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To be an ideal global citizen... | ||
Tags: Ideal | Multilingual | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Huliganov Octoglot Senior Member Poland huliganov.tvRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5356 days ago 91 posts - 304 votes  Speaks: English*, Polish, French, German, Russian, Spanish, Esperanto, Czech Studies: Romanian, Turkish, Mandarin, Japanese, Hungarian | Message 9 of 23 21 February 2011 at 3:45pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I have an easier way to become a global citizen. In my case it would suffice to go a year without any of my diets or exercise regimes and just eat what I like and go everywhere in a car instead of walking, and I would become truly global. In fact, I might even leave the planet altogether... Edited by Huliganov on 21 February 2011 at 3:47pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hashimi Senior Member Oman Joined 6260 days ago 362 posts - 529 votes Speaks: Arabic (Written)* Studies: English, Japanese | Message 10 of 23 22 February 2011 at 3:42am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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As stephen said, East Asians have embraced (or are gradually embracing) Western values in nearly everything, from music to politics. The major cities in China have embraced Western culture within their border. From the sky rises of American hotel chains such as Marriott to the Chinese buying up American debt, Chinese culture has accepted Western ideas and products. China, like the rest of East Asia, faces the challenge to retain its own cultural identity and national characteristics despite the homogenizing tendencies of globalization. Accroding to political theorists such as Huntington, Fukuyama and Benjamin Barber, East Asia is not the real competitor. Fukuyama says that the only real challenger today is the Arab world. Benjamin Barber puts forth a theory that describes the struggle between "McWorld" (globalization and the corporate control of the political process) and "Jihad" (tradition and traditional values, in the form of extreme nationalism or religious orthodoxy and theocracy). So if the "ideal global citizen" only have time to learn two languages, personally I think the other one is Arabic not Mandarin. You can see it as "Civilization vs Savagery" if you want! or "Globalization vs Tradition" as Barber sees it. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sennin Senior Member Bulgaria Joined 6035 days ago 1457 posts - 1759 votes 5 sounds | Message 11 of 23 22 February 2011 at 12:47pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Why is that? 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| ilcommunication Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6693 days ago 115 posts - 162 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Russian, Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 12 of 23 22 February 2011 at 2:21pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
"Civilization vs Savagery"...ugh. Sorry for being blunt, but Huntington and Fukuyama are born fools who have no relevance to what's happening in the world today (I haven't read Barber, but I doubt he's much better). Just as an example, in "The Latino Challenge", Huntington essentially argues that the presence of Spanish within the United States is anti-American. That speaks for itself. This whole idea is a dead-end. In my opinion, there are only two things that matter when it comes to languages: what you need...and what you love. 5 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| lichtrausch Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5961 days ago 525 posts - 1072 votes Speaks: English*, German, Japanese Studies: Korean, Mandarin | Message 13 of 23 22 February 2011 at 4:18pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
On the culture point I was just going on my perception of the situation so I could be wrong. The world strikes me as more penetrated by East Asian than South Asian culture.
Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have thoroughly disproven the theory that modernization requires adopting everything Western and losing your cultural identity. Japan remains distinctly Japanese, South Korea distinctly Korean, etc. Even those elements of Western culture which are imported into East Asia go through a filter and are adapted to East Asian sensitivities. For evidence of this have a look at a McDonald's menu in Japan or check out the street fashion in Taipei or Seoul.
That kind of thinking is rather out of date. In fact Fukuyama has turned over a new leaf. The End of the End of History Edited by lichtrausch on 22 February 2011 at 4:19pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| SamD Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6660 days ago 823 posts - 987 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Portuguese, Norwegian | Message 14 of 23 22 February 2011 at 4:59pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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This sounds like something that could become an argument that goes on and on with no satisfactory resolution. I'd suggest that the IGC (ideal global citizen) speak at least two substantially different languages.
Perhaps there are ideal characteristics for this person that are not connected to languages as well. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Lucky Charms Diglot Senior Member Japan lapacifica.net Joined 6950 days ago 752 posts - 1711 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German, Spanish | Message 15 of 23 23 February 2011 at 4:18am | IP Logged | ||||||||
I'm not the one who originally posted this, but for me, the phrase "global citizen" suggests some kind of "global government" to whom we owe our allegiance, which is kind of unsettling to begin with, and the idea of striving to be some kind of "ideal citizen" has a slight communist ring to it. If the discussion were about how to be an "ideal globally-minded woman" or something along those lines, I wouldn't have the same gut reaction, so it must be the word "citizen". So, in order to be an "ideal globally-minded woman", I believe English, Chinese, and Arabic are all necessary. Although the Eastern nations represented here by the Chinese language are adopting Western attitudes and ideas, they are still the ones outside the Abrahamic tradition with the most influence and power. I also believe that under their Gucci attire and behind their Starbucks paper cups, they still retain their traditional societal values to a high degree. As for Arabic, I disagree that their ideas have less influence throughout the world - it's just that they haven't penetrated Western culture so much. It's precisely this isolation from and resistance to the globalizing forces of the West that make the Arab world a contending force, arguable more so than even the Eastern world. Now after nitpicking so much about terminology, I feel dirty for generalizing with terms like "East" and "West". ;) 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| clumsy Octoglot Senior Member Poland lang-8.com/6715Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5179 days ago 1116 posts - 1367 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Japanese, Korean, French, Mandarin, Italian, Vietnamese Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swedish Studies: Danish, Dari, Kirundi | Message 16 of 23 26 February 2011 at 7:50pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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OK, a real global citizen must be an acquaintance with:
Widely spoken languages: Learn English and Spanish (Latin America) Muslim Culture: Learn Arabic Africa: learn Swahili Indian Culture: learn any Indian language (Hindi,Tamil, Punjabi) East Asia: learn Chinese or Japanese Eastern Europe: learn Russian Learn official language of your country learn minority language of your country - if there is one 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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