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     This week, I accomplished one of my goals in presentational speaking, where I wanted to learn how to talk about different types of educational background. For example, in the U.S., there are different levels of education, such as high school and college. In South Korea, they also have these different levels, but I was always confused on how to say it in Korean. Therefore, I was able to learn what elementary school, middle school, high school, and college meant in Korean. Since I keep forgetting these terms, my language exchange partner helped me look at the roots of these words (like you do in Latin) to help me make the connection better. For instance, middle school in Korean is “joong hak-kyo,” where the first part means “middle” and the second part means “school.” Although this is a very simple connection, it helped me a lot to break down the words because now I can realize the words with “joong” can reference "middle." A simple application is to the word "middle school student," which is simply “joong hak-saeng,” as we can see that "joong" was used to describe "middle." This can also be applied to saying "joong-soon," which can reference the middle of the month. I also have a hard time remembering this term, so this helped me learn both terms!

     Therefore, I think it was very helpful to find a way to break down parts of these words because it helps me make connections to other words in Korean.   

     Some of my cultural goals are incorporated into my learning plan in the interpretive communication section because I want to learn about these topics to be able to talk about them with other individuals, such as family and friends. One topic that I was interested in learning about is South Korea’s bird, tree, flower, animal, and etc. I am interested in learning these cultural aspects because I know what they are are for my state (Virginia) and country (U.S.), which is why I was curious to learn what these were in South Korea. I can explore this topic by researching about it and watching videos that discuss this manner.

 
    Along with this topic, I want to also learn the early historical myths in South Korea and understand what the national anthem means in English. Since I just came back from studying abroad in South Korea last semester, I am very interested in looking at the similarities and differences between the cultures in South Korea to that of the U.S. Therefore, I will use this semester to explore these ideas!

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In both of these readings, they stated the factors that make the language and the culture of each country unique from others. In Figuring Foreigners Out, the author mentions how the the two extremes ends of each spectrums, such as individualist/collectivist, nonverbal communication, monochronic/polychronic, internal/external, direct/indirect, affect countries to be different from one another. Hofstede also states a similar claim with ideas such as the power distance index, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty tolerance index, and long term orientation.

I agree with the statements made in both readings, and I believe the differences in countries based on these ideas is evident and quite distinct. For example, America is more focused on the idea of being individualists, while Asian countries, including South Korea, are more focused on the idea of being collectivists. In the U.S, people are more focused on being an individual and the idea of “every man for themselves”. They emphasize individual goals, and the achievement one makes on his or her own. In Korea, people are more focused on the concept of group or family. They believe that one must take his or her own responsibilities and provide for the group or family. There is a strong sense of membership, and the sense of cooperation and harmony is stressed, which is also proven by the Hofstede map.

Both Figuring Foreigners Out and the Hofstede Dimensions of Culture defined 6 dimensions of culture: individualism, power distance, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance, long term orientation and indulgence. Of these 6 dimensions, 4 of these dimensions are considered significant. First, individualism measures the degree that a society enforces individual or collective achievements and relationships. Second, power distance measures the degree of acceptance of equality or inequality between people. Third, masculinity measures the dominant values of a society driven either by competition and success or caring for others and quality of life. Finally, uncertainty avoidance measures the degree of tolerance for uncertainty in society.

Through these measuring standards, we are able to evaluate and see the different values that an individual who lives in that country may hold more strongly than another. Peoples' cultural outlooks thus affect their use of non-verbal communication or being less direct, committing more individualistic choices, being monochronic versus polychronic, and amount of control an individual has of their future. An action that may mean something in one culture may hold no meaning in another in which the message is lost to the person receiving it. Due to these differences, we are able to understand why it may be difficult for foreigners to acclimate to a new country as they communicate and process actions and words very differently. 

I readily agree with the Hofstede Dimensions of Culture in that it takes key aspects of culture which affect the core values of people and which in turn affects their actions and thought processing. Related to me, the United states and Korea are very different in all dimensions of culture. While the U.S. tends to be a more individualistic, success defined by achievement, and a less rule structured society, South Korea tends to be a more collectivist, success defined by quality of life and a very structured society. Looking back, I can see the differences in culture by the way that I could address people older than me, differences in perspectives of certain jobs, as well as emphasis on different things in life. 

