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Mottainai (もったいない or 勿体無い) is a term of Japanese origin that has been used by environmentalists. The term in Japanese conveys a sense of regret over waste; the exclamation "Mottainai!" can translate as "What a waste!" Japanese environmentalists have used the term to encourage people to "reduce, reuse and recycle", and Kenyan environmentalist Wangari Maathai used the term at the United Nations as a slogan to promote environmental protection.

Etymology, usage, and translation

After the Second World War, the dominant meaning of the Japanese word mottainai is "waste" or "wasteful", indicating something that is being discarded needlessly, or to express regret at such a fact – something like: "what a waste!". Older and/or largely eroded definitions of the term, which has an elaborate history of varied meanings, illustrate, for instance, trouble, impropriety, disappointment or graciousness, and include meanings such as "awe-inspiring", "unworthy", "undeserving", "profane" and "sacrilegious". In the 1990s the word was used infrequently, while its connotations became more negative, shifting towards issues of waste management and valuing things. In this decade, its meaning was partially understood as "shabby", "dingy", or "stingy". In the 21st century, mottainai became a catch-all concept within expanding waste consciousness: by then, it encapsulated a wide range of connotations regarding waste, including concerns regarding waste proliferation and scarcity of resources, and regarding what was truly meaningful and valuable apart from financial gain. Waste consciousness proliferated via a wide spectrum of publications, including children's books, e.g. Mottainai Grandma.

Mottainai is the classical Japanese terminal form mottainashi. Two frequently-cited early examples of usages of mottainashi, both given in both Kōjien and Daigenkai [ja], are the Genpei Jōsuiki and the Taiheiki. A form of the word, motaina (モタイナ) appears in the late-14th or early-15th century Noh play Aritōshi [ja], apparently in a sense close to the original meaning of the word, i.e., "inexpedient or reprehensible towards a god, buddha, noble or the like". Kōhei Hasegawa [ja], then a professor at Nagano University, writes about a historical semantic shift in which the original meaning became less prominent. Citing the Kyoto University Japanese literature scholar Kōshin Noma [ja], Hasegawa states that the word originated as slang in the Kamakura period, and that by the mid 15th century had perhaps already acquired the meanings of "awe-inspiring, unmerited, undeserved, used to express thanks" and "an expression of regret at the full value of something not being put to good use".

The word nai in mottainai resembles a Japanese negative ("there is no mottai"), but may have originally been used as an emphatic ("tremendous mottai"). Mottai itself is a noun appearing as such in, for example, the dictionary Gagaku-shū [ja], which dates to 1444. Daigenkai gives buttai as an alternate reading of the word, and it appears written with the kanji 勿躰, 物體, 勿體, 物体, or 勿体. It means (i) the shape/form of a thing or (ii) something that is, or the fact of being, impressive or imposing (モノモノシキコト monomonoshiki koto). The compound that is pronounced as mottai in Japanese appears in Sino-Japanese dictionaries as a Chinese word in a sense similar to (ii), but mottainashi does not, as it is an indigenous Japanese word.

The 18th-century Kokugaku philologist Motoori Norinaga, in the preface to his 1798 treatise Tamaarare('Ice Crystals (like)Jewels':玉あられ) designed to stir people up from their sleepy acquiescence in acquired customs that were not authentically native, was critical of the use of the word to express gratitude, as he felt its use for such a purpose (along with those of kajikenashi and osoreōi) was vitiated by its ultimate derivation from imitating forms of Chinese rhetoric and greetings. In his 1934 essay Nihon-seishin to Bukkyō, the Buddhologist Katō Totsudō (加藤咄堂:1870-1949} included the "aversion to wastefulness" (mottainai) in a putative series of what he considered to be "core Japanese personality traits".

Since World War II, the "wasteful" sense of the word is, as noted above, overwhelmingly prominent, and many people who use it simply assume that it has "always been associated with wastefulness and an ideal of waste consciousness".

Modern Japanese environmentalism

In November 2002, the English-language, Japan-based magazine Look Japan ran a cover story entitled "Restyling Japan: Revival of the 'Mottainai' Spirit", documenting the motivation amongst volunteers in a "toy hospital" in Japan to "develop in children the habit of looking after their possessions", the re-emergence of repair shops specializing in repairing household appliances or children's clothes, the recycling of PET bottles and other materials, the collection of waste edible oil, and more generally the efforts to stop the trend of throwing away everything that can no longer be used, i.e. the efforts of reviving "the spirit of mottainai". In that context, Hitoshi Chiba, the author, described mottainai as follows:

We often hear in Japan the expression 'mottainai', which loosely means 'wasteful' but in its full sense conveys a feeling of awe and appreciation for the gifts of nature or the sincere conduct of other people. There is a trait among Japanese people to try to use something for its entire effective life or continue to use it by repairing it. In this caring culture, people will endeavor to find new homes for possessions they no longer need. The 'mottainai' principle extends to the dinner table, where many consider it rude to leave even a single grain of rice in the bowl. The concern is that this traditional trait may be lost.

In a 2014 study of an apparent increase in interest in the idea of mottainai in early 21st-century Japan, historian Eiko Maruko Siniawer summarized the views of several Japanese writers who claimed that mottainai was a specifically Buddhist concept. She also cited a number of views of Japanese authors who believed that it was a uniquely Japanese "contribution to the world", which views she characterized as mostly being "deeply rooted in cultural generalizations, essentialisms, and disdainful comparisons between countries".

