Japanese culture is said to be high context. The Japanese share high degree of common ground among themselves, therefore they can communicate each other without details which are implicitly understood beforehand. Although I agree on this idea in a certain degree with my experiences working with foreigners, I do not clearly remember when I felt this characteristic in real situation.
News about graveyard of Muslims living in Japan gave me an example this could be an example of high context.
The issue was known by Japanese media for the first time. Muslim custom commands earth burial. Meanwhile most part of Japan is cremation nowadays. Therefore, graveyards for Muslims are hardly available. They managed to find a land, which is opposed by part of the community.
The news media that I got to know handled the issue in an almost same tone: situation of Muslim custom and situation of Japan, and the problem of land acquisition for Muslim graveyard.
While I was looking at the news, I unconsciously categorized this issue in the understanding of local community, that is, almost same issue as the land acquisitions of waste disposal site or dam construction.
News from Economist magazine, which was issued about one week later, changed my perspectives. In the beginning, the news was similar tone as those in Japan, however its tone changed halfway, to the issue of diversity in Japan, and concluded in a positive tone.
At first, this perspective of diversity hit me. This issue would apparently be a diversity issue for foreign eyes. It seems that I unconsciously put this perspective out of sight.
My further research told that other Japanese media and a member of Japanese Diet (both are not many though) pointed out the diversity on this issue. I concluded this incident that although diversity is likely to be overlooked among the Japanese, those intelligible to diversity can identify the issue differently.
In fact, what I was surprised more was that the Economist magazine concluded the news in a relatively affirmative tone on the effort in Japan to recognize the diversity. Even the previous Japanese who had sharp eye did not conclude the issue affirmatively.
This second surprise reminds me of scenes when there was a leap of logic during a meeting with foreigners. While we discuss analysis and solutions on a problem, at times the discussion goes to unexpected direction (against my assumptions). This is scary for the Japanese who do not have prior experiences. I tried to prepare for such unexpected situations at the beginning though, I decided to give up. I tried to accept the difference: different direction may occur with foreigners, and it may derail at times.
This might be difficult for most of the Japanese to understand. In the communication among the Japanese, detailed background is shared in advance, therefore they can reach conclusion relatively fast and the process is predictable. On the other hand, once foreign nationals join there, not only do they need detailed explanation on the background, but the Japanese might also feel the discussion point jumps. It’s either one or the other because this is the difference of communication strategy.
However, Japan is said to be a high context culture which is rarely seen in the world, meaning that the Japanese must be aware of their unique communication strategy. I am trying to look at things with the fact that what I take granted for is not always so in real world. ■