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Minhang Oz

Joined: 23 Apr 2003 Posts: 610 Location: Shanghai,ex Guilin
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Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2003 7:41 am Post subject: |
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As a PM to Bertrand didn't bring a response, I'll have to post an answer.
1] Answer the question: why can you use the word"dialects", but I can't without providing a definition?
2] Why are we China FT's "stuck' here-a recurrent theme of yours. Did you bother to read the postings on the thread you started? If I'm "stuck" in Shanghai, then I'm cetainly not complaining.
3] The money boast, 1000 HK a day for doing squat. Well, the job I'm on leave from in Australia pays 70k a year, equal to 30,000 rmb a month. However, I don't boast about doing squat all for my salary.
4] The qualifications. What are yours, and what does this qualify you to actually do? Mine are all I need for the job I do, BA, B.Ed, Post Grad.Dip. TESOL. I work hard at being a good teacher. You seem to hold teachers in low regard.
So Bertrand, the challenge is to make some kind of interesting, positive, useful contribution to this forum. We tend to discuss living and working in PR China. Your knowledge seems to centre around Hector of Urumqi, and underage prostitutes in Zhuhai. You believe the FT population is made up of backpacking hippy substance abusers who work for EF. You say any number of pretentious and pedantic things, and are then outraged when people respond as they do. |
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Roger
Joined: 19 Jan 2003 Posts: 9138
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Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2003 2:53 pm Post subject: |
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Bertrand,
I do not think Minhang or anyone else on the mainland envies you in Hong Kong! I happen to know your current base, and I hate going there., which I must fromn time to time. I envy wOZ and Minhang much more because they happen to be living in a happening place, a city that is surpassing Hong Kong in many ways! With half the salary you make in HK you are an emperor in Shanghai, and much more in the countryside! And, the workloads here are some of the lowest in the world. I never heard NETs enthuse about the "low" number of periods they put in - some complain they have to work six days a week, and accept reduced holidays! And the commutes! Plus the rudest natives between Mongolia and New York!
Your posts are getting weirder and weirder, Bertrand! Maybe you are not as happy as you pretend to be? |
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Bertrand
Joined: 02 Feb 2003 Posts: 293
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Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2003 6:09 am Post subject: |
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Minhang Oz wrote: |
As a PM to Bertrand didn't bring a response, I'll have to post an answer.
1] Answer the question: why can you use the word"dialects", but I can't without providing a definition?
2] Why are we China FT's "stuck' here-a recurrent theme of yours. Did you bother to read the postings on the thread you started? If I'm "stuck" in Shanghai, then I'm cetainly not complaining.
3] The money boast, 1000 HK a day for doing squat. Well, the job I'm on leave from in Australia pays 70k a year, equal to 30,000 rmb a month. However, I don't boast about doing squat all for my salary.
4] The qualifications. What are yours, and what does this qualify you to actually do? Mine are all I need for the job I do, BA, B.Ed, Post Grad.Dip. TESOL. I work hard at being a good teacher. You seem to hold teachers in low regard.
So Bertrand, the challenge is to make some kind of interesting, positive, useful contribution to this forum. We tend to discuss living and working in PR China. Your knowledge seems to centre around Hector of Urumqi, and underage prostitutes in Zhuhai. You believe the FT population is made up of backpacking hippy substance abusers who work for EF. You say any number of pretentious and pedantic things, and are then outraged when people respond as they do. |
Okay, first, sorry about the private message; I will have to update my email addresses as that was an account I set up long ago and hardly use now that I am on I-Cable broadband.
You demand that I answer the question as to why can I use the word "dialects", but you can't without providing a definition.
