i thought that maybe as an addendum to my previous post, i should explain a bit about the term losing face (丢脸）. in china, it is extremely important not to lose face. doing something that compromises others' opinion of you reflects not only on yourself but also on your family. as China is much more community-based than the west, if you cause an embarassment to yourself or your family within the community, it is taken very seriously. losing face can occur to a private individual, or on a grander scale to a public individual, or even to China as a country in the face of other world powers.
take for instance, the time when my friend Ben Saller and I were travelling around China during a week's break from our study abroad program. In a small town near a mountain called "Huang Shan" (Yellow mountain), a very popular site for Chinese tourists but not so commonly visited by foreigners, we met a local who had somehow become fluent in english. he fancied himself as kind of a tour guide for all westerners who came through the town, and quickly attached himself to us. he had been written up in the Lonely Planet, so i figured we could trust him, but you always still have to be on guard when you're travelling. anyway the night we met him, he told us about some pictures he had painted and asked if we would like to see them, possibly to buy some. we followed him into the residential area of the town, and then he led us to a house. he told us that his apartment was upstairs, and urged us to walk inside. while he went upstairs to get things ready, we waited on the ground floor. it was extremely dark inside and looked kind of abandoned. here's where being a suspicious new yorker kicked in.
i got really freaked out, and said that i couldn't just walk into this random house. Ben understood, and so we sort of backed away and said that we weren't interested. at this, the man became really agitated and pressed us to come inside. that always makes me more nervous, so we started to walk faster.
he followed us, and begged, "please, please come look."
he had this kind of childlike air about him, so Ben tried to explain, "in america, you can't just walk into people's houses that you don't know. it could be dangerous."
"but it's me!" the man said, looking like he was going to cry. "you read about me in lonely planet. mr. chen. you know i'm a good person."
"yes," Ben said, trying to sound soothing. "but we just have to be careful."
"you don't understand," the man said. "i told my family i was bringing foreigners upstairs, and then you run away. i have really lost face, it is very embarrassing."
we felt bad, but i was still worried in case that was just what he said to people to lure them back to his apartment to kill them. so we compromised by going to his restaurant and eating his banana pancakes.
Face is also extremely important in politics, when a public figure tries to avoid losing face. the famine that killed millions of people during the great leap forward, for instance, could have easily been avoided. it was not actually even a famine, or not one caused by natural means anyway. the problem was that, first of all, the communists, rejecting "western science," engaged in really bogus farming practices that ravaged much of their produce. and then second of all, because each official was pressured to report falsely high yieldings, a majority of the produce was then shipped from the countryside to cities, or even to neighboring countries. there are other factors as well, but the point is that Mao knew about what was happening, and he could have stopped it before so many people starved to death. but because he didn't want to lose face by admitting that the leap had been a mistake, millions more would die. other high officials who tried to publicly inform him what was going on were quickly cast out. that Mao's attempt to save face was carried out to the point of giving other countries China's grain in order for the leap to appear successful to the world is unforgivable, but it really gives a sense of how important it was for Mao and China to give the appearance of success.
finally, i come to the loss of face for China as a nation. as the events in China during the majority of the 20th century left the country far behind the Western powers, when the country finally began to open its doors to the rest of the world, the Chinese were embarassed to discover where they now stood in world politics.
especially when you consider China's traditional political philosophy, Tian Xia, which organizes the world not as nations, but as spheres of influence radiating out from china as the center of the world. China's nearby neighbors, admittedly inferior to the most developed country in asia, gave a yearly tribute to China and were mostly left alone. when britain began trade with china, had it taken the prostrating attitude that countries like korea used in relations with china, things would have gone much more smoothly. an unwillingness to kowtow to the emperor for instance, caused the emperor to lose face.
back to the 1980's, as China found itself far behind the rest of the world powers in development, technology, and economics . the chinese do not like to be inferorior to other nations. which is why today there is so much excitement about China's steady advancement. the chinese, on an individual level, are proud that China will someday be a leading power again. as any country's citizens would be no doubt, but in china it is tied in with this feeling of embarassment or the loss of face, and the desire to regain the country's face.
