Any discussion on the study of guilt and shame culture will inevitably result in the discussion of internal and external sanctions for controlling behavior. This is of course necessary and is a result of the original distinction between guilt and shame culture proposed by Ruth Benedict. According to Benedict, “true shame cultures rely on external sanctions for good behavior, not, as true guilt cultures do, on an internalized conviction of sin.”[1] Her distinction rested on the idea that shame sanctions required an audience or the fantasy of an audience. Guilt on the other hand does not require an audience. The veracity of this typology has been argued since her original proposal in 1946, with supporters and detractors adding their own research and opinion to the subject matter.
Maintaining reliance on the differentiation of guilt and shame cultures according to internal and external sanctions has proven problematic. It has been demonstrated that guilt and shame are rarely experienced according to Benedict’s typology, though some still rely on her distinctions.[2] Studies have provided examples of a complete reversal of Benedict’s requirements[3] or a complete lack of reliance on public audience for inciting feelings of shame or guilt altogether.[4] The results of these studies are beneficial to heathens studying guilt and shame culture and have resulted in a widely accepted rejection of internal and external sanctions in guilt and shame cultures respectively.
In all cultures guilt and shame are expressed both internally and externally in various ways. Benedict’s insistence that guilt was an internal conviction, a man’s feeling that “may actually be relieved by confessing his sin”[5] acknowledges only one aspect of guilt, the private side. There is also a public side to guilt, the side that in Benedict’s examples are acted out by the Christian god. Her examples assume that the individual has accepted the judgment and power of an authority (laws, codes of conduct, commands from figures of authority), necessary for a sense of guilt to manifest. This authority serves as the guiding principle by which the individual judges his actions as a transgression resulting in his feelings of guilt. The public side of guilt is the judgment of guilt, regardless of the individual’s own feelings of guilt, in which the public demands restitution for the transgression in order for the individual to be accepted back into good standing within the community. Such judgments are an acknowledgment on the part of the community that an individual has violated the rules of the community[6]; rules that all members of the community are expected to follow in order to maintain the cohesiveness and health of the community.[7] Private guilt is expressed in the desire to make restitution for a misdeed and a “mild and often unconscious anxiety”[8] or “nagging focus or preoccupation with the transgression.”[9] It is possible for an individual to feel guilt even though no actual transgression has been made, or with no acknowledgment of the transgression on the part of the public.[10] Public guilt, on the other hand, is expressed in the punishment or demand for atonement for the individual’s misdeeds. Until the individual has paid his debt, regardless of whether he confesses to the sin, his status in his community is altered. Upon making amends he is able to return to his place within the community. Guilt then is the result of a transgression of a code of conduct that serves to maintain the health of interpersonal relationships and prevent “actions that would violate obligations to family, the larger social group, and deities.”[11] Such transgressions result in a desire to make, or demand for, amends for the misdeed in order to reestablish the health and stability of the community.
Like guilt, shame has a public and private side as well. Internal shame results from self-evaluation and the determination that the individual is falling short of an ideal. This sense of shame is the response to the fact that the individual believes his failings are, or may become, known to other members of his social group and that such knowledge will result in a loss of respect, prestige, and/or position within the social group. Feelings of worthlessness, powerlessness, and exposure accompany feelings of shame.[12] The opposite internal response to shame is the sense of pride in that an individual is living up to the ideal espoused by his social group. Private shame does not require any participation on the part of other members of the social group. It only requires the fear that such members may become aware of the individual’s inadequacies.[13] Public shame is the act of shaming an individual in the public sphere; an act that results in the loss of respect, prestige, and/or position within the social group as a result of the individual not meeting the community’s standards. Public shaming is the effort to publicly humiliate the individual in order to incite conformity to the community’s beliefs, attitudes, values and behaviors. Public shaming does not require a corresponding internal shame response in the individual.[14] Honor is the opposite of being publicly shamed. Shame, either public or private, arises when the image of the self and its relationship to the idealized image of self is compromised revealing an inconsistency between the two.[15]