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The reading Figuring foreigners Out introduce two notions of personal identity. Individualist and collectivist. Individualist values their own happiness above others while collectivist concern about their role in a group. Cultures have both identities, but the problem is the same behavior may have different meanings. We can categorize the nonverbal behaviors into three categories. First is that the behavior means the same in the target culture. Second is that the behavior means different in your target language. The third is that the nonverbal meaning has no meaning in your target language.

People’s conception of time also differs in various cultures. Monochronic means time is limited and quantifiable. Polychronic is that time is unlimited. The biggest cultural differences are probably whether people believe the locus of control comes from internal or external. This may greatly change ones ’perception to the event in life. We can see from the 6-D model of national culture shows that American people tend to be individualism while Asians are more viewed as collectivism. One of the models raises my interest. American tends to have short-term plans while Asians put emphasis on short-term benefits. I agree with this assessment. With the pressure of purchasing an apartment, people in Asian tends to be more focus on the short-term benefit. People work day to night for high pay and therefore lower their standard of living.

I think since Korea and China are all Asian countries, we share a similar value. We have similar working and social environment so the way we use language to describe everyday life can be regarded as highly identical. I think this similarity is a privilege since it would help my language understanding. I would understand the scenarios faster thus have a better language intuition.

     According to the Levels of Competence, I would rate my speaking in between Intermediate-Developing 2 and Advanced-Expanding 1. Although I am the most confident in speaking Korean, I always have room to improve. Therefore, I am not sure if I am an advanced speaker yet, which is why I can always increase my vocabulary and fluency in speaking. As for writing, I would say I am an Intermediate-Developing 2 because I was able to work on my writing skills while I was abroad in South Korea, last semester. Nevertheless, I can always work on learning the grammatical rules for writing. Lastly, I would say that I am the weakest in reading because I have had the least experience with developing this skill.

     Through SDLC 112, I want to mainly focus on developing my reading skills for Korean because I need the most help with it. I really want to increase my reading comprehension by learning how to understand what I am reading in a faster and more clear dynamic. Although this is my main goal, I will also work on developing my speaking and writing skills. I will dedicate 2 hours on Wednesdays to work on these goals with my learning partner and I will schedule other times during the week to put into practice what I have learned.

Angella Lee's Learning Plan (Initial)

There is no doubt that culture is the breeding ground of value and character. Both the article ‘Figuring Foreigners Out’ and the analysis of Skim Geert Hofstede bring out the notion that people from different cultures might form different values.

The results are really interesting. Take the monochronic and polychronic as the example. People from different culture handle time differently. I totally agree with this conception. When I travel to Hongkong, citizen there is more tendency toward monochronic. They believe time is a commodity which is quantifiable. People I work with really pay attention with time and they always have a sense of urgency in many matters. However, when I went to Norway for my vocation, people there are more polychronic. They usually have leisure. This clearly shows that people will have different characters because of different culture and country.

I also love the part talking about direct communication and indirect communication. Grown up in China, I am more tending to speak indirectly. Chinese tend to be collectivist and tend to infer, suggest, and imply rather than say things directly. During China’s long feudalism history, seignior has superior power and other peasants, inferior citizens, need to follow their order completely. Saying directly might lead to the fury of seignior. In this case, people are tending to speak indirectly. Even nowadays, in the democratic republican country, there are a lot of group activities, so people are really aware of the unity of the group. However, in the Western world, people will speak directly and to get direct answers. The great thing is that in Korea, people are more tending to speak indirectly. They are usually more aware of social stratum.

At the end of my journal, I want to quote one sentence from the article, even though I do not totally agree with it. ‘Culture is more often a source of conflict than of synergy. Cultural differences are a nuisance at best and often a disaster.’

The reading tried to make a spectrum with two extremes for the four cultural concepts, but I think one culture can't be just leaning towards one or the other. Everyone has both extremes used in different situations. In my opinion, everyone is an individualist to some degree. However, they are also able to excel in group settings and can have a larger meaning in a group. In addition, I have a different interpretation on the topic about time being monochronic and polychronic. Time definitely is finite for everyone and wise usage is encouraged. People always adjust schedules, but efficiency is not defined by the ability to do one thing at a time. Instead it is the ability to maximize work done towards a goal in a finite time whether it may be one or multiple, it is what defines efficiency. Interruptions aren't a nuisance but just a change in course towards a goal and adjustments are made to make wise usage of time. For the discussion of internal versus external, it is true that there are circumstances that are set. But, change in one's life is still possible. There are things out of our control like luck, however, it should not determine the outcome. The outcome depends on how well an individual maximizes the effect of good luck and minimizes the effect of bad luck. Finally, direct and indirect communications is used all the time and it is hard to distinguish whether a culture is more direct or indirect than the other.

