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"TIES THAT BIND" (LEONARD HELFGOTT) & "A YEAR IN THE LIFE OF A SHINTO SHRINE" (JOHN NELSON).
Term Paper ID:25464
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Essay Subject:
Compares cultural studies of social history of Iranian carpets & annual cycle of (Japanese) Shinto rituals.... More...
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12 Pages / 2700 Words
2 sources, 23 Citations,
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Paper Abstract:
Compares cultural studies of social history of Iranian carpets & annual cycle of (Japanese) Shinto rituals.
Paper Introduction:
Leonard Helfgott and John K. Nelson have chosen very different vantage points from which to study the cultures of Iran and Japan. Yet Helfgott's study of the manufacture of carpets and Nelson's description of the annual cycle of activities at a Shinto shrine have several important points in common. Both authors deal with traditional practices that have involved and affected every level of their societies. Both of these practices have been modified in ways that reflect broader cultural change. And both practices have unique and very significant roles in their respective societies today. But the two studies necessarily employ very different methodologies and seek different types of information. As a study of a major aspect of the material culture of Iran, Helfgott's Ties That Bind: A Social History of the Iranian Carpet deals with economic aspects of
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Changes in demand, based on declines in theEuropean economy and changes in style, made the cheaper, simpler rugs ofthe Ottoman Empire more appealing to the West. The ceremonies touch on everyaspect of life from birth through reaching adulthood (but seldom deal withdeath). Ties That Bind: A Social History of the Iranian Carpet. But he never gets to the point of telling the reader why thereis such an interest. Thus the reader asks, where Nelson derive hisknowledge of Mika Yoshida's feelings?. The evidence assembledwithin the chapter is based on the scanty supply of information about thenature of the carpet industry in the Timurid period. YetHelfgott's study of the manufacture of carpets and Nelson's description ofthe annual cycle of activities at a Shinto shrine have several importantpoints in common. In pastoralgroups the reemergence of the industry had a limited effect. As astudy of a major aspect of the material culture of Iran, Helfgott's TiesThat Bind: A Social History of the Iranian Carpet deals with economicaspects of Iranian culture, and the society's relationship with the Westand the world economy, in some detail. The Iranian industry,perhaps because it lacked direction after the fall of the Safavids and thebeginning of an extended period of political and social turmoil, didnothing to adjust to the market for less elaborate carpets. Few examples of thework or discussions of its production survive from the period and mostscholarly deductions have been based on the evidence of miniature paintingof the era. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1994.Nelson, John K. The meaning of Shinto for his subjects is the material on whichhe hoped to base his deductions about its general meanings for society.But Nelson, while he has made an interesting, thorough study of the SuwaShrine's ritual year, does not succeed in explaining the import of Shintofor contemporary Japanese culture. It is a historical industry studythat concentrates on the relationship of that industry to the broadersociety. He has neglectedto specify how they connect with the past and how they manage to instillvalues and norms in the Japanese people. Did Matsumoprovide him with his view of the matter? The general lack ofknowledge about "the entire socio-cultural linkages between Shinto practiceand themselves" is, Nelson remarks, one of the most interesting aspects ofthe ceremony (213). But asvarious social and economic pressures mounted over the next few decades toforce pastoral nomads from their traditional grazing lands, the economicvalue of the skill facilitated their transition to villages and towns. He makes no organic connection between that Japaneseindividual who chooses to have his car blessed and the individual's view ofthe import of this action. Theproblem is not that Nelson seems to be wrong or untrustworthy but thatwhile he assembles information about the ritual year from his observationsof visual and aural events and from his conversations with the priests, henever makes the same connection with the people whose knowledge of andreactions to Shinto he purports to analyze. Sincethe ritual will be covered by television cameras she is, apparently,worried about the shaming potential of such a situation. What emerges from this discussion is the clear knowledgethat the shrines are utterly dependent on the good will of the public whosupports them. Yet he does not include interviews withlay participants in Shinto practice and this proves to be something oflimitation on his broader purpose of relating Shinto to Japanese culture ingeneral. Throughout the twentieth century the problemsof the industry have gradually been exposed. There is no indication that Nelson spoke directlyto Mika Yoshida and the description of her feelings is followed by a directquotation from Matsumoto-san (a priest) who has been lecturing theparticipants on correct procedure. He then goes on to argue that a general system of urbanworkshops, and perhaps guilds, developed under the Timurids for many typesof art objects. But his conclusions are based on broad trends in postindustrialJapanese society about which he provides little information. Helfgott is primarily engaged in explaining how the tradition ofIranian carpet manufacture fits into political, social, and economicaspects of the society--but he proceeds from a framework that is familiarfrom other studies of material