Chinese Language Learning and Mobile Technologies

China's global influence has increased with its spectacular economic development. With the growing trade and cultural exchange between China and other countries, there is a rapid rising need for Chinese language learning. Although Chinese language is challenging to learn due to its different intonations, complicated shapes, and considerable significance, it still attracts more individuals, organizations, and companies. Advances in mobile technologies provide new opportunities for language learning anytime and anywhere. To meet the diverse demands of students of language learning, many scholars have studied Chinese mobile language learning and developed many mobile applications to improve language learners' skills in listening, speaking, reading, and writing by leveraging the emerging mobile technologies. This chapter reviews earlier studies on mobile technologies employed in Chinese language learning and provides recommendations for future research.

The Introduction of North China’s Ceramic Culture to 15th Century Joseon and the Influence on Buncheong Ware

This paper is a study on Korean Buncheong ware in relation to the ceramic culture of North China. The focus on drawing connections between the ceramic industries of Korea and North China expands on views presented in previous scholarship. Research thus far has traditionally ascribed the origin of Buncheong forms and decoration techniques to the influences of inlaid celadon from the late Goryeo Dynasty and the Cizhou ware of the Yuan and Ming Dynasties. The ceramic culture of North China was quickly transmitted to Korea due to the naturalization of the Jurchen people, who took part in founding the early Joseon Dynasty. Another factor was the migration and settlement of immigrants from North China, which began from the late Goryeo Dynasty and continued into the Joseon Dynasty or the fifteenth century. Therefore, the influence of North China is evident in various aspects of Buncheong ware from the early fifteenth century as observed in the forms of inlaid examples produced during this period. In the latter half of the fifteenth century, increased cultural exchange between the two regions and the growing number of migrants from North China were two important factors in the development of Buncheong in Korea. This is particularly true for examples featuring underglaze iron-brown (cheolhwa), sgraffito (bakji), slip-brushed (gwiyal), and slip-coated (deombeong) decorations fired in kilns populating the region of Chungcheong-do and parts of Jeolla-do. Traces of ‘Bunjang (粉粧)’ ceramics, which served as the transition from celadon to White Porcelain, is detected not only in the fifteenth century Buncheong ware of Joseon, but also in the porcelain of North China produced in the late Yuan and early Ming Dynasties. Though South China also experienced a quick transition from celadon to White Porcelain, the inclusion of ‘Bunjang’ ceramics is unique to North China. In conclusion, early Joseon Buncheong originated and developed from the inlaid celadon of late Goryeo–a progression that occurred under the ceramic culture of North China, whose influences prompted innovations in form and technique vital to the development of Buncheong ware.

Hospitable Friendship

Chapter 1 sets up the theoretical questions of female friendship across race, nationality, and gender. It establishes exclusivism in the philosophical discourses of friendship and hospitality and their political and ethical implications demonstrated by Jacques Derrida. It then discusses the practical challenges the three Victorian women travellers to Meiji Japan—Isabella Bird, Mary Crawford Fraser, and Marie Stopes—pose to the male homosocial model of friendship with their praxis of friendship and hospitality through their writing. It highlights the aporias of male philosophical theorizations and addresses them with female literary representations of real-life instances of cultural exchange and congress in a non-Western context. Drawing on feminist theorizations of open subjectivity and affective relationality, it presents alternative models and paradigms of friendship, which the book terms hospitable friendship, and argues for particular political affordances of literature for cross-racial female solidarity.

Tun Mahathir’s administration of Malaysia’s relationship with Bangladesh: A preliminary appraisal

This study examines the pertinency and materiality of Malaysia’s affiliation with Bangladesh. It presents the picture of deep reciprocal relationships in trading and investment, workforce issues, and the societal, religious and cultural exchange between Malaysia and Bangladesh that deserve elevated research to get ideas of a further snapshot. The historiographic approach and literature-based qualitative method apply to this research and uses written primary and secondary sources to gather information. Several published texts and archival documents examine to achieve the objective. In terms of significance, the result of this study would craft a narrative of a new spear of the economic relationships, societal circumstance, and cultural contact that especially evident during Tun Mahathir administration when he served Malaysia as the fourth Prime Minister that would deserve supplementary study. Furthermore, it would serve to understand the characteristics of the subsequent engagements of Malaysia with Bangladesh.

