BALANCE of CULTURE

The revolution continues to be tweeted in front of our eyes

This NYT article is a reflective look at how ordinary citizens behind technology like Twitter shockingly served the world's "elite" an inevitable wake-up call this year.

I'm also relieved that the writer addresses Malcolm Gladwell's painfully ignorant "the revolution will not be tweeted" thesis…until he makes his comeback, Gladwell's intellectual credibility continues to bleed in the public eye. It's disappointing but shows that even the most eloquent writing style simply cannot protect a theory so unfortunately -- and confidently -- confined and parochial.

2011 was the defining year when many of the world's "elites" started to realize that the joke (of their elitism, that is) is probably on them, whether they like it or not. This doesn't mean any of them participate in social media or tech communications one bit, and it doesn't matter if they ever do. But they're quickly being left behind in the dust, which is probably where they belong anyhow.

Greece's Volunteer Radio gives locals a voice

This is an interesting development in otherwise troubled Greece: just weeks ago, the Municipality of Thessaloniki launched the nation's first ever all-volunteer radio station, Volunteers Radio (Radiofono ton Ethelonton). On 100.6 FM, the focus of this new station is culture and education/science, but don't expect your usual school lectures on these subjects -- the first segment had local high school students presenting poetry set to background music.

The people at Volunteers Radio want every listener to know that something "fresh" is happening in Greece despite their economic woes. Gathering participants from unlikely reaches of the community was a compelling first step -- the radio station program was formed by a cross section of typical Greek society like local schools, the Thessaloniki Labor Center, and the Thessaloniki YMCA, but also non-Greek organizations such as Germany's Goethe Institute, the British Council, and the American Consulate.

Political segments and ads will not be a part of the station's programming, so this may serve as an authentic yet "safe" outlet for those who feel stifled by recent socio-political hardships. However, the organizers also recognize that "when something new and innovative comes along, it is often treated with a certain level of reluctance."

We all know that people ultimately hate change, so any reluctance isn't so surprising. But despite what skeptics may feel, this collaborative effort by local groups is a pretty cool way to ignite a creative and alternative voice within the country's economic unrest. What can a little radio station do? I'm not sure either, but it's one of the first empowered and healthy things I've seen coming out of Greece's financial situation this year.

 

Hicks.com

Italian-American model Vanessa Hessler was fired this week from her biggest contract with European telecommunications conglomerate Telefonica, after her very public comments supporting the Gaddafi family (she had a 4-year relationship with Mutassim Gaddafi, the son of dictator Muammar Gaddafi).

International models like Hessler are common now in our globalized world. Lots of models opt to work exclusively overseas for better pay and travel opportunities, and such experiences definitely add interesting elements to their careers even when they are not even known as models in their home country.

What is unfortunate is not only how Hessler failed to remember that "faces" for large companies often can't say whatever they want publicly (especially when it comes to an abhorred dictator and his family), but how this simply adds to the flighty image of international models, whether it's warranted or not.

But the lack of education logic is not the problem of only