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Chief Religions in Afghanistan include the Sunni and Shia Muslims.
Sunni Muslims account for 80 percent of the population.
• They follow Muhammad and his Hadith (speeches/followings in connection with the Quran). There are six books of the Hadith:
• Sahih al-Bukhari
• Sahih Muslim
• Sunan an-Nasa'ii
• Sunan Abu Dawud
• Sunan at-Tirmidhi
• Sunan ibn Majah
Sunnis also have six schools of law that fill in the gaps in answering questions that the Sunnah and Quran do not address (i.e. free will, etc.). There are the Hanafi Maliki, Shafi’i, and Hanbali schools.

I decided to explore the people of Afghanistan in this cultural post to get a better grasp of the society I am soon to be acquainted with.

First: Ethnic groups in Afghanistan.

I never analyzed this in the past and during research, I was intrigued to find that I had not heard of many of the ethnic groups. This made me realize how closed off I can be from the rest of the world as an American. I will of course strive to change that. I found the ethnic breakdowns on the CIA fact book, but created the chart myself for an easier depiction. People in Afghanistan are called “Afghan” to clear up any confusion.

Link to chart: http://nces.ed.gov/nceskids/createagraph/index.asp?ID=eae7f39691324cb9bc2a00fa14a54669

Pashtun are 42 per cent of the population. They are part of the Eastern Iranic ethnic group and have been the dominant group for over 300 years.

Tajik account for 27 per cent of the Afghan population. Tajiks are Persian-speakers of Iranian descent. I discovered that there are even Chinese Tajiks.

These are the dominant ethnic groups found in present-day Afghanistan.

The fact book estimates that there will be 30,419,928 people in Afghanistan by July 2012.

Most Afghan people are between the ages of 15 and 64, with 42.3 per cent of the population below 14 years old. It is shocking that only two percent of the population living past the age of 65.

There are about 40 births per every 1000 people in Afghanistan.

This concludes the basic facts of society in Afghanistan and I will continue to analyze this in future posts.

“On October 14, 2009 President Obama signed an executive order that restores the White House Initiative and President’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders to address issues concerning the Asian American and Pacific Islander community.” (WHIAAPI)

This weekend, I had the privilege of attending the Southeast Regional Action Summit hosted by Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. Students across the country were in attendance to listen to keynote speaker, Chris Lu, Assistant to the President and Cabinet Secretary, and WHIAAPI Co-chair. Other speakers also contributed, such as WHIAAPI Executive Director Kiran Ahuja, and Hines Ward, the WHIAAPI commissioner. For those of you who aren’t versed in long and confusing acronyms, WHIAAPI refers to White House Initiative on Asian American and Pacific Islanders.

The topics that drew us in for this summit was, simply put, to talk about resources and initiatives related to AAPI community members. They offered information on the foreclosure crisis, and John Trasvina, the Assistant Secretary for Fair Housing in the U.S. Department for Housing and Urban Development, spoke to us about how to avoid foreclosure and preventing loan modification fraud, among other common issues. Later, Shyam Reddy, Region IV Administrator, U.S. General Services Administration and Cassius Butts, Regional IV Administrator, U.S. Small Business Administration, spoke on the topic of growing small business with a concentration on exporting and building capital. A topic that hit home for many in attendance was elaborated upon by Andrew Strait, Public Advocate, U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Seema Nanda, Deputy Special Counsel, U.S. Department of Justice. They spoke about immigration and and refugee communities, and were accompanied by immigration rights officials and organizations. Additionally, Dr. Arlene M. Lester, Captain, U.S. Public Health Service, Regional Minority Health Consultant, Office of the Secretary, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services talked about mental and physical health and resources available pertaining to maintaining a healthy life.

Students and administrators were urged to Tweet, blog, and submit questions to WHIAAPI throughout the day, and their efforts to promote open dialogue were well-received. Many critical questions, as well as compelling stories, were shared and answered throughout the day, and insights were revealed by students and White House officials alike. I was overwhelmed by the impressive rhetoric and thoughts that were raised, and I had a feeling of community and familiarity with a sea of people who seemed passionate and involved in issues that affected not just themselves, but the AAPI community at large.

After researching the Korean language and its history, I think I will be able to learn the language with more understanding. It's important to know how a language developed over the years in order to fully comprehend why somethings sound the way they do. Korean changed over centuries starting with Proto-Korean than to Old Korean, Middle Korean, and now finally, Modern Korean. Konglish (Korean words from English words) was a very interesting subject to learn. It also allowed me to understand why Koreans have such trouble pronouncing some English words. Not all the characters and sounds in English are represented in the Hangul alphabet. 

