Day of Diversity
Feb. 13th, 2007 09:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Today I went to a conference of for people at my workplace who work in student affairs and the theme was diversity. I picked a session on blocking conversation on diversity, one on bilingualism, one on South Asians, and one on accommodating people with disabilities.
The conference was not as effective for me as one might wish, but I did learn some interesting things.
**
In the session on conversations about diversity, the point was supposed to be that some things that people commonly say effectively block further discussion on diversity issues. Examples included:
* "Sorry if I offended you, but ..." - the person is not even willing to discuss whether offense was taken let alone any details. One quote I liked: "Apologies are not if-then statements."
* "I don't see color, I see fairness." - the person has already decided that the process is fair.
* "If they don't like it, they don't have to participate." - it does not occur to the person to try to think of something that people would actually like.
We talked about not talking like this and about responding to people who do say things like this when you don't want conversation blocked.
My problem is that I saw two different situations. The first is where you find out that you have actually bothered someone. In this case, it makes sense to find out what bothered them so that you can refrain from doing so again. Also, you can get interesting stories out of them this way.
The second is where you are dealing with a large group of people and fear you might offend someone. The example is student workers who deserve an award for their hard work, and it is decided that the reward will be cute little gifts of Easter candies in fake grass. Yes, someone might be offended by something with a religious name. But you can't keep from offending people just by pretending that religion, race, and gender don't exist because people are bothered by all kinds of things. Other people who might not appreciate Easter candy include diabetics, people allergic to chocolate, people on diets, people who don't like chocolate, people who have had a traumatic experience involving bunnies, and who knows who else. You can go crazy trying to cater to imagined feelings of everyone in a large group of people.
**
There was a session on bilingualism--why it's good to learn another language and how to do so.
I loved the opening joke. What do you call a person who speaks three languages? Trilingual. (I'm not done with the joke yet.) What do you call a person who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks one language? American.
Less than 10% of Americans speak more than one language fluently, whereas just over 50% of Europeans are fluent in more than one language. Well, I'm guessing that's because in the US, you can travel quite a bit and still be in the same country, with the same primary language. In Europe, the countries are so small and adjacent ones often have different languages and sometimes there are language borders within countries. It makes perfect sense for more of them to be multilingual, and it makes perfect sense for more of us to speak one language.
Good reasons we were given for learning another language:
* Hispanics are expected to make up over 50% of the population of Texas by the year 2010. So, Spanish can come in handy for Texans. Of course most Hispanics in Texas do speak English, but still, many don't speak English well, and it's nice to have an extra language to try when trying to communicate.
* Even babies with good hearing can learn sign language more quickly than spoken language, which makes things less frustrating for all concerned. Also, learning sign language improves their acquisition of spoken language.
* If your company tries to do business someplace with a different language, they should learn it and not rely on possibly misleading translations of slogans. Also, interpreters are expensive. And really good ones, like you'd want for vital communications, are very expensive.
* Learning a language exercises your brain.
Mostly they just said that a lot of people in the world don't speak English. Well, we're hardly going to learn every other language in the world. Even people who are fluent in 20 languages can't communicate verbally with just anyone at all.
They also brought up a lot of examples where not quite knowing another language can get you into trouble. Frankly, that information is more likely to keep me from wanting to learn a new language because I'm just not very good and might never become fluent.
The hints for learning a new language were relegated to the last five minutes of the session. Books, tapes, classes, conversation. We got some websites for both lessons and places to meet with people, so that might turn out to be helpful.
**
The session on South Asians started off with them asking us to write down what we think of when we think of South Asians. I didn't feel comfortable spewing a bunch of stereotypes. Then we learned a little about about intergenerational differences between first- and second-generation immigrants.
I learned that the main country of descent for Asians in the US is China, followed by Korea, followed by India. I would have guessed Thailand over Korea, so that's interesting. I guess the Thai have just been more visible to me.
