Cross-Cultural Blog

Yesterday, we capped off a great year of Cross-Cultural Rhetoric with our 2nd annual CCR Symposium. It was a great event, with participants from over 9 countries and 26 academic institutions joining us via Marratech to discuss pedagogical and theoretical applications of Cross-Cultural Rhetoric. (To see the Symposium program and participant list, visit http://ccr.stanford.edu/symposium.htm)

Here at Stanford, we took over Wallenberg Hall for the event, using the same format that we use for our undergrad classes: we started in a large virtual auditorium, then moved to the fourth floor for smaller group discussions on Pedagogy, Theory, Technology, and Interculture. As instructors, it was especially significant to enact the same video conference experience as our students; it brought our own conversations into sharper focus.

We also used the Symposium to inaugurate our two new video conference stations -- designed specifically to make future class-to-class interactions even more stable and productive.

Personally, one of the aspects of the conference I most enjoy happened in the first few minutes when we created a sign-up sheet on the white board, asking the participants to add themselves to a discussion group as they waited for the Symposium to begin. Watching people connect up, then take control of the whiteboard, put their name in one place, then erase, then put it in another, all the while chatting with each other through both microphones and text chat was an amazing moment of true connection, where we all came together from the first as an international cohort, despite our vast geographic separation. (You can see that moment, captured in a screenshot, in the image above)

I look forward to next year's Symposium, where perhaps we might even integrate some student panels or participation into our international conversation.

Posted by Christine Alfano at 09:27 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

My visual argument asks why we are forced to look towards the images of horror and turn our backs on the images of happiness when a combination of both is neccessary to provide a synthesized view of a topic. The tagline, "Are We Shown the Truth?" refers to the fact that the media does not display positive images and instead displays negative images.

I also could not get my visual argument to load directly to the blog, so here is a link:
https://coursework.stanford.edu/access/content/group/Sp08-PWR-1-41/Student%20Folders/Julia_s%20Folder/Research%20Project/PWR%20Visual%20Argument.doc

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 10:33 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Below is the link to my visual argument, which is a PowerPoint slide.

Download file

I am making an argument that as the Vietnamese economy has experienced economic liberalization and transitioning to a market-oriented economy, the country's women have been able to make themselves visible with more job opportunities in the private sector.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 10:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Background Image: Ferghana Valley, the most fertile region of Uzbekistan, a reference to women's traditional roles and source of respect as mothers and a symbolic of women as seeds of change in Uzbekistan, as the people who drive Uzbekistan forward from tradition to modernity by changing their own roles in society.

Layout of Images: The women presented appear to progressively become more modern from top left to botton right. 1. A traditional Uzbek dancer, a national symbol of Uzbekistan, wearing the traditional Uzbek "kalpok" hat, shimmering dress, hair in braids, and the pleasant, smiling expression of the traditionally idealized Uzbek girl.
2. Oijon, the matriarch of the popular Soviet film "Kelinlar Qo'zg'aloni," a traditional woman whoser home is her domain and whose children are her primary responsibility,; Oijon is a symbol if maintainign tradition.
3. Dilorom Toshmuhamedova, Uzbekistan's first female candidate for president in 2006, used as a bridge between Soviet and post-Soviet times when women played prominient roles in politics.
4. Yulduz Usmonova, Uzbekistan's most popular flok and pop singer of the Soviet and post-Soviet periods; she exercises complete control over her life and is known as a strong female (a modern value) but claimed in an interview with BBC that she has God to thank for her success (a traditional principle)
5. The everyday business woman who has taken advantage of post-Soviet Uzbek government's and NGO's support for women's entrepreneurship; Oijon's complete opposite, she reflects that modernization has streamed down to the common folk
Slogan: Although the layout has these women "streaming into modernity" as if on water on the stream across the image, the "water" is "atlass," traditional Uzbek silk, an indicator that these women are supported emotionally/morally by tradition in their move to modernity. Tradition is their foundation as water in a stream supports a floating object. Contemporary women find their strength in traditional morals and values, which keep them afloat in a sea/stream of change.
Furthermore: Despite the symbolic placement indicating transition and passage of time, similarities between "traditional" and "modern" women are meant to indicate that the strength, responsibility (as mothers, politicians, performers), and respect for particularly the three women in the middle were always present in Uzbek society. Similarly, the modest nature and sweet demeanor of 1 and 5 in spite of time change indicates the desire to youth to continue to preserve as least these traditional values of femininity.
Partial Stream: indicates that we are looking only at small chunk of time in Uzbekistan's history

Posted by Alyssa O'Brien at 10:02 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

On the Struggle of Chinese-Indonesians: My research focused on how the Chinese had been struggling for their equality of social rights and national identity. As a persecuted minority, I found that they had been "rejected" bacause of various factors, including apparent jealousy of wealth, and one source even indicated that the Indonesian Islam had never accepted the Chinese as Buddhism and Hinduism.
The Chinese themselves had done the best they can to do their best to accomplish their responsibilities as citizens, such as representing Indonesia in international sports competitions while trying to preserve their traditions and culture. However, what it means to be Indonesian for the indigenous population was to act, feel, and think as Indonesians, thereby completely adopting the indigenous culture. The gap between these two definitions had been the primary cause of tensions between the two groups.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 09:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Unfortunately, my visual argument layout is done on Microsoft Word, and it is quite complicated to embed into the blog, so I have attached the file for viewing.

