Class Roundup: Chinese Society

Traditional Chinese Society ended yesterday, with my first final during finals week(s) and my fourth final overall. Being my first one during finals it was officiated in an authoritarian manner that I’m only used to for standardized tests. The professor had the exams on our desks when we came in then read verbatim off of an instruction sheet provided to him by the university. I know that it was provided to him because he laughed when he read aloud that you are allowed to have calculators out (since the only number we dealt with was the number of souls that a person has).

Out our class of twelve, I was given seat number twelve. For the large classroom, we were all squished onto the left side rather than spread out over the room, as would have been sensible from an administrator’s standpoint.

After we were read out loud the directions, the professor, who already had us down by name, seeing that he taught all the tutorials and the class was really small, had to verify all of our identities by means of our student identification cards.

I didn’t think the final examination was too hard. To study, I did all the readings again and went over our class discussions of the topics—both those online and those in the classroom. He specifically said not to stress specific details—so I didn’t.

We were given seven questions based on various topics that we covered in class and we had two hours to answer two of those questions in an extended in-class essay format. And I feel I answered those two questions well and completely, despite the fact that I was the first to finish. (I usually finish somewhere in the middle, though the fact that I finished first may be because I was the only native English speaker in the class.) We’ll see how I did.

Other assessments for this class included the weekly journal, online discussions, and project.

The weekly journal entries only had to be two hundred words long each, and I usually went past that. Many of my classmates, realizing that you can’t really say much in two hundred words went well over four times that. This blog has already added up to over one hundred thousand words, so I’ll attest to the fact that you can’t say much in two hundred words. We were to write on the topic of traditional Chinese society that we were covering that week. Whereas other classmates treated the entries as anthropological research assignments, I did less of that and instead had personal reflections on the topics. Often, I would through in the line or two about how I feel we’re exoticizing the subject too much, but I’ve talked about that a lot already.

The online discussions I contributed to more often than not. Some people had contributions several times a week. It was also apparent that some people had not contributed once to the discussions. I always tried to interact with other students on these online discussions rather than only summarizing articles as was prevalent at the beginning of the semester.

I can’t remember if I talked about the term project, but it consisted of a two thousand-word (field) research paper accompanied by a presentation to be made during tutorial. On the syllabus, it said that it was due week seven. To that effect, I got it done before the week seven tutorial, ready to present. I was the only one in the tutorial that had anything to show, not that the professor was expecting it. That week he decided to schedule in everybody’s presentations, and when it came to me, I asked if I could do it that day, since it was already done. He (reluctantly) said yes and I got it over with—meaning that I unintentionally lectured for forty minutes.

My topic was on the (Christian) religious beliefs of HKU students. My sample size was small, as he only required about ten interviews. Overall, my results fell in line with Hong Kong SAR statistics. I noted that I didn’t encounter as many self-described Christians as I imagined. My professor made the note (that I didn’t see) that the number of self-described Buddhists was higher at HKU than in Hong Kong SAR statistics. I felt that my report was well-researched and well-written.

On a different note about the same class, I’m planning on petitioning to have this course qualify for my minor in the Study of Religion for my degree back at UCSD. The undergraduate advisor told me I couldn’t because nothing in the syllabus mentioned directly “religion,” so I had to rebut by saying that religion in the modern, scholarly sense ultimately refers to one’s overall view on the world and what things are significant and how those things are significant. In addition, there is a class called “Chinese Society” at UCSD that has the same course description as the course I was about to take, and it happens to fulfill the requirement without petition. She then forwarded my request for preapproval to the director or the program, who decided that I did have a case and that I did receive preapproval. So hopefully everything falls in line.

Phonetics

I figure that I’m probably the first student in the UC system to take Phonetics here at the University of Hong Kong. Whereas the other classes I’m taking (with the exception of Humanity in Globalization which is a new class) were all listed on the EAP catalog of classes for HKU, Phonetics wasn’t. The database is a guide and unofficial, because it gathers data based on classes former students have taken, and now, Phonetics is listed with the other HKU classes.

In the class of probably seventy-something (though half that many show up with any regular frequency), I am but a handful of students. The professor, a white American, speaks Cantonese and Mandarin in addition to English, and the tutor/TA at the beginning of the quarter would make all announcements in Cantonese, which I would then have her repeat in Cantonese.

Other than the obvious reasons for taking Phonetics here rather than back home, namely that I’m here and I need to take Phonetics as a required class for my major in Linguistics, I enrolled in this class because whereas back home the class is all about English, probably only American English, this class here focuses on American and British English as well as Cantonese and to a lesser extent Mandarin.

This fact is ultimately why I chose to take this class here and not here, and for the most part I feel like—1. It’s given me some insight into the one language that through my childhood had given me the worst time learning; 2. It’s helping me learn Cantonese more accurately and more efficiently now.

