bit hot under the collar, old chap? oh dear.

look, i'm pretty much what you can call an english-educated fella, but i don't sound like an it freak. heck, i'm like borderline computer-illiterate, but i make it up by telling lame jokes based on puns and sarcasm (not funny ones, sad to say).

i have to say that those educated at chinese schools tend to exude less confidence in mixed crowds. i mean, yeah, its great that she can open up in a group of fellow chinese-eds, but then it's gonna be a very small group of people. where's the fun? where as we perhaps fail to communicate with chinese ed girls, those girls rather fail to communicate to a much larger group of people, on balance. i say it is they who phail.

i speak a bit of a few languages, just that i don't speak chinese. i might have trouble ordering food in a chinese restaurant, but no big deal, i'll bring her to a malay one, polish one, a french one, or a german one. it is not that we look down on them as 'low-class', nor do we look them as somehow more thick, its the confidence that seems to lack. you might be all that with your own community, but if you don't mix around that'll not be impressive. there is more to society than just being able to speak chinese.

i do agree with the chap above, but the way i see it is this: the language is an inhibitor.

let's say you know mandarin and a bloody genius at it. all well and good, nothing wrong with it. however, when you speak only mandarin the only people you're going to interact with are other chinese. yes, some say theres tonnes of people from various nations learning mandarin but i guess i missed their party or something because i don't see many of them around.

anyway, once you start mixing only with your own people, the usual problem crops up: you become indoctrinated with your cultural norms (and hence become pretty much stereotypical), you become xenophobic, and sometimes you become racist.

doesn't really apply only to the chinese, replace mandarin in the above paragraphs with malay, tamil, hindi, or even english, and you'll get the same thing.

in this country however, when you speak passably good english, it'll most definitely be as a second language. you'll interact with more people, and you become less bigotted and more free. in the cities, english helps you get along with more people. in the rural areas, just simply knowing malay (if you're chinese) or some cantonese (if you're malay) or some hindi will help you get along well and become free.

look at it this way, english people who only speak english can also tend to become bigots. it's the ability to mix around afforded by being multilingual that is the key here. its not chi-ed vs eng ed.

in b4 tl;dr

lol wut? can't understand what you're saying.

oh yeah, irony.

uhh... wat?

i just lol'd when he said 'you may use the terms "Banana"' and 'i used the term "English Culture" without realising it'.

i was half expecting him to end it with 'jolly good show, chaps.'

personally i dont see any point in pc-ing it into 'english culture', or English Cult as samteng puts it. we damn well don't see them drinking tea at four and having pudding before desserts. what you people see as english culture is merely anything that is non-chinese culture.

i mean over here, liberal thinknig is not a part of the culture at all; it's just an effect after the development of the liberalism ideal. i can go on and say that in terms of philosophical development (in terms of developing ideals such as liberalism, individualism, and such) asians are way way behind the west. but that's rwi stuff.

english ed is an appropiate term. the education system incorporated the many post-enlightenment era philosophical development (education is actually a complex philosophical subject) stressing on individual thinking whereas the chinese tend to focus on the social, and develops the individual less. it makes sense, actually: having generations after generations of people who obey authority makes governing them easier, which in china with its billions of people is indeed a problem. of course, you get a bunch of robots who are on an individual basis you can run rings around. they get lost when the info is not in front of them. that's why you see all the chinamen flooding the more mathematical paths of economics while absolutely none are picking up philosophy.

of course, the western thought is stunted somewhat in malaysia because of asian parental and societal pressure.

so yeah, 'english ed' is more appropiate than 'english culture'.

This post has been edited by empyreal: Oct 14 2008, 07:11 AM

if that implies that chinese ed girls are docile, meek and obedient, i'd rather have the other one. if i want docility, i get myself a maid. perhaps its reflective of the male that one finds such a domesticated wife/girlfriend attractive.

one's funney, the other's not. which you pick is what you are.

of course not, my jokes all involve penises.