by Whitey | Nov 16, 2007 | Weekly Re-Cap
It’s been a pretty good week. Regarding my TESL studies, it hasn’t been as productive as I’d have liked, but I’m hoping to make up for that today by finishing this big assignment I’ve been slowly working through and thus wrapping up module 3. On the support raising front, I’m still having trouble connecting with new contacts, but the support is still rolling in. In fact, I now have less than $9,000 to be raised! Check out the Support Info page for the details.
I’m pretty amazed at how much new support has come in just lately. It seems like all the seeds I planted for the past year and a half are finally starting to bear fruit. I guess that’s how it works, though. People are usually reluctant to commit to something on the spot (and I can’t blame them). And with church budgets, meetings are required before commitments can be made. So it’s taken time for some to jump on board, but jumping they are! Also, churches who couldn’t support me in last year’s budget have started to support me in this year’s budget, and some churches who have been supporting my ministry have increased support.
So… stuff’s happening. It’s looking totally possible that I could have my support raised by December, and maybe even be in Japan by the new year. I just hope the COE and visa processing don’t hold me back when the support’s raised and HQ gives me the go ahead. Let’s pray the timing’s right.
And that’s a wrap for this week. See you next week.
by Whitey | Nov 14, 2007 | Ministry News
Approximate Amount Remaining: $9,445 — that’s only about 39 people at $20 per month! Please pray with me for the rest of the faith promises to come in quickly. If you can help out financially as well, check out the Support Info page and sign up. Thank you!
by Whitey | Nov 14, 2007 | Thoughts
The following article is from a paper I wrote for my Teaching English as a Second Language course. It’s based on the interview I did a while back, which I also used for my podcast. The focus of the paper is, of course, on language learning.
Haruka Kudo comes from Saitama (near Tokyo), Japan but has been living in Fredericton, New Brunswick since 2002. She originally came to Canada to study journalism, graduating last year from Saint Thomas University, but liked Fredericton so much she decided to stay. Haruka now works for the Multicultural Association in downtown Fredericton.
Recently, Haruka and I had the opportunity to sit down at a local coffee shop and talk about her experiences learning English. She told me that speaking English was one of the biggest adjustments she faced when she first came to Canada. Like most young Japanese, she had taken English in school, from junior high through high school. In Japanese public schools, however, most English teachers are not native English speakers, and the focus is on grammar and reading, with very little practice in actually speaking the language.
After high school, when she was working but not yet in university, Haruka went to a private English school for lessons. Yet when she first moved to Canada, she still didn’t speak English very well. This was because in Japan, she didn’t have many opportunities to practice.
Haruka told me that the hardest things about learning English were pronunciation and slang. Proper pronunciation is hard to achieve without practice, especially when your native tongue is so much different than the target language. And slang, course, is usually not a big part of the curriculum in public schools. But in every day life, it can be a big part of communication.
Haruka said that meeting native speakers and having the chance to practice the language were the most helpful things in learning English. She also pointed out that TV and books were helpful tools. When I asked her what people in particular were most helpful to her, she said her university ESL teachers here in Canada were, because they knew how to communicate with non-native English speakers. They were very patient with her and were willing to slow down and speak clearly when talking to her, in order to help her understand what they were saying.
Haruka said that if there was any advice she could give to a person learning a second language, it would be to find lots of opportunities to practice with native speakers. She also said not to be shy – this was difficult for her at first. I can relate to that because I’m learning Japanese and am a little bit shy about speaking up when I have the opportunity to use it in the real world (which isn’t very often these days).
It would seem that immersing herself in an English-speaking culture was the best thing Haruka could have done for her English language skills. Immersion gives people the opportunity to talk to native speakers every day. And if a person is shy about speaking out in the target language, necessity might force them to do so like nothing else could. So it is probably the best thing any of us can do if we are learning another language.
Of course, not everyone has the opportunity to be immersed in a foreign culture. But what ESL teachers should learn from this is that students usually need practical experience as much as, or more than, being taught grammar, spelling or vocabulary. In a sense, if we plan our lessons well, we can give them an opportunity at a “mini-immersion” of sorts, even if it is just for an hour at a time.
by Whitey | Nov 9, 2007 | Weekly Re-Cap
Another week has come and gone (more or less) and here we are again, wrapping things up with the Weekly Re-Cap. I don’t have too much to report this week (of course, I’ve said that before and written several paragraphs, so maybe I should just scratch that). Support levels have gone up a notch or two, and the good news is I’m out of the teens. I’m pursuing some new contacts, but the bad news is I haven’t gotten anything booked yet. This weekend I’m away doing ministry, but it’s not a team building thing, though one never knows what might happen.
I’m really looking forward to the day when these Re-Caps can be about what I’m learning and what God’s doing rather than all about support raising. On the other hand, God’s doing stuff in the here and now; maybe I just need to pay more attention.
Meanwhile, hits to the blog were up this week. My anime post from the other day got me some unexpected extra traffic. Maybe I need to do more writing here that’s not directly related to my ministry. This could be a good place to digest and memorialize what I’m learning about life, culture, Japan and so on… So yeah, hopefully I can get into the habit I’d planned on: Monday, Wednesday and Friday posts, every week. More when I’m in Japan — if there’s time.
I guess that’s a wrap.
by Whitey | Nov 7, 2007 | Thoughts
I saw a short documentary recently on the history of anime (Japanese animation). Some may think that cartoons are not a real view into the culture of a country. But I think that pop culture as a much a part of culture as more traditional forms of art. They give us a glimpse of how history and religious belief influence people and the arts even in modern times.
Here are some bullet points I took away from the documentary. I think it’s interesting how the differences between Japanese and American animation show some of the differences between the cultures at large.
- In American animated film making, the emphasis is on “animated”. In Japan, the emphasis is on “film”. In other words, animation is just another tool used in making films and telling stories, so the kinds of stories one can tell in animation are not limited as they usually are in the west. That’s why Japanese ‘toons aren’t always “kid-friendly”.
- Anime is often post-apocalyptic because Japan itself is post-apocalyptic.
- Manga (comics) and Anime took off in popularity soon after World War II because there was a “hole” in culture for entertainment.
- Budget limitations early on in anime led to the development of certain styles, which are still part of anime today even though the budgets are bigger (for example, panning the camera across a scene — one picture — to give the illusion of movement where no actual animation is taking place).
There are also elements of Japanese religious tradition that show up in anime. Paul Nethercott has an article HERE pointing some of these aspects out. The fact is that there is a different story-telling sensibility in Japanese animation, and in film making in general. If you’ve watched any, you’ve probably noticed this, and may not have understood some things. As THIS article points out, an understanding of Japanese religion and other aspects of culture is needed to fully understand and appreciate many of these works.
I would add, too, that knowing about Japanese tradition, religion and, yes, even pop culture is important for those of us seeking to build bridges with Japanese people. People are a product of culture as much as culture is a product of the people.
