Comparing Bateson and Benedict

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Freudian Psychology and Schismogenesis Benedict states in the opening chapter of the Chrysanthemum and the Sword that the book originates from an assignment in 1944 to study the values and motives of wartime Japan and predict Japan’s reaction to the diplomatic and military moves by the U.S. authorities. Due to the strong pragmatic orientation of the book, Benedict doesn’t share Bateson’s methodological concerns in separating eidos and ethos nor his attempt to keep the analysis synchronic as opposed to diachronic in his book Naven. Despite their differences in orientation, Benedict and Bateson are both concerned with the dynamic relationship between individuals and culture as a whole. They both believe that a culture has a generalizable pattern that undergoes progressive change and argue that the psychology and behavior of individuals within the culture are standardized through experience and learning by the generalized cultural pattern. Benedict wants to characterize the Japanese culture: I had to look at the way they conducted the war itself and see it not for the moment as a military problem but as a cultural problem. In warfare as well as in peace, the Japanese acted in character. (Benedict1946:5) She explains the notion of taking one’s proper station and various categories of responsibilities in Japan and how Japanese internalize these cultural assumptions through learning and upbringing. Benedict gives importance to “the anthropologist’s premise that human behavior in any primitive tribe or in any nation in the forefront of civilization is learned in daily living. No matter how bizarre his act or his opinion, the way a man feels and thinks has some relation to his experience” (Benedict1946:11). Therefore, after she described the cultural assumptions behind adult behaviors, Benedict accounts for the establishment of the Japanese assumptions about life
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