culture. Helfgott makes it clear from the beginning that heis going to discuss the history of the carpet industry in the context ofWallerstein's idea that a unified "modern world system" has emerged overthe past four centuries and that countries at the core and on the peripheryhave had different experiences in the course of this development (9).Nelson, on the other hand, draws his conclusions on the basis of his ownreactions to the things he observes--yet says very little about hiscircumstances or the theory on which he bases his conclusions. Even when Nelson discusses lay participants inthe Suwa Shrine's rituals, such as the young women in the Doll Festival orthe young men and women in the coming-of-age ceremony, his descriptions arequite oblique. The distinction between the "services' provided by thepriests and the "demands" of the public formed one of Nelson's mostinteresting chapters--on the social and financial management of Shintoshrines (77). In Helfgott's case the impact of the industry onIranian culture and its role in the nation's relations with the West seemadequately explained--while raising, of course, many other interestingquestions about the society that exceed the scope of the study. Leonard Helfgott and John K. By grounding himself firmly he is able toconvey a sense of the flow of these developments that responds to changeson a larger scale. The Safavids,in contrast to previous regimes, "promised economic and social benefits toensure the regular employment of skilled crafts people," which served theirgoal of linking Iran's economy to "an expanding world commercial system"(68). Helfgott's study is a historical survey that increases in complexityas he nears contemporary society due to the increased amount of dataavailable to him. I haveconcentrated, therefore, on the methodological comparison...... Helfgott too presents a prescriptive conclusion. At that point the skilled workers, whowere male, were separated from those who were "assigned the tasks of rotetechnique--the tying of knots uninterrupted by any other related task"--women and children (272). And in these descriptions Nelson establishes the parameters ofShinto beliefs while attempting to relate the practices to general notionsof behavior. These workshops would also have responded to thestylistic imperatives of the court workshops, the "elite-sponsored artistichubs" setting the style for the urban population that could afford suchwork and wished to emulate the elites (46). Nelson states at the beginning of his study that "recent politicaland social events" have made it clear that a revival of interest in Shintohas raised a "hoard" of questions about the importance of Shinto practicein contemporary Japan and he holds that, "rather than casting about in theoceans of information relevant to Japan as a whole [he] hope[s] to convincethe reader that there is no better place to look than into the 'life' of acontemporary Shinto shrine for issues of 'tradition,' 'modernity,' and'individual versus group agency'(5). None of these questions is answered in his text. A comparison of these two works will demonstrate two distinctapproaches to the study of culture that share the common goal of reaching abroader understanding of a culture via the study of a single aspect of thesociety. But, moreinterestingly, the speech thanks the participants for coming and being partof the celebration. Thus, when hebegins the next paragraph with the question, "The first time?" the readeris unsure whose ignorance is reacting to the priest's remark (Nelson's? This put enormous pressure on the cottage industry in agrarianvillages where economies of scale were impossible but the economic value ofthe activity was too high to be abandoned. He clearly establishes the breadth of the relationship betweenShinto ritual and aspects of everyday life. the participant's?). He describes the manner in which modern media interact with therituals of the shrine and suggests that this demonstrates a high level ofinterest. The longstruggle to amend the worst problems of the labor force was, however, onlysucceeded by new problems when, in the last quarter of the twentiethcentury, mechanization took over. Both authors deal with traditional practices that haveinvolved and affected every level of their societies. Nelson have chosen very differentvantage points from which to study the cultures of Iran and Japan. "'But if you forget because you're toonervous,' Matsumoto-san continues, 'that's all right. The speech draws fairly standard parallelsbetween the events of Spring--"the sprouting of rice seedlings [and] thebirths of children to happy parents," all of which are "a part of Morisaki-no-Kami," the presiding deity of the festival (98). There is, however, asignificant difference in the manner in which they go about this. Nelson's A Year in the Life of a Shinto Shrine, on the otherhand, deals with the ritual year at a single contemporary shrine, andhistorical and general social questions are incidental to the body of thestudy. A Year in the Life of a Shinto Shrine. Seattle: U of Washington P, 1996.NOTE TO CLIENT:Because you chose an historical survey of an aspect of material culture anda descriptive account of a year in a single, contemporary, religiousestablishment the kinds of comparisons you spoke of were hardly feasible.Most of the categories that you mentioned are either entirely outside thescope of these studies or are covered in one but not the other! Inaddition, while Helfgott's is a historical study that draws on a variety ofprimary and secondary written sources, Nelson interviewed Japanese subjects(priests at the shrine) in the attempt to develop a picture of what Shintopractices and beliefs are and what they mean to those who participate inthem today. There is a clearmethodological split between what Nelson has actually done in terms ofassembling data and what he believes can be deduced from this data. This isultimately somewhat disconcerting