Colour perception and taboos in Japan.

Akai – 赤い = red.   Red was the first adjective I learned when I started studying Japanese many years ago.  

Before I left to take a job in Osaka, I bought myself a thick wool sweater which was a deep dark red.   It took up an inordinate amount of space in my suitcase but I brought it anyway.   

Little did I know how seldom I would wear it in public. 

The first time I wore it on the subway, I had the impression that people were looking at me.

Commuters, when their noses aren’t buried in newspapers or manga, normally have a tendency to discretely observe gaikokujin 外 国 人 (outside country people -- foreigners) but that day I felt that I was turning more heads than usual.

Was there some kind of taboo with red? 

It didn’t make sense.   

Many temples in Japan are painted red because it is said to be auspicious.

My kitchen toaster was red. 

And red is the colour of the Hinomaru, the circle on the nation’s flag. (Hi 日 symbolizing the sun and Maru 丸 meaning "round").

I arrived at the office and asked Izumi-san, a Japanese colleague, for clarification.

What’s the story with red?   Is all this staring just my imagination? 

“That’s because you’re wearing red”, she explained.  “Men don’t usually wear red.”

So red was acceptable for a temple, a toaster or a flag but taboo for men’s clothing.   Red was a “forbidden colour”.

“Forbidden Colours”.   That was the title of a British pop song in the 1980s inspired by a Yukio Mishima novel of the same name. 

To be more nuanced, the red in Mishima’s novel is an akebono… あけぼの  a delicate shade of red which can be seen in the sky at dawn.  

It is similar to the pastel red on a Japanese maple in autumn.     The colour symbolises secret passion (in the novel, same sex love) which cannot be expressed in public.

Yet Japan is not the only country with a history of colour taboos.

For centuries in China there were laws which strictly regulated the use of yellow, the imperial colour.   Chinese emperors wore yellow robes as a symbol of power and commoners were forbidden from wearing yellow or even using it in their household decorations.   

Violation of these laws could lead to severe punishment, including imprisonment or even death. (Worse than staring!)

Today modern Chinese have no inhibitions around wearing bright colours, including yellow but the Japanese still use it parsimoniously.

I discovered this early on in Japan when I went to purchase a yellow bicycle with my Japanese friend Tomoji.   I bought it because it was by far the least expensive bike in the bike shop.   

"It's a good value!", I told him.

“But it’s…..uh….it's....yellow,” he stated.

“What does that matter?”, I said.

I reasoned that the bike would be very easy to find amid the jungle of black, white and red bicycles parked in the lots near any subway entrance.   What I didn’t understand then is that which stands out in Japan is chigaimasu (different) and not looked upon favourably.  

My yellow bike got stolen only 3 months after buying it!

After assimilating the colours red and yellow into my active vocabulary, I turned my attention to aoi – blue.    

One day a Japanese woman kindly offered to bring me what she said were blue plums from her garden. 

Blue plums?   I couldn’t imagine what shade of blue they might be! 

I was disappointed to learn that they were green.  

No, no….she smiled but insisted that they were aoi. 

This led me to the interesting reflection of

“How do I know what I see is exactly what YOU see?”  Even if we are both looking at the same bowl of plums, we initially tend to perceive and define things through a cultural lens or filter.

As an intercultural leadership coach, I am often asked about taboos.

All cultures and subcultures have them…except for LinkedIn of course, where there are absolutely no taboos whatsoever (ha ha!).

Taboos sleep near the bottom of a culture’s iceberg and members of the culture are often unconscious of them.      

In 1980, Geerte Hofstede published his pioneering research "Culture's Consequences: International Differences in Work-Related Values" with comparisons of over 40 different countries. 

Japan had a particularly high score on what was then called a Masculinity Index (95 out of 100).    Recently, this cultural dimension is now more appropriately renamed “Motivation Towards Achievement and Success”.

Countries or corporations with high levels put an emphasis on individual performance often at the expense of harmony and well-being.   These traditional kinds of workplace environments tend to tolerate toxic or alpha male behaviour.

There are unspoken rules as to what men and women can and can't do.

Young Japanese women looking for opportunities to develop their leadership potential struggle tremendously with this mindset.   Many choose to work for foreign owned companies or simply leave their homeland.

According to Statista Research, in 2022 only 8.2% of company presidents were women!

Yuriko Koike, Tokyo’s first female governor recently stated that,

"Women are still largely underrepresented in the top echelons of companies. This is not just a gender issue, but also an economic issue. In order for Japan to truly thrive and compete on the global stage, we must harness the talents and potential of all our citizens, regardless of gender."

Redefining who can take what roles and responsibilities in a company is an uphill battle in many cultures.   Both women and men need to challenge these assumptions because in the end, everyone benefits.

I salute these courageous women. They have more important things to worry about than the colour of plums or what they wear to the office.