Teaching in God’s land
There is a whole lot going on in this recent story about a feud over a foreigners’ cemetery in Seoul, but the thing that struck me most was how nationalism is tied up with almost everything is Korea. There are lots of reasons given for the nationalism in South Korea that often manifests itself as anti-almost-everywhere-ism, but the overwhelming reason for nationalism in any country is that it helps the ruling classes stay in power- just look at how theoretically internationlist communist leaders like Stalin and the present Chinese leadership used and use nationalism to cling onto their positions.
Whatever the country, there seems little you can do as a humble English teacher to tackle feelings of national superiority/ paranoid feelings that other countries are looking down on them/ strange mixed up combination of the two- especially as the school you teach in is unlikely to give you the power to pick the history textbooks they use any time soon. So, is there anything we can do to make our students and other people in the country we live in react to the rest of the world without so much of an attitude?
Here are some ideas:
- A good lesson on cultural assumptions etc. works like a good grammar lesson- they end up asking you for any information or opinions you have on the matter instead of you just sounding off while they think about something else.
- As a representative of foreigners in the country you need to be open to the culture you are in to prove that foreigners can be polite etc. by their standards, but not too open as this could be used as evidence that their way of life is inherently superior so all foreigners get to love it more than their own
- Just like a teacher that is going to teach grammar well, you need to be prepared. This means not only knowing their culture, but knowing your own and other cultures too. For example, if they tell you “In our country we…” you will then be able to say “That’s interesting, in (Thailand) they do the same thing”, and if they say “Why do they do that stupid thing in (China)?” you will be able to explain why.
- Never let a conversation on culture turn into a conversation on history.
Any more ideas? Comments below please:
October 3rd, 2007 at 3:13 am
I find in China that the nationalistic education, apart from a fanatical few, has not really taken hold. People tend to be curious, rather than set in their opinions, and are open to alternative viewpoints. I often hear “I hate Japan” from my students here, but it’s more of a rote expression rather than a deeply-held belief. I drop a few facts in, and they’re amazed at what their government doesn’t tell them. Japan has apologised to China 17 times for WWII atrocities, for example, but the Chinese have been told that Japan has never apologised. They also believe that every Japanese school uses the whitewashed history textbooks, because that’s what they were told.
Even the protests against Japan here were organised by university officials. In most cases, sleepy university students were told to report to a rally point, given a Japanese flag to burn, and herded onto buses, which took them to the protest. There, they were told what to do and what to say. Most of them didn’t give a damn and didn’t want to be there.
October 3rd, 2007 at 5:57 am
I have had one experience with a Chinese student in the UK that made me look at all my other Chinese students a bit differently and made me come to the conclusion that such nationalistic feelings do have an impact, but one that can lie underground when everything is going swimmingly and then flare up when things go wrong, you feel stressed or, in the worst cases, when your life falls apart.
Having a low Elementary class that was exactly half mainland Chinese and half Spanish speakers (mainly Columbians) I had a real hard time keeping the communication in English and resorted to the Yellow Card (warning for speaking your own language) and Red Card (chucked out till next lesson for speaking your language again). I always had to brandish a few yellow cards, but the response to a second reaching to the pocket usually meant an actual red card was only necessary once. The Chinese student who had to leave for the last 15 minutes did so, but not before giving a five minute speech on how Columbians hate Chinese, much to their shock and mine.
Digging around a bit after that incident, it turned out that the accommodation staff etc. often had complaints from Chinese students that centred around paranoid theories like “I have problems with my (host parents because they hate Chinese”, not something I ever heard about other nationalities.
This was a few years ago before the Chinese looked like they were going to rule the world again, so I predict if it doesn’t turn out that way and the bad times come back the nationalist rallies may well turn more spontaneous.
I think the whole world has that idea about Japanese textbooks, unfortunately. Although if that false impression forces the Japanese to change it might not be a bad thing…