Beyond Words: Languages on the Web

For this blog post, I would like to blog about a blog (so 2014 of me, I know). While browsing EchoDitto the other day, I came across a blog post about language on the web. In the post, author Conor Walsh challenges the idea that we have entered an information revolution of easily accessible content on the web. Written word is still one of the cheapest and most efficient avenues of communicating on the web. Though non-text media sharing has exploded in recent years, pictures, videos, and intuitive design cost quite a bit. And with the internet becoming more and more connected around the world, we risk marginalizing those languages in which the writing systems do not exist or are not available. If you can’t read or write your language, like some oral cultures we discussed in class, the internet becomes virtually useless. Despite this, however, Walsh contends that we are nothing if not resourceful in the technological age. Instead of technology being a hindrance to minority languages, it can be rethought for benefit—like Google’s attempt to expand natural language capability in its Translate feature and an increase of mobile applications assisting minority language communities.

After reading this blog post, I thought of the Thurlow article when he speaks of language as a technology for global capital (p. 232). He speaks of the shift from manufacture-based to service-based economics (represented in the majority of the internet), and how this facilitates a semioticized, or “textually mediated,” discourse. This reliance on textually mediated discourse is exactly what Walsh is speaking of in his post. Given that this text-based discourse is not likely to change soon, how will we level the playing field for minority languages on the web? What effect does the dominance of English create?

Identity Gaps

            

Before reading these articles in different IIC courses, I sometimes thought to myself that there had to be something wrong with me because I couldn’t socially interact with certain people; it made me feel like I had some kind of personality disorder. However, this article helped me understand why it is I feel like this. Orbe et al define identity gaps as, “an identity gap refers to the differences between or among different frames of identity” (2010, p. 306). It is because I am this third culture kid, stuck between a mesh of two cultures and fending on my own to find a balanced path to follow between the two worlds. I find myself feeling much more comfortable amongst other Latinos, and feeling very uncomfortable amongst White Americans and having to adopt this “American Yessy” personality. I don’t act like the person I truly am with people I don’t feel comfortable with. I mentioned to my professor how I can’t wait to graduate from DU as soon as possible because it’s such a strain to have to always adopt this “American Yessy” and it makes me feel tense and alien with myself and I become very introverted with my classmates. It’s almost like on pilot mode that I become this person I am not when I enter a mainly White environment, and I have yet to understand why that happens and if there will ever be a time when I can just be myself, Yessy, the Coloradicana that loves to speak Spanish and Spanglish and say things without being judged and hug everyone I meet and ask them how their day was and spend hours talking together and make silly Mexican jokes that everyone would understand. I’m not saying I wish everyone could be more Latino, but I wish there wasn’t so much separation between races and ethnicities to the point that those who aren’t part of the majority are forced to adapt an identity they do not like. I love how it is described in the Chen article, "Ultimately, I want to return to the place where I had felt myself to be part of a culture of belonging - to a place where I could feel at home, a landscape of memory, thought, and imagination" (Chen, 2010, p. 492). 

Resources

Chen, Victoria. (2010). Authenticity and Identity in the Portable Homeland. 483 - 494.

Orbe, P. Mark, Urban, L. Ewa. (August 2010). Identity Gaps of Contemporary U.S. Immigrants: Acknowledging Divergent Communicative Experiences. V. 61, 3. 304 – 320.

Double Amputee Shoots Hoops

                CNN is reporting on the inspirational story of Bailey Roby, a high school senior at Mountain Vista High who is on the Varsity basketball team.  The article describes Roby’s persistence and skills on the court, as a double amputee.  He has been an amputee since birth, and has worn prosthetics since the age of one. 

                In our discussions in class, and the articles we read on disability, it is the perfect example of the “dual position” that Emma Loja discusses.  This dual position for disabled persons refers to the admiration that the athletes receive, but of course because they overcome the obstacle of their disability.  Roby is only being recognized in this article, not because he is the best player on the team, but because of his disability. 

                I have mixed feelings about this article. While it is admirable for CNN to report on a local high school basketball team, and a local player, bringing the “inspirational” story only further depicts disabilities as a novelty.  The fact that Roby doesn’t have legs hasn’t prevented him from doing anything that other boys his age are able to do is something to respect, but the perspective that it is something out of the norm is also insulting. Several persons with disabilities are able to do things that “normal” people are able to do, and even if they cannot accomplish things like play basketball, that’s ok too.

