Lies That Bind Chinese Truth, Other Truths

This provocative book explores the ideology of truth and deception in China, offering a nuanced perspective on social interaction in different cultural settings. Drawing on decades of fieldwork in China, Susan Blum examines rules, expectations, and beliefs regarding lying and honesty. She argues that public lying is evaluated within Chinese society by culturally specific moral values. Chinese, for example, might emphasize the consequences of speech, Americans the absolute truthfulness. But many Americans also excel in manipulation of language, yet find a simultaneous moral absolutism opposed to lying in any form. Blum considers Japanese and Jewish traditions as well, which similarly struggle to control the boundaries of honesty. Deception and lying, the book concludes, are distinctively cultural yet universal-inseparable from what it is to be a human being equipped with language in all its subtlety.

Susan D. Blum is associate professor of anthropology at the University of Notre Dame.