because the prescriptive conclusions thatNelson reaches are not based strictly on the material he presents. But thisleads the reader to expect a rather different sort of book from the oneNelson wrote. When he makes assumptions that he cannotverify, however, Helfgott is careful to point out that he is doing so andpresents ordered arguments in support of his conclusions. In the final analysis Helfgott has written a study in whichthe effects of capital on the carpetmaking industry in Iran have beenconvincingly demonstrated. thereader's? They stretch out into far moregeneral pictures of the societies they study. Thus its form derives directly from the subjectunder study while Helfgott's study follows a more familiar path. "What a disasterthat would be for her family and herself, as thousands of people shedoesn't even know see her make a fool out of herself" (212). "More than likely," he argues, such workshops would havereceived commissions from wealthier patrons while producing for the generalmarket as well (46). Neither of these studies pretends to strive for total objectivity orneutrality and both authors draw from their conclusions recommendationsabout what courses Iran, and its carpet industry, and Japan, and theinstitution of Shinto, should follow in the future. Nelson,for example, reassures the reader that he was once naive and ignorant aboutShinto practice despite his familiarity with Japanese culture. But Nelson has only succeeded at describing the"series of repetitive ritual or symbolic practices" (1 ). But the two studies necessarily employ verydifferent methodologies and seek different types of information. One of the most interesting sections of Helfgott's book is that inwhich he describes the conditions in which the new Western demand forIranian carpets developed--the "orientalizing" view of the corrupt andexotic East. This type of acceptance ofartistic style in the "exchange and consumption of art and craft objects"also implied an acceptance of the hegemony of the non-Iranian rulers while"asserting the predominance of Iranian culture" (46). The development of the hugeindustry had a negative effect on "individuality of expression" incarpetmaking, but, far more seriously, "social and religious attitudestoward women's work reinforced static, low wages for women and children andminimized the possibilities of their taking corrective social, political,or economic action" (248). But, as a result of theirvery different subjects and approaches, the two studies produce differentkinds of knowledge. As it turns out, however, he is referringto the (presumed?) ignorance of the participant. Interms of argument, Helfgott tends to proceed from the facts and evidence hehas marshaled to the demonstration of various effects; e.g., the responseof the Iranian carpet industry to developments in world capitalism.Nelson, on the other hand, combines his on-site observations, personalinterviews, his reading of historical and literary sources and hisassertions about the nature of Japanese society and deduces from them themeanings that the many aspects of Shinto practice have for the Japanesetoday. Onescholar, for instance, formed her ideas about the diffusion of cultureduring the Turkman and Timurid dynasties from tax records and officialdecrees which indicate that the rulers "freed wealth from the coffers ofthe state and placed it into the hands of regional elites" who used some oftheir increased resources to extend their patronage of Iranian arts andcrafts (41). Inaddition Nelson takes care to provide whatever he feels is essentialbackground. Frequently what he has to say is illuminating. In the account of the ritual year of Suwa Shrine, however, Nelson'sstudy is more straightforward when he concentrates on the activitiesinvolved. But these arguments follow generally accepted practice. But thereis little sense that the reader has come in any way to know how Iraniansfelt or feel about their work, how they perceive the West for whom theyproduce these objects, or what it is like to be a carpet-maker in Iran. It's not easy thefirst time'" (212). Hediscusses the ritual year at the shrine in great, and often illuminating,detail and he relates the various episodes to general themes in Japaneselife. It is true,of course, that Nelson cites Hobsbawm's notion that traditions which "seekto instill certain values and behavioral norms by stressing a series ofrepetitive ritual or symbolic practices which automatically implycontinuity with the past, can best be thought of as creative process[es]'invented' to fit the complexities of the social moment" (1 -11). Atthe same time the vastly increased demand resulted in the emergence of"workshop and factory systems of rug production" in the towns and cities(248). He begins his discussion of the Saitan-sai, or coming-of-age ritual,by describing one participant who "is skipping school today with the fullconsent of her teachers" and goes on to describe, in the voice of anomniscient narrator, Mika Yoshida's fear that she will, for example,display indecision at some step in the elaborate procedure (212). But "it persisted throughoutthe transitional period to be reconstructed later by the demands ofcapital" (77). Nelson's study, however, adapts itself to the flow ofthe ritual year at the Suwa Shrine at Nagasaki. These assumptions, while clearly labeled as such, are supported bythe evidence Helfgott assembled in the preceding chapter and by the generaltheory, which he cites, of the relations of material culture to thepolitical and economic dominance of hegemons. In terms of the direct description ofthe shrine's rituals Nelson necessarily leaves significant gaps in thereader's knowledge because it is not his purpose to provide a thoroughgrounding in the history of Shinto and the origins of the practices heobserved. Nelson, however, tries to get at more of this type of personalcontent. Throughout this discussion Helfgott makes it clear that theeffect of this view