                Basically, my point is, that their disability doesn’t make them abnormal.  Roby is an individual, who just so happens to not have “real legs.” 

Sources:

Emma Loja’s Disability, embodiment and ableism: Stories of resistance. 

http://denver.cbslocal.com/2014/02/17/double-amputee-makes-best-of-his-hoops-minutes-for-mountain-vista-high/?hpt=us_bn10 

Ethnic Divide

In the Curtin and Gaither (2007) chapter “Contested Identities, Shifting Publics in a Globalized World,” the authors refer to a nation as an “imagined community, constructed and maintained by those who claim membership” (pp. 175). In the case of the Rohingya in Myanmar, the state has denied membership to a group of people that call this nation home.

The Rohingya are a Muslim ethnic group that is not recognized among the official ethnicities of the country. Many Rohingya are confined to internally displaced camps and must bribe their way out. Often those who do manage to escape end up trafficked as slave laborers in Thailand or Malaysia.[1]

Zigor Aldama, a journalist for Al Jazeera, described their situation: “They can’t leave the camps, they can’t marry without permission, most are unemployed and have no source of income, and they rely on the World Food Programme to survive. A law passed in 1982 denies them citizenship and makes them stateless because they are considered immigrants from neighboring Bangladesh, who came along with British troops in the 1800s.”

The story of the Rohingya follows much the same pattern as that of the Roma. The ethnic divide between the Rohingya and the Buddhist population of Myanmar began as the result of an alleged rape and killing of a young Buddhist woman by Rohingya men. In retaliation for this alleged crime, 10 Muslims were beaten to death by a group of angry Buddhists.

One of the few Rohingya politicians in Myanmar, Kyaw Min, fights for the rights of the Rohingya people. According to Min, the Rohingya have existed peacefully in the country formerly known as Burma since before British colonization, and more specifically, since the year 785.

How is it that a nation can rewrite its history and marginalize an entire ethnic group and get away with it? The UN considers the Rohingya to be “one of the most persecuted minorities in the world,”[2] but still nothing is done to help the situation. After reading the article, do you think there is there anything that can be done to help improve the current situation in Myanmar for the Rohingya people?

---

[1]  Aldama, Z. (04 Feb 2014). Myanmar's Buddhist-Rohingya ethnic divide. Al Jazeera.

[2] Ibid.

Co-culturation and Space

The Mongolian ger has been in use for more than eight hundred years. It is older than Chinngis Khaan himself. Strong traditions around the structure and layout of a ger have built up over time. For instance, a ger door always opens to the south. Explanations for this include the need for a ger to face the sun to the south, to avoid the strong winds from the north, and even to be able to see Chinese armies coming from the south. Whatever the reason for it, this tradition exists today even if that means it will face a fence instead of the middle of a compound.

A ger's interior from the door (south). 

The traditions inside the ger are similarly strong. While visiting another’s ger, whether for a holiday or a simple friendly meal, where you sit depends upon your age, your social standing, and gender. The eldest hosts always sit at the northern point of the ger, across from the door, with the youngest closest to the door. Men sit on the west side, women sit on the east. So particular are these traditions, that they are often not followed when entering a square apartment. As with many traditions, these rules are sometimes adjusted or modified depending on the level of reverence given to a guest. For instance, when my program visited, a 30 something female, visited my sight, my host family had her sit on in the position of the most revered guest. Her power over determining whether the village would get another volunteer after I left raised her level of importance.

In analyzing co-culturation of immigrants in a new culture, Curtin noted how “everyone is continually engaged in social and political processes of identification and that these processes are highly situated and discursively based” (pg. 283). The place where I was encouraged to sit constantly shifted depending on the ger I visited and my relation to the hosts, and my level of integration with the community. When I first arrived, I was the welcome guest as my program manager was treated. As I grew to become one of the teachers in the school, I gradually moved closer to the door as I was the second youngest among. My host mother, the director of the village school, held quite a bit of power, and thus my family did. So, at times I was brought up the line to sit near my parents. At times I could be identified as a young male, as an interesting guest from America, as a member of my host family, or as a respected teacher for my students. Each of these identities placed me in different parts of the ger; something incredibly simple became a measure of how integrated I and others felt I was. 