Use by Wangari Maathai

At a session of the United Nations, Kenyan environmentalist Wangari Maathai introduced the word mottainai as a slogan for environmental protection. According to Mizue Sasaki,

Dr. Maathai, brandishing a t-shirt emblazoned with the word MOTTAINAI, explained that the meaning of the term mottainai encompasses the four Rs of reduce, reuse, recycle and repair ... made the case that we should all use limited resources effectively and share them fairly if we are to avert wars arising from disputes over natural resources.

Maathai has worked to popularize the word mottainai in places outside Japan. At the 2009 United Nations Summit on Climate Change, she said, "Even at personal level, we can all reduce, re-use and recycle, what is embraced as Mottainai in Japan, a concept that also calls us to express gratitude, to respect and to avoid wastage."

See also

• Affluenza
• Anti-consumerism
• Bal tashchit
• Conspicuous consumption
• Freeganism
• Frugality
• "Mottai Night Land", a Kyary Pamyu Pamyu song which has Mottai nai in the title
• Muda, mura and muri, three types of waste in lean manufacturing
• Planned obsolescence
• Simple living

References

Citations

1. ^ Siniawer 2018, p. 241.
2. ^ Hasegawa 1983, p. 25.
3. Siniawer 2018, pp. 241–242.
4. ^ Siniawer 2018, p. 242.
5. "Mottainai Grandma Reminds Japan, 'Don't Waste'".
6. ^ Hasegawa 1983, p. 26.
7. Hasegawa 1983, pp. 26–27.
8. ^ Hasegawa 1983, p. 27.
9. Hasegawa 1983, pp. 25–26.
10. ^ Hasegawa 1983, p. 28.
11. Markus Rüttermann, "So That We Can Study Letter-Writing": The Concept of Epistolary Etiquette in Premodern Japan, Journal of the International Research Center for Japanese Studies, 2006 18,1 pp.57-128,86.
12. Chūō Bukkyō 1934 18/3 pp.1-12,11-12 cited in Ives below.
13. Christopher Ives, vThe Mobilization of Doctrine: Buddhist Contributions to Imperial Ideology in Modern Japan, Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 26, 1/2 Spring 1999 pp.83-106,90:'Katō Totsudō also identifies purportedly core Japanese personality traits of aversion to wastefulness (mottainai: 勿体無い), gratitude (arigatai: 有難い) and sympathy (ki no doku: 気の毒) with the Three Mental Attitudes of laity set forth in the Upāsaka–śīla sūtra the mind of poverty (hinkyūshin:貧窮心) 　the mind of requiring blessings (hōonshin:報恩心) and the mind of merit (kudokushin:功徳心).'
14. ^ Chiba, Hitoshi (November 2002). "Restyling Japan: Revival of the "Mottainai" Spirit". Look Japan. Archived from the original on April 5, 2004. Retrieved July 22, 2013.
15. Siniawer 2014, p. 175 sfnm error: multiple targets (2×): CITEREFSiniawer2014 (help).
16. Siniawer 2014, p. 176 sfnm error: multiple targets (2×): CITEREFSiniawer2014 (help).
17. Siniawer, Eiko Maruko (2014). "'Affluence of the Heart': Wastefulness and the Search for Meaning in Millennial Japan". The Journal of Asian Studies. 73 (1). Cambridge University Press, Association for Asian Studies: 165–186. doi:10.1017/S0021911813001745. JSTOR 43553399. citing Yamaori Tetsuo. 2006. "Nihonjin wa ima, donna kachi o shinrai subeki ka" (interview). Bōsei 37(7):11–18.
18. Sasaki, Mizue (7–9 November 2005). Perspectives of language: cultural differences and universality in Japanese (PDF). Paris: UNESCO. pp. 124–125. {{cite conference}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |booktitle= (help)
19. Iwatsuki, Kunio (2008). Sustainable Use of Biodiversity, with Reference to the Japanese Spirit of Worshipping Nature (in "Conserving Nature, A Japanese Perspective") (PDF). Biodiversity Network Japan. pp. 4–11. ISBN 978-4-9901743-1-6. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 9, 2015. Retrieved July 25, 2013.
20. "Statement by Prof. W. Maathai, Nobel Peace Laureate, on behalf of Civil Society" (PDF). United Nations. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-06-01. Retrieved 24 February 2018. Cited in Siniawer, 2014, p. 177.

Works cited

• Hasegawa, Kōhei (1983). "Mottai-nashi Kō". Academic Bulletin of Nagano University. 4 (3–4): 25–30. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Siniawer, Eiko Maruko (2014). "'Affluence of the Heart': Wastefulness and the Search for Meaning in Millennial Japan". The Journal of Asian Studies. 73 (1). Cambridge University Press, Association for Asian Studies: 165–186. doi:10.1017/S0021911813001745. JSTOR 43553399. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Siniawer, Eiko Maruko (2018). "We Are All Waste Conscious Now". Waste: Consuming Postwar Japan. Cornell University Press. pp. 241–265 (and endnotes pp. 343–347). ISBN 9781501725852. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

External links

• Mottainai Campaign official site
• Mottainai Movement in Brazil

• Value (ethics)
• Social philosophy
• Japanese philosophy
• Japanese business terms
• Japanese words and phrases
• Resource economics
• Waste management concepts
• Words and phrases with no direct English translation