There’s one problem for me though—most of my classmates are native Cantonese speakers. Whereas back home most of my classmates would be native English speakers, with my classmates being mostly native English speakers, and with the class being in English, here, everything’s the opposite except that the class is taught in English as set by school policy. Whereas back home we analyze our English intuition and transcribe the way we ourselves speak, here we’ve analyzed British and American English, lightly touching on Australian and New Zealand English a bit, and then analyze our (or their) Cantonese intuition and learn how to transcribe that.

This has manifested in a couple of ways. First off, when I voiced my opinion about American English intuition, it was replied to by saying that I don’t speak standard American English—which I would admit to, but then again no one truly speaks a standard form of a language. On the other hand, the Cantonese speakers in the class when they voice an opinion on Cantonese intuition, it gets replied to in the way that I felt like I should have been replied to. “Well, that’s how you speak and linguists aren’t here to correct your language, but observe it,” or something along those line.

I guess it’s fair, and I’d never complain to the professor or the tutor about it. I have to learn about Cantonese sound systems without the aid of intuition and they have to learn about English sound systems without the aid of intuition.

What might not be so fair is that I don’t know too many colloquial Cantonese characters. See, he the last homework assignment he gave us two big assignments, neither of which I could do without the help of a native Cantonese speaker from Hong Kong. If I understand correctly, Hong Kong Cantonese writers use a lot of colloquial characters to write down what cannot be directly written down in Mandarin in informal contexts but write in standard Chinese in formal contexts. In addition, some words in Hong Kong Cantonese are so new that there are no characters for that syllable, so they write out the sounds in English letters.

The assignment was in two sections: the first gave Chinese characters (many of which colloquial Cantonese ones), of which you were to transcribe the sounds into the International Phonetic Alphabet (which was designed to be able to use to write down all human languages); the second was to take IPA transcriptions devoid of tone which we had to write the Chinese characters for. I don’t mind asking for help on assignments if people don’t mind helping me—and they don’t so I don’t mind. But, after all my help, I only completed about three quarters of the assignment. Don’t worry, though—he went over all the answers before we had to turn it in.

Later he said that there will be similarly structured questions on the final examination (styled quiz). The professor knows though that I, along with a few other students, can’t easily do that without sufficient aide, and with this being an English-medium class, I’m confident that he’ll do his best to accommodate me.

Now that Monday’s over, I only have two weeks of instruction left. Next week I’ve got two finals ace, for which I’m bringing study materials this weekend to Thailand. Au revoir!

Copyright © 2009 James Philip Jee
This work may not be reproduced by any means without express permission of the author.

To Extend or Not To Extend

That is the question, isn’t it?

It’s something that I knew that I would have to decide sooner and later, and I have to say that though I have come to it, I can’t help thinking the decision was made before me.

I applied to study here for one semester in substitution for one quarter back home. I chose not to file the departmental preapproval form for extension, in hopes that that would force myself to come back home for the latter two quarters of the year.

The reason for doing this was that because this university runs on two semesters per year and UCSD runs on three quarters per year, my substitution of two semesters for three quarters would delay my graduation substantially, making me miss several required classes that are only offered once a year.

So I found out after I was accepted that I can actually petition to bypass that preapproval to allow me to study here for a full year. I realize that to graduate on time though, I can’t.

Though when I arrived, I practically began counting down the days to when I leave, I’m growing to love Hong Kong. Though I still look forward to going home, I still want to make sure that these next ten weeks (yeah, I only have ten weeks left here) are the best.

In Rhinesmith’s Ten Stages of Adjustment, I’m most definitely at the sixth stage, where I’ve fully accepted my host culture. After this last trip to Beijing, I realized that my Mandarin isn’t half bad, and I’m ready to put my Cantonese learning into a higher gear.

In some ways, it is a race to the finish line, with me trying to get my travels in, learn languages, and get good grades at the same time. Right now, I’d rather be the turtle though rather than the hare, and unfortunately I presently feel like the latter.

Ready, set, go.

Copyright © 2009 James Philip Jee
This work may not be reproduced by any means without express permission of the author.

Shopping for Classes, Part 2

The add/drop period for class registration ended September 14. For the Faculty of Social Sciences, September 15 was when we had to turn in a signed finalization of those classes. Though I met both deadlines, making sure that classes will be approved for meeting requirements for general education and my majors and minor has been a little more difficult.

With shopping for classes done and over with, I ended up with five six-unit classes and one three-unit class, Cantonese for Foreign Learners 1. That class may actually contain the majority of the fun I have on campus. Organized to give us conversational knowledge of Cantonese, the class is simple and entertaining. For the fifty minutes, twice a week that it’s worth, I can tell that the teacher is really enthusiastic about what she does. What makes it more fun is that, since I cannot apply this class to any graduation requirement back home, I’m going to take the class pass/no pass, I can enjoy myself and the content of the class without feeling to bothered about what grade I get.

The three five-unit classes that I plan to apply to requirements back at UCSD are Introduction to Arts of Asia: Past and Present, Traditional Chinese Society, Hong Kong and the World, Humanity in Globalization, and Phonetics.

