Meeting 10: Day 2 of the Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion

Last week the guests presented for the Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion. Below is our schedule for Day 2. After our schedule, I will post the summaries of each guest's presentation:

1. Ice Breaking: 4 Corners
2. Mini Discussions with guests:

• Each group will have 10 minutes to talk to a guest. Here is some possible content to discuss.
  

A) Follow-up on the guest’s presentation

• Did you understand all of the guest’s presentation? What parts did you not understand? Are there any words, phrases, or concepts you heard for the first time? Ask the guest questions about his or her speech to clarify what she/he said. You can also confirm your guest’s answers to the below questions:

Are there any responses that you are proud of?
Are there any responses you do no think are true?
What else do you think we should know about your country?

• Until now, you have talked about how people in your country imagine your guest’s country, why don’t you ask your guest what her/his images of Japan were before she/he came to this country. How accurate were the guest’s images?

3.“Discussion on Values” activity (Time Permitting)
4. Closing words: JH

Post Discussion
Please write about what you learned from the discussions that you had with two guests on the MMCE Blog. Please do this by June 30.

Summaries of Last Week's Presentations

Uyghr

Uyghur is regarded as unknown place for many people in the world. Even though people don’t know much of its cultures, we can see some of them because Uyghur is the mother of many things in the world. For example, noodles are origins of pasta, and the Uyghur language is origin of east languages such as Turkish.
Also,Uyghur is really multicultural place. There are 9 countries around Uyghur (China, Pakistan, Mongolia, Turkey etc.) that have influences to its culture. Though there are many faces in Uyghur and some looks like a Chinese, only 10 percent of the Uyghur population can speak Chinese and 100 percent of the people are Muslim.
As to our group’s survey, almost all are right but there are some wrong stereotypes. Uyghur people are not nomadic nor nomadic.

France

Food:French live on bread. Wine is famous,but
Beaujolais Nouveau isn't treat an
expensive wine. And cheese has nothing
to do with France.

People:There are basically mix people in
France. Black,Arabian...there are
various race. And,there are many
strikes.

National flag:Flag of France was a symbol
of the revolution movement.
It expresses freedom and
equality.

Russia


People know a lot about Russian people. For example, Dostoevsky, Putin, Rasputin, Sharapova, Arshavin, Tchaikovskii and so on.
Many people think that Russia is a cold country, but it depends on season and locations. In northern place, it is very cold and has a lot of snow in winter. On the other hand, Saint Petersburg is about 25 degrees now.
The location of Russia is good because Russia locates between Europe and Asia. Because of the closeness of Europe, Marina can study English and use English, and because of the closeness of Asia, she can learn Asian languages. She chose Japanese as her third language among the Asian languages.


Philippines


【race】
After the presentation→In fact,not so many black men and they don’t call black man
but ‘brown man’ in Southest Asia.

【language】
After the presentation→In fact,they speaks over 180 kinds of languages.And under
the data is survey for language’s percentage.
　※Filipino and English is official language.

Main article
Native Language
Tagalog 22million, Cebuano 20million, Ilokano 　 7.7million, Hiligaynon 7million, Waray-Waray 3.1million, Kapampangan 2.9million, Chavacano 2.5million

【climate】
After the presentation→In fact,North area is not so hot though Southest Asia.

【geography】
After the presentation→In fact Philippine is made of 7107 islands.It’s very surprise truth.

【religion】
After the presentation→In fact,there are 90 percent for Christiantity.This is unbelievable,but we got under the data.

Religion in the Philippines
Religion Percent
Christiantity 90％, Islam 5％, Buddhism 2％, Hinduism 1％, Others　2％

【culture】
After the presentation→In fact the pub is where only they can drink and drug is the
world problem.
Our group was very surprised about religion because 90 percent for Christiantity.
Now,we know that is prejudice and ideology.There were our image from some
Information by the education and the medias.

Pakistan


Food:Pakistani like spicy food like India.

Religion:The religion of Pakistan is Islam.
The turban is related to Islam.

Climate:There are some climate situation in
Pakisatan.

Person:The color of skin is blown not black.

Incident:There are disputes not incident.
Individual person decides to participate to disputes.

Meeting 9: Day 1 of the Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion

Day 1 of the Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion will be held today. Here is our schedule of events:
1) Introduction to MMCE
2) Mind Map Viewing
3) Ice Breaking: 2 Truths, One Lie
4) Confirm the results in groups
5) Guest Presentations (5 minute presentation + 5 minute question and answer):
1. Jolina F., Phillipines
2. Ablajan I., Uyghr
3. Marina, Russia
4. Janet A., France
5. Sara B., Pakistan

CLGs: I would like each CLG to ask a question to their guest after the presentation. Also, I would like each CLG to summarize their guests presentation and write it as a comment on the blog.

