Nihonjinron

Nihonjinron (日本人論^?, lit. "theories/discussions about the Japanese"), is a genre of texts that focus on issues of Japanese national and cultural identity. Such texts share a general assumption of the uniqueness of Japan, and the term nihonjinron can be employed to refer to this outlook.

The concept became popular after World War II, with books and articles aiming to analyze, explain, or explore peculiarities of Japanese culture and mentality, usually by comparison with those of Europe and the United States. The literature is vast, ranging over such varied fields as sociology, psychology, anthropology, history, linguistics, philosophy, biology, chemistry and physics so in addition to the common generic word nihonjinron, a variety of topical subgenres exist, divided up by specific theme or subject-matter. For example:

Books written by non-Japanese authors may also be classed as nihonjinron, if they share, contribute to, or reflect the vision, premises, and perspectives characteristic of the Japanese genre.

There seems no doubt that intense feelings for one's native country and its identity were an early part of Japanese literary culture, and a value given aesthetic expression. Robert Borgen studies just one example from the life of the monk Jōjin (成尋, 1011–1081) and remarks:

Hiroshi Minami, one of the foremost scholars of the genre, states in his survey:

...
Wikipedia