Brian J. McVeigh
Encyclopedia
Brian J. McVeigh (born 1959) is a psychological and political anthropologist who received his doctorate in 1991 from Princeton University
’s Department of Anthropology
. While a graduate student, he studied under Julian Jaynes
whose influence is apparent in his research. He now teaches at the University of Arizona
.
Though McVeigh’s original interests were in Sinology and he studied at Beijing University for one year (1982-1983), his publications have been about Japan. He spent many years teaching in Japan, and from 2002 to 2003 was chair of the Department of Cultural & Women’s Studies at Tokyo Jogakkan College. Evidently his time in Japan significantly shaped his research focus and much of his writing is based on many years of participant observation in Japan’s education system. A fascination with the “staginess of social life” and simulation theory colors his work, and his interest in the intersection of psychology and politics is apparent in his linking of self-presentation with political economy. The theatricalization of gender roles is the topic of Life in a Japanese Women’s College: Learning to Be Ladylike (1997). In Japanese Higher Education as Myth (2002) he asked “why do so many students pretend-study and so many faculty pretend-teach?” and investigated the disconnect between official policies and actual pedagogical practices. He termed the loss of academic value and poor quality schooling “institutional mendacity,” a claim that earned him both criticism and praise in Japan. The book was nominated for the Francis Hsu Book Prize (2004), Society for East Asian Anthropology, American Anthropological Association
.
In his third book on Japanese education, The State Bearing Gifts: Deception and Disaffection in Japanese Higher Education (2006), the influence of Jean Baudrillard
, Umberto Eco
, and Guy Debord
is evident. By linking the ideas of these simulation theorists to the “gift” as defined by the French anthropologist Marcel Mauss
, he charted the “exchange circuitry” that links and transfers value among Japan’s education ministry, universities, instructors, and learners. With elite political and corporate interests determining policy, the purpose of education is lost and the value of grades and diplomas is diluted. The staginess of educational policies results from burdensome “exchange dramatics” among students (always being on one’s best behavior for teachers, preparing for too many exams, etc.). He contends that his arguments about Japanese higher education possess general applicability: the more intense massive bureaucratic forces become, the more we excessively dramatize ourselves for the wrong reasons. The consequence is a “parareality” that breeds self-deception, inauthenticity, and alienation.
His other works have also pursued the theme of how politics shapes the psychology of self-presentation. In The Nature of the Japanese State: Rationality and Rituality (1998) he explained how “state guidance” of educational structures and “moral education” are official attempts to ensure the values of hierarchy, centralization, compartmentalization, and standardization in Japan’s political economy and civil society. In Wearing Ideology: State, Schooling, and Self-Presentation in Japan (2000) he turned his attention to the cultural psychology of how we stage our selves and looked at the role of material culture (school uniforms and other accoutrements) in the management of self-appearance.
In Nationalisms of Japan: Managing and Mystifying Identity (2003) he explored the varieties of nationalist expression. He stressed that Japanese policies are informed by “renovationism”: the more an ostensible Japanese authentic identity is threatened, the more modernizing national projects are pursued to refurbish Japan’s economic might. These latter policies ironically increase the perception of identity threat since modernization, at least from an idealized “traditional” perspective, makes Japan seem somehow more “foreign.” The result is an ideological positive feedback loop with practical consequences for Japan’s policy-making circles.
In an unpublished book manuscript, The Propertied Self: Wealth, Progress, and Human Nature, McVeigh explores the political implications of a Jaynesian psychology, arguing that economic policies must take into account changes in psyche. This is related to his call for a “stratigraphic psychology” that acknowledges radical changes in human psyche by incorporating evolutionary psychology findings while steering clear of simplistic cultural evolutionism.
He is also researching the history of Japanese psychology in an effort to illustrate global shifts in nineteenth-century definitions of human nature that resonate with the emergence of the independent citizen as the building block of national state construction, the autonomous producer and consumer of economic liberalism, the “inward turn” to a privileged protagonist in art, and the individualized subject as the crucial unit of analysis in academic psychology.
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
’s Department of Anthropology
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
. While a graduate student, he studied under Julian Jaynes
Julian Jaynes
Julian Jaynes was an American psychologist, best known for his book The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind , in which he argued that ancient peoples were not conscious....
whose influence is apparent in his research. He now teaches at the University of Arizona
University of Arizona
The University of Arizona is a land-grant and space-grant public institution of higher education and research located in Tucson, Arizona, United States. The University of Arizona was the first university in the state of Arizona, founded in 1885...
.
