To his father he may show only respect. His father is the great exemplar to the child of high hierarchal position, and, in the constantly used Japanese phrase, the child must learn to express the proper respect to him ‘for training.’ He is less of a disciplinarian than in almost any Western nation. Discipline of the children is in the woman’s hands. A simple silent stare or a short admonition is usually all the indication of his wishes he gives to his little children, and these are rare enough to be quickly complied with. He may make toys for his children in his free hours. He carries them about on occasion long after they can walk – as the mother does too – and for his children of this age he casually assumes nursery duties which an American father ordinarily leaves to his wife.
Children have great freedom with their grandparents, though they are also objects of respect.
Grandparents are not cast in the r?le of disciplinarians. They may take that r?le when they object to the laxness of the children’s up-bringing, and this is the occasion of a good deal of friction. The child’s grandmother is usually at hand twenty-four hours of the day, and the rivalry for the children between father’s mother and mother is proverbial in Japanese homes.
From the child’s point of view he is courted by both of them. From the grandmother’s point of view, she often uses him in her domination of her daughter-in-law. The young mother has no greater obligation in life than satisfying her mother-in-law and she cannot protest, however much the grandparents may spoil her children. Grandmother gives them candies after Mother has said they should not have any more, and says pointedly, ‘My candies aren’t poison.’ Grandmother in many households can make the children presents which Mother cannot manage to get them and has more leisure to devote to the children’s amusements.
The older brothers and sisters are also taught to indulge the younger children. The Japanese are quite aware of the danger of what we call the baby’s ‘nose being put out of joint’ when the next baby is born. The dispossessed child can easily associate with the new baby the fact that he has had to give up his mother’s breast and his mother’s bed the newcomer. Before the new baby is born the mother tells the child that now he will have a real live doll and not just a ‘pretend’ baby. He is told that he can sleep now with his father instead of his mother, and this is pictured as a privilege. The children are drawn into preparations for the new baby. The children are usually genuinely excited and pleased by the new baby but lapses occur and are regarded as thoroughly expectable and not as particularly threatening. The dispossessed child may pick up the baby and start off with it, saying to his mother, ‘We’ll give this baby away.’ ‘No,’ she answers, ‘it’s our baby. See, we’ll be good to it. It likes you. We need you to help with the baby.’ The little scene sometimes recurs over a considerable time but mothers seem to worry little about it. One provision for the situation occurs automatically in large families: the alternate children are united by closer ties. The oldest child will be favored nurse and protector of the third child and the second child of the fourth. The younger children reciprocate. Until children are seven or eight, what sex the children are generally makes little difference in this arrangement.