Western people show exclamation even over trifles. This phenomenon isn't found an oriental culture that appreciates people who control their feeling and taciturn. We can usually see Americans who are moved so easily by things that Koreans aren't effected by. This means they are accustomed to expressing feeling freely and frankly. In Western culture, they start a conversation about the weather when they meet someone for the first time: "It's a lovely day, isn't it?" This is reference to the inclement weather in England. The people who live in an area with nice weather like Korea aren't touched by this kind of thing but Englishmen can be impressed.
The link has changed several times since I first posted it to waygook.org a couple years ago, so check back often. I'll also direct your attention to BarryFunEnglish, which has lots of supplemental material for the Korean elementary school curriculum, as well as some worksheet templates.
7 comments:
Reading that excerpt highlighted by Brian reminds me that there seems to be a lot of misinformation about the concept of "small talk". Korea isn't the only culture that finds this odd. The expression, "Isn't a lovely day?" serves a communicative purpose. The moron Jon Huer calls it "nonsense speak".
When starting an English language conversation class in Finland, I would first ask my class what they wanted to learn. Always, "small talk" was at the top of the list. Finland, like Korea, is a homogeneous country. They don't need to "feel" people out like those of us from immigrant heterogeneous countries (which all inner circle English speaking countries are). The Finns thought it was odd to talk about the obvious, but when I explained the purpose and background of "small talk" they jumped into small talk with both feet.
The idea that the weather in the UK somehow has something to do with the reason even Floridians, Australians, and Hawaiians (places with better climate than Korea) use "small talk" today is really silly and reaching.
My co-teacher showed me this site on my first day, so I've been using it from the start. It's useful, but sometimes the practice/greeting sections are a little hokey. The cultural tips are sad/hilarious as you pointed out, but sometimes they're right.
I wish they would just put it in a book, though. I have most of them printed out (the work of the teacher before me), but it would be so convenient to have it in a book.
I'm surprised that all native elementary teachers aren't given this link by their school.
My school gave me these in textbook form and they emailed me the file in March. I just presumed the education office had finally stepped up their game and all teachers had them.
My favorite cultural tip is:
"Koreans can easily calculate prices without a calculator but Americans have difficulties even in simple calculations without a cash register or a calculator."
Since when does Korea have nice weather? Hot and steamy 5 months of the year, cool but too dry to snow 3 months of the year, and pleasant in the spring with the exception of Mongolian dust and Chinese heavy metals...leaving the autumn...gorgeous but brief.
For a grad school class, I once did an analysis of English-teaching textbooks over the 20th century in order to analyze them for content on Korean national image building (it is here where the "four seasons" likely comes from, as a way to describe the country, though it does not say Korea is the "only" country that has four seasons).
The discussions of other countries in these materials were largely taken from American, British, and other textbooks, but from the early 1960s and 1950s or earlier, so not only are they full of stereotypes of people in other countries, but they tend to justify and reinforce Korean tendencies to look at other countries in terms of unifying or common characteristics, even though such stereotypes fell out of favor in those same countries that supplied the stereotypes, in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.
Thanks for a good laugh, Brian and Dancing Bear. I'm going to stop using small talk with Koreans and start asking them important questions like "How old are you?" and "Are you married?" and "What is your job?". Also, I'm going to practice simple math with the spare change I have laying around my place.
Ed - don't forget to ask them where they're from.
And if you get stuck on the maths, just ask the nearest Korean.
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