Background on Japan

Background on Japan Geographical and Cultural Settings of Japan Japan is an extremely mountainous country, with most of the population living in two plains regions: the Kanto, containing Tokyo and Yokohama, and the Kansai, containing Kyoto, Nara, and Kobe. Cultural anthropologists have theorized that the remoteness of Japanese villages, which were (and still are) situated in mountain valleys, led to the development of the Japanese group-based social order. Reliance onand the inability to escape fromone's neighbors became a key organizing principal in Japanese culture, and has been a key feature of the society ever since. Understanding the remoteness of early Japanese life is important for two major reasons. First, the local nature of Japanese life led to local deities, spirits, and other entities gaining anthropomorphic significanceeven mountains became "kami" in some places (the Japanese reverence of Mount Fuji is the best known example of this phenomenon).. Furthermore, the contrast with American culture could not be more severe. With our ideas of "manifest destiny" and our belief in the myth of the "Marlboro Man"the lone rider who can carve his own history out of the vast possibility that American geography representsJapanese "closeness" and desire for harmony provide a thought-provoking contrast to bring to students attention. Spiritual Landscape Japan's first religion was Shinto. Shinto maintains that Japan was created when the gods dipped a jeweled spear into the oceans and pulled it out, leaving behind drippings that became the four main islands of Japan. From this moment on, the divinity of place has been a core tenet of Japanese religion, spirituality, myth, and folklore. Shintoism's deities, kami, are limitless. Millions are on record, but everyone's ancestors become a form of kami upon death, also. Shrines dot the Japanese landscape, with the most famous being located in the two historical capitals of Edo and Nara (near Kyoto). The result of all of these minor deities inhabiting the countryside is a rich mythological and folk tradition of ghosts and spirits.