Well, obviously, you can 'use the word' (in a Wittgensteinian sense) without having to give a definition. But if you are using a word that - perhaps totally unknown to you - has seperate, technical meanings AND someone (who knows these differences) feels that your point is worth answering, then that person will surely seek clarification. Let me give you an example: what does 'discreet' mean? (Please do not flood me with question such as 'what does word X mean'? Yes, I know it is an unanswerable question; for those sceptics out there who feel that every word has a definitive, monolithic, meaning, try to read Wittgenstein's PI, especially his treatise on 'game' and how he can find no ONE defining feature of the various activities we call 'a game' that are common to all 'games'. This, however, is semantics and not TEFL; anyone interested though can mail me or begin a discussion in the non-jobs related section). So, 'discreet', what does it mean? Well, do you mean in 'normal' discourse? Or do you mean how the word is used in mathematics and/or linguistics? Discrete infinity is one of C.F.Hockett's design features of natural language and (as in maths) refers to the possible generation of an infinite number of grammatical clauses from a FINITE grammar (also used in a sense totally different to that normally known to TEFL teachers). (Those with knowledge in Set Theory will be familiar with the term 'generate'.) So, in short, I think it is very important to ascertain the sense in which a word has been employed, if only to save time. If you want to read about 'dialects' then I can, if you are interested, point you in the right direction. As a lot of you have now no doubt realised, the term 'dialect', when employed in normal conversation, refers to broad brushes with political paint; differences between languages - at whatever level of analysis they appear, i.e, at a phonetic/phonological/morphological/syntactic/semantic/pragmatic level - have more to do with governments and politics than anything linguistic; either general or generative.
You ask that I clarify why you China FT's are "stuck' there in the PRC; request that I confirm whether or not I read the postings on the thread I started, and you assert that if you are "stuck" in Shanghai, then you are cetainly not complaining.
I would aver that the only people stuck in China are those that are in prison, or have lost their money and or paperwork, etc. But this really goes back to your next point but one: that you are not complaining. Well, from where I sit and from my computer screen it really does look like you do nothing BUT flame and complain. Yes, I try to read messages before posting replies; it aids dialogue.
You then (your point no. 3) request that I further explain what you term a 'money boast', viz., 1000 HK a day for doing squat.
First it is not a boast. No one who works or has worked in HK would ever boast about earning that sum; a lot of NETs BEGIN their work on anything around 40 or sometimes even 50,000 HK dollars. They could boast; I can't. Maybe you meant that I was boasting because when placed in comparison to salaries on the mainland mine does indeed appear to be high. I can only repeat what I wrote before. If people ask my salary and they are discussing this topic anyway, I am not going to lie. It really does seem to me that it is you that suffers from a feeling of persecution, that someone is trying to upstage you. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have a friend here who teaches and researches in my speciality areas(evolutionary linguistics/Chomskyan universal generative grammar/child language acquisition) and he earns no less than 85,000 HK dollars a month. Do you now think that is a boast, or is it only when the breadwinner him- or herself states what they earn. Perhaps the problem lies in parsing: I said the hours I do for my money; I did not say it was "squat".
The topic then turns to qualifications. You ask what mine are and what this/they qualifies/qualify me to do actually? One of my qualifications allows me to answer post advertisements for university lecturers of general linguistics in which a doctorate and a publication record are required. I think, however, that is neither important nor relevant. My initial point was that people should not assert half-truths and myths (however appealling they may be) about aspects of a natural structure (language) if they have not even spent 1 second thinking about an issue. My initial point was that TEFL is TEFL; doing a 3 or 4 (or 100) week course does not make you a contender for Chomsky's position at the top of generative grammar; it's really that simple. I doubt very much indeed whether many teachers out there would argue about advanced technical aspects of, say, Mathematical Knot Theory, or, say, Imaginary Numbers, if they had only spent 3 or 4 weeks actually studying it (and they most certainly would not think themselves able to TEACH it!). Now, language confuses people, everyone thinks they know everything about it. Why? Because you know at least one to an intimate state (to be evinced below) but this, of course, does not entail your knowing about HOW it works; that is, what the mathematical transformation are to, say, co-refer anaphoric elements. Let's use an anology: Do you know how to use Microsoft word? Yes. Okay, so could you please explain to me - since you know how to USE Word so well - how the software stores deleted information? Many centuries ago philosophers distinguished two types of knowlege: Knowing how and knowing what. Another example: Can you pick up a coffee cup? Yes. Can you explain to me HOW you lift it up, I mean, can you detail that which needs to take place in the brain and arms and fingers, etc., before this can be done? Returning to intimate knowledge of your MOTHER tongue (or tongues). Consider (1) and (2) below:
1) Bees swarm in the garden.
2) The garden swarms with bees.