take for instance, the time when my friend Ben Saller and I were travelling around China during a week's break from our study abroad program. In a small town near a mountain called "Huang Shan" (Yellow mountain), a very popular site for Chinese tourists but not so commonly visited by foreigners, we met a local who had somehow become fluent in english. he fancied himself as kind of a tour guide for all westerners who came through the town, and quickly attached himself to us. he had been written up in the Lonely Planet, so i figured we could trust him, but you always still have to be on guard when you're travelling. anyway the night we met him, he told us about some pictures he had painted and asked if we would like to see them, possibly to buy some. we followed him into the residential area of the town, and then he led us to a house. he told us that his apartment was upstairs, and urged us to walk inside. while he went upstairs to get things ready, we waited on the ground floor. it was extremely dark inside and looked kind of abandoned. here's where being a suspicious new yorker kicked in.
i got really freaked out, and said that i couldn't just walk into this random house. Ben understood, and so we sort of backed away and said that we weren't interested. at this, the man became really agitated and pressed us to come inside. that always makes me more nervous, so we started to walk faster.
he followed us, and begged, "please, please come look."
he had this kind of childlike air about him, so Ben tried to explain, "in america, you can't just walk into people's houses that you don't know. it could be dangerous."
"but it's me!" the man said, looking like he was going to cry. "you read about me in lonely planet. mr. chen. you know i'm a good person."
"yes," Ben said, trying to sound soothing. "but we just have to be careful."
"you don't understand," the man said. "i told my family i was bringing foreigners upstairs, and then you run away. i have really lost face, it is very embarrassing."
we felt bad, but i was still worried in case that was just what he said to people to lure them back to his apartment to kill them. so we compromised by going to his restaurant and eating his banana pancakes.
Face is also extremely important in politics, when a public figure tries to avoid losing face. the famine that killed millions of people during the great leap forward, for instance, could have easily been avoided. it was not actually even a famine, or not one caused by natural means anyway. the problem was that, first of all, the communists, rejecting "western science," engaged in really bogus farming practices that ravaged much of their produce. and then second of all, because each official was pressured to report falsely high yieldings, a majority of the produce was then shipped from the countryside to cities, or even to neighboring countries. there are other factors as well, but the point is that Mao knew about what was happening, and he could have stopped it before so many people starved to death. but because he didn't want to lose face by admitting that the leap had been a mistake, millions more would die. other high officials who tried to publicly inform him what was going on were quickly cast out. that Mao's attempt to save face was carried out to the point of giving other countries China's grain in order for the leap to appear successful to the world is unforgivable, but it really gives a sense of how important it was for Mao and China to give the appearance of success.
finally, i come to the loss of face for China as a nation. as the events in China during the majority of the 20th century left the country far behind the Western powers, when the country finally began to open its doors to the rest of the world, the Chinese were embarassed to discover where they now stood in world politics.
especially when you consider China's traditional political philosophy, Tian Xia, which organizes the world not as nations, but as spheres of influence radiating out from china as the center of the world. China's nearby neighbors, admittedly inferior to the most developed country in asia, gave a yearly tribute to China and were mostly left alone. when britain began trade with china, had it taken the prostrating attitude that countries like korea used in relations with china, things would have gone much more smoothly. an unwillingness to kowtow to the emperor for instance, caused the emperor to lose face.
back to the 1980's, as China found itself far behind the rest of the world powers in development, technology, and economics . the chinese do not like to be inferorior to other nations. which is why today there is so much excitement about China's steady advancement. the chinese, on an individual level, are proud that China will someday be a leading power again. as any country's citizens would be no doubt, but in china it is tied in with this feeling of embarassment or the loss of face, and the desire to regain the country's face.
posted by Amanda at 9:14 PM
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