My next artifact will be a recording of me reading a letter from one of my family members. I would like to do this to represent my understanding of the pronunciation of the letters. I might not be able to understand all the words and phrases, but I hope that if I can read the writing, I will also be able to ask someone what the meaning is. 

I have been practicing reading the Korean hangul language as I have been learning. I learned the complexity of sounds and how it's difficult to relate English letters to Korean characters sometimes. The vowel pronunciations don't change like English vowels depending on the word. Some consonants in Korean change sounds depending on where it is within a character. One of the symbols that looks similar to a backwards S (except with straighter lines) makes a sound between an R and an L. I find that the most difficult to pronounce. When I read, it takes a while to put the sounds together, but I can eventually read most words. I feel very accomplished in being able to do even this little by reading slowly because a couple of weeks ago, Korean letters just looked like scribble scrabble to me. My goals of an extensive vocabulary does seem more difficult than I had imagined. I need to overcome the struggle with simple words before I can move on to much longer phrases. I think my goals are still realistic, but it will just take a lot of practice. 

For my cultural project I have decided to focus on the mandatory involvement of Israeli citizens in the IDF. In my research I would like to explore the affect of this law on nationalism, political activism, community, international perspective, and on culture and society as a whole. Since Israel is a westernized modern first world country, I think this topic is especially important in understanding some of the cultural differences that occur between this nation and countries in Europe or versus the U.S. I think visuals and specific examples will be most successful in conveying this aspect of Israeli culture to an unfamiliar audience.

Having visited back in Israel I am extremely interested in catching up with some of the military related terms that have become mainstream language used daily in Israeli culture. In order to grasp the bigger picture of this culture I plan to research written texts, video clips, photographs, etc. 

In order to gain a more personal perspective, I plan to interview one of the soldiers that accompanied my birthright trip and just recently was released from a paratrooper's unit and ask questions related to his experience of being Israeli prior and after serving in the IDF. 

This week I have made flashcards from all of the vocabulary that I have accumulated over the past six weeks. In order to refine not just the translation of the words, but also their use in literary context, I have created new sentences using the vocabulary in order to practice implementing it. 

I have also started my research for the cultural project which I will be doing on military culture in Israel. I am interested in this topic because service in the IDF is mandatory for the citizens in Israel and is thus immersed into the culture of living there and being an active citizen. This is an experience that I did not and most likely will not partake in as an Israeli citizen because I have spent a majority of my life living in the states. I look forward to learning not only the vocabulary involved in military participation, but also the ideology and its effects on society and political awareness.

This week I have introduced another news source to my regular reading of the news on Ha'aretz in order to try comparing perspectives and political subjections of the source. I think it will take more than a week to come up with this analysis. 

I have additionally enjoyed researching video clips on youtube to get a feel for cultural contexts and mainstream media in Israel.

Lastly I continued reading in my novel.

My partners, Jessy and Sheetal, and I, have decided to make our cultural project focus on the standards of beauty in Korean society. We are going to talk about the influence of Western standards in Korea/Asia, and particularly on the ideals of skin color (light), height (tall), and eyes (big and double-eyelids). While my partner and I were researching, one of our first and most resonating thoughts was that none of those qualities are naturally considered to be Korean. When you think of a tall, light-skinned, and big-eyed lady, do you imagine Lucy Liu or Scarlett Johanson? It makes sense, therefore, to imagine that the standard is based off of a Western look, and consequently, unattainable through natural means. 

As a result, plastic surgery is common and very pervasive in Korean culture. Often, plastic surgery is given as a high school graduation gift for procedures such as eyelid reconstructive, skin bleaching, or nose jobs. Unlike America, beauty is a very narrow consideration in Korea - differences are not celebrated the way that they can be here. The youth emulate pop stars that emulate the most popular artists in America, and the cycle is vicious. Until boys and girls find peace with their natural bodies, plastic surgery will remain prominent in Korean society. 

I already had done some research on blepheroplasty, or eyelid surgery, so I was interested in the other aspects of Korean beauty. I learned a lot about methods of skin whitening, such as bleaching and special creams and lotions, as well as the emphasis put on tall, lean legs. It is fascinating to read about Korean standards of beauty because although I am Korean, I have a different perception of beauty altogether, and I absolutely am not light-skinned, tall, or have double-eyelids. Yet, I am comfortable with my appearance and wonder how I would be received if I went to Korea. 