Research
Jaynes’s impact is evident in McVeigh’s first project which explored the role of spirit possession in a Japanese religious movement. His findings were published in Spirits, Selves, and Subjectivity in a Japanese New Religion: The Cultural Psychology of Belief in Sûkyô Mahikari (1997) and “Spirit Possession in Sûkyô Mahikari: A Variety of Sociopsychological Experience.” His other relevant articles include “Standing Stomachs, Clamoring Chests and Cooling Livers: Metaphors in the Psychological Lexicon of Japanese” and “The Self as Interiorized Social Relations: Applying a Jaynesian Approach to Problems of Agency and Volition.”Though McVeigh’s original interests were in Sinology and he studied at Beijing University for one year (1982-1983), his publications have been about Japan. He spent many years teaching in Japan, and from 2002 to 2003 was chair of the Department of Cultural & Women’s Studies at Tokyo Jogakkan College. Evidently his time in Japan significantly shaped his research focus and much of his writing is based on many years of participant observation in Japan’s education system. A fascination with the “staginess of social life” and simulation theory colors his work, and his interest in the intersection of psychology and politics is apparent in his linking of self-presentation with political economy. The theatricalization of gender roles is the topic of Life in a Japanese Women’s College: Learning to Be Ladylike (1997). In Japanese Higher Education as Myth (2002) he asked “why do so many students pretend-study and so many faculty pretend-teach?” and investigated the disconnect between official policies and actual pedagogical practices. He termed the loss of academic value and poor quality schooling “institutional mendacity,” a claim that earned him both criticism and praise in Japan. The book was nominated for the Francis Hsu Book Prize (2004), Society for East Asian Anthropology, American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association
The American Anthropological Association is a professional organization of scholars and practitioners in the field of anthropology. With 11,000 members, the Arlington, Virginia based association includes archaeologists, cultural anthropologists, biological anthropologists, linguistic...
.
In his third book on Japanese education, The State Bearing Gifts: Deception and Disaffection in Japanese Higher Education (2006), the influence of Jean Baudrillard
Jean Baudrillard
Jean Baudrillard was a French sociologist, philosopher, cultural theorist, political commentator, and photographer. His work is frequently associated with postmodernism and post-structuralism.-Life:...
, Umberto Eco
Umberto Eco
Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist, best known for his novel The Name of the Rose , an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...
, and Guy Debord
Guy Debord
Guy Ernest Debord was a French Marxist theorist, writer, filmmaker, member of the Letterist International, founder of a Letterist faction, and founding member of the Situationist International . He was also briefly a member of Socialisme ou Barbarie.-Early Life:Guy Debord was born in Paris in 1931...
is evident. By linking the ideas of these simulation theorists to the “gift” as defined by the French anthropologist Marcel Mauss
Marcel Mauss
Marcel Mauss was a French sociologist. The nephew of Émile Durkheim, Mauss' academic work traversed the boundaries between sociology and anthropology...
, he charted the “exchange circuitry” that links and transfers value among Japan’s education ministry, universities, instructors, and learners. With elite political and corporate interests determining policy, the purpose of education is lost and the value of grades and diplomas is diluted. The staginess of educational policies results from burdensome “exchange dramatics” among students (always being on one’s best behavior for teachers, preparing for too many exams, etc.). He contends that his arguments about Japanese higher education possess general applicability: the more intense massive bureaucratic forces become, the more we excessively dramatize ourselves for the wrong reasons. The consequence is a “parareality” that breeds self-deception, inauthenticity, and alienation.
His other works have also pursued the theme of how politics shapes the psychology of self-presentation. In The Nature of the Japanese State: Rationality and Rituality (1998) he explained how “state guidance” of educational structures and “moral education” are official attempts to ensure the values of hierarchy, centralization, compartmentalization, and standardization in Japan’s political economy and civil society. In Wearing Ideology: State, Schooling, and Self-Presentation in Japan (2000) he turned his attention to the cultural psychology of how we stage our selves and looked at the role of material culture (school uniforms and other accoutrements) in the management of self-appearance.
In Nationalisms of Japan: Managing and Mystifying Identity (2003) he explored the varieties of nationalist expression. He stressed that Japanese policies are informed by “renovationism”: the more an ostensible Japanese authentic identity is threatened, the more modernizing national projects are pursued to refurbish Japan’s economic might. These latter policies ironically increase the perception of identity threat since modernization, at least from an idealized “traditional” perspective, makes Japan seem somehow more “foreign.” The result is an ideological positive feedback loop with practical consequences for Japan’s policy-making circles.
In an unpublished book manuscript, The Propertied Self: Wealth, Progress, and Human Nature, McVeigh explores the political implications of a Jaynesian psychology, arguing that economic policies must take into account changes in psyche. This is related to his call for a “stratigraphic psychology” that acknowledges radical changes in human psyche by incorporating evolutionary psychology findings while steering clear of simplistic cultural evolutionism.
He is also researching the history of Japanese psychology in an effort to illustrate global shifts in nineteenth-century definitions of human nature that resonate with the emergence of the independent citizen as the building block of national state construction, the autonomous producer and consumer of economic liberalism, the “inward turn” to a privileged protagonist in art, and the individualized subject as the crucial unit of analysis in academic psychology.
Select Publications
- McVeigh, Brian J. Spirits, Selves, and Subjectivity in a Japanese New Religion: The Cultural Psychology of Belief in Sûkyô Mahikari. Lewiston, New York: Edwin Mellen Press, 1997.
- McVeigh, Brian J. Life in a Japanese Women’s College: Learning to Be Ladylike. London: Routledge, 1998.
- McVeigh, Brian J. The Nature of the Japanese State: Rationality and Rituality. London: Routledge, 1998.
- McVeigh, Brian J. Wearing Ideology: State, Schooling, and Self-Presentation in Japan. Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2000.
- McVeigh, Brian J. Japanese Higher Education as Myth. Armonk, New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2002.
- McVeigh, Brian J. Nationalisms of Japan: Managing and Mystifying Identity. Boulder, Colorado: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003.
- McVeigh, Brian J. The State Bearing Gifts: Deception and Disaffection in Japanese Higher Education. Boulder, Colorado: Lexington Books, 2006.