Benedict’s requirements of guilt cultures relying on internal convictions and shame cultures relying on external sanctions are an incomplete assessment of social mechanisms of enculturation. Public and private shame and guilt both play a roll in inciting the individual to conform to a society’s beliefs, attitudes, values and behaviors. It is necessary for individuals to internalize the authority behind external guilt and shame sanctions for them to be truly effective in inciting conformity.[16] Studies dealing with shame and guilt typology and their expression in social adaptation and interpersonal behavior illustrate the failure of Benedict’s model for differentiation. This failure has resulted in various new methods of differentiation being proposed. Takie Sugiyama Lebra proposes that guilt arises when the reciprocal obligations of members of a community are no longer maintained[17] and the result is “the sense of social injury unjustifiably inflicted by Ego upon Alter.”[18] She also states that shame is “generated or triggered…in conjunction with ‘status’ occupancy…Shame results from whatever happens to undermine or denigrate the claimed status by revealing something…of the claimer which is inconsistent with the status.”[19] Similarly, Anthony O’Hear states, “If an unjust action is conceived as a transgression against a moral injunction, it will provoke guilt, while if it is seen as something unworthy of an honourable man, it will provoke shame.”[20] Additionally, we are warned by Douglas Cairns that: “
It would be wrong to focus too closely on the supposed distinction between failure and transgression; any transgression of a boundary is a failure to observe it, and a failure to achieve a goal can be a transgression of an interdiction. Thus, in dealing with agent-reports of shame and guilt, we cannot simply decide that any reference to transgression indicates guilt and any reference to failure, shame.[21]
More importantly than adopting any single definition of guilt and shame is the awareness that what we should take from such studies is the fact that these typologies should only be used to supplement our understanding of the expressions of guilt and shame in the public and private sphere of human activity. They cannot be used to define individual or cultural activity themselves, but only aid in our comprehension of that activity.
[1] Ruth Benedict, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword: Patterns of Japanese Culture (Mariner Books, 2006), 223.
[2] Paul Gilbert and Bernice Andrews, Shame: Interpersonal Behavior, Psychopathology, and Culture (Series in Affective Science) (Oxford University Press, 1998), 227.
[3] Millie R. Creighton, “Revisiting Shame and Guilt Cultures: A Forty-Year Pilgrimage,” Ethos 18, no. 3 (September 1990): 282; Takie Sugiyama Lebra, “The Social Mechanism of Guilt and Shame: The Japanese Case,” Anthropological Quarterly 44, no. 4 (October 1971): 2.
[4] June Price Tangney and Ronda L. Dearing, Shame and Guilt (The Guilford Press, 2002), 13-15.
[5] Ruth Benedict, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword: Patterns of Japanese Culture, 223.
[6] R. E. Lamb, “Guilt, Shame, and Morality,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 43, no. 3 (March 1983): 337-338; Anthony O’Hear, “Guilt and Shame as Moral Concepts,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 77 (1976): 73.
[7] Paul Gilbert and Bernice Andrews, Shame: Interpersonal Behavior, Psychopathology, and Culture (Series in Affective Science), 228; Takie Sugiyama Lebra, “The Social Mechanism of Guilt and Shame: The Japanese Case,” 243.
[8] Paul Gilbert and Bernice Andrews, Shame: Interpersonal Behavior, Psychopathology, and Culture (Series in Affective Science), 228.
[9] June Price Tangney and Ronda L. Dearing, Shame and Guilt, 19.
[10] Anthony O’Hear, “Guilt and Shame as Moral Concepts,” 73.
[11] Paul Gilbert and Bernice Andrews, Shame: Interpersonal Behavior, Psychopathology, and Culture (Series in Affective Science), 228.
[12] June Price Tangney and Ronda L. Dearing, Shame and Guilt, 18.
[13] Thomas J. Scheff, “Shame and Conformity: The Deference-Emotion System,” American Sociological Review 53, no. 3 (June 1988): 97.
[14] R. E. Lamb, “Guilt, Shame, and Morality,” 339.
[15] Takie Sugiyama Lebra, “The Social Mechanism of Guilt and Shame: The Japanese Case,” 246.
[16] Millie R. Creighton, “Revisiting Shame and Guilt Cultures: A Forty-Year Pilgrimage,” 287.
[17] Takie Sugiyama Lebra, “The Social Mechanism of Guilt and Shame: The Japanese Case,” 243.
[18] Ibid., 244.
[19] Ibid., 246.
[20] Anthony O’Hear, “Guilt and Shame as Moral Concepts,” 82.