I also learned a new word, "Desi," pronounced DAY-see. I've never noticed this word, but most people around me have. In some Indian language (I forget which), this means "of the country." So things made in India are referred to as "Desi" and compared (unfavorably!) to imported items. When people of South Asian descent refer to their culture, they might use a term describing a country (such as Pakistani) or a religion (Sikh) or a language (Tamilian) or they could use the term Desi. Sometimes second- or third-generation immigrants will refer to first-generation immigrants in an eye-rolly way: "She's so Desi."
I also learned that most South Asians who immigrated to the US did so after 1965 in the US's attempt to find professionals in areas like engineering. Entire families of well-educated folks came over. This contrasts to pre-1965 immigration which was much more rare and which involved mostly male farmers who came alone--they were not allowed to bring their families. Many of these immigrants in California married women of Mexican descent.
**
The session on disability mostly covered the kinds of services available for students. One nice thing is that our center for students with disabilities researches the disabilities of everyone who wants to use their services and gets documentation. So then when a professor gets approached to make accommodations for a student, the professor doesn't have to worry about whether the student really has a legitimate need because this has already been researched.
However, they did not address my bias that I have trouble imagining a situation where it levels the playing field to allow some students to have more time to take tests, etc. They did make available some pamphlets at the end, and maybe these will convince me.
**
We also had breakfast, lunch, and snack, and I sat at tables with interesting people this time, which was just lovely.
Except two different people called me a wild woman. If you know me, and especially if you only sort of know me, you know that I am not a wild woman. I am that quiet one who you can barely even notice. But now at least two people are spreading the rumor that beneath this calm exterior is--what? A party animal? I don't know exactly. Odd.
We also got a lot of free giveaways that I don't want such as plastic cups and pads of paper with company or department names all over them.
The conference was not as effective for me as one might wish, but I did learn some interesting things.
**
In the session on conversations about diversity, the point was supposed to be that some things that people commonly say effectively block further discussion on diversity issues. Examples included:
* "Sorry if I offended you, but ..." - the person is not even willing to discuss whether offense was taken let alone any details. One quote I liked: "Apologies are not if-then statements."
* "I don't see color, I see fairness." - the person has already decided that the process is fair.
* "If they don't like it, they don't have to participate." - it does not occur to the person to try to think of something that people would actually like.
We talked about not talking like this and about responding to people who do say things like this when you don't want conversation blocked.
My problem is that I saw two different situations. The first is where you find out that you have actually bothered someone. In this case, it makes sense to find out what bothered them so that you can refrain from doing so again. Also, you can get interesting stories out of them this way.
The second is where you are dealing with a large group of people and fear you might offend someone. The example is student workers who deserve an award for their hard work, and it is decided that the reward will be cute little gifts of Easter candies in fake grass. Yes, someone might be offended by something with a religious name. But you can't keep from offending people just by pretending that religion, race, and gender don't exist because people are bothered by all kinds of things. Other people who might not appreciate Easter candy include diabetics, people allergic to chocolate, people on diets, people who don't like chocolate, people who have had a traumatic experience involving bunnies, and who knows who else. You can go crazy trying to cater to imagined feelings of everyone in a large group of people.
**
There was a session on bilingualism--why it's good to learn another language and how to do so.
I loved the opening joke. What do you call a person who speaks three languages? Trilingual. (I'm not done with the joke yet.) What do you call a person who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks one language? American.
Less than 10% of Americans speak more than one language fluently, whereas just over 50% of Europeans are fluent in more than one language. Well, I'm guessing that's because in the US, you can travel quite a bit and still be in the same country, with the same primary language. In Europe, the countries are so small and adjacent ones often have different languages and sometimes there are language borders within countries. It makes perfect sense for more of them to be multilingual, and it makes perfect sense for more of us to speak one language.
Good reasons we were given for learning another language:
* Hispanics are expected to make up over 50% of the population of Texas by the year 2010. So, Spanish can come in handy for Texans. Of course most Hispanics in Texas do speak English, but still, many don't speak English well, and it's nice to have an extra language to try when trying to communicate.
* Even babies with good hearing can learn sign language more quickly than spoken language, which makes things less frustrating for all concerned. Also, learning sign language improves their acquisition of spoken language.
