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Attached are three news clippings addressing language/dialect questions in China. One survey suggests nearly half of China's population can't speak the "standard" dialect. The second article notes the state directive not to translate foreign programs into local dialects. The third notes that Hong Kong may slip in its importance to world business unless English is re-emphasized in education.

Would it be appropriate to raise such issues with your students? One lead-in might be the ethnic tensions evident in a smaller nation, Iraq: Kurds, Sunnis, and Shites. You might also show a bit of Chinese currency, which has five languages (Chinese, Mongolian, Tibetan, Manchurian, and Uyghur) all saying People's Republic of China. We have ballots in multiple languages, but our currency just has English and a bit of Latin.

You can see Chinese currency at:

http://www.chinatoday.com/fin/mon/

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Attached are three news clippings addressing language/dialect questions in China. One survey suggests nearly half of China's population can't speak the "standard" dialect. The second article notes the state directive not to translate foreign programs into local dialects. The third notes that Hong Kong may slip in its importance to world business unless English is re-emphasized in education.

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Debbie's presentation on castles is quite helpful. It works fine in Netscape/Mozilla/Firefox. It includes photos (she took the Miyajima ones in 2003 when she participated in an NCTA study tour to Korea and Japan), diagrams, and lesson assignments. She also has helpful links to related books and more.

A reminder -- please follow Debbie's lead and share resources you create as well as those you find. You can copy and paste her web address into your browser or you can click on the link below to see it:

http://home.apu.edu/~dbrittenham/517/Castleleaf.htm

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Paul (and everyone else) --

First -- thanks to anyone and everyone who wants to share ideas and resources. This kind of helpful collegiality is terrific.

Paul's right -- many publications now restrict free access to their articles to first week of publication. If you see an article you want to share with your colleagues (in the study tour forum), please do the following:

(Most of you already have the first several steps down, but just in case...)

1. Highlight (or select) the text of the article (often it's easiest to do this after clicking on the "printer-friendly version of the article" -- this gives you the text without all the ads and other stuff on the typical page).

2. Copy the highlighted text by either pressing ctrl +C (Windows) or command + C (Mac). Of course, you can also use the edit menu at the top of your browser (click on edit, then on copy).

3. Open a text editor (all Windows machines have Notepad and Wordpad located under Start/All Programs/Accessories) or word processor.

4. Paste (ctrl + v or command + v or using the edit menu) the copied text into your text editor or word processor window. Please be sure to include the source and date of the article. You may also wish to include the web address where you originally found it.

5. Save the new document (ctrl + s or command + s or file | save). Use a simple name such as how-to-save-article. If you are using a text editor, the document will automatically be saved as a text file. This is best since every computer can open text files quickly and the files are small. If you are using a word processor, you'll need to select "text" from the "save as file type" list under the "save as" box. Just click on the down arrow and you'll get your choices. This is a kindness to your readers. Not everyone will have the same word processor and its format, but everyone will be able to open text files. Text files cannot contain viruses and are absolutely safe to open. Most people can also open rich text format (rtf) and, thanks to Microsoft's domination, doc format documents.

Now that you've saved your file (it's on your hard or floppy disk), it's time to attach it to a forum message.

1 Open a new browser window (click on file, new, window) and go to the discussion forums (http://portal.international.ucla.edu/asiainstituteforums)

2. Locate the proper forum and thread (topic). Remember that it is best to place your posts in established threads (e.g., ethnic minorities, family, economy....). Click "reply".

3. Type in your subject line. It might be the article title or topic. Type in your own message. Explain what's in the article, why we might be interested in reading it, and, if appropriate, the teaching application of the article.

4. Below the box where you type in your own message is the "attach" dialogue box. Click on "browse" to locate the file (the one you just saved). Select it and click open or select. The location of the file will be shown in the attach dialogue box. When you click "post" your message and the file will automatically be uploaded to our web server. Both will be available to your colleagues.

To open a file attached to a message, just click on the file icon (it is supposed to look like a vise squeezing a file). Most of the time it will open automatically. On some computers you will need to choose which program to open it with (text files can be opened with text editors like Notepad or any word processor).

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Some might take offense at including "Tom and Jerry" in our literature forum, but I wanted to use a recent news story on Tom and Jerry in China to raise a couple of questions.

The Associated Press story by Christopher Bodeen notes that China's central government blocked a Shanghai television stations efforts to use Shanghai-dialect in dubbing "Tom and Jerry," the popular American cartoon series. [BTW: the author noted that Tom and Jerry, in the English original, don't speak. In this version, however, they do.] Bodeen notes the government seeks to forge national unity partly through the promotion of Mandarin in schools and through radio, films, and television.

London Times version - 12/23/2004

LA Times version - 12/19/2004

Questions to take up with students --
1. What role do language and literature play in forging national identity?
2. What examples can you cite where dialects or accents and customs help to identify where, within a nation, a person comes from? How do authors/filmmakers use dialects/accents to signal something about a character or situation?