Visual Argument

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 01:58 AM | Permalink

My visual argument is the website that can be found at this URL:

http://www.stanford.edu/~shefali/visual%20arg%20-%20final%20version/Paint_the_State%3A_Brushing_Up_on_Meths_Consequences/Paint_the_State.html#0

My research paper is about the Montana Meth Project, an anti-drug campaign that has enjoyed incredibly success in Montana. In my paper, I focus heavily on what steps the Montana Meth Project can take before it can become a national success.

This visual argument focuses on a social outreach program that the Montana Meth Project started in Montana - a public art competition called Paint the State. Paint the State is just one way in which the anti-drug campaign has interacted with, rather than lectured to, teenagers in Montana. In order for the Montana Meth Project to become a national success, such interactive measures (perhaps the creation of several Paint the State competitions?) must be implemented.

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http://http://www.asianbite.com/KoreaImages/korean-wave.jpg

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 01:19 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

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My visual argument conveys my topic, which is the analysis of the Olympic's and subsequent propaganda's effect on civil reform in China. The media often relays an exaggerated negative image of China, which is, in reality, slowly heading towards reform. This image is exaggerated even more greatly in the present, with the Olympics being held in Beijing. Therefore, it is somewhat a balancing effect between the positive and negative effects of images of China portrayed through the media relevant to human rights issues.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 10:07 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

My topic is about the current protest in Tibet. Apparently, the western media and the Chinese media say differently. According to the western media, there exists serious human rights violation in Tibet, while the Chinese say that the human rights in Tibet have actually improved. Where is the truth?

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 09:25 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

My visual argument gives a visual version of my argument, which centers around how different forms of Korean media have caused the solidification of the Westernization of Korean beauty standards and the naturalization of plastic surgery.

*The features used on the after picture were actually taken from popular American and English actresses.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 07:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

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Within the current Kosovo conflict, there are three main political contributors: the Albanians, the Serbians, and NATO. Each group uses its own media and visual rhetoric to construct specific political messages regarding what policies should be established in Kosovo. How the Albanians and the Serbians utilize media reveals deep undercurrents of and reliance on nationalism and ethnonationalistic ideals, while the rhetorical methods NATO uses portrays peacekeepers as an objective force within the region. Although the political views and messages of these groups have received the most attention in recent news, the rhetoric of these three contributors extends along a temporal spectrum as well. The Serbians focus on the past and their belief that Kosovo is their cultural homeland. The Albanians focus on the future and their hopes for what the independent nation of Kosovo will become. NATO focuses on the present and encouraging its soldiers in their mission to preserve peace and ensure security in the region.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 05:07 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

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Our Cultural Interfaces class here at Stanford watched a YouTube video that Mahmoud from the American University in Cairo made as part of his research project (you can find the first of the three parts of the video online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5LlHUID_GI). It was an interesting film to watch, especially as it resonated in a way with our video conference discussion with AUC about Bridge to Baghdad a few weeks ago; getting international perspectives on the US-Iraq conflict was a great opportunity for us to move out of our own particular world view and gain a broader perspective on this highly politically charged issue. (For student reactions to that video conference and those discussions, go here, here, and here).

Our class discussion of this film touched on issues of delivery and content -- namely, given that here at Stanford students are asked to produce fairly formal research papers as well as oral/multimedia presentations, how does the idea of producing a video as the final product for a research project offer possibilities for learning? And, also, how did the content of the video reflect an awareness of audience? What was the argument put forth by the author of the video, and how did the composition of the video contribute to its overall persuasiveness?

We felt very fortunate that Mahmoud was willing to share his work with us -- it provided us with an additional model of research delivery as well as sharing with us a window into one perspective on bin Laden's role in creating the current highly combustible political international climate.

Posted by Christine Alfano at 10:08 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Right before our video conference in the middle of May, Sanaa and Wafaa at American University in Cairo shared with us a youtube video made by one of their students about hiphop in the Middle East (you can watch the first part of the video here). While we weren't able to talk about it during the video conference because of time constraints, the students here in my Stanford Cultural Interfaces class did spend a good portion of today, the last day of our class for Spring Quarter, discussing it. We were all struck by the theme of transnational music that we found both in the video as well as in Bridge to Baghdad (the subject of our May video conference discussion) -- whether it was learning about how urban hiphop has become a vehicle for political expression in the Middle East or, alternately, how American heavy metal has found its way into Iraqi garage bands.

