The Meaning of Scotland
Great question in my senmongakko (private college) class today: “Teacher, I still don’t understand what Scotland means”
I chose to take that as a geographical and political question rather than a philosophical one (Does anyone really, deep down, understand what Scotland means??).
Not sure I managed to answer the question however you take it, seeing as the student had never heard of my closest examples (The Vatican, Monaco) and pre-handover Okinawa (when it was 100% occupied by the Americans until 1972 rather than 45% occupied it is now) isn’t the best of comparisons. Any metaphors spring to mind?
The issue this brings up is a common lack of Japanese knowledge about the outside world. This is more understandable than the Spanish lack of knowledge about the outside world, seeing as there are 115 million Japanese working for companies of world impact living on an isolated island. It’s also not as bad as the Chinese students I had ten years ago who of all the famous people I could think of to explain job vocabulary had only heard of Bill Clinton, and mainly for his bad taste in women… But the problem does remain, and this particular class will be studying abroad next year and are not going to widen their circle of friends when they meet the statement “I am from Argentina” with a blank stare (about 30% of the class had no idea such a country existed). I’ve mentioned the theoretical friend-losing encounter and we’ve done stuff with maps. Have also done an unintentional Basil Fawlty impression when I found out how little they knew.
Looking for other ideas to try out the next few weeks like getting them to plan a trip round the world (We are going to visit…) and using a worksheet I’ve made up with famous products they have to guess the origin of (Louis Vuitton is French etc- should be a hit!) and will let you know how they go.
Tags: Japan/ Japanese students
June 19th, 2007 at 4:30 pm
Hello Alex.
Good points well made, as ever. And as a former TEFL-er in London and Japan, in schools you know well, I empathise with many of your comments.
Only a year ago I had a 30-something, upper-middle-class Chinese student in a group in London, who got rather emotional after half an hour of hearing bemused Euros (and even some Japanese!) splutter disbelief at her inability to name some of the world’s most well-known and popular figures. (it was a variation of the Inside Out ‘Dinner Party’ activity, by the way).
As for the Japanese themselves, it really is a question of exposure. Their linguistic and geographical ‘otherness’ means it’s not surprising most of them won’t know things we take for granted, yet it’s a country where a high proportion of folk have interests that broaden their knowledge of the world: whether it’s the otaku indie fan who knows his way round the north of England, the girl obsessed with Latin American dance or the football nut who follows the leagues all over Europe. This at least can be refreshing, and helps to counter the staggering ignorance we all face at times.
bye for now
Darren
June 23rd, 2007 at 1:19 am
just did a search on the internet ‘what does scotland mean?’. I’m slightly curious as my sister lives there with my 2 sweet but incomprehensible nieces, and my visits up there always made me feel lucky that I live in a more developed country (Vietnam). Anyway, Google offered me a link to a guy asking that very question to the world, and to date he hasn’t had a single reply. I think our best hope is to ask your student to dedicate their life to finding out the answer, because with a bit of otaku application and the fact that they said ‘STILL dont understand’ seems to indicate that they are suprised that they haven’t found the answer yet. This is a glimpse of light at the end of the dank depressing glaswegian tunnel…