I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, and while there is a good deal of Asian culture here and available, very little of it delves into the ancient texts or philosophies.
In Canada there is sometimes a trend amongst 'Asian' youth to group together and call themselves 'Asian' and promote some odd kind of 'Asian Pride' as a response to living in a predominately white community. I find that kind of odd because Asian-Asians don't really see themselves as a common nation or race and many object to being equated to their neighbors. I mean tell a Korean they're Japanese and you might get smacked for it. Thus, 'Asian American' culture is something of a new fashionable trend that takes bits and peices of mainstream Asian fashion and pop-culture, yet still retains very evident western Americanized roots. Unfortunately, most people where I come from take that particular culture and their local Chinese buffet (run by Filipinos) to be 'Asian Culture'. That coupled with the lack of education about the various cultures and history of Asia just sadly produces a very ignorant view towards Asia in general.
Since what age have you been a linguo-phile? Having Latin and Sanskrit under your belt is indeed an impressive accomplishment. I've done a bit of latin but heck if I can remember any of it. I'd like to do Sanskrit sometime in the future. My classical Chinese is at a point where I can actually write in it if I take my time and recall grammar patterns, though the problem is that the language shifted from being a spoken language to a literary language, and so there is a difference between Classical Chinese and Literary Chinese. The later being the language people wrote in for two millenia in E.Asia. It didn't of course reflect the spoken language as I'm sure you're probably aware of. Hence I sometimes have to decide what period style I want to write and what vocabulary set to use (classical uses mostly one character words, literary is often two character words with the particles being a bit more formalized).
I think in a few years after my Mandarin is solid enough I'd try to dive into probably the most difficult spoken language a native speaker of English could attempt -- Catonese. Eight tones and a whole smack of sounds that don't commonly occur in English. I figure though if I get good in Mandarin then adding a few more tones and sounds won't be that difficult. But we'll see. One thing at a time.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2007-03-23 05:43 am (UTC)In Canada there is sometimes a trend amongst 'Asian' youth to group together and call themselves 'Asian' and promote some odd kind of 'Asian Pride' as a response to living in a predominately white community. I find that kind of odd because Asian-Asians don't really see themselves as a common nation or race and many object to being equated to their neighbors. I mean tell a Korean they're Japanese and you might get smacked for it. Thus, 'Asian American' culture is something of a new fashionable trend that takes bits and peices of mainstream Asian fashion and pop-culture, yet still retains very evident western Americanized roots. Unfortunately, most people where I come from take that particular culture and their local Chinese buffet (run by Filipinos) to be 'Asian Culture'. That coupled with the lack of education about the various cultures and history of Asia just sadly produces a very ignorant view towards Asia in general.
Since what age have you been a linguo-phile? Having Latin and Sanskrit under your belt is indeed an impressive accomplishment. I've done a bit of latin but heck if I can remember any of it. I'd like to do Sanskrit sometime in the future. My classical Chinese is at a point where I can actually write in it if I take my time and recall grammar patterns, though the problem is that the language shifted from being a spoken language to a literary language, and so there is a difference between Classical Chinese and Literary Chinese. The later being the language people wrote in for two millenia in E.Asia. It didn't of course reflect the spoken language as I'm sure you're probably aware of. Hence I sometimes have to decide what period style I want to write and what vocabulary set to use (classical uses mostly one character words, literary is often two character words with the particles being a bit more formalized).
I think in a few years after my Mandarin is solid enough I'd try to dive into probably the most difficult spoken language a native speaker of English could attempt -- Catonese. Eight tones and a whole smack of sounds that don't commonly occur in English. I figure though if I get good in Mandarin then adding a few more tones and sounds won't be that difficult. But we'll see. One thing at a time.
How many years did you live in Japan?