During our conversation today, we also reflected on the role of video as the culmination of a research project. Many students were excited by this idea, speaking to how it might teach them skills they could turn to good use later in life. Others were more hesitant, reflecting on the possibilities that there would be a lot of tech know-how involved in producing such research texts. I know from an administrative perspective, a few years ago our Program in Writing and Rhetoric pulled back from assigning students multimodal projects for that reason. However, perhaps with the new advances in technology (look how easy Apples and iMovie makes it to make a film!), perhaps it is time to rethink our assignments.

In any event, as a class, the film generated some healthy discussion and we felt fortunate that it had been shared with us.

Posted by Christine Alfano at 10:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

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LANGUAGE IS THE KEY
by: Lydia, Alicia, Janessa, Shefali, Charity and Andrea

For our final day of video conference, group LAJACS presented their visual arguments related to each person's research papers.

Janessa's visual argument presented the current Kosovo issues entitled Kosovo Compromise, which was depicted by the map of Kosovo and tinier versions with Serbian and Albanian colors to represent the past and future. Due to technical difficulty, Alicia and Lydia could not present their visuals but gave a great presentation nonetheless. Alicia's research focused on the comparison of Moroccan weddings, French weddings and an American wedding in Las Vegas. Lydia chose to focus on IKEA in China and using statistics of IKEA stores and their business strategies and integrating them into Chinese cultural values and everyday life. Charity presented a before and after image of a Korean woman to convey the power of media and Western influence on the plastic surgery culture/craze in Korea. Shefali used a website depicting artistic works by the youth for the Meth Projects and related this to finding solutions, looking at case studies of other meth projects aside from that of Montana Meth to find strategies to nationalize the project. Andrea presented a visual argument representing China and Japan and how the Nanjing Massacre has affected relations between the two countries

For the final group activity, group LAJACS came up with the LAJACS Conversation Club.
The LAJACS Conversation Club is targeted at students in developing countries, particularly in China. The LAJACS Conversation Club hopes to improve the English conversational skills of Chinese students by connecting English speaking and Chinese speaking students and have a cross-cultural exchange.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 06:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

My visual argument embodies the main point of my paper, which is to analyze how the perspectives of Japan and China have changed since the Nanjing Massacre in 1937. Over the seventy years that have passed since the Nanjing Massacre took place,

both China and Japan have undergone several changes and approaches as to how to deal with an event as significant as the Nanjing Massacre. With the use of several historical texts, photographs, and the releases of documentaries and films, I hope to give a comparison between the sudden emergence of information and different forms of prose and media within China and all over the world and Japan's lack of information on the Nanjing Massacre as seen through the absence of the event in history textbooks.
Through the analysis of all these things, I hope to present an accurate interpretation of Japan's and China's cultural perspectives as well as the current state of political and economic relations.
My visual argument depicts the two countries' flags and the photographs, and movie posters serving as a bridge between the two nations. The photographs used are those taken for documentation during the war and some of them are taken during the present, as several Chinese people commemorate the Nanjing Massacre. There is a noted imbalance of pictures as you can see. There seem to be more pictures on the side of China than in Japan. The significant imbalance of photographs is used to represent Japan's silence and denial regarding this event.
There is one picture on the Japanese flag though. This indicates a slow willingness to share stories of the war, and several scholars attempts to make sense of the Nanjing Massacre in the Japanese perspective. The Japanese public still remains confused, but some have taken it upon themselves to remember and call for reconciliation with China.

Posted by Stanford: Visual Rhetoric Across the Globe at 06:34 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

IKEA is known as a Swedish furniture company selling well-designed products with low prices, but for the Chinese customers, this was not the case when IKEA opened the first store in Shanghai in 1998. Most of the Chinese customers went there just to wander around without buying; only those called “white collar” who get good pay can afford IKEA products because it was too expansive. IKEA became luxury products for the Chinese customers even though IKEA kept its low price strategy in China. IKEA faced many challenges in terms of culture and business practices, as well as the economic and political conditions in China. An important challenge for IKEA is the need to understand the different environments the company operating in. My paper attempts to make sense of some of the unique cultural values affecting the customers’ behavior in China. Understanding the cultural values is an important base for achieving the business and strategic goals in China. Success in doing business in China means understanding cultural values and business practices. According to Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, China is a culture with high power distance and Long-Term Orientation, status symbols and saving money are important in China. By understanding the Confucianism and Taoism which underpin Chinese ways of thinking, we can develop a better understanding the needs of the Chinese customer’s needs and make some adaptations to meet the customers needs. IKEA will be more successful by combining different marketing strategies such as low-price and provide better delivery and assembling service. The development and expansion of the Chinese economy and raised income levels of the Chinese people will make IKEA products become affordable for more potential consumers in the future.

Presentation of IKEA in China
Download file

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