I have implemented the use of artifacts quite a bit thus far in my study of Hebrew. I have taken advantage of my prior knowledge of the language by watching clips of tv shows, listening to music, and reading a whole assortment of texts. I find these to be supportive in my learning of the language, especially in their ability to place the new vocabulary I am learning not only in linguistic context but in a frame of reference and cultural context of when and by whom it is appropriately used. I have found that there is a lot of specialized vocabulary depending on areas of expertise, vocation, or for example in the military. Such popular fields have also made new words in modern Hebrew become more mainstream and commonly used. One of my goals this semester was to grasp a better understanding of some of the slang that is used that is not officially in the Hebrew dictionary. I anticipate that artifacts such as comedy clips and others will reveal some of this culture and its vocabulary that I am foreign to.

I have spent a majority of my self directed study in Hebrew by reading, so it has been an extremely influential tool for me in my advancement of the language. Reading has provided me not just with the opportunity to learn new vocabulary, but examples of the context in which I can apply that vocabulary, a cultural background for its use, whether it be political, storytelling, street vocabulary, or military slang etc. and has been a great source of engaging me with the process of learning. Some of the ways in which I have sought to apply what I have learned through my reading and retained the new vocabulary is through creating my own sentences with the new words that I am working on adding to my repertoire. One of the weekly tasks I have assigned myself is keeping up with news briefs in Hebrew. After catching up on the news, I write a summary in Hebrew about the article, my opinion, and my thoughts about the author's perspective. Another way I have challenged myself with understanding not only the written aspect of language but its subliminal messages is by trying to interpret political cartoons. This has been difficult because it requires knowledge of political figures and a political context from an Israeli perspective. Both of these tasks have stimulated my interest in discovering the language and teaching myself how to implement what I am learning.

I wrote a card to my Korean friend's mom.

For the free topic cultural post this week I have decided to focus on the culture of arts and creativity in modern Israel and its importance in unifying a diverse body of people in the relatively young nation. State formation required not only the obvious variables of law, governance, education, a common language, and army, but also a core culture that people could identify with and value. Israel saw immigration from over 100 nations with immigrants who had been indentured in assimilation and the culture and linguistics of their homeland. Arriving in Israel was not just a challenge economically, but also in creating a sense of identity in place which they could take ownership in and raise new generations within a specifically Israeli culture. For this reason, the arts in Israel have prospered intensively especially in the era of technology. For a nation that is ultimately westernized and adopts many aspects of American and European culture, Israel is home to unique radio shows, TV series, music artists of all genres imaginable, world renowned artists, movie and theatre productions, etc. One of the sites that I was excited to stumble upon detailed all the yearly festivals that are held in Israel. I was previously familiar with parades that are held for national and religious holidays, however, I was excited to find out about unique festivals that include story telling, children's theatre, belly dancing, and jazz, just to name a few. These can be found on popular social media websites under CultureIL. I also found in my research that Israel is home to the highest number of museums per capita in the world! I thought I had been to quite a few myself, but clearly there are dozens I've never heard of. One of my favorite experiences with Israeli arts has been the Nachalat Benyamin arts and crafts market. Every Tuesday and Friday a main street in Tel Aviv is closed off for local artists to set up booths, sell and display the work. It is a great opportunity for no-name artists to get their talent out and it is genuinely beautiful and ranges from woodwork to glasswork, jewelry, to painting and ceramics. This personal interaction with the artist is one of the great things I value about the Israeli culture of the arts.

In week five I set out to combine the personal pronouns and verbs I’ve learned to form an array of simple sentences that will (hopefully) open the door for conversational competency. At times, Modern Hebrew's personal pronouns can be confusing. To give the most obvious, and frequently commented on example according to my instructor;

“he”=she (fem. sing.) and

“who”=he (masc. sing.)

Once you turn off the English speaker distortion goggles, this doesn’t become a challenge. However, personal pronouns, and the verbs they connect to, do morph based on gender. For example: 

ata ohev gvina=I (male) like cheese, while: 

at ohevit gevina=I (female) like cheese

This doesn’t provide an immediate challenge. However, it will be something to keep in mind when forming basic sentences. 

SDLAP_learningplan.docx

This week in MLC 110 I accomplished the following:

-Writing:  I wrote out 15 sentences utilizing the main interrogative words (who, what, where, when) -- have not studied "why" yet, as it is much more complex than the other four interrogatives.  The sentences helped me gain a better sense of the word order that one uses when utilizing the question words, because at first the word order when using these interrogatives was quite confusing for me.

-Grammar:  Memorized 7 post-positions (especially ka) -- and worked on Usha Jain's exercises in the "Introduction to Elementary Hindi Grammar" book for the "ka" postposition (of or belonging to me, you, we, he, she).

-Listening and reading:  Completed all the activities and listened to all the lessons about "Kinship" on the Defense Language Institute (Foreign Language Center)'s website for Hindi as preparation for next week's focus on family life and hobbies. URL is available here: http://gloss.dliflc.edu/products/gloss/hnd_soc321/hnd_soc321_act1.html.  This activity took me a very long time to complete because of the amount of Hindi reading that was involved, which I am still quite slow at accomplishing, since I am a beginner.

