Japan's Geography, Language, Religion, and Culture Explained

Geographic Peculiarities of Japan

A complex set of factors affects the culture of any country. One of the most important aspects that determines the way of life of a people is the geography of the area in which they reside. In the case of Japan, a single geographic feature alone — its being an island nation — determines much of the country's insular character, giving rise to a unique language, culture, and religion. This paper analyzes Japan's language, religion, and politics, and identifies important socio-geographical features of the country, including the role of religion and language in defining Japanese culture, the connections between political systems and those forces, and how the religions and cultures of Japan relate to and differ from those of the United States.

Japan is roughly the size of California, consisting of four major islands — Honshū (the largest), Hokkaidō, Kyūshū, and Shikoku, which together make up 95% of Japan's territory — and more than 3,000 smaller islands formed as a result of volcanic activity beneath the sea. It has a population of approximately 125 million, most of it packed into about 20% of the country's plains near the coasts, since 75–80% of the country consists of mountains. This makes Japan one of the most densely populated countries in the world. In the "urban corridor" between Tokyo and Kobe, 45% of the country's population lives on just 17% of its land area, with the average population density in Tokyo reaching approximately 13,000 persons per square kilometer.

The country is endowed with few mineral and natural resources and has limited land available for agriculture due to its vast mountainous territory, though highly intensive farming methods mean Japan grows more than 60% of its own food. Japan's geography also features a long and irregular coastline, a rainy and humid climate with cold harsh winters in the north and hot humid summers in the south, and approximately 10% of the world's active volcanoes. Earthquakes are a regular feature. These socio-geographic features determine much of the country's culture and its people's way of life (Cybriwsky et al., 2003).

The Japanese Language and Cultural Identity

Japanese is the official language of Japan and is spoken by virtually all of the country's inhabitants, as well as by Japanese communities living in Hawaii, the Americas, and elsewhere. Chinese and Korean people who lived under Japanese occupation before the end of World War II also speak it as a second language. For most of its history, the Japanese language developed in isolation. For this reason, it is a distinctive language whose vocabulary, sound system, and grammar bear little relation to other languages of the world, though some scholars trace its origins to the Altaic languages of central Asia — such as Turkish — and to Korean, while others find similarities with the Austronesian languages of the South Pacific (Brodie, 1957). In its more recent history, Japanese has been influenced by Chinese and by several Western languages, particularly English.

In many ways, the Japanese language defines Japanese culture. Japanese speech is highly sensitive to social relationships and reflects the elaborate social etiquettes observed in everyday life. Several degrees of politeness and familiarity exist in the spoken language to distinguish between superiors, equals, and inferiors based on factors such as age, sex, and social status.

The evolving changes in the language also reflect the political and social changes in the country. Before the 5th century AD, when Japan was largely isolated from the rest of the world, Japanese was solely a spoken language. Over the following centuries, with increased interaction between Japan and China, the Chinese writing system was adopted and the language assimilated many Chinese words (Cybriwsky et al., 2003).

During the Meiji Restoration, and particularly after the U.S. occupation of the country following Japan's defeat in World War II, the language absorbed numerous words from Western languages such as Portuguese, Dutch, German, and especially English. Yet just as the Japanese managed to retain their traditional culture despite rapid Westernization, their language retains little structural similarity to Western languages.

There are a number of regional dialects spoken in different parts of the country. However, as Japan has become increasingly urbanized, the dialect of educated speakers in Tokyo has emerged as "Standard Japanese" and is now understood throughout the country. The dominance of Standard Japanese has driven Ainu — Japan's only other indigenous language — into near-extinction, reflecting the broader urbanization of Japanese society.

Religion in Japan: Shinto and Buddhism

Modern Japan, in the period since World War II, has become primarily a secular society in which religion is no longer a dominant factor in most people's daily lives. Despite this trend, certain religious traditions and practices remain vitally important for the Japanese and continue to help define the society.

Most Japanese people profess to follow one or both of the country's two dominant religions: Shinto and Buddhism. Shinto is Japan's native religion and traces its roots to prehistory. The term Shinto is the equivalent of the Japanese kami-no-michi, meaning "the way of the gods" or "the way of those above." Unlike most major world religions, Shinto has no organized body of teachings, no recognized historical founder, and no explicit moral code; it is instead a mixture of religious beliefs and practices that focuses on the worship of nature, ancestors, and sacred spirits or gods that personify aspects of the natural world. The Shinto religion accorded divine status to Japanese Emperors, regarding them as descendants of the sun goddess. Shintoism was also historically linked to the shoguns — the traditional warrior class of Japan (Cybriwsky et al., 2003).

From 1868 to 1945, under the Japanese imperial government, Shinto was Japan's state religion. After Japan's defeat in World War II, the occupation government deliberately worked to eliminate official patronage of the religion, since Shintoism had been used to promote militarism and aggression in the lead-up to and during the war. A further reason to discourage State Shinto was the occupation government's intention to strip the Emperor of his divine status.

Buddhism — the other major religion of Japan — originated in India, where its founder Gautama Buddha was born. It arrived in Japan in the 6th century by way of China and Korea. In the centuries that followed, numerous Buddhist sects took root in Japan, the most prominent among them being Zen Buddhism. Zen was introduced from China in the 12th century and quickly became popular among the dominant warrior class under Japan's first shogunate (military government). Zen Buddhism fuses the Mahayana form of Buddhism that originated in India with the Chinese philosophy of Daoism.

Zen Buddhism has had a significant effect on Japanese culture, primarily through the artistic activities cultivated in Zen monasteries, which function partly as training schools. Students receive thorough training in arts and crafts — particularly painting, calligraphy, gardening, architecture, and the ceremonial tea drinking known as chado. Zen monasteries are also known for training in fencing, archery, and jujutsu. Under Zen influence, the Japanese elevated ceremonial tea drinking to a high art. From the late 15th century to the late 16th century, the tea ceremony became a model of social harmony and spiritual fulfillment during a period of internal conflict. It has survived the wave of Westernization that eclipsed many other traditional Japanese arts; even today, the largest tea school in Japan is said to have two million students (Varley, 2003).

Conclusion

The unique political geography of Japan has largely been responsible for shaping the country's distinctive language, culture, and political system. The country's major geographical features — above all, its island character and the limited landmass available to support a large population — have shaped most of Japan's history and the characteristics of its people. Japan's religions and language have influenced its culture and way of living to a great extent. Although Japanese and American cultures have little in common and have maintained a complex relationship for a long time, the two countries and their peoples have not remained entirely immune to each other's influence.