak directly. They value clearness and simplicity greater than harmony in communication, and the sooner reply is better even when they say “No” (Haneda, Shima 7). Even the ideal of American society is that people express their ideas vividly and powerfully. This characteristic of way of communication is based on the assumption that each person is different and to respect and unify the people, it is the best way to face the diversity (Barnlund 113). Americans considers it is important to protect the right of each person to express himself/ herself in distinctive ways (Barnlund 130). This attitude has been implanted since they are very young. Even at school and at home, children are given a lot of opportunities to debate and discussion (Barnlund 113).
  On the other hand, Japanese communication is famous for its indirectness. It sometimes irritates American. At the ELP-JLP discussion on October 14^th, one JLP student said that she had been confused by the way of ambiguous communication when she came to Japan, and another student was nodding to her. Obscuring expressions such as “~かも kamo” are used frequently in daily conversation. This word originally means “maybe” in English, but Japanese add it to a sentence which expresses his/ her opinion about something. For example, “これいいかも kore e kamo” is “I like it” plus kamo. Although the Japanese should have a clear feeling about the thing, he/ she often use this word (Yang, Cao 2.1). This characteristic of ambiguous also arises in business communication. Japanese often say “I will consider your request very carefully (よく考えておきます。 Yoku kangaete okimasu).” to refuse a suggestion. They do not like to say “No” (Halls 61).

Those phenomena should be difficult for people who live in direct communication culture to understand, but of course, they are not for irritating others. This indirectness is the product of spirit that tries hard to avoid conflict and hurting others, and reflects Japanese traditional context that values social harmony.

 As above mentioned, American and Japanese culture have completely opposite theory of communication, so there must be misinterpretations and conflicts. What should people from the one country do when they need to exchange their opinions with people from the other country then? Needless to say, it is very important to learn about culture and manner of communication each other. Knowing more about them gives people broad views and encourages accurate perception of foreigners. The MEXT of Japan should not only focus on teaching English language, but also include more curriculums for educating manners of foreign countries. In addition, it is better for American school to have special classes of studying current foreign ways of thinking.

  Another possible way to avoid cultural conflict of communication is to set the rules among people. For example, in a business scene, it should be very efficient to create mutual format of e-mail and paper like scientific research papers. Deciding the structure of them, receivers can read information clearly without irritating or confusing. Also this way can be applied to discussion and meeting. Determining the rules of making a statement is useful to avoid occurrence of confusions during the conversation.

  Japanese and American have struggled to understand each other. However, their differences of communication style have prohibited accomplishing it. American way is generally based on direct expression. In American society, sharp manifestation of idea is most valued and quick response is welcomed. To the contrast, Japanese prefer to use indirect way of communication. This indirectness was created by the spirit of social harmony. Their most important matter is to avoid conflict and hurting others in order to maintain a good atmosphere. To overcome this difference and misunderstandings occur from it, there are two possible ways of solution. One is to know more about other culture. The other way is to create the domestic communication rules among people. 

This intercultural problem does not only happen between Japanese and Americans, and it is one of the most difficult things to solve. As the number of intercultural exchange increase, the more often the problem happens. However, since international communication in modern society is unavoidable whether the situation is nationwide scaled or casual, people have to overcome this subject as long as human being has various cultures around the world.