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Great information, Pennie, especially in noting the curriculum standards addressed by the exhibition. Please be sure to include information on how the exhibition helps teachers anxious to bring more of Asia to their students. For those who are interested, the Norton Simon website on the exhibition may be useful:

Norton Simon -- Assemblage

The site includes information about related activities, including tours, family days, and adult education sessions.

Please do not create new threads (topics) for individual exhibitions, films, or web resources. Instead, please add them to existing threads (museum resources, film festival, and web resources, respectively). Put the title of the exhibition, film, or website in the subject line. This will make it easier for readers.

Remember -- click on the search link at the top of the page to search through all the forums that you have access to.

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The University of Michigan's Center for Japanese Studies has long published some of the best works on Japan and has performed a terrific service by making out of print classics on Japan available. And now many of these CJS publications are available online.

http://websvcs.itcs.umich.edu/cjs/publications/electronic.php

These include:

Michigan Classics Online (e.g., Donald Ritchie's 1971 Japanese Cinema: Film Style and National Character)

CJS Faculty Series (e.g., Motion Pictures Reprint Series)

Out of Print Books Online (e.g., Studies in Japanese Culture)

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Those interested in seeing web samples of some of Michael Burr's photos on Cambodia (discussed above by art teacher Pennie Dobkin) should go to his website:

http://www.mburrphoto.com/

In addition to the Cambodian images, Burr's site also offers photos he took in Vietnam, 1969-70 and 2003.

Rather than starting new threads (topics) for each exhibition that you may take in, please put your observations into our museum resources thread (which, obviously, could be better named museum/gallery resources).

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The attached article tells about the Chinese government's efforts to promote the use of Mandarin, an effort partly aimed at forging national unity. In this specific case, the issue is how to dub the popular cartoon "Tom and Jerry."

Certainly, students will find this interesting and you could tie it to discussions of regional distinction in other places (Indonesia, the US....).

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The attached article details the effort by the Chinese central government to promote the use of Mandarin, even in dubbing the popular American cartoon "Tom and Jerry."

Check it out, your students will certainly connect with this. You can talk about notions of regional distinction (perhaps tying China's dilemma to red state/blue state divisions or to the persistence of regional accents in the US).

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The attached article details the effort by the Chinese central government to promote the use of Mandarin, even in dubbing the popular American cartoon "Tom and Jerry." Check it out, your students will certainly connect with this.

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The current Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition focuses on China's links with its neighbors during the so-called era of division and the Sui and early Tang dynasties. It's an extraordinary exhibition, drawing heavily on recently unearthed items from relatively small Chinese institutions. The website devoted to the exhibition is quite good and teachers will find many images and descriptions they can use with their students. I visited the exhibition on 12/4/04 and purchased the catalog (educators get 10% off). The catalog includes far more images than provided by the website. The Starr Foundation funded the exhibition and the Freeman Foundation funded educational programs associated with it.

http://www.metmuseum.org/special/China/index.asp

One of the points the exhibition hints at, but isn't as sharply demonstrated as clearly as it might be is the changing depiction of the Buddha and bodhisattvas. It would be possible, for example, to put Greek-influenced sculptures beside those of later periods and increasingly Eastern locations. Still, the influence of nomads and civilizations to the West is clear. For example, take a look at the sarcophagus of Yu Hong: http://www.metmuseum.org/special/China/s5_obj_1.R.asp. Use the zoom feature to bring out the details.

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The Japan Foundation is making a new video resource available for teachers of Japanese. In 2002 the Foundation released a popular collection of TV commercials to support language instruction. The new collection includes 51 commercials, each 15-180 seconds in length. Supporting materials include explanations of each commercial's content, vocabulary lists, and more. These commercials were among the winners of a 2002 advertising competition.

To rent a copy of the video and get the materials, contact either the nearest Japan Foundation office or the nearest Japanese consulate or embassy. For teachers in Southern California:

Japan Foundation Los Angeles Office and Language Center
http://www.jflalc.org/

Japanese Consulate
http://www.la.us.emb-japan.go.jp/e_web2003/e_home.htm

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The Japan Playwrights Association and the Japan Foundation have put together a web database with synopses of 100 modern Japanese dramas. The dramas date from the 1930s to the present.

http://www.jpan.org/100/e/index.html

You can access the list by just browsing or via the author and title indices. Information provided includes:
author profile
when was it first performed
the number of acts/scenes
the number of roles (and info on how many are male or female roles)
synopsis

For those able to read Japanese, simply clicking on a link takes you to a Japanese version of the same entry.

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Hi Folks,
When sharing web resources, please help us by putting a descriptive label in the subject line. Examples:

Japanese Woodblock Print Web Resource

Indian Cinema Web Reource

Thanks -- this small touch helps readers a great deal.

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