[21] Douglas L. Cairns, Aidos: The Psychology and Ethics of Honour and Shame in Ancient Greek Literature (Oxford University Press, 1993), 2.
I’m not at all familiar with any of the “guilt/shame” scholarship. One thing that strikes me is that when “guilt/shame” cultures are mentioned very little is said about any sort of positive reinforcement for behaviors. Are you aware of any work that is less concerned with “shame/guilt” and more concerned with positive reinforcements of behaviors?
Unfortunately, positive reinforcement is generally only alluded to. The general consensus seems to be praise, rewards of wealth, elevated prestige, renown, and improved status. In Germanic society the upward mobility of individuals and groups seems to exist but is limited, while downward mobility is really unlimited. As a result, the critical risk is in shame and guilt judgments that tend to facilitate downward movement in preventing socially unacceptable actions. Studies seem to emphasize these sanctions because they are generally more clearly defined and observable. On the other hand, the potential for status consistency and/or upward mobility is wrapped up in role behaviors and the adherence to socially expected behaviors for people of certain roles; basically the statement that the individual’s behavior is either valued as consistent and appropriate to one of his role or elevates him above the others. Punishment is often strict and clear cut; while rewards often depend upon context and people involved.
First – well put. thank you.
Next…
Frankly, I think that one of the problems of humans and human groups generally is the tendency to label as a means of distinction. “Shame-based society” is about as descriptive of a heathen community as, say, “we are our deeds.” Both have become buzz-phrases lately, which irks me in that neither are wholly right, nor should be wholly applied, to “all of” modern heathenry.
Your essay resonates with me in that it captures preciely my skepticism not only of the buzz-phrase (“Heathens are a shame-based community”) itself but of its relevance in general. Travis touches on this, too, in his reply. I’m still working through my own research and thoughts on the matter, but I tend to see us as more focused on “reputation” than “shame/guilt.” The knowledge that it is very easy to lose status and prestige drives us to make reparations, because in that way we maintain our reputations. We work, and act, as we do because we value our reputation, and weigh it against/in favor of the community at large. It’s a subtle distinction to make, but given that the so-called “warrior cultures” in general focus on the struggle to achieve, achievement, and the conse
I exceeded the word limit, so I will just finish the thought and step away…
…the conesquences of failure, bad behavior, and the like (loss of prestige/status, shunning, banishment, outlawry, death, and so on), it’s slowly becoming my opinion that ‘shame/guilt’ are only part of a wider body of actions, based on a different theme altogether.
I’m rambling; I’ll stop. But I’m curious to know your thoughts on the matter.
As much as I hate interpreting Germanic heathen culture according to the latest trends (does shame/guilt still constitute “latest”?) in sociological or anthropological themes, it’s difficult not to see the importance of role and status play out in the literature. Looking into methods of sanctioning behavior is useful and interesting, but should not be used to define Germanic heathen culture. In Germanic society, role is immensely important and adherence to the standards attributed to an individual’s role result in his or her social position, or status, in the society was critical. You are correct that reputation, or fame according to Alexander Welsh in What Is Honor?: A Question of Moral Imperatives (pp. 2-3, following Schopenhauer), is the goal or the result. Or more clearly put, maintaining status is the reason we perform our role, but fame is the reason we perform our role well. That statement could have easily read “status is the result of performing our role, but fame is the result of performing our role well.” Schopenhauer states:
That is an interesting statement that is literal in the context of Germanic society. Every man in heathen society had a value placed on him, even thralls had a value to be paid to their owner, and each man had obligations and duties legally prescribed to him. This was a man’s honor, his value and worth. On the other hand, fame is the judgment of the people that an individual is better than others of his status and role. Beowulf was a man of honor, but so was Unferth. The only reason we know of Unferth is because of the role he played, when Beowulf was establishing his fame. Honor is your place among the people; fame is what sets you apart from the rest. Hávamál incites us to be exceptional amongst men, not to just be honored. Renown and fame, reputation, the good judgment of our folk; these are the things that give us immortality. No man is so wretched that he is without joy, but fame will never die. Sanctions are just attempts to control behavior, they change with roles, status, groups, cultures, and time periods. Focusing on the which sanctions are more prevalent tends to ignore the truly important things, what is actually expected of a person in a particular position.