Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Yu_Bum_suk]

So I've been experimenting with the idea of getting a couple of my higher-level classes to do pen-friend exchanges. The students with whom I spoke seemed really excited about the idea. I found a few teachers on the Net, one from Morroco and one from Kuwait, who seemed quite interested. Great I thought. Well when I told the class I immediately got 'Can we do England? Can we do USA? Morroco no like, dirty' and things like that.

'The only teachers I found happen to be in Morroco and Kuwait' I explained.

'We want England or USA' they continued whining.

So I told the ones who were most heart-set on finding a pen-friend from England or America that they could come see me in the staff room and we could find an individual pen-friend through an exchange site. A small group came to see me yesterday and we found a few sites. Of course they all want a boy (they're all girls) 17-18 years old. On one site there happened to be a boy, aged 17, from England. Assa, sounds perfect. We read over his info and he says he speaks English and Hindi. 'Hindi, what is Hindi?'

'The most used language in India' I explain. 'His parents probably come from India'.

'Oh no, no, no ... another'.

I found another web site from America that acutally has photos - wow. I clicked the 'M' and '15-20' options on the search function. Well, you can guess what they thought of anyone who wasn't white.

I have to admit that I just don't have the will-power to make the effort even to try to bother to change such misconceptions anymore.

[sharkey]

thats awful, when I was young I never even thought about race.... Still don't really ... cultural differences I guess ....

[jvalmer]

I'd say it's more ignorant than racist. They just don't know. And American TV and movies don't help much. Racism is more about harming someone.

[marlow]

There aren't many excuses for not being colorblind. Taking a stance against certain cultures is fine, but judging color isn't. The racism may be caused by stupidity, but then again, it usually is.

[Otherside]

[moosehead]

[Rusty Shackleford]

I had a student say "Ghandi, Ghandi, nigger, nigger" the other day when we were looking at stamps from various English speaking nations. My policy, usually is to ignore bad language but anything that could potentially cause issues in a western country I crack down on.

It was simply ignorance on the students part and I was lucky I have a good co-teacher at that school who backed me up. But I could definitely see a Korean exchange student getting into all sorts of strife at an American high school through such a cultural/social mis-step.

[hari seldon]

The only Indians these students have ever seen in person were 3Ds riding the subway. They probably couldn't show you where India is on a map or say anything rational about its inhabitants..

[Bread]

Here's a story my coworker in Japan told me:

Once, he was teaching a lesson about jobs. He would show a card with a person, and the student would say eg "She is a waitress."

There was one card that had a black man wearing a doctor's coat and a stethoscope.

The student said "He is a basketball player."

[Rusty Shackleford]

Sorry for the double post. But I tend to make a distinction between what happened here, which I would consider prejudice (or prejudism) and racism. Racist is being denied service (Korean telcos anyone?), as well as much more obvious examples. Simply socially avoiding someone 'cos they aren't the same colour as you is more prejudiced than racist in my opinion.

I remember in primary school my best friend was an Egyptian kid but my arch nemesis was a Philipino kid. I always resented that I got in so much trouble from the principal for not getting along with him. The racism word was even bandied about, for a 7 year old?

I just don't think it's possible for a child to be intentionally racist.

[The_Source]

[Rusty Shackleford]

[Bread]

[Bread]

[ED209]