Meeting 8: Preparing for the Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion

Making Mind Maps

I. As a group, please make a mind map based on the data you collected. In the center of the mind map should be an image of your country and then you should have an image of each category. Also, somewhere in your mind map I think it would be good if you could include some basic information about the country. See the data here.

Here is a sample mind map of a country from last year.
Country: Mexico
Categories: Food, Geography, Artifact, Sports, Color, Plant/Animal, Image


Country: China
Categories: Culture, Disaster, Event, Food, Person, Personality, Policy, Society

II. Unfortunately, I have not received the completed data from 3 groups. For the next MMCE, I would like you to do the following:

• Please contact your guest THIS WEEK and arrange to give them the categorized and sorted data . Please tell them that you would like them to speak for about 5 minutes about the following:

1. Which responses that people wrote about your region/country are you proud of?
2. Is there anything written that you think is not completely true or wrong? If so, which responses?
3. Is their anything you would like to say about your region/ country that has not been written? If so, what would you like to say?

• Please arrange to meet your guest again BEFORE MMCE on June 17 and escort him/her to the MMCE room (rm.405).
  

III Plan for Day 1 of the Discussion

Below is the tentative plan for Day 1 of our Discussion:
The Discussion
10:30 ~ 10:35: Intro by JH
10:35 ~ 10:45: Mind Map Gallery Viewing
10:45 ~ 10:55 : Ice Breaking
10:55 ~ 12:00 Guest Presentations (5 minutes presentation + 5 minutes question and answer)

Each group, while your guest is speaking, please take notes. As a group, please summarize what your guest said and e-mail it to JH by Monday, June 15. I will post it on the blog so others can read it.

Each group is responsible for asking its guest a question during the question and answer period.

Here is the completed data that I have:
Russia
France
Philippines
Pakistan
Uyghur

Photos of last year's presentations:
USA

China

Meeting 7: Beginning our Preparation for the Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion

Agenda for Meeting 7

I Comparing Country Profiles

1. Compare country profiles: When you do not know a word, ask the speaker the meaning and write it down.

• Questions that you can answer as a group:
  
• Which country has the most natural resources?
• Which country has the most serious envirnonmental issues?
• Which country has the most ethnically diverse population?
• Which country has the lowest/highest infant mortality rate and life expectancy?
• Which country has the most languages?
• What other interesting comparisons can you make between the countries

2. Return to your group and do the following

• Make a list of words that you learned during the country comparison. From the list, choose 5 words that you think are essential for your group and you would like to learn.
• Group Philippines: monsoon, coral reef degradation, land, sub-arctic, tundra
• Group Russia: petroleum, copper, deforestation, republic, Moscow
• Group France: Uranium, Gross Domestic Product (GDP), French, air pollution, life expectancy
• Uyghur, China: pollution, republic, deforestation, infant mortality rate, Mandarin
• Pakistan: infant mortality rate, literacy, acid rain, deforestation, industrial waste

• Think about what questions about the information from the country comparisons you would like to ask your guest.

II Preparing the Data

1. JH will explain about the breaking National Stereotypes Discussion
2. Categorize the data you have collected.
3. Contact your guest and give them the data that you have collected by next week.

For next time, please do the following:
1) Think of categories for the responses.
2) Write the categories into the file that JH will send the computer supervisor (係）
3) Send JH the new file by Tuesday, June 9.

Meeting 6: Culture and Cultural Phenomenon

I Review

How are culture 1 and culture 2 different?
Please discuss human nature, culture and personality.

What are products?
What are examples of products?

What are practices?
Please define Acts and operations

II Culture and Cultural Phenomenon (Cont.)
Practices: Scenarios, life

Practices: Non-verbal communication
Proxemics
proxemics test
- Shogo and Hiroki : 20 centimeters
- Marina and Aimi: 60 centimeters
- Atsumi and Yu: 1 meter
- David and Yukitake: 1 meter
- Yoshiki and Mr. Hall: 0.5 cm

What does this say about acceptable physical distance in your culture?
- Japanese dislike short distance (less than 60cm)
- Different by situation but normally 50CM - 60 CM is acceptable distance. Friends can speak at a shorter distance.
- When we are facing eachother the distance is farther and when we are standing side by side the distance is shorter.


Kinesics
Haptics
Oculesics
Chronemics
Olfactics
Vocalics
Perspectives
Communities
Persons

III Explanation of Breaking Down National Stereotypes Discussion
Give a Survey

Your group is responsible for asking 30 people the following question about the country of your guest:
What are the first three things you think of when you hear the country name "________"?
「国X」と聞いたらどのような事を思い浮かぶか、3つ挙げてください。
In addition to the above question, please ask the age and occupation of the person answering the question. Try not to ask the same people as other CLGs and also please do not ask any member of MMCE to answer the question. Lastly, please ask a Japanese citizen to answer the question.
Your CLG should download the Excel File on the blog and enter the data (The answers of the 30 respondents) in it.
o Do not worry about the "category" column.
o The data should be in English and Japanese, because some participants will not speak English and others will not speak Japanese.
o To do this efficiently, each member of your group can ask 5 - 7 people, and you can enter the data into the excel file together.
o Please e-mail JH the excel file by Monday, June 1, 5PM.