One thing I could relate to my own native culture is the reading on nonverbal communication. In Korean culture, the act of eye-contact is considered disrespectful whereas in the American culture it is good to make eye contact while having a conversation. After immigrating to United States, I have several miscommunication experiences due to the difference in cultural meaning. I think it is very important to be aware of the difference in meaning of various behaviors so that you are able to express your true intention. 

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Figuring Foreigners Out and Hofstede Dimensions of Culture broadly categorizes one's native culture and the target culture and explores the differences between them. It includes ideas such as the individualist vs. collectivist, differences in nonverbal communication, monochronic vs. polychronic, internal vs. external, and direct vs. indirect communication. I agree that different cultures could have more emphasis on one over the other but in general, they consist of elements of both sides. For the individualist vs. collectivist category, I think American culture leans more on the importance of the individual, while Korean culture is quite the opposite. In America, you grow up hearing often about how everyone is a special snowflake and how individuals rights are valued. I found it interesting that the reading mentioned this quote, "Koreans believe that to accomplish something while causing unhappiness or discomfort to individuals is to accomplish nothing at all." I think in Korea, the importance of family drives the actions of the individual. Even the hierarchy within the family is a major aspect of Korean family culture. When I looked at Geert Hofstede's collectivism-individualism world map, I noticed how America is a very dark purple, while Korea is a very pale purple on a range of white meaning collectivist and dark purple meaning individualist. It's interesting to see a visualization of how different countries actually are based on these categories of differences.

Both Figuring Foreigners Out and the Hofstede Dimensions of Culture attempt to place international cultures into certain ‘categories’ on a spectrum of two ends. Figuring Foreigners Out made a lot of interesting points, some commonly heard before and some commonly not. These include concepts of the individualist vs collectivist societies, monochronic vs polychronic societies, internal vs external societies, and societies depending on direct vs indirect communication. The monochronic vs polychronic society was a completely new concept I had never even thought of before. I hear so much in the U.S. that “time is money,” but I wonder if those sentiments exist in Turkey. However, I could not help but feel as if some points were just too general. For instance, that behavior does not have an inherit meaning and that meaning is only given when assigned by people. There are cases where this is not true, and these cases are huge in how we communicate. The biggest example is of facial expressions. Several studies have found that facial expressions, such as those of happiness and fear, are virtually the same across all cultures and countries, even remote native tribes with barely any contact from the Western world. This is a very huge pillar of nonverbal communication, yet this text makes it seem as if nonverbal communications are just too different across cultures and a foreigner will be doomed to not have any form of nonverbal communication right off the bat when entering another country.

The Hofstede Dimensions of Culture continued with the trend of shoe horning the vast amount of cultures into the world into a dichotomous spectrum. This is not entirely a bad thing, but it may impede in our ability to truly connect with something if we simply feel it is too ‘foreign’ rather than simply another way of being human. Another culture may simply just be seen as far too ‘different’ and impenetrable, and a foreigner too stuck in their ways to change. The piece of text that greatest gave me this impression is the quote of Hofstede himself provided in the second link: "Culture is more often a source of conflict than of synergy. Cultural differences are a nuisance at best and often a disaster." This is not someone open to accepting another culture or learning about them, but rather one who just wants to see another culture as some sort of set difference that he would rather just avoid altogether. The ‘dimensions’ he mentions on his website seem very short-sighted. There is a lot of variation in the underpinnings of each culture on a lot of these topics, such as with the ‘femininity-masculinity’ scale. A lot of the scales were just a bit bizarre, to be honest. Though I can understand that some of these scales have some truth to them, it just does not seem the scales were constructed on the right type of premise and that they generalize a bit too much. The U.S. and Turkey both fell in categories I expected, such as the U.S. being very individualist and Turkey being moderately collectivist and individualist (I expected Turkey to lean a little more on collectivism actually), and the U.S. not having a large power distance while Turkey had a moderate amount. All in all, I appreciate what truths the Hofstede scales have to offer, I simply do not think they should be the only reference to understanding a culture as they are very limited.

