Reviews for An answer to the Declaration of the American Congress

The average rating for An answer to the Declaration of the American Congress based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2017-12-31 00:00:00 David Liang Massage Parlors of the Ego For many years, Japan's hardworking salarymen (men working in middle and large size companies engaged in various businesses) have repaired to special clubs after hours to drink and be entertained by women of a demi-monde. Geishas worked in this way in their day, but now, the traditional aspects of Japanese culture that were personified in the geisha are outmoded. The salarymen want ( or at least get) a more modern style woman. What goes on in such clubs ? What is the relationship of businesses to the clubs ? How do such clubs fit into the overall picture of Japanese culture ? Anne Allison became a hostess in one club for some months back in the 1980s. She didn't hide the fact that she was an anthropologist, but was accepted as a hostess anyway. The result is this most interesting and well-written book which answers all three questions very ably. Not only is the description of the research engrossing, but the author contests or agrees with the views of various Japanese sociologists very capably. It is a very good idea to discuss what Japanese intellectuals think about hostess clubs, though most such people disparaged her research plan and thought that she would learn nothing. People like myself, who have not read such Japanese academics as Aida, Tada, Minami, Nakane, Ishikawa, Wagatsuma, or Yoda, but are interested in their arguments, will find the subsequent discussion most fascinating. Allison also weaves in some arguments from such theoreticians as Barthes and Lacan, but does not engage in the jargon which makes their work so difficult to digest. Hostess clubs, while seeming an innocuous, if titillating part of Japanese culture, turn out to be a nexus where attitudes and expectations about work, play, sex, gender roles, identity and money come together. The ethnographic descriptions of behavior and conversations in the club make fascinating reading. By making `play' an extension of `work', by cutting the salarymen off from family life, the companies, she says, are able to maximize the work they get from their employees. She challenges the naturalness of working late at night by `playing' at a club, though Japanese sociologists claim that it IS natural because Japanese think of themselves as forever part of groups, especially the work group. Paying hundreds or thousands of dollars for short periods of drinking and mostly insubstantial chat with hostesses, Japanese companies believe that their business deals are enhanced and that human relations among bosses and workers are improved. Allison argues that in addition hostess clubs function as a place where men's egos (but nothing else) are massaged by the attentive, flattering behavior of the hostesses. She explores the relationship of Japanese salarymen with mothers and wives and concludes that "whatever men say they need, think they're doing, and justify as necessary `for work' in the demi-monde is effected symbolically and ritualistically through women and the sexuality they represent"; the sexuality they almost never exercise in fact. Like Edward Fowler's "San'ya Blues", this is an ethnography of modern Japan, far removed from Embree's "Suye Mura" or Beardsley, Hall and Ward's "Village Japan"---the ethnographies of yesteryear. If you are teaching a course on Japanese culture or society, if you're a graduate student in Japanese studies, or if you are interested in gender and role formation in any society, this book is a must, so well-organized and clearly-written.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-07-19 00:00:00 John Past The author is an anthropologist who even worked as a hostess in a club in Tokyo and this is what convinced me to read the book. It was much less fun that I anticipated and would be much better if it was twice as short. It actually seems like a forcefully stretched academic essay, just to make it long enough for a book: the same questions and answers are repeated over and over again, reformulated in a thousand ways and drowning the really good stuff. The best parts are the anecdotal episodes when Allison describes real situations from the hostess club: how hostesses interact with clients, the customer's stupid jokes about breasts and penises and so on. Some are really funny, others actually insightful. Allison also has moments when she engages in truly interesting analysis, mostly drawing on the writing of others. For example, she shows how the absence of fathers, the excessive care of mothers, the need to study intensely for university or job exams, makes young Japanese somewhat socially and sexually dysfunctional. Their dedication to work makes it hard for them to engage in complex relationship with women, as they are used to being serviced and taken care of by their moms like babies even in their twenties. Thus, it is easier for them to satisfy their sexual and ego needs by paying hostesses and prostitutes, which service them without the need for mutual personal engagement with each other. The same goes for relationships with their wives: the salarymen (sarariimen) bring home paychecks and the wives take care of the children and the house, as if being contracted to this. Allison's conclusions are also surprinsingly satisfying: Japanese companies pay for the entertainment of their employees in hostess clubs because this helps erase the line between work and pleasure or play. Professional life mixes with the personal life to the extent that workers remain workers even outside their offices. Practically, if the boss says they will later go to a hostess club, the worker will work several extra hours. This will keep him away from home and estrange him from his family. The worker gets used to the routine and, in time, company-paid entertainment in hostess clubs becomes for him the only and true source of relaxation. This extension of his workday becomes the realm of pleasure, where almost anything is allowed, while home and family become alien, not something he looks to return to. Such a worker will always be willing to work extra hours instead of returning home, as work becomes his true home. The topic of the book is really interesting and it would be really cool if it was an essay 100 pages shorter. As it is, the reader has to go through a lot of deadwood, so much that you may question whether it is worthy. I'm not sure.