The Unique Phenomena in the Meeting between Western Medicine and Traditional Chinese and Vietnamese Medicine during the 17th and 18th Centuries

Based on academic achievements of, primarily, Chinese and Vietnamese researchers including materials recorded in the form of writings, reports, diaries, and letters sent to Europe by Western missionaries operating in China and Vietnam in the 17th and 18th centuries, and at the same time combining the application of two main research methods of Science and History (historical method and logical method) with other research methods (systematization, analysis, synthesis, statistics, etc.) and especially the comparative method, this article aims to clarify two points of focus. The first is the open attitude of Chinese and Vietnamese rulers in accepting Western medical achievements and the positive, respectful, and admiring views of some missionaries towards different aspects of traditional Chinese and Vietnamese medicine. The second is the contradiction in some Western missionaries' perception and actions when they criticized the superstition in the way of disease diagnosis and treatment of the Vietnamese and Chinese, especially the Taoist priests, however they committed to such approaches in the process of examining and treating indigenous people. The study of some of the phenomena that arose during the connections made between Western medicine and traditional Chinese and Vietnamese medicine in the 17th and 18th centuries as mentioned above would make a certain contribution to the study of the history of the East-West cultural exchange in China and Vietnam in general, as well as the medical history in the two countries, in particular during this period.

Arabskie zapożyczenia leksykalne w języku hiszpańskim

The large number of words from Arabic found in modern Spanish is proof of the deep influence Arabic has had on the Spanish language. Historical sociolinguistic processes which have lasted to the present day indicate that the influence of Arabic culture has been neither brief or superficial. Instead, it has, and continues to have great significance for the language situation of Spain. Much linguistic research has shown how loans from Arabic have been assimilated as they have become part of the lexical resources of modern Spanish. Arabic culture and civilization in the Iberian Peninsula (711-1942) above all involved the sciences, literature, art, architecture, engineering, agriculture, the military, medicine. At that time, Al-Andalus was one of the most influential European centers of science and cultural exchange in Europe. Contacts between Arabic and the Romance languages found in the Iberian Peninsula resulted in numerous loans both from Arabic to the Romance languages and from the Romance languages to Arabic. These topics have been the subject of extensive research conducted from historical, cultural and linguistic points of view. Despite the existence of numerous works concerning Arabic loans, this area requires, further, deeper research. In this article, selected issues concerning Arabic loans in Spanish are analyzed as are the adaptive processes they have undergone and the level of their integration into Spanish. The basis of the analysis is made up of oral and written texts collected in the Corpus de Español del Siglo XXI [CORPES XXI, RAE] – a corpus of contemporary Spanish from the 21st century.

MELAKA AS A FOOD TOURISM DESTINATION IN MALAYSIA: DOMESTIC TOURIST EXPERIENCE

Melaka was awarded as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO on 7 July 2008 due to 500 years of development and its role in trading and cultural exchange between Eastern and Western world countries in the Straits of Melaka. The rich history makes Melaka a multi-ethnic cultural heritage and historical tourist destination in Malaysia, mainly food. This study aims to identify the variety of local food in Melaka offered to tourists and review the experience of domestic tourists in Melaka, specifically in food eaten, eatery locations, and foods brought as souvenirs. A total of 297 respondent participated in this study, and a convenience sampling method was applied. The result showed that 65 different menus and drinks from Malay, Chinese, Indian, Baba-Nyonya, and Portuguese ethnic enjoyed by domestic tourists. Malay food is the primary choice of most respondents, while asam pedas (spicy sour) is the most favourite food among tourist. Most domestic tourists enjoy local food at restaurant and market/street food accessible around Melaka city. Dodol, a type of Malay sweets, was the most purchased food as a souvenir.