After reviewing my lesson plan and the track that my lessons are on currently, I think it would be best to focus on interpretive listening and interpretive writing, since those are the two skills that i would be able to apply most frequently to my day-to-day Korean interactions. From the feedback that I got from my Korean teacher Jimin, she also agrees that interpretive listening and interpretive writing would be best to work on, since it would apply to me best and it would be the areas where I would be able to show the most improvement. While a lot of the tasks that I have in my learning plan focus on interpretive reading as well, I think those tasks are all connected and would benefit me holistically. 

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I have designed my learning plan focusing on improving my familiarity with the language rather than learning any particular skill. Because I have some background knowledge on my target language, I wanted to improve on applying in real life and expand its range of usage by improving on fluency. I did learn some new Korean slangs that could allow me to have better conversations with native speakers.

Rather than using a lot of textbooks, I decided to use many online sources where I can visually see better as I am a tactile and visual learner. Some grammar works will be done with textbooks, but most of the exercises will involve analyzing videos and actively speaking and applying in real conversation. I have included some cultural activities such as eating at a Korean restaurant and watching movies to gain more cultural experience while learning my new language. 

I am self motivated to improve on my own Korean skills. I grew up with my parents speaking informal Korean in my house. However, it wasn't enough to fluently speak outside of the house with other native Koreans. Once I visited Korean once, I noticed how foreign I was to the native people. I wanted to regain my roots again and improving my Korean skill will improve my relationships with my Korean family members. 

The “Figuring Foreigners Out” article identifies several ways that cultures differs: individualist vs. collectivist, nonverbal communications, monochromic vs polychromic, etc. The notion of individualistic versus collectivist identities that are found within all cultures, though no one single culture is exclusively individualist or collectivist, I can see how countries such as the United States places an emphasis on individualist more. This manifests in the form of self-autonomy, First Amendment rights, etc. I predominantly agree with the article’s various arguments on how different cultures have general trends in personality but not everyone within the community act the same way. This reminds me of anthropology’s definition of culture, that it is shared yet contested, meaning that each individual interprets cultural rules and values differently because we have different experiences, desires, and needs. The experiment conducted by Dr. Hofstede attempts to categorize countries base on different dimension and rate their inclination or the lack thereof respective to that dimension. Based on this map, it shows that my native culture, China, as well as my target language culture, Korea, is very collectivist focused whereas United States is completely on the other end of the spectrum, very individualist focused. I think the most interesting I found looking at these maps is the underlying historical circumstances that has prompted the various developments of cultural norms and values.

For this semester, the learning plan for Greek for Daniel Kunath will be organized like a very basic grade school course.  Beginning with the simplest tools and developing into more advanced vocabulary and usage as the semester progresses, it should bring me up to an almost conversational level of Greek proficiency by December.  It includes some weeks set aside for understanding the Greek culture, in the past and present, to grow a greater understanding of Greek life and people.

For this semester, the learning plan for Greek for Daniel Kunath will be organized like a very basic grade school course.  Beginning with the simplest tools and developing into more advanced vocabulary and usage as the semester progresses, it should bring me up to an almost conversational level of Greek proficiency by December.  It includes some weeks set aside for understanding the Greek culture, in the past and present, to grow a greater understanding of Greek life and people.

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My learning plan focuses on speaking and my goal for this semester is to learn basic everyday conversations. I have detailed objectives listed in my learning plan, including learning a K-pop song, understanding Korean drama and writing short paragraphs. My language partner and I agreed that we should start with vowels and consonant. Therefore, we set up goals to learn basic vowels and consonants in 3 weeks and then we would proceed to sentence composition.

My interest in learning Korean starts with the popularity of K-pop culture. I love to listen to K-pop songs and watch Korean dramas. Therefore, I want to learn Korean, so I could be able to understand them. Learning Korean could also help me to understand more about their culture, and how it is developed over the years.

After reading the feedback, I think I should make the plan more detailed, so I could keep track of my own pace every week. I decided to keep a weekly journal after I learned basic sentence composition. The journal could help me learn more vocabulary and grammar rules, and help me with my language learning process.

I organized my self-directed learning plan to suit speaking a language rather than trying to learn a language. I've always thought of language as a formula and a puzzle; however, after watching the TED talks video, just speaking the language will be much more efficient in getting fluent. I've learned a lot of Korean slangs so far, and it is really interesting to see ones that are so creative! I found interesting books to aid me in my studies. Learning more and more about Korean will allow me to understand the lifestyle Korean students live, which will ultimately lead me to my study abroad in Korea. I really wanted to study abroad in Korea, and that motivated me to really learn the language deeply.Goals%20paper.docx