scholarly journals ETHNIC RELATIONS AND ETHNOCENTRISM IN SELECTED MALAYSIAN SHORT STORIES

Author(s):  
Ahmad Zufrie Abd Rahman ◽  
Ida Baizura Bahar

The issues of the ethnic diversity of the Malaysian way of life, have been explored in scholarship on Fernando’s selection of Malaysian Short Stories (2006), consisting of six fictional narratives on life in pre-independence Malaya namely “Nannan and A Certain Cry” by Cynthia Anthony, “Ratnamuni” by K.S. Maniam, “Pasang” by Pretam Kaur, “The Third Child” by K.S. Maniam, and “Birthday” by M. Shanmugalingam, through the lens of post-colonialism. The stories have been described as an exceptional compilation due to the fact that Fernando is able to assemble stories written by authors from different ethnic backgrounds and cultures other than their own but we argue in this paper that the short stories do not contain intercultural sensitivity as they depict more ethnocentric orientations. We define ethnocentric experiences here as interculturally-sensitive elements which trigger a series of complex emotions in avoiding cultural differences either by denying their existence, raising defences against them, or by minimising their importance. Using the understanding of ethnocentrism as conceptualised by Milton J. Bennet (2013) as part of his Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity, we attempt to examine the type of ethnocentric experiences depicted by the authors through selected characters in two out of the six short stories. Our findings demonstrate that the three types of ethnocentric experiences, denial, defense and minimisation of cultural differences, are indeed found embedded in the unconscious minds of the authors through their portrayals of selected characters, which in turn provide a platform of cultural fertilisation in Malaysian pluralistic society.  

2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 83-98
Author(s):  
Emily Bost ◽  
Gary Wingenbach

Cultural heritage describes our way of life. It comes from previous generational traditions and incorporates our current constructed and natural environments, and tangible artifacts. The photo narrative process, derived from photovoice, combines photography and narrative expression about artifacts important to one’s way of life. The purpose of this study was to explore effects of the photo narrative process on students’ intercultural learning in agriculture. Photo narrative assignments were developed for students to capture facets of their cultural heritage, and their host countries’ cultural heritage from three separate study abroad programs. Archival data were collected (i.e., course assignments to illustrate one’s cultural heritage via photo and text) and visual social semiotics were used to analyze data. The Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity provided context for students’ levels of intercultural competence. The results showed participants experienced frame shifts (i.e., perspective change in worldviews) from ethnocentrism to ethnorelativism, as evidenced in the rhetoric of their artifacts after participating in the photo narrative process. The photo narrative process is a valuable educational technique; its purposeful use helps learners experience and progress through the stages of intercultural competence. Photo narrative takes advantage of young people’s preferred communication methods (i.e., social media), combining image and text, which empowers them through expressive communication and reflection. Purposeful photo narrative processes may be adapted to help learners explore perspective shifts in racism, classism, or religion to increase understanding and empathetic response between dissimilar groups.


Astraea ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-78
Author(s):  
Marina RAGACHEWSKAYA

Desire is a specific subject of research in many areas, including literary studies and text analysis. The representation of desire in fiction is an inseparable part of the sub-genre of psychological prose; its interpretation by readers and scholars requires an interdisciplinary approach and relies on psychoanalytic theories and terminology for elucidation. Shorter psychological fiction – novellas and short stories – depend on the authors’ mastery of language use, while the formal textual length is limited. Therefore, the study of desire encoded in a short fictional piece is both difficult due to laconism and suggestiveness, and fruitful as a revelation of most subtle nuances of human nature through the examination of artistic discourse. D.H. Lawrence’s novellas and short stories articulate desire as the unconscious wish to obtain the object of love. It is the merit of the writer’s art to employ various artistic means that may serve as the manifest content. Interpreting imagery and symbolism, bodily consciousness and characters’ “syncopated” dialogues, opens up such aspects of a textual embodiment of desire as its elusiveness, impossibility to verbalize and often its “forbidden” nature. Instead, the Ragachewskaya Marina writer resorts to heavy suggestiveness, gaps and silences to be filled with the reader’s intuitive or professional knowledge, meaning-charged adjectives, metaphors and analytical intrusions. Examples from a selection of D.H. Lawrence’s short fictional works reveal defense mechanisms that balance the fulfilment of desire. The mastery of D.H. Lawrence’s shorter fiction rests on the skill to reveal the unnamable, to show the inner conflict working through desire fulfilment, to bring to consciousness the shame, guilt and pleasure irrespective of moral judgment.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-268
Author(s):  
Giovanni Ciofalo

Abstract This article develops from a wider inter-university research project that focused on the analysis of reciprocal forms of representation of United States and Italy within media industries, and proposes a cross-analysis of the films My Name is Tanino directed by Virzì (2002) and Under the Tuscan Sun by Wells (2003). The aim is to highlight how both films refer to cultural generalizations and stereotypes in regards to American and Italian cultures in a complementary way. To identify the recurring elements of the communicative frame, the article takes an approach based on the recognition of high-context and low-context styles. Finally, to deepen the films’ shared logic of intercultural representation, this article proposes a further interpretative approach based on the Developmental Model of Intercultural Sensitivity (DMIS) (Bennett 2017), useful in categorizing recurrent attitudes towards cultural differences such as denial, minimization, defence, acceptance, integration and adaptation.


