To the Editor:

I feel I must take strong exception to the views expressed in Masahiro Shinoda's Point of View column (Dec. 19). So much of what was written there upset me so much that I hardly know where to begin to respond.

Shinoda is concerned that what he calls "creolization" is destroying the remnants of traditional Japanese culture. While this can hardly be denied, I think it is important to recognize the fallacies and dangers of the way he approaches the problem.

To begin with, it would be stretching credibility to suggest that the industrial culture of the West was forced down the throats of the Japanese people. My perception is that, from the Meiji Era until today, they have embraced it enthusiastically. And I think you would have a hard time finding more than a handful who would prefer to go back to the time of the shoguns.

Nevertheless, I agree with his belief that culture must be preserved. As a maker of films, I think he has an exceptionally good tool for recording the ways of old. Film is probably the best medium for the preservation of a disappearing culture. But to say that it is necessary to remember the past is not to say that it is desirable to try to live in it.

Twice the word "inauthentic" is used to refer to contemporary Japan. I would like to know by what criterion he dares judge authenticity. The land of the Yamato 2,000 or more years ago was very different from the Nippon of 200 years ago. Does that make the latter inauthentic?

The reality of the world we live in, with its telecommunications and international travel, is increased hybridization of highly divergent cultures and lifestyles. Like milk and water poured into the same bottle, these will only become more and more integrated--never separated back into their original "pure" forms. (And just as with milk and water, their purity is an illusion created by the limitations of casual perception. A very close examination reveals that they are in fact anything but.) And I put it to Shinoda and those who share his views that contemporary Japanese culture is authentic simply by virtue of the fact that it exists.

Shinoda wishes to recognize the distinctions between people (in particular "me" and "you", though this presumably extends to "Japanese" and "foreigners") without being labeled as discriminatory. While I can sympathize with his rejection of the recent obsession with political correctness, it is necessary to see that PC is not an evil conspiracy, but an aspect of social evolution, and is not entirely without merit.

Besides, let's consider what is surely one of the bastions of the backbone of Japanese culture: Buddhism (another foreign import, we note). Buddhist teachings state that any symbolic distinction between what is "I" and what is "not-I" is necessarily false and illusory. Though I may seem to have turned Shinoda's own argument against him at a different level, this really only shows that the world is a vastly complex place where simplistic, parochial viewpoints and analyses are no longer acceptable.

As for his evalution of the state of the Japanese language, I am appalled and incensed at the use of a word like "contaminated." Does he consider that the language he now speaks is contaminated with tens of thousands of (foreign) Chinese words? Which "parent form" does he want to return to? Where does he draw the line between pure Japanese and polluted Japanese? Yayoi period? Heian period? Edo period? All languages undergo change and evolution along with the circumstances of their speakers.

Because of Japan's cataclysmic transition from a very stable, feudal agricultural system to industrialism, there is perceived as being an immutable "original" language and culture against which to judge the current situation. But there is no such thing. The Edo period represents a mere moment in the history of these islands, and less than the blink of an eye in the history of humankind. Even during that stagnant era, it is undeniable that the Japanese language and culture continued to change, albeit slowly.

Just below the thin, apparently open-minded surface veneer of Shinoda's opinions lie the dangerous seeds of racist nationalism. There is no doubt in my mind that he is not personally a neo-fascist, but as a famous person with access to the mass media, he has great responsibility for the effect of his words on others.

We're supposed to have graduated from xenophobia. It is saddening to see how much it has been revitalized in this post-Cold War era. Shinoda goes so far as to state that the primary reason for preserving the old ways is to help fight off the incursion of foreign influences. At least it is reassuring to me that most of the people I speak to regard it as a good thing that Japan become more "international."

He suggests that if the characters in one of his films, representing an aspect of "authentic" Japanese culture, are to perish, that this is equivalent to saying that the Japanese people will lose their identity. This viewpoint is completely misguided. A person's identity is determined by his own current reality, not by his great-grandfather's.

Needless to say, this is just as true for Japanese as for anyone else. The key idea that I want to communicate is that everything evolves naturally and inevitably. One of the foremost problems facing the generations of this century and the next is that change is happening faster than the ability of most humans to adjust to it. But we must recognize our place in the continuum of history rather than cling to a past viewed through rose-colored glasses.

I do not condone the Western imperialism that led to this "creolization" of Asia. It is one of the understandable reasons why Japan started the war. And I truly regret, perhaps more than many Japanese, that certain elements of its classical culture have been, for all practical purposes, already lost.

However, we cannot continue forever to think (much less to live) the same way our ancestors did, because that way does not apply to our era and our civilization. The importance of this fact cannot be overemphasized. The real question is: What can Japan offer to the future transnational world culture?

David Iannucci
Tokyo