of the East had serious economic implications. Did he speak to her? Yet when he tries to explain why the public, who oftendisplay only very limited interest in Shinto, offer such support, Nelson isat a loss. Other arguments are inferred from developments in other arts--as with one scholar's conclusion that the broadened base of patronage forfifteenth-century architecture (which came to include the religious classand the bureaucracy) would have meant that the same economic base forpatronage of carpet-makers existed at the time (43). Works CitedHelfgott, Leonard M. Occasionally Helfgott lackssufficient data, especially regarding early modern times, to support hisgeneral idea that the carpet industry developed in direct response tointeractions among the primary economic groups of Iranian culture and thedisposition of capital in Iran. And this is certainly true--if it is true. Because he succeeded inrelating the past history of Iranian carpet manufacture to developments inIranian society and the world economy, Helfgott has already provided thereader with a full disclosure of the data and theories on which hisconclusions are based. In the late sixteenth-century the Safaviddynasty saw benefits for Iran, and for themselves, in entering the emergingEurocentered world market. Theindustry revived in Iran after 1873, but this time the Western interest inIranian arts was stimulated by the fact that such work had been elevated tothe level of "artistic accomplishments" worthy of museum exhibition (133). But the reader may still feel that this is not sufficient.The subtle connections that Nelson is necessarily drawing between Shintoand Japanese culture seem, in the end, to be based less on what he hasobserved, and been told, at the Suwa Shrine than on how he believes Shintopractice is fulfilling certain goals that he believes it should possess.He proceeds by assertion rather than, as he believes, by deduction.Indeed, at several points, Nelson leaves the reader unsure of the validityof his conclusions simply because the reader does not possess enoughinformation to evaluate what he says. Clearly neither study limits itself to the relatively narrow rangethat might be inferred from the titles. Did Nelson assume that these werethe young woman's feelings based on his knowledge of Japanese culture?Does she represent a composite subject? This is largely a matter of how they drawtheir conclusions and on what they choose to base their arguments. In thisperiod, without the spur of a demand economy, carpetmaking became a veryminor craft meeting a limited local demand. Nelson began by marveling at the factthat so many Japanese "feel a need to take their brand new Honda or Toyotasedan to a shrine to have it blessed before subjecting it to thevicissitudes of city and highway driving" and other similar, seeminglyanomalous forms of behavior (3). Shinto is amysterious practice to non-Japanese observers and in, for example, thediscussion of Fecundity rituals, Nelson supplies a speech by the headpriest that clarifies the relationship between the Kami (spirits ordeities) of Shinto and the world around the participants--at least as faras the priests understand it. Both of thesepractices have been modified in ways that reflect broader cultural change.And both practices have unique and very significant roles in theirrespective societies today. Yet he asksthe reader to take his current deductions more or less on faith. This sentenceis in the third person. The conditions under which the carpet industry experienced a massivedecline in the late seventeenth and the eighteenth centuries were relatedto a wide variety of factors. Helfgott's care in establishing the likely historical precedents forthe development of the carpet industry from the "interpenetration ofnomadic pastoralism and sedentary agrarian life" into "an autonomous urbancraft" is essential to his thesis regarding the relationship betweencarpetmaking and society (36). But his ideas arebased on the nature of observable phenomena. The Safavids, therefore, "actively enlargedIran's trade with the outside world" by directing the bulk of trade to thenewly dominant Dutch and English traders and by encouraging the large-scaleproduction of exportable arts and crafts--including carpets. Even a readerfamiliar with much of Japanese culture may think that many of Nelson'sdeductive leaps go too far beyond the content of his study. In the 192 s and 193 schildren suffering from rickets in this poor society worked in the dampmills and developed bone distortions while their mothers developed pelvicabnormalities that made birthing difficult and dangerous. Thus his discussion of the difference between the modesof manufacturing in the Timurid and Safavid dynasties leads clearly to hisanalysis of the relationship between the Safavids' economic world view andthe fortunes of carpetmaking. The calendar dictates, toa large extent, the manner and order in which topics arise and arediscussed by the author. Both works are admirably thorough investigations of their material--but there is a considerable degree of difference in their success inmeeting their stated goals. The development of the modern carpetmaking industry produceddifferent effects in different sectors of Iranian society but, overall, itsconsequences for the workers, especially women, were not good. If Nelson hoped to supply the reader with an explanation orunderstanding of the car-blessing behavior, and other such actions, hefails because his study is rather tightly confined to the rituals at theshrine, the conversations of its priests, and Nelson's assertions aboutJapanese culture. Such information is outlined in his notes and these areorganized to direct the curious to other sources of information. To take oneexample, Helfgott remarks that "patronage- and market-driven carpetproduction probably coexisted during fifteenth-century Timurid rule ofIran" (46).
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