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Typological differences exist across cultures in the concept of rela- tionality. But how are the opposing forces between society and self within and across cultures dealt with psychologically? As our task is to understand language and thought across cultures, we should ask whether it is possible to shift one’s orientation of relationality. To answer this question, let us turn once again to our mythical images of Japan and the United States, the samurai and the cowboy.

In this regard Philip Slater’s insight offers special significance. Slater (1970, 8–9) recognizes “three human desires that are deeply and uniquely frustrated by American culture.”

1. The desire for community—the wish to live in trust, coopera- tion, and friendship with those around one.

2. The desire for engagement—the wish to come directly to grips with one’s social and physical environment.

3. The desire for dependence—the wish to share responsibility for the control of one’s impulses and the direction of one’s life. The irony of this characterization of American culture lies in the fact that Americans are, too often and too quickly, labeled as strong proponents of independence and freedom. As important as inde- pendence may be, human beings also long just as much—or possi- bly even more—for dependence.

And Japan, a country characterized as fostering dependence and subordination of the individual to the welfare of the group, is haunted by contradictory forces. As we saw in the samurai’s inner

thoughts, there is a desire for independence and freedom—often freedom from the bonds of human relationships. Japanese people seem to seek out every possible nook and cranny in their fairly tightly woven society to find solitude—being distant from the crowd and being free from (sometimes forced) dependent human relationships.

The heroic and tragic images of the samurai and the cowboy reside in our consciousness regardless of our individual cultural heritage. They simply reflect the human emotional tug-of-war— the simultaneous desire to foster a relationship and to sever it. In this sense the fiercest battle between two different values takes place in each individual’s heart.

Competing Values in America

Such a battle may be represented in a public forum. According to Donal Carbaugh (1988/1989), contemporary American discourse often takes the shape of individual and self fighting against society, as is depicted most clearly in the television talk show “Donahue.” After examining “Donahue” discourse, Carbaugh observes that the terms “self” and “society” are used with strong semantic force, and a deep agony is enacted in American speech as the “cultural sym- bols of ‘self ’ are asserted against the cultural symbols of ‘society’ ” (Carbaugh 1988/1989, 181). He states:

Consider the following: (1) “self” is divisible (unique) from others, yet in so being, enacts a cultural person, and thus enables identification with others; (2) “society” is unity (uniformity) with others, yet so bound, gives perspective to uniqueness and motivates “self” acts of extrication and separation. Treated together, the cultural and social functions may thus be summarized: “self” provides a cultural model for individuation and division, but is held in common, thus displaying a social outcome of unity; further, since “self” symbolizes division from others, acts seeking unity are motivated; “society” provides a cultural model of unity, but since it is de-valued, social outcomes of division are sought. With “self,” a common sense of the divisible per- son motivates unity; with “society” a unified sense of sociation moti- vates division. Such is the complexity of the social and cultural tensions that are activated when American life is discoursed through a deep agony. (1988/1989, 204)

This agony, displayed daily on American television, reflects today’s inner conflict. As Kenneth Burke aptly puts it, when a person

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identifies with another, he or she is substantially one with that other. “Yet at the same time he remains unique, an individual locus of motives,” and therefore “he is both joined and separate, at once a dis- tinct substance and consubstantial with another” (Burke 1950, 21).

Tipping the Scale of Competing Values

The ancient battle for priority between self and society will con- tinue on every level of human life. This universal conflict, although acted out differently in different cultures, is the primary opposing value—both within and across cultures. Although it seems that this difference in values can be reconciled only by the victory of one, with the annihilation of the other, in reality opposing cultural val- ues remain at near equilibrium in the heart. Slater explains: “An individual who ‘converts’ from one viewpoint to its exact opposite appears to himself and others to have made a gross change, but actually it involves only a very small shift in the balance of a persis- tent conflict” (1970, 8).

The characteristics of Japanese communication—both in lan- guage and in thought—that I identify through my discussion of relationality may, in reality, be less particular than at first assumed. Cross-cultural understanding may not be as difficult as it seems. Indeed, understanding Japanese communication is not as difficult as it is often made out to be.

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4 Relationality Cues in the Sociocultural