Japan's New Middle Class: The Salary Man and His Family in a Tokyo Suburb (38 page)

share her problems with the older children and treat them like adults, even in their early teens. The mother is particularly dependent on the oldest son, and may have deeper emotional ties toward him, yet she commonly treats him with more respect and less light-hearted affection than she does a younger son. She looks to him for advice and help with younger children and for financial help in her later years.

Younger children often, in fact, fit the stereotype of being less responsible and more mischievous, but more spontaneous and charming. Many mothers delight in affectionately telling funny stories about the youngest child's exploits, tricks, and insatiable quest for attention. A mother is likely to make allowances for his "misbehavior" since he is the youngest and hence not so responsible. The youngest often is treated as a family pet and granted a certain amount of license by the older children and the father as well as by the mother. Small children call their mothers and fathers
okaachan
and
otoochan
(affectionate terms corresponding roughly to mommy and daddy). As they get older, they use more formal terms of respect,
okaasan
and
otoosan
(mother and father), but the youngest children usually continue calling their parents by the affectionate childish name much longer than their older siblings.

The youngest child is pampered and babied by his siblings as well as his mother. The mother weans him at a later age and sleeps and bathes with him for a longer period of time. Until he is three or four, he is given virtually anything he asks for. In quarrels between older siblings and children under three or four, the mother does not investigate who started the fight, but asks the older to yield. By the time the youngest is in grade school, more demands are placed on him, but often the pressure for him to act like an older sibling comes not from the mother but from the older siblings. Even then, however, the younger sibling is permitted more freedom than the elders received when they were his age.

The biggest change in the relationship of a child with his mother occurs when a younger sibling is born. The age at which a child is weaned, or required to sleep or bathe alone, or to assume responsibilities for his own behavior is determined more by the time his next younger sibling is born than by any other single factor. The youngest, having no such pressure, is permitted to remain childish to a much later age.

While most couples are anxious for their first child to be a boy, some wives argue, perhaps partly to protect themselves against possible disappointment, that it is better to have a girl first because a boy is more
wagamama
(determined to get what he wants). Mothers tend to feel that boys are more difficult to manage. They are afraid that unless they gratify a boy's demands quickly he may become uncontrollable, and some mothers become panicky if their sons do not do precisely as they wish them to. Girls, on the other hand, are thought to be patient and able to endure it (
gamanzuyoi
) if their wishes are not satisfied immediately. While many girls complain that their brothers are required to do less work and are criticized less, girls win their mothers' respect because they have stronger characters than their more impulsive brothers. Since mothers consistently treat boys as if they are impulsive and girls as if they have greater abilities to endure, it is not surprising that boys often do turn out to be less capable of tolerating frustration.
^[9]

This combination of birth order and sex roles tends to make the relationship between mother and youngest son especially affectionate. However, as much as she is devoted to her youngest son, the mother is sometimes concerned that he does not give her a chance to get her work done or to visit friends or attend PTA meetings because he is always following her around wanting to play. And the youngest son, accustomed to his mother's constant attention, is sometimes upset when his mother has other things to do.

While the youngest son enjoys the most pampering from the mother, the stepchild or the adopted child suffers most from neglect and discrimination. The number of these cases in Japan is large because of the number of war orphans and because parentless children are more likely to be cared for by relatives than placed in new homes where they might be fully accepted as family members. Furthermore, the housing shortages after World War II and the problem of caring for children who were finishing schooling has required relatives to care for children apart from their parents for

[9] This points up the inaccuracy of one wartime interpretation of the Japanese. It was thought that Japanese were aggressive in the war because they were controlled and kept all their feelings inside. If this were true, one would expect that since women were ordinarily much more controlled they would become much more aggressive under stress. Such is not the case.

extended periods, taking on a role much like that of step-parents. A number of Mamachi families have cared for rural nieces or nephews who came to the Tokyo area to attend high school or college. In case of divorce, the custody of the children in Japan frequently goes to the father's family so the child would be cared for by a stepmother or by the father's mother or sister who might have the same psychological relationship to the child as a stepmother.
^[10]
Because the mother-child relationship is so intense, the stepchild is likely to feel particularly deprived. No matter how much the stepmother tries to be fair, it is someone else's child whom she is caring for, and feelings of fondness are not ordinarily as deep as those between the mother and her true children. The actual number of stepmothers is relatively small, but the public wrath against them expressed occasionally in newspapers, TV "home dramas," and "movies" suggests the extent to which everyone has strong feelings about the evils of inadequate mothering.

In the daily work of child-rearing, the Mamachi father plays a minor role. Occasionally he plays with small children or takes older ones for a walk, but he does not share the responsibility of caring for and training the children. He does not serve as a mother substitute or as mother's helper in performing the routine aspects of child care when the mother is busy. It is true that a few modern fathers, albeit a bit awkwardly and gingerly, are attempting to help their wives, but this pattern is scarcely common enough to constitute a trend. Nor does the father often consult with the mother about questions on the daily handling of the child.