-Vocabulary:  Most of my vocabulary that I learned this week was based on interrogative words and postpositions, since they are completely different from Punjabi.  I studied the main interrogatives, yes/no indicators, and the postpositions.

My first artifact was well received by my Grandma. She loved it! My mom is visiting soon and will be bringing a letter for my grandma and her response. I would like for my next artifact to be of a recording of me reading the letter to show that I have learned to pronounce words better. I will also post the translation of the letter. My goals for week 4 and week 5 were to understand how to ask questions and how to answer questions. My goal was to be able to know answers to common questions and responses for what to say when I don't know what someone is asking. My language partner taught me what is most commonly said and questions that are most commonly asked. I learned that Koreans often mention eating in conversations because it is polite to make sure people are well fed. I achieved my learning goals with the help of my language partner and by additional research online. I learned that responses to even yes or no questions vary depending on how formal one person must talk to the other. Hierarchy is very important to every conversation even what would seem to be a casual small talk conversation. There is definitely more for me to learn because questions and answers and endless. I am confident with the words I did learn and think that I am on the right track towards my ultimate goals of communication with my Grandma and also traveling in South Korea. 

Evaluation of Artifact 1: 

I think I did a pretty good job! I created a video of myself talking, greeting an invisible person, introducing myself, asking who they were, then telling them about who I am. There were certainly a couple words I stumbled over, but I showed Anna the video and she said she could understand everything I was attempting to say! For me, to have a native speaker be able to understand what I'm trying to say is the greatest accomplishment when it comes to learning a foreign language. It gives me confidence going forward as I try to learn new aspects of Norwegian. Certainly what I said was not flawless, but for a novice with no experience with germanic languages (outside of English), I feel pretty good at where I am at. 

Assessment of Goals + Reflection: 

I feel that I accomplished all of my goals. I'm certainly able to express greetings, farewells, and introductions both orally and written. If a random Norwegian came up to me right now and introduced themselves I think I would be prepared to reply to them. Again, my pronunciation is still not perfect, nor do I think it ever will be. I find myself adding a French accent to certain words or letters. My brain has certainly created a binary of expressing and understanding English and expressing and understanding French. When I try to do a foreign accent my mind just reverts to the latter section. Adding a new section for Norwegian with a significantly different accent is still quite difficult for me. Anna says my accent is cute, but I'm annoyed when I can't say the word entirely correct.  But I feel, at least for the basics, I've done as well as I can for now.  

Ancient Hebrew in a Modern Context

In order to prove that learning Hebrew is not useless (not that anyone would argue such), one need look no further than The Economist. A Hebrew word appears in the title of the recent article “Shares and shibboleths”. A shibboleth (שבלת) is literally translated as meaning the part of a plant containing grains. However, its adoption into modern English stems from the biblical story recorded in the Book of Judges. In the story, shibboleth is used as a sort of passcode to differentiate between locals (people with the familiar pronunciation) and outsiders.

Pretty cool stuff. I’ve posted the link to the original article as well as a link to a Wikipedia explanation.

original article:

http://www.economist.com/node/21550273

Wikipedia on shibboleth:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibboleth

During this week I focused on learning more about a current debate in Sweden surrounding a recent proposal to implement a 40% mandatory quota for women in the board of directors of businesses. This proposal was made by the Social Democrats and has been a highly debated topic since Norway's recent adoption of this same law. In order to understand the diversity of opinions and arguments for the quota system I have followed media coverage in several news sources and listened to interviews with top representatives of political parties, feminist groups, and the Swedish organization for enterprises. The following are some of the articles I have read:

Interview with a female representative from the Organization of Swedish Enterprises

http://www.newsmill.se/artikel/2011/09/23/lika-inte-s-rskilda-r-ttigheter-arkelsten
Interview
http://www.expressen.se/debatt/kvotering-fungerar---se-bara-pa-norge/
http://www.dn.se/nyheter/valet-2010/norsk-kvotering-gav-hojd-kompetens
http://www.svd.se/naringsliv/karriar/ratar-norges-modell_2051167.svd

Through reading of these articles and discussing the topic further with my language partner I have also expanded my vocabulary in the areas of argumentation and related vocabulary.

jämställdhet: gender equality

särbehandling

rättigheter

måltavla: target

särskildt: particular

likabehandling: equal treatment

kvotering: quota

bolagstyrelse: Board of directors

egenskapar: personal skills

målriktaded: goal driven

undersökning: research study

motsatset: the counter

jämfor med: compare with

talesperson: representative