Directions on how to do the survey

Meeting 5: Culture and Cultural Phenonmenon

Note: For the past couple of years I have been discussing the same cultural theory for MMCE primarily referencing Geert Hofstede. This year, I have decided to alter the content and look at culture from a more complete perspective by incorporating other theories into the introduction of culture. I hope that you all find this meeting interesting and useful.

Our Objective: Understand the profound influence culture can have on the way we behave and our outlook on the world.

Today's co-Facilitators: Sayah and Panda

Agenda

1. Review of Meeting 4:

What did you think about the other culture you met last week? Please say some key words.

Why did you say such words?

What could you have done to make your first meeting better?

2. An Introduction to Culture
a) What is culture?
b)The Culture Pyramid
c) Cultural Phenomenon: products, practices, perspectives, communities, persons,

The Iceberg Model of Culture drawn by Panda

Products:

Practices:（We finished our meeting at this point)

Communities:

Perspectives

Persons

Next Meeting: We will finish pracices, communities, perspectives and persons and then introduce basic information from out countries.
Next Meeting's Facilitators: Bolero and Pocchama

Sources used for today's meeting are below:

Banks, J. (2003). Multicultural Education. New York: John Wiley and Sons.
Hall, E. (1959). The Silent Language. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, Publishers.
Moran, P. (2001). Teaching Culture. Australia: Heinle & Heinle.
Neuliep, J. (2002). Intercultural Communication: A Contextual Approach. California: Sage Publications.
Thompson, N. (2003). Communication and Language: A Handbook of Theory and Practice. Palgrave Macmillan.

Meeting 4: An Introduction to the kind of Culture we will study in MMCE

Here is our agenda for today's Meeting:

1) A Discussion of "Maybe we go skating"

Japanese Group	Dutch Group
Describe how you think the Dutch students feel about the Japanese student's behavior. Answer: - J students behavior is ambiguous (not clear) - The behavior of the Japanese students is irritating (irritates them) Why? Because the D students want clear answers from the Japanese students.	Describe how you think the Japanese students feel about the dutch students' behavior. Answer: - It is not good to say too clearly (speak straightly) Why? Perhaps it is important to cooperate others. - The Japanese students think the Dutch students candid(frank) people. The Japanese students do not know how to communicate in English very well so they are confused by the Dutch students' behavior.
Identify the reason why the two sides are conflicting. Answer: - Difference of culture. The Japanese students are indirect people and the Dutch students say directly. - Behind the backgrouns of J culture, Japanese people pay more attention to other people's opinion than their own indivudual opinion. Because it is more polite to reserve their own ideas in front of foreigners with different background cultures. And the Japanese people want to show respect to keep away from direct decision. Therefore, they wait for their questioners' expectancy of answer.
Give advice to the Japanese side about how to get along better with the Dutch side. Answer: - Don't be afraid to say your own opinion clearly - Don't hesitate to say your own opinion clearly - Honesty is the best key to make friends with the foreigners	Give advice to the Dutch side about how to get along better with the Japanese side. Answer: - We belong to different thinking types so we have different behavior habits. So the problem is our problem, not just with one side or the other. My advice is that we should spend more time to understand. We must have patience. - Please explain detailed information to the Japanese students. For example, date, members' names, place, - Students should talk to J students step by step. They should ask questions to the group, not to just one person because typical Japanese students want to act with the group. Sometimes it is hard for them to decide things immediately, so the Dutch students should give the Japanese students time to think about the question. For example, give us the answer by tomorrow.

2) Short talk on "What is Culture?" (Handout to fill out is here) - This will be discussed next meeting
3) The Martian and Earthling Activity

Preparation for Meeting on May 20

Please be ready to discuss the following about the role play:

1. What did you think about the other culture you met? Please brainstorm key words.
2. Why did you say such words?
3. What caused these misunderstandings?
4. Could you have done anything to avoid these misunderstandings?

Next week's assistant facilatators will be Sayahh & Panda. Today's assistant facilitator was 37. Great job 37!

Preparation for Meeting on May 27

1. Go to the CIA World Factbook
As a group find out the following information for your country. Write your information in this sheet and be prepared to report it next meeting:

Environment:
Area (How much bigger is the area than Japan?), Climate, Natural Resources, Current environmental issues:

People:
Population, Age Structure, Infant Mortality rate, Life expectancy, Ethnic groups, Languages,
Literacy

Government:
Country Name (conventional long form), Capital, Government type

Economy:
GDP per capita, Population below poverty line