Culture of Japan

Culture of Japan. The culture of Japan is the result of a historical process that
begins with the waves of immigration originating from the continent of deAsiaand of the islands
of thePacific Ocean, followed by a strong cultural influence coming fromChinay,
subsequently, a long period of isolation from the rest of the world called Sakoku
part of the Tokugawa shogunate until the beginning of the Meiji Era, at the end of the 19th century, in
where it receives an immense foreign influence that increases after the end of
theWorld War II. This resulted in a culture distinct from other cultures
Asian.

InJapan, personal relationships are very influenced by the ideas of 'honor',

"obligation" and "duty", which represents a custom different from an individualistic culture.
and liberalism of Western countries. The conceptions of 'morality' and 'behaviors
"desirable" are less practiced in family, school, and friendship situations, without
an embargo, a more formal practice is observed in front of superiors or unfamiliar people.

On the other hand, the Japanese have an intricate and complicated sense of humor, which is
it reflects a lot in the language, culture, religion, and ethics, which is sometimes considered
as very difficult to interpret by other cultures.

Summary
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Language
A large percentage of the country's population (around 127 million people),
they speak theJapanese language, which currently constitutes the ninth most spoken language in the
world, so by understanding the language, one would also understand a large part of the
country's culture. This language and its local dialects are closely related to the
Ryukyuan languages, spoken in theRyukyu Islands, in the south of the country, and that combine the
family of Japonic languages. Nevertheless, there are theories that consider Japanese as a
isolated language or one that is connected with the Ural-Altaic language family or with the
Austronesian languages of the Pacific.

The Japanese language is an agglutinative language that has a complex writing system.
with three types of glyphs: the Chinese characters, called kanji, which were introduced in
the 5th century from China; and two syllabaries: hiragana and katakana, created in Japan in the
9th century. It is also used theLatin alphabetbut on few occasions. Also the language
Japanese has provided words for other languages, examples
howsushi,karaoke, samurai, tsunamiokimonoare of Japanese origin and used
commonly in the Spanish language.

SeeJapanese language

Gastronomy

Sushi, a typical dish from Japan

Japanese gastronomy has a long culinary past that has developed in

onegastronomysophisticated, refined and specialized for each season. It is similar to the
Chinese gastronomy with respect to the staple foods oshushoku, which are based on
five foods rich incarbohydrates: rice, wheat, oats, beans, and common millet. The dishes
known as kokazu, they serve to flavor the main dish, and for
general salty.

A standard Japanese meal always consists of a bowl of Japanese rice.

side dish, which is a soup bowl and a
variety of okazu dishes such as fish, meat, vegetables, etc. It is also considered as
It is customary to name the meals depending on the amount of okazu that accompany them.
rice and soup. It is also worth noting that, since Japan is an island nation, it is consumed
a lotseafood.

Clothing

Kimono

In Japan, you can find two types of clothing: traditional and modern.
traditional clothing is highlighted by the kimono, which is a long, eye-catching garment used by
women, men, and children on special occasions. Other garments used by the
Japanese are: layukata, which is a light summer kimono; lahakama, a garment.
ceremonial; eljinbei, a lightweight male garment used as pajamas; and eljunihitoe, a garment
feminine similar to a kimono and worn by the nobles.

Concerning modern Japanese fashion, there are some trends like ganguro.
what is a women's fashion characterized by wearing designer clothes, having the skin
tanned and adopting the excessive use of accessories. Another modern trend in Japan is
lamoda lolita, which is inspired by Victorian children's fashion with elements ofRococoy
that has had derivations from the gothic, punk, media subculture, etc. Interestingly the
Japanese school uniform has been taken as a special variant of youth clothing,
which is very evident in Japanese media. Another trend
the modern one that started in Japan is thecosplay, which consists of dressing up as someone
character that appears in some of thesmeans of communication of
Japan: anime, manga, video games, music videos, etc.

Sport
In Japan, there is a diversity of both traditional and modern sports.
the last ones appeared after the Meiji Restoration; both forms have a
great acceptance among the Japanese population and are widely practiced from a young age.
Regarding traditional non-martial sports, we can highlight falconry (art
of hunting with birds of prey), thehunt, kite skills, elkemari, what is it
ancient ball game and elyabusame (Japanese archery). Among the numerous arts
Japanese martial arts, which are traditional sports, we have aikido, thejudo, eljujutsu
thekarate, thesumo(all these contact sports or fighting), eliaido, elkenjutsu(these
two, handling of the Japanese sword), kendo (Japanese fencing) and shurikenjutsu (handling
of theshurikenor Japanese knife).

Among modern sports, baseball, soccer, basketball have been imported,

volleyball, table tennis, rugby, and Australian football are also practiced
automobile racing and motorcycling, there are also other originals from Japan such as elekiden,
What is a long-distance race, elkirin, which is a bicycle sport and elsoft
tennis, which is a racket game that uses a rubber ball.

Religion
Most Japanese people are not affiliated with a particular religion, in turn they
they incorporate various features from many religions into their daily lives and that said
this process is known as syncretism, and therefore they celebrate festivals belonging to
different religions like elBuddhism, theChristianityand theShintoism(Shinto religion). One of
The most practiced religions in Japan is Shinto, which is also the native religion of
Japan and which is exclusive to that country, was the only religion that existed before the arrival
from Buddhism to Japan and significantly marked theJapanese mythology. It involves a religion.
polytheistic that takes place in shinto temples or jinja, based on four affirmations:
tradition and family, love for nature, purification and the celebration of festivals
traditional. It has no canon or sacred book, and it is not a religion that is
interested in increasing its number of followers, therefore, this religion has not spread to
worldwide. It was a state religion from the Meiji Era until the beginning of the Second
World War, and at that time it suppressed other religions, especially with theBuddhism
Japanese.
Japanese Buddhism is the religion mostly practiced in Japan, it arrived in the country
coming fromKoreaIn the sixth century, although it was promoted in Japan in the following century.
Within Japan, various schools and trends began to emerge, stemming from Buddhism.
Mahayana, however, the trend that prospered in Japan and that had an impact on
Japanese culture is Zen Buddhism. The most practiced branches in Japan are
current events are part of Zen, Jodo Shinshu, and Jodo Shu, which are liberal schools.
belonging to the Pure Land branch of Buddhism and that do not require monastic life
within its cult; and Nichiren Buddhism. It is worth noting that Buddhism is very
merged with Shinto and sometimes both are considered as a single belief
within Japan.

Other religions that have found a place in Japan areJudaism, theHinduismand in less
measure theIslamism. Despite not being religions, elConfucianismand theTaoismhim
They rooted out certain aspects of Japanese Buddhism that were purely cultural.