In his day-to-day contact with the children, the father is ordinarily incredibly mild. He almost never gives orders to the children, and he leaves the disciplining of the children entirely to the wife. He plays on the floor with small children, almost as if he himself

[10] In one study of 3754 divorce custody cases in 1953 in Japan, in 42.1 percent the custody of the children was awarded to the fathers, in 44.5 percent to the mothers. Eiichi Isomura, Takeyoshi Kawashima, and Takashi Koyama, eds.,
Gendai Kazoku Kooza
(The Structure of the Contemporary Family), Tokyo: Kawade Shoboo, 1956, Vol. 5,
Rikon
(Divorce), p. 208. In contrast, in a Detroit sample of 425 cases, mothers were awarded custody in 94.8 percent of the cases, fathers in 2.4 percent. William J. Goode,
After Divorce
, Glencoe, Ill.: The Free Press, 1956, p. 311.

were a child or, perhaps, more accurately, as a number of mothers phrased it, a child with a toy, the toy being the small child. He may be very affectionate to the children, and when the second child is born he may sleep and bathe with the eldest. Fathers see themselves as very kindly in relation to their children and try to avoid telling them what to do. They often side with their children when the mothers are too strict, and sometimes give them little presents without the mothers knowing about it. Children respond to this attention and are usually delighted to have a chance to go out with their fathers for walking or shopping.

Yet children are aware that this pleasantry has limits and at times are afraid their father may explode if not treated with proper caution.
^[11]
Children can have raucous good times with their father, but they must catch him in the right mood, and even then they may not feel free to talk to him about their own concerns. The positive bonds of affection which Mamachi children feel toward their father are not always strong enough to overcome their feeling of restraint because of the potential authority which he can exercise. In part, the respect for the father's authority derives from his expression of opinions which he does not even think of as restraining. Sometimes, as for example when the father wants the children to bring him something or to be quiet, he is so simple and direct that he does not think of himself as invoking authority; yet the children feel constrained to obey. In part respect derives from the few but memorable occasions when the father lost his temper and suddenly demanded something in a tone of voice that caused everyone to scurry to obey. In large part, however, the child's respect for the father's authority is learned from the mother. At times, she warns the children that if they do not perform properly in school or if their behavior brings shame to the family, the father will punish them. At other times the mother conveys the image of the father as an authority by more subtle means. In the father's absence, for

[11] In sentence-completion tests, children making critical comments about their parents most often describe their mother as
urusai
(bothersome, noisy, or strict) and their father as
kowai
(frightening or scary). This supports the view that while the mother takes care of the day-to-day discipline problems and is continually after the children to behave properly, the father is more readily obeyed on the few occasions when he does say something. Children can take their mother's criticisms and comments more lightly than their father's.

example, she may talk with the children about how to get something from the father without getting him angry. The impact of such discussions is to make the children cautious in approaching their father. Some fathers are uncomfortable about the reserve which the children feel in their presence, but even with their mild manner, playful behavior, and frequent presents, fathers have difficulty breaking through this wall of silence. Although kind and gentle to his children, the father nonetheless represents and enforces community standards to the children. It is he who loves and respects the child who does well on entrance examinations, the child who is admitted to a good school or job and makes a good marriage. Because he is a representative of the outside world to his children he cannot entirely escape being seen by them as they see the outside: aloof and frightening. And they feel they must observe some of the caution they do on the outside. As much as the father may try to avoid being cast as an authority and to win the children's friendship by considerateness, mildness, and good humor, his position as authority and representative of the outside always remain in the background.

Being home even a few hours a week is sufficient for the father to serve as role model for the boy, when reinforced by the mother's encouraging her son to behave in accord with the male role. The mother's expectations are usually sufficiently unconflicted as to obviate any problem in the boy's learning male roles. Sex roles and the attitudes associated with Oedipal ties between father and daughter on the one hand and mother and son on the other hand are also learned primarily from the mother.

Oedipal relationships are especially pronounced in late adolescence. At that time the daughter, like a person fond of someone she rarely sees, often feels more positive affect for the father even though she is in many ways more intimate with the mother. Similarly, the constellation of family roles and in particular the mother's relationship to her sons is sufficient to produce the father's rivalry with his sons, particularly his eldest son, even if the father spends relatively little time at home.

Most Mamachi parents, fathers and mothers, are lenient with their children, especially when they are small. By Western standards

grandparents are so uncritical that, as the Japanese saying goes, they "wouldn't even feel pain if the children got stuck in their eye," i.e., nothing the children do could possibly be bad or painful. Small children are permitted to run, climb, yell, stay up late, eat large amounts of sweets, keep their mothers occupied away from company, hit bigger children, and climb on their parents' laps or backs with almost no limit. Yet somehow, Mamachi mothers must train their children to become properly behaved adults.

So little do parents even think of punishing their children that mothers rarely if ever use techniques of discipline commonly used in the West. They rarely yell at, criticize, hit, spank a child, or mete out a specific punishment for a wrongdoing. Several Japanese mothers, visiting the United States, have expressed their shock at the cruelty and crudity of American mothers who spank or yell at their children in public places such as supermarkets. Yet Mamachi children do learn how to mind, are well-behaved in most public situations, polite to teachers,
^[12]
and considerate of others. Some Western observers who have attempted to explain the paradox of Japanese permissiveness toward children alongside the children's carefully controlled public behavior have argued that mothers suddenly become strict with children when they are about five or six years old.
^[13]
It is true that mothers become stricter as children grow older, particularly when a younger child is born and when the child enters school, but it is no sudden application of strictness that did not exist before. And even a typical three-year-old child has already learned to stay away from danger, to bow to guests, to take off his shoes as he enters the house, to treat adults with courtesy, and to be quiet in public.