Author(s):  
Zimmatul Liviana

The research grammatical interference in a collection ofshort stories Biarkan Aku Memula iwork Nurul F. Hudaisa collection ofshort storiesset in the back that Is start work Let Nurul F. Huda contains many grammatical interference.The problem of this   study were(1)how   the various morphologi calinterference containedin   a   collection of short stories Biarkan Aku Memulai work Nurul F. Huda. (2)how the various syntactic interference contained in a collection of short stories Biarkan Aku Memulai work Nurul F. Huda. The purposeof this studyis to describe the morphological and         Syntactic interference contained in a collection of short stories Biarkan Aku Memulai work Nurul F. Huda. Sociolinguistics is the study of language variation and use in society. Interference is the event of the use of language elements of one into the other language elements that occur in the speakers themselves. This research uses descriptive qualitative method because to describe the actual realityin order to obtainan accurateand objective. Qualitative descriptive methods were used to analyzethe elements ofa word orphrase that incorporated elements of other languages with the analysis and description of the formulation of the problem is the answer. Data collection techniques using observation techniques, the determination ofthe object of research, the selection of short stories.Based on the analysis of the data in this study can be found that there are six forms of interference morphology, namely (1) the prefix nasal N-sound, (2) the addition of the suffix, (3) the exchange prefix, (4) exchange suffixes, (5) exchange konfiks, (6) removal affixes. While the syntactic interference only on the words and phrases in a sentence. The results of the study it can be concluded that the interference morphology more common than syntactic interference.


2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-174
Author(s):  
Amel Alić ◽  
Haris Cerić ◽  
Sedin Habibović

Abstract The aim of this research was to determine to what extent different variables describe the style and way of life present within the student population in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In this sense, in addition to general data on examinees, gender differences were identified, the assessment of parental dimensions of control and emotion, overall family circumstances, level of empathy, intercultural sensitivity, role models, preferences of lifestyles, everyday habits and resistance and (or) tendencies to depressive, anxiety states and stress. The survey included a sample of 457 examinees, students of undergraduate studies at the University of Zenica and the University of Sarajevo, with a total of 9 faculties and 10 departments covering technical, natural, social sciences and humanities. The obtained data give a broad picture of the everyday life of youth and confirm some previously theoretically and empirically justified theses about the connection of the family background of students, everyday habits, with the level of empathy, intercultural sensitivity and preferences of the role models and lifestyles of the examinees.


Author(s):  
Fatmir Shehu

This paper examines the influence of Islam on Albanian culture. The Islamization process of the Albanian culture was very crucial for the Albanians themselves as it gave them a new identity, which they lacked since their settlement on the Adriatic shores. According to history, Albanians, the biggest Muslim nation dwelling in the Balkans, South-East of Europe, are believed to be the descendents of the ancient Illyrians, who settled in Europe around 2500 years ago. They lived a social life based on tribalism, where every tribe had established its own cultural system and way of life. Thus, their cultural differences disallowed them to unite. Such situation did not change, even when Christianity was introduced to them. Because, Christianity came to Albania through two great dominations: Christian Catholics of Vatican (the Northern part of Albanian) and Christian Orthodox of Greece (the Southern part of Albania). The continuous religious and political suppression faced by the Albanians from their Byzantine and Latin masters enabled them to be the first people of the Balkans, who welcomed openheartedly the Ottoman Muslims and embraced Islam as their new way of life in the 15th century. The study focuses on the following issues: (1) Historical background of Albania and Albanians; (2) The genesis of Albanian culture; and (3) The process of integration between Islamic culture and Albanian culture. This research attempts to provide important findings, which will be very helpful to the Muslims and others.


2021 ◽  
pp. 147490412110317
Author(s):  
Rory Mc Daid ◽  
Emer Nowlan

Despite an increase in ethnic diversity within the state, the Irish teaching workforce remains starkly mono-ethnic. This article is based on an analysis of data generated through a sequential explanatory mixed method research project involving questionnaire responses from 240 migrant teachers and subsequent focus group with a selection of teachers. Findings suggest that migrant teachers are slow to engage in the formal accreditation process, and face considerable challenges when they do. This reflects not only practical difficulties, but also narrow discourses of who can legitimately be recognised as a teacher in Ireland. This in turn is linked to cultural arbitraries highlighted through the research, such as a requirement to be able to teach through the Irish language in primary school and a requirement to be registered to teach in primary or post-primary schools only. In exploring these barriers, we draw broadly on Bourdieu and Passeron’s (1990) work, which understands teachers as pedagogic agents, imbued with pedagogic authority through formal processes of accreditation and selection. These processes involve the imposition of cultural arbitraries which legitimate certain languages, content or stances over others. Recommendations include revisions to the registration process to take previous teaching experience into account.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Schick

This study defends the legitimacy of the Enlightenment project by way of its different realizations in the philosophies of Immanuel Kant and Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi. Today, Enlightenment as a cosmopolitan project with a global claim is often considered synonymous with Western chauvinism. The assertion of a universally binding reason is all too obviously inconsistent with the much-cited recognition of cultural differences. In contrast, it is the conviction brought forward in this book that an adequately understood Enlightenment is an unconditional right of every person taking an active interest in a self-determined way of life. Only the realization of this conception of Enlightenment can provide the required space for the reciprocal recognition of human differences to freely unfold.


2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 73
Author(s):  
Catherine S. Thomas ◽  
Leona Konieczny

Nursing students require education and experience to develop cultural competence. Cultural sensitivity is a step on the journey to cultural competence. Nursing curricula vary regarding when and how to promote cultural sensitivity. Service learning (SL), is an experiential pedagogical method, which provides the opportunity to communicate and interact with persons from various cultures. A descriptive pilot study was undertaken in order to examine whether the program level affects the intercultural sensitivity of nursing students exposed to SL. The original Intercultural Sensitivity Scale (ISS) was used to assess intercultural sensitivity. In a paired samples t test, two statements in the ISS relating to Interaction Confidence (p = .006) and Respect for Cultural Differences (p = .002) demonstrated junior level students had increased intercultural sensitivity scores when compared with sophomore level students’ scores. This study may provide guidance to nursing faculty in determining at which level of students who will have maximal gain from SL.


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