Be a good listener: sit quietly and wait your
turn to talk. Right? Not in Japan! Here it's actually rude not to interrupt someone. And here's why. Welcome to my old dōjō. I practiced a martial art called kendō, the
"sword path". While we drilled our way through footwork
and cuts of the sword over and over, my highest-ranked sensei watched with intent eyes and a jolly
smile. But he wouldn't wait to grade us on our skills. Feedback was constant. Always talking, always, nnn, sōōō sō sō
sō. Every step, every move of the hand, right
or wrong. There was almost a rhythm to it. A rhythm with a constant flow of interjections. Looking back, I think what was going on here
was a kind of aizuchi. Consider a conversation in English. The person who's talking shares a thought,
and you listen quietly until they finish. Hah, no actually, that may be polite for some,
but for most of us there's back and forth, with room for reactions, transitions and taking
turns. That's important. No cuts! Wait your turn. Now a conversation in Japanese. Notice all the interaction by the "listener". The speaker barely gets out the topic before
they're cut off! Then come uh huhs and yesses and reallies
scattered throughout. Clearly, Japan has a different opinion on
what being a "good listener" means. To see why, think back to kendō. Not kendō with my sensei, but 550 years
ago, when a struggle for Shogunate succession broke out into the intense Ōnin no Ran. Warriors trained to take up the sword, and
ironworkers to produce them. As swordsmith and apprentice hammered together
back and forth, they coined a new term: ai-dzuchi, "mutual mallet". Later, this compound became a metaphor for
Japan's culturally valued take on being a "good listener". Today "chiming in" is still aizuchi o utsu,
to strike mutual mallets. This involves talking back with a bunch of
"tokens", little words or phrases. Your choice of tokens varies, but most get
reused frequently. And not only when it's your turn. More often than not, and for some by definition,
you say these tokens while the speaker is still talking. It's happening at the same time, "overlapping"
the speaker's speech. But aizuchi is not merely a list of memorized
keywords. Japanese listeners pay attention, even repeating
or asking for more: So, last month - last month yes? - I was visiting family - family,
really? Master this, because bad aizuchi can get you
labeled "dorai", cold, shallow. I first learned about ironworkers and mutual
mallets from this masters thesis. The same anthropologist later did a study on conversations
between US and Japanese businesspeople. She acknowledges the Japanese stereotype that
amerikajin are dorai but then introduces someone who was never called cold: Gary. Here is Gary helping a coworker with an English
lesson. What makes him so warm? Overlapping the coworker and constantly using
feedback tokens. Don't misinterpret them though. Go look up "hai". What does it mean? "Yes"! Not in the world of aizuchi. Another US businessperson, let's say not-Gary,
is giving a Japanese subordinate advice on running an ad campaign. Despite repeating "hai", the employee does
not take any of not-Gary's advice. Uh, what? Well, there were hints of disagreement. Also, so important, these tokens tell you,
"I follow, go on." As these researchers put it, interrupting
aizuchi mean "I listen" but "never agreement or empathy". Now, they use the word "backchannel", a term
coined in 1970 for "short messages" a listener gives back to a speaker. English also has overlapping backchannels. Japanese just does it more. Like, three times more. And, curiously, Mandarin does it a lot less. Less than Korean, where the metaphor is instead
beating the mutual drum. English listeners tend to backchannel when
it's time to take turns, but, like Japanese, Korean listeners were heard backchanneling between turns. Speakers actually cued listeners
to backchannel by raising pitch and drawing out sounds. So one reason it's impolite not to interrupt
in Japanese may come down to this simple mechanism: pitch. Analyzing a bunch of "messy" conversations,
this paper found that speakers were lowering their pitch 110ms before backchannels. Low - or maybe high - pitch change was a solid
predictor, better than the meaning of the utterance, better even than whether speakers
have finished their thought. So active listeners, but also active speakers
inviting reactions and building conversations together. Dynamic! Japanese speakers even use "loops": a back-back-channel
to respond to your backchannel signals that the floor is now open for your turn. Hah. Speakers prompting listeners prompting speakers...
this is what reminded me of the rhythms and interruptions of my training. My sensei did give opinions: "almost ok" when
you did well, "zaawan" when you glimpsed hard-to-repeat perfection. But often I think the "feedback" was aizuchi
that really meant "keep going". And with you here supporting me, that's exactly
what I plan to do. Animating linguistic tales takes a while,
but my hands are already busy with the next one. So stick around and subscribe for language.
Thanks for sharing! The Southern Spanish dialect in/around Andalucía does this too (“ea”, “aro”, “unchi”, “ya ves”...) but I had no idea it had this reach. Made me rethink my perspective. (✿◠‿◠)
That's really true when on the phone. If you're not making any noise and quietly listening and waiting for the person to finish before responding, they may stop and ask if you're still there or listening. lol