Internationalism=/Occidentalism
The anthropological training, of which I have only had a very minor taste, makes you think alot about your role as participant in what you seek to learn about, regardless of the general given that there is no such thing as innocent observation, unmediated by interpretation and fixed in space and time. Do I learn more about my kids interaction and subsequent growth into certain kinds of being through interacting myself? Sometimes the situation works itself out, such as Shoma falling off his unicycle during breaktime at Nisshin shogakko today. The year groups at that school noticeably separate themselves- the 5th/6th years were all playing soccer, the 1st years inside with their teacher, the 3rd and 4th playing gleefully in the fallen yellow leaves of the ichou tree, the 2nd years all atop the unicycles that they've recently come to master. These clusters of around 6 kids seamlessly play around each other and one sees confrontation or loss of temper extremely rarely. Shoma fell off and I heard his throaty crying. Nanami and I had been trying to so 'saka-atari', pulling onself in a backwards roll around a bar at shoulder level (or at least, I tried...twice, and Nanami did). I was interested to see whether Shoma, a shy and delicate little boy, was behaving "normally" in his persistent crying, in part of my general interest in emotional display, reaction to pain and the relevance of this to notions of individuality...or the universality of kids' fearlessness and its role in learning and becoming 'embodied'. This may sound callous...these kids are not scientific cyborgs, but my intervention to see if he was ok was quickly squished out by the kids and Shoma himself, who weren't sure what to make of my jokey suggestion that we whisk him straight to hospital. However, Nanami and Shunya quickly grabbed his arms and legs and pretended to be his ambulance, carrying him towards the school until he was laughing. He soon returned with a little gauze on his tiny graze. It seems that kids here are incredibly helpful to one another, ignoring their meaningless mistakes and tumbles but taking care when they perceive a real problem.
Why do I recount such minutiae when there are such wider currents and importances? I think it just prompted an old thought current, problematic when doing my Ghana research, as to how my action influences the things I'm trying to learn and whether it matters.
I have also tried to become more reflexive about the discourses that I have unwittingly become embroiled in.
International.
There's a thread that surfaces alot about making relationships with Japanese people. This tends to be on the girls-with Japanese boys side rather than the opposite, and the whole imbalance is riddled with fascinating gender questions.
But for now, the 'intenational' discourse. As JET participants, your function as in-country 'internationaliser' has never been smokescreened. We all wonder what exactly it means, and feel comfortable constantly moaning about how inferior is the Japanese English education system, treatment of animals, driving speed, urban architecture, dental health, work devotion, lack of political engagement, treatment of women etc. I agree with some of the criticisms, though as time goes on one gains information that allows you to put these strange differences into context and thus more comprehensible. But lots of girls claim that they can only date a Japanese guy if he's 'international', and this word is used as an adjective to describe a slew of personality traits. But their general criteria are English proficiency, foreign-travel experience, self-possessiveness and, often, being seen as a bit odd by other Japanese people (although I have friends who combine the two beautifully). Other friends speak of their explicit desire to 'become' international in their consumption, social and appearance choices. But of course, I'm not really talking about internationalisation, but a specific form of defensive occidentalism that imagines a superior cultural entity opposed to another we call 'Japan'. Ostensibly, this need, generated against a stereotypical view of the Japanese male, serves to protect the aware-yet-vulnerable western woman against the evils of Japanese chauvinism, but I think it also reflects a refusal to question the idea of the 'west' and its supposed superiority. There is the major issue of language. I have myself said that I would shy away from a relationship where from the start you can't grasp the nuances in another's language, ask about their views and express affection. But then, what is the best way to learn a language? Is there a real male to embody the ideal 'western' guy? We criticize or patronize the effete androgony of J-boy style, feminising them without questioning the contingency of ideas like long hair=female, muscle=male...
I have been long threading feelings of guilt, frustration, confusion and ambivalence about the question of how ELT, even today, reproduces and even produces a colonial construct of the 'west'. In our discussions, we reproduce and make implications of the clean, cultured, industrious, masculine, adult European Self in opposition to the dirty, natural, indolent, feminine, child native Other. This doesn't map exactly onto many ALTs ideas of Japanese people and I am ignoring that the discourse is by no means one way, but I wish to spend some time here getting beyond the idea that English is the answer, to try and find out what's being said in a way that I can never understand while I retain the idea that people should try to learn to be like me...
Why do I recount such minutiae when there are such wider currents and importances? I think it just prompted an old thought current, problematic when doing my Ghana research, as to how my action influences the things I'm trying to learn and whether it matters.
I have also tried to become more reflexive about the discourses that I have unwittingly become embroiled in.
International.
There's a thread that surfaces alot about making relationships with Japanese people. This tends to be on the girls-with Japanese boys side rather than the opposite, and the whole imbalance is riddled with fascinating gender questions.
But for now, the 'intenational' discourse. As JET participants, your function as in-country 'internationaliser' has never been smokescreened. We all wonder what exactly it means, and feel comfortable constantly moaning about how inferior is the Japanese English education system, treatment of animals, driving speed, urban architecture, dental health, work devotion, lack of political engagement, treatment of women etc. I agree with some of the criticisms, though as time goes on one gains information that allows you to put these strange differences into context and thus more comprehensible. But lots of girls claim that they can only date a Japanese guy if he's 'international', and this word is used as an adjective to describe a slew of personality traits. But their general criteria are English proficiency, foreign-travel experience, self-possessiveness and, often, being seen as a bit odd by other Japanese people (although I have friends who combine the two beautifully). Other friends speak of their explicit desire to 'become' international in their consumption, social and appearance choices. But of course, I'm not really talking about internationalisation, but a specific form of defensive occidentalism that imagines a superior cultural entity opposed to another we call 'Japan'. Ostensibly, this need, generated against a stereotypical view of the Japanese male, serves to protect the aware-yet-vulnerable western woman against the evils of Japanese chauvinism, but I think it also reflects a refusal to question the idea of the 'west' and its supposed superiority. There is the major issue of language. I have myself said that I would shy away from a relationship where from the start you can't grasp the nuances in another's language, ask about their views and express affection. But then, what is the best way to learn a language? Is there a real male to embody the ideal 'western' guy? We criticize or patronize the effete androgony of J-boy style, feminising them without questioning the contingency of ideas like long hair=female, muscle=male...
I have been long threading feelings of guilt, frustration, confusion and ambivalence about the question of how ELT, even today, reproduces and even produces a colonial construct of the 'west'. In our discussions, we reproduce and make implications of the clean, cultured, industrious, masculine, adult European Self in opposition to the dirty, natural, indolent, feminine, child native Other. This doesn't map exactly onto many ALTs ideas of Japanese people and I am ignoring that the discourse is by no means one way, but I wish to spend some time here getting beyond the idea that English is the answer, to try and find out what's being said in a way that I can never understand while I retain the idea that people should try to learn to be like me...