Seeking Input for a Presentation/Workshop
Dear Forum Members,
I am going to be doing a presentation/workshop at a center for international exchange here in Japan on "How (not) to talk to foreigners."
I have found the ideas on this and related threads very helpful for thinking about the kinds of things I would like to have the audience consider.
As an American fluent in Japanese and having lived in Japan since 2002, I tend to agree with many of the "Don'ts" that have been discussed here (particularly regarding the chopsticks routine). However, I am wary of putting such issues in an overly negative light. I want to avoid making my audience feel guilty or making them even more self-conscious than they may already be. Therefore, I would also like to focus on some "Do's" to balance with the "Don'ts" (or even rephrase some Don'ts as Do's).
I would really appreciate your thoughts on this.
a perspective from the other side
After having had lived in the United States for many years, people were still asking me the same questions regarding food, customs, etc. "Do you like American food?", "Would you prefer rice?", "Sorry, we only have the regular tea... (assuming I would prefer Green tea, which I do. lol). They still commented on things like my English ( "Your English is very good for a Japanese person."), on being away from home ( "Aww, it must be so hard for you to be away from your family!", "You must miss the food!"), on me being familiar with things you would think anyone who has lived there for 20 years would surely be familiar with ( "Wow, you know about so-and-so better than an American person!" ).
Like other members have been saying in this and other threads, people in general tend to have pre-conceived ideas about "foreigners". The process of getting used to the idea of some of us who have been in their countries/cultures for a long time (or regardless of the amount of time spent there, I suppose...)and have a good knowlege of the countries/cultures/languages.
While I do understand why some of you get annoyed when complimented on your expert chopstick skills, I would not make an issue out of it. In the future, they will come in contact with more and more foreigners like you and slowly, their reactions will change.
I always try to look at each situation from THEIR point of views. You grow up not having much experience meeting foreigners. All you know of them, you have learned from how they are portrayed in the media. Then comes a foreigner who does not fit your idea of one. Would that completely shatter the image/idea of the foreigner you've had in your head? Maybe...Maybe not. But at least now you know ONE foreigner who is different. Soon, you will meet another, then another...
I just try to be patient and explain to them that there are many of "us" out there and maybe go one step further with those I know well and hint at how silly some of the questions may sound to some WITHOUT making it into a big speech.
As long as it takes to change people's perspectives on things, it also takes just one incident with a single individual to cast a dark cloud over an entire country. Let us all remember that whenever we find ourselves in another country/culture, whether we like it or not, we are representing our home country and its people.
Like I said earlier, I really do understand your frustration. One time back in my college days, I came home to Japan with an American friend of mine. My mother went and bought 10 burgers from McDonald's for dinner the first night. She had thoght, because he was American, 1. He likes burgers. 2. He eats a lot. He thought that was really funny and was a good sport about eating 3 of them in addition to the sushi my father had prepared. The remaining 5 ( I had 2 myself at dinner ) became our late night snack and breakfast ( hey, we were college students!). After having him live with us for a month, however, my family had learned, I think, to look at him as an individual rather than a "foreigner".
Sorry for the long post. Please get back to your discussion. It is only healthy to let off some steam about our pet-peeves and this is a good place for it.
Thanks for the Input & Looking Forward to More
Much appreciation for your replies to my previous post.
Glenski, Annubis, Nanook, FrustratedDave and Ashikaga, I found your posts to be particularly helpful.
Below is a rough draft of my abstract for the presentation/workshop that I am planning:
This presentation will cover problems that sometimes occur when native Japanese attempt to communicate with foreigners. Many of these problems occur unbeknownst to the Japanese person involved, but may lead to further trouble as communication continues. Not only will this workshop help attendants avoid these problems, but it will moreover give them strategies to improve communication and gain confidence when speaking with people from other countries. Both native Japanese and non-Japanese are welcome to attend and contribute their own ideas and experiences. The workshop will be done in a combination of Japanese and English.
As the second to last sentence implies, I would like to be more of a discussion facilitator than a lecturer, bringing out the ideas and opinions of anyone who cares to voice them. The presentation is open to the public, but will probably consist mostly of middle-aged Japanese people with perhaps a few college students. Hopefully, other foreigners will also show up, and hopefully at least some of those foreigners will not be white males like myself, so that we can learn about how others experience communication in Japan differently (or similarly). I am also hoping that at least some of the Japanese people in attendance will have had experience living abroad, so that they can relate issues they had when communicating with people in those countries.
I do plan, as Glenski suggested, to "keep it light". I agree with FrustratedDave (and probably most, if not all, of the others here) that such things as "日本語上手!" to a ”はじめまして” are seldom if ever born of ill-intent and are not as big of a deal as they seem to have become on this thread. As FD and some others seem to suggest, at least some of the fault lies with foreigners who negatively interpret what has been said.
I think I will begin the presentation by relating a funny parallel experience that a Japanese native had when living abroad and then get the audience to look the other way around, putting themselves in the shoes of foreigners living here in Japan. Ashikaga, I would love to read more about situations where you felt a little irked by the assumptions others seem to have made about you during your 20+ years in the States (e.g. the "sorry we only have regular tea" incident).
This post is getting long, so I leave off here for the time being.
Thanks again and looking forward to more discussion.