Language and Identity Construction

A few weeks ago we discussed language and its role in identity formation, as well as its role in the power -hierarchy formation of nations. Normatively speaking, language is often passed off as 'just words'. I'm sure many among us have used, or heard, the expression, 'sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me'. This defensive definition of words is, of course, a delusion. Words matter, and language affects us, and in many ways creates us. Martin and Nakayama further this by claiming that words are not 'empty vessels' but rather play a 'powerful and constructive role....by which strategies of power and inequality are enacted daily'. For the most part we don't recognize the way language guides our identity formation, but over time the effects are visible. In a recent article on NPR.org, here, the Spanish language is discussed with its relationship to Americans of Puerto Rican dissent. The author of the article explains the complex relationship between maintaining her Puerto Rican identity, while at the same time struggling with the fact that she was raised only to speak English. Much of this complex relationship is due to her parents' desire to assimilate into 'American culture' while raising her. A classic example of power defining identity through language. Interestingly, the power dynamics between language and identity are changing, and being bi-lingual in Spanish and English in 'American culture' is seen as an asset. It's about time.

What's in a Name?

Our names are our past, our present, and our future. They connect us to the history that has made us, our circumstances that in part define us, and sometimes, the possibilities that will be open to us. When I stumbled across this Al Jazeera cultural series spotlight, "What's in a name," it was an idea I just couldn't shake. Thoughts of ascribed identity, historical implications, social mobility, and gender assignment, among other things, flooded my mind. These names we are given speak so much about who we are, but yet, leave so much out. One hundred years ago, a name would delineate our gender, our bloodline, our nationality, our ancestry, and sometimes, our socio-economic status. Now, arguably, none of that is true. But, nevertheless, names link our thoughts to ideas about the world. Without ever meeting a person, a name can paint a mental picture of what that person looks like. It can generate discriminatory thoughts. It can incite racial profiling. It can regionalize, nationalize or racialize people. Think about when you hear/see first names like Shemiqua, Bobbie Sue, Jesus, Josefina, Ahmed, Vladimir, Olga or Francisco. Immediate types came to mind, right? And last names, which are passed down through time, mean so much to some people. But in different ways, I would argue. 

In this article http://projects.aljazeera.com/2014/namestories/#intro , Al Jazeera highlights 3 main stories. The first, is Emily Tanaka, a half Caucasian (her mother), half Japanese (her father) woman. When she travelled to Japan to visit family, no one would believe she was actually Japanese, because she looks very Caucasian. Everyone was convinced she was married to a Japanese man. So when she got married (to a gentleman by the name of Smith), she dealt with an internal struggle of sorts as to whether or not she should keep her last name, take her husbands, or hyphenate. By taking her husbands, she felt she would lose part of her cultural identity, the part that she so proudly felt represented her father. The second is Cecilia Gentili, an Argentinian woman who when born, was named Alejandro Gabriel Gentili. In her 20's Cecilia decided she would move forward with a complete gender re-assignment (from male to female) so her body would reflect who she was on the inside. Through much of this time, friends referred to her as Alex or Alexa (nicknames from Alejandro). Once her surgeries were finished, Cecilia decided it only made sense to legally change her name. To her, Alex was so androgynous, commonly used as a name for both men and women. She wanted to affirm her identity by selecting a name that was unmistakably female, much as she was. Her name and her identity finally became aligned, and ultimately helped her to define to the outside world her true identity. The third is John H. Doe's story. He is a Korean American from New York City, New York whose given name at birth was Jang Huan Do. When he was in grade school, he urged his family to change their name to Doe, because it would help Americanize them. Also, he was tired of people calling him Jang (how it rhymes with sang), and Do (like to do, instead of Doe). In efforts to assimilate, his family did change, and from that point forward he went by the name John. In 3rd grade, while reading the dictionary, a friend pointed out his name was actually in there. John Doe was listed as a "legal, fictitious identity which does not exist." 

The meanings of their name differs in each story, but all represent part of their identity. Identities that these three have found equate to negotiations of who they are with society.

I feel on some level, I understand the struggle with ones' name and identity. Being adopted slightly later in life, I was completely cognizant of my name change. And so was everyone else in my grade. Having to explain why in 4th grade your name was one thing, and in 5th, another, is interesting to do for a 9 year old. But more than that, the change of my name signified a change in my identity. I was no longer Chelsey Bowen from Texas, I was Chelsi Hudson from Tennessee. I was, from that point forward, a Hudson. My "family" signified those currently in my life, that shared my name, instead of those in my past, who no longer did. I had to learn a new way to sign my name, and become used to responding to a different one. Eventually, I became used to it, as did everyone else, but that awkward time sticks with me. 

So, although names are always subject to others interpretations, it is not always indicative of who they are, where they come from, or what they believe.