* If your company tries to do business someplace with a different language, they should learn it and not rely on possibly misleading translations of slogans. Also, interpreters are expensive. And really good ones, like you'd want for vital communications, are very expensive.
* Learning a language exercises your brain.
Mostly they just said that a lot of people in the world don't speak English. Well, we're hardly going to learn every other language in the world. Even people who are fluent in 20 languages can't communicate verbally with just anyone at all.
They also brought up a lot of examples where not quite knowing another language can get you into trouble. Frankly, that information is more likely to keep me from wanting to learn a new language because I'm just not very good and might never become fluent.
The hints for learning a new language were relegated to the last five minutes of the session. Books, tapes, classes, conversation. We got some websites for both lessons and places to meet with people, so that might turn out to be helpful.
**
The session on South Asians started off with them asking us to write down what we think of when we think of South Asians. I didn't feel comfortable spewing a bunch of stereotypes. Then we learned a little about about intergenerational differences between first- and second-generation immigrants.
I learned that the main country of descent for Asians in the US is China, followed by Korea, followed by India. I would have guessed Thailand over Korea, so that's interesting. I guess the Thai have just been more visible to me.
I also learned a new word, "Desi," pronounced DAY-see. I've never noticed this word, but most people around me have. In some Indian language (I forget which), this means "of the country." So things made in India are referred to as "Desi" and compared (unfavorably!) to imported items. When people of South Asian descent refer to their culture, they might use a term describing a country (such as Pakistani) or a religion (Sikh) or a language (Tamilian) or they could use the term Desi. Sometimes second- or third-generation immigrants will refer to first-generation immigrants in an eye-rolly way: "She's so Desi."
I also learned that most South Asians who immigrated to the US did so after 1965 in the US's attempt to find professionals in areas like engineering. Entire families of well-educated folks came over. This contrasts to pre-1965 immigration which was much more rare and which involved mostly male farmers who came alone--they were not allowed to bring their families. Many of these immigrants in California married women of Mexican descent.
**
The session on disability mostly covered the kinds of services available for students. One nice thing is that our center for students with disabilities researches the disabilities of everyone who wants to use their services and gets documentation. So then when a professor gets approached to make accommodations for a student, the professor doesn't have to worry about whether the student really has a legitimate need because this has already been researched.
However, they did not address my bias that I have trouble imagining a situation where it levels the playing field to allow some students to have more time to take tests, etc. They did make available some pamphlets at the end, and maybe these will convince me.
**
We also had breakfast, lunch, and snack, and I sat at tables with interesting people this time, which was just lovely.
Except two different people called me a wild woman. If you know me, and especially if you only sort of know me, you know that I am not a wild woman. I am that quiet one who you can barely even notice. But now at least two people are spreading the rumor that beneath this calm exterior is--what? A party animal? I don't know exactly. Odd.
We also got a lot of free giveaways that I don't want such as plastic cups and pads of paper with company or department names all over them.
Translations
on 2007-02-15 04:46 pm (UTC)I've had a fair bit of experience with translations and the many things that can go wrong. In a business setting (and here I'm addressing an American business promoting products and services to non-English speakers in the US), I would even be skeptical of using an employee who is a *native* fluent speaker of the language to do the translations, since they may speak a dialect of the language that would not be appropriate in the setting you are using and frankly, you can't trust that they speak the language well. (Think of co-workers you have known who can barely form grammatically correct, let alone articulate and clear, sentences in English; the same will happen in another language only you won't be able to tell.) Even using a professional translator is no guarantee of quality; I've gone round and round the translation/review/back-translation process for ages. If you're doing business in a foreign country, you really should have people on the ground there to help not only with language issues, but also the cultural aspects that can be critical in success. I'm not saying that learning a foreign language wouldn't be useful, but I think your caution about a little knowledge making you dangerous is well-grounded.
Re: misleading slogan translations - They didn't bring out that hoary tale of the Chevy Nova not selling well in Mexico because its name translates as "no go" did they? The ongoing proliferation of this urban legend makes me crazy.