To be rephrased as Introduction to Asian Art on my University of California transcript, this is the other class that I think I’ll take pass/no pass. This is to fulfill the non-western fine arts class for Eleanor Roosevelt College’s general education requirements. Being in Asia, I figured that this would be a good opportunity to do so.

The class is very interesting to say the least. As of yet we’ve been discussion Buddhist art and just last lecture we were discussing how Buddhism’s arrival to Japan reflected the native Shinto way of life and its reflection in art and architecture, particularly the design of temples. It was further related to the present day, in which reflecting the older works we went over selected contemporary works by such notables as Yoko Ono.

Traditional Chinese Society is an ethnographic, anthropologic class that deals more with contemporary Chinese society in light of traditional Chinese society. Right now, I’m trying to get it preapproved for my minor in the Study of Religion, with my case being that the class focuses on way of life, which is true religion in its essential form. Concretely, similar classes have been approved for the Study of Religion at UCSD, namely Chinese Society (a sociology class) and Traditional Chinese Society (an anthropology class). Here at HKU there is not an anthropology department, so this class is listed under Sociology. In crossing classes with UCSD, the description of my class here at HKU is in between the two UCSD classes, leaning more towards the anthropological one.

If the Study of Religion program refuses to see my logic, I plan to make my case to apply this as an anthropology class to the secondary focus of my International Studies-Political Science major. Unfortunately, UC transfers this course over as a sociology class by default, so I would have to prove its anthropological content through the syllabus and explaining the ethnographic methods used in analysis.

As of right now, we’ve been dealing with what it means to be Chinese (a topic which I have addressed and will address again personally in a later post). Last lecture we talked about creation stories as an aspect of Chinese culture and contrasted the shear view of culture to that of Christianity. Next week we focus on the body and the traditional Chinese view of it.

This class’s tutorial is also the only one I’ve been to so far. With such a small class, there is no teacher’s assistant and the tutorials, called sections at UCSD, are run by the professor himself. It was set up as an informal environment in which we could discuss the readings and the current class materials. In that tutorial, I had to make my case for why I call myself American, but more on that later.

Hong Kong and the World is another favorite class of mine. It is listed under politics and public administration, and rightly so. The professor doesn’t have a PhD but work experience, having a consulting firm with such clients as the William Clinton Foundation. I plan to apply this class to my International Studies-Political Science major.

In light of Hong Kong’s political situation as a highly autonomous part of the People’s Republic of China, we look at why Hong Kong as been such an economic success and evaluate its future competitiveness in light of rising Chinese cities and Hong Kong’s eventual return of full sovereignty back to China.

This particular professor organizes his classes with many guests. Our first is the current director of the InvestHK, and described his job as attracting and retaining foreign investment in Hong Kong. This was followed by an intense question-and-answer section which he handled like a seasoned politician.

Humanity in Globalization is another political science class taught by the same professor as Hong Kong and the World. This actually ended up being a substitute class for me, as I meant to take International Relations of East Asia, but was troubled by the lack of oratory skills of the professor. I opted for the more interesting, more grounded class (for IR talks about countries practically as sentient beings whereas Humanity in Globalization talks about individual people in relation to the world.

So far, we’ve talked about modern-day slavery (which most people don’t know about) with one source claiming that there are more slaves today than there have ever been before. (Though I wonder if you cast that data as a percent of the population whether the numbers would seem less dire.)

My last class is Phonetics, which at first I was really excited about, but now I’m questioning the content. With my second major being a specialization in linguistics, Phonetics is a core class for me, and deciding to take it here I thought would be a good experience.

At UCSD, Phonetics is taught in light of English, introducing anatomical features of producing speech, and focusing hardly at all at the International Phonetic Alphabet Chart. Regarding linguistics, I actually prefer phonetics and phonology over semantics and morphology because there is a quantifiable reality to the study. Semantics for me seemed a little soft because it seemed less logical than other linguistics sub-disciplines.

At HKU, Phonetics is taught much the same, with the exception that we go over sounds of Mandarin and Cantonese in addition to American English (I don’t know why we don’t go over British Received Pronunciation). It sounded good and all, but for the second lecture, we went over sounds of American English, and being that many local students (most all local students) don’t speak American English, he taught it more like a let’s-learn-how-to-speak-properly class.

This was problematic in my head because at UCSD a resounding message in my linguistics classes is that linguists (and social scientists) for that matter, being researchers, work to the effect of description and not prescription. That means that Linguists don’t dictate how we should speak, they just analyze how we do speak.

Being a native American English speaker, I had no problem, but as we have to go over that again in Mandarin and Cantonese, I hope he doesn’t continue in the same manner.

To make matters worse, the TA for the class makes all the announcements in Cantonese. I always end up raising my hand to request her to repeat what she said in English.

Though I hoped to write this post after I settled into a routine, I figured that I should get out my sentiments about my classes and reveal the results of my shopping before going any further.