IS FACE THE SAME AS LI?
A CRITICAL NOTE ON AGASSI AND JARVIE, 'A STUDY IN WESTERNIZATION'
MARGARET N. NG*
The Claim that Face is the Same as Li
This paper has a very simple aim: to point out and explain a confusion made by Joseph Agassi and I.C. Jarvie in their controversial paper, 'A Study in Westernization'. In this paper, the authors raise the question, how far is Hong Kong westernized, and answer, Hong Kong is superficially westernized but deeply Chinese, because the Chinese in Hong Kong are dominated by the concern for face, which, being Confucian, is deeply Chinese. In the present note I shall not address myself to the central question of how westernized Hong Kong is; I shall concentrate on criticizing the subsidiary theory that face is Confucian. My contention is that Agassi and Jarvie have erroneously confused face with li (translated as propriety, courtesy, rites, all of which are notoriously inadequate). This is perhaps a minor error, but as no one seems to have noticed it I think I should give my own criticism of it, for what it is worth.
Agassi and Jarvie claim that face is Confucian; this claim is made directly on p. 140 of their paper. The authors are explaining that the reason why it is difficult to change the Chinese preoccupation is because there is a narrow 'traditional view that the Chinese way of doing things is not simply the best, or the right, way of doing things, but the only way of doing things'; they allege that Confucius can be sympathetically read to say that causing others to lose face is the worst way to lose face, and that 'Men are human because they have face to care--without it they lose human dignity'. From this it is clear that the authors think that li, fundamental in the teachings of Confucius, is the same as face.
* Dr. Margaret Ng has BA and Ph.D. degrees in Psychology from the Universities of Hong Kong and Minnesota, and until recently was on the administrative staff of the Centre of Asian Studies, University of Hong Kong.
IS FACE THE SAME AS LI?
A CRITICAL NOTE ON AGASSI AND JARVIE, 'A STUDY IN WESTERNIZATION”
MARGARET N. NG*
The Claim that Face is the Same as Li
This paper has a very simple aim: to point out and explain a confusion made by Joseph Agassi and I.C. Jarvie in their contro- versial paper. 'A Study in Westernization'. In this paper, the authors raise the question, how far is Hong Kong westernized, and answer, Hong Kong is superficially westernized but deeply Chinese, because the Chinese in Hong Kong are dominated by the concern for face, which, being Confucian, is deeply Chinese. In the present note I shall not address myself to the central question of how westernized Hong Kong is; I shall concentrate on criticizing the subsidiary theory that face is Confucian. My contention is that Agassi and Jarvie have erroneously confused face with li (tran- slated as propriety, courtesy, rites, all of which are notoriously inadequate). This is perhaps a minor error, but as no one seems to have noticed it I think 1 should give my own criticism of it, for what it is worth,
Agassi and Jarvie claim that face is Confucian; this claim is made directly on p. 140 of their paper. The authors are explaining that the reason why it is difficult to change the Chinese preoccupa- tion is because there is a narrow 'traditional view that the Chinese way of doing things is not simply the best, or the right, way of doing things, but the only way of doing things'; they allege that Confucius can be sympathetically read to say that causing others to lose face is the worst way to lose face, and that 'Men are human because they have face to care--without it they lose human dignity'. From this it is clear that the authors think that li, fundamental in the teachings of Cosfucius, is the same as face.
* Dr. Margaret Ng has BA and Ph.D. degrees in Phsycology from the Universities of Hong Kong and Minnesota, and until recently was on the administrative staff of the Centre of Asian studies, University of Hong Kong.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.