#CfP für die #Tagung "#Interkulturelle Begegnungen – #Intercultural Encounters. Sprachen und #Literaturen im interkulturellen Kontext", die am 15. und 16. Oktober 2024 an der Pannonischen Universität Veszprém stattfinden wird.
#RamadanMubarak for all who celebrate! In my class, #Ramadan always is an important family ritual for many children and they are happy to let me take part in it. Towards the sunset, I receive photos and videos of the prepared food at home via the school platform, and once we broke the fast together at school at beautifully laid tables and with lanterns in the windows. The children also celebrate Christmas, Advent & Easter with the same enthusiasm!
Distance works in time as well as space. Frequency of contact indicates closeness, so contacting someone often can be a transgression. Rather than 'getting to know you better,' they can maintain the same distance as the circumstances when you first met. Thus, many foreigners say they can't make friends with Japanese.
Much use of silence. Large private self vs. small public self. The same act, such as posting one's photo & real name online, falls into the public #self of Westerners but the private self of Japanese.
Most Japanese are undemonstrative of emotions & affection. Standing close or touching them can easily be taken as a sexual or presumptuous invasion of their private realm.
Japanese feel personal space palpably. They make a cutting #gesture when passing someone closely.
The #conference "Nordsüdlicher Divan. #Intercultural Worldmaking in #Literature and #Film from Europe and the Global South" will take place at the University of Illinois Chicago (#thisisUIC) on November 2-3, 2023.
"U.S. Culture and Multiculturalism": A longtime professor in Japan looks back at the U.S. in terms of culture. See this self-explanatory slideshow for Thai and Japanese university participants on what culture is, world cultures and values, and comparative culture. For example, you can see intercultural communication research findings on where the U.S., Japan, and Thailand stand on the cultural dimension of individualism vs. collectivism. The presentation aims for objectivity, so you can draw your own conclusions: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/374143089_US_Culture_and_Multiculturalism