Ask any native speaker of English whether these two claused 'mean the same'. Most, if not all, will respond yes, they mean the same. (Non-native speakers will ALWAYS say yes, they are the same.) But no ask them this question: In which of these two gardens is the garden fuller? Research (for those of you that know: GJT) shows that when asked this question people say well, actually in (1) the wholoe garden might well be full, but the bees could actually just be swarming in one corner of the garden. In (2), however, informants respond, because of their intuitions that stem from very abstract underlying grammatical processes (theta-role assignment, etc.), that it is more likely that it is indeed the whole garden that the bees are swarming in. (Cf. Pinker's Learnability and Cognition: the acquisition of argumant structure [MIT Press] for an interesting account of how - and why - children exposed to English come to have these intuitions VERY early in their learning/acquisition of language.)
Consider (3) and (4):
3) The police brought the criminal in.
4) The police brought him in.
Now consider (4) and (5) -(the asterisk indicates unacceptable to a native speaker):
4) The police brought in the criminal.
5) * The police brought in him.
(Chomsky, N. (1957) Syntactic Structures. Mourton: The Hague) Nevertheless, I read in EVERY TEFL book I find: 'pronouns replace nouns'!!!!!! Rubbish! Utter, useless, rubbish! As Wittgenstein said: 'Don't think, look!' Look at the date above, pronouns do not replace nouns, they replace noun phrases:
6) The postman is tall.
7) The blonde-haired, blue-eyed, South African man over there is a tall.
He is tall.
The substitution (that can only take place under certain, strict conditions) takes place at the level of the phrase on the tree diagram. So, what are these strict conditions? Consider 9):
(This is called 'repeated name penalty in computational linguistics):
9) After Bill came into the room, Bill sat down.
If you are like most native speakers of English your first analysis is that they must be two Bill's- otherwise the second instance of Bill would have been replaced with the appropriate pronoun, 'he'. So, really, here you could argue that pronouns MUST replace noun phrases (of which 'Bill' is one) or else risk ambiguity or total misunderstandings. Now consider (10) below:
10) The wall is taller than the wall is high.
This is the same effect. Such points are the stuff and analysis of undergraduate linguistics degrees; not TEFL (just as well, how would you teach them)? Last but not least just to prove the point (if there is one). Consider the following:
11) After Mary won the money she left.
In (11) 'Mary' and 'she' may co-refer, that is, they may refer to the same individual. 'She' does not have to, though (it could refer to, say, 'Lucy' who was mentioned in the sentence prior to this one. Now consider:
12) After she won the money Mary left.
Again, 'she' and 'Mary' can, though do not have to, co-refer. Now consider:
13) Mary won the money after she left.
Yet again, they can co-refer; that is, we can achieve anaphoric resolution (which is incremental and never spoken about [or taught explicitly to children]). Now consider:
14) She won the money after Mary left.
Can they co-refer now? Can you tell me - explicitly enough for me to progam a computer - why not? (Please don't say - as if you are an expert - 'because 'she' comes before 'Mary'. First, language production, parsing and structure is non-linear and second, it is the same situation as in (12).
You then say that your certificates are all you need for the job you do, and that you have a BA, a B.Ed, and a Post Grad.Dip. TESOL. So, in short, a confession that in fact, you have never studied theoretical linguistics.
You then say that you work hard at being a good teacher and that I seem to hold teachers in low regard. I would not know if you try hard or not, but as regards teachers (in China or anywhere), yes, I hold bad teachers in low regard and I also hold in low regard those that blurb on about things they have never studied or even thought about (because if they did/had, they would see that they really do not know what they are talking about).
You then infoem me of a challenge. You say that I need to make some kind of interesting, positive, useful contribution to this forum.
I would simply retort that I do; the 'try speaking more softly' instance being a case in point.
You say that you tend to discuss living and working in PR China but that my knowledge seems to centre around Hector of Urumqi, and underage prostitutes in Zhuhai.
Yes, as I have written here in this forum, I believe it to be wrong - simply WRONG - to have a non-native speaker as a DOS. That is my opinion and I will always express it. Just ask any non-native speakers about the bees swarming in the garden and you will see the differences between intuitive grammatical 'knowledge' (in the knowing how sense) and, well, non-native knowledge. I also think it is wrong of EF to tell paying customers that all their staff are native speakers; they are not and this is a typical lie in and around China that I think - that I think - an international company like EF English Farce should not contribute to. I also think it really unfair on the staff there who have to have a meeting with themselves after having had a meeting with their 'native speaker DOS teaching expert' to try to work out what he said (and yes, it really is that bad - level 3 EF test!) Anyway, this is totally germane to the thread which was about native speakers. As regards all the thousands of underage whores in Zhuhai yes, here too that was relevant (the question was what people know about Zhuhai). My impression was that it was a bad place; I had only walked over from Macau and I was totally overrun by whores. Someone asked for impressions and I gave mine. If it does not tally with yours then I would simply say that I doubt that anyone is in the slightless bit interested.
You then say that I believe the FT population [of China] is made up of backpacking hippy substance abusers who work for EF.
I have never used the term backpacker and have never referred to backpacking here in this forum. I have never referred to substance abuse either (though I did once refer to EF pissheads; again, based on my experience which is, after all, all one can relate here). I do npt think that every teacher in China works for EF.
You say that I say any number of pretentious things, but I - like many others - merely feel that it is you and you alone that reads it that way.
Last edited by Bertrand on Thu Jun 19, 2003 7:00 am; edited 1 time in total |
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bluey
Joined: 24 Feb 2003 Posts: 50 Location: Shanghai
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Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2003 6:54 am Post subject: A link to a vacancy... |
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Boxcarwilly,
Go to
http://www.chinatefl.com/guangdong/index.html
Click on Shenzhen Polytechnic
Above is a link to the Guangdong index on Chinatefl.com which also lists a vacancy for a Spanish teacher (native speaker, I think). I hope this helps. The post is in Shenzhen, which is OK and "happenning", if a bit soulless. The whole city sprang up over the last 30 years and is becoming a trade and finance centre for this region.
Shenzhen is also right on the Hong Kong border, so if Bertrand can take his feet out of his mouth for long enough, he can invite you to watch him dig holes and fall into them.
Honestly, Bertrand, must you be so pompous? Go on, ask me for an example... Or make me define pompous. |
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Minhang Oz

Joined: 23 Apr 2003 Posts: 610 Location: Shanghai,ex Guilin
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Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2003 7:28 am Post subject: |
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Thank you, Bertrand, for taking considerable time to reply to my post.
I have never claimed to be, nor do I wish to be, a linguist. I'm not sure how you could support that contention. For a language teacher to discuss language matters with peers on a forum designed for such discussion would seem normal, yet you appear to object. Why?
A brief glance through your postings, which are generally brief and rely heavily on the use of the quotation facility, would indicate a lack of any real interest in the issues at hand. A strong desire to make facetious and negative comments, and to assert your own authority, are characteristic of your contributions.
As for me being the only member who finds your attitude pompous and pretentious.........
p.s. As an example of the above, references to Chomsky are not lost on me, even when used in your trademark manner. But why do it? Am I the only reader who finds the examples you offer patronising rather than educational? Is this your normal tenor, or do you reserve it for this forum? |
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Roger
Joined: 19 Jan 2003 Posts: 9138
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Posted: Thu Jun 19, 2003 1:36 pm Post subject: |
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My God, B.! What a breathtaking exploration of the semantics of "word"! Why read L. Wittgenstein? Half a century before him, F. de Saussure simply said:
"le sense d'un mot est arbitraire".
You can say "water". You can also name it "H2O". Or 'shui', whatever!
IT's the context that defines words such as 'discreet' or 'dialect'. You... |
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Bertrand
Joined: 02 Feb 2003 Posts: 293
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Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2003 5:26 am Post subject: |
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Roger wrote: |
My God, B.! What a breathtaking exploration of the semantics of "word"! Why read L. Wittgenstein? Half a century before him, F. de Saussure simply said:
"le sense d'un mot est arbitraire".
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Right, but I was not referring to the arbitrary nature of the Saussurean sign, that's obvious, but I meant the problems encountered by Wittgenstein when he attempted to find features common to 'games' (cf, his Language Games in the Blue and Brown Books). Have you read:
James Hurford, "Biological evolution of the saussurean sign as a component of the language acquisition device," Lingua, vol. 77, pp. 187--222, 1989.
?
It's a great paper and is a classic in my field. |
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Gray000

Joined: 14 Apr 2003 Posts: 183 Location: A better place
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Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2003 6:47 am Post subject: |
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You're not the only one, MO. I find this whole thing to be more amusing than anything MW or H Canuck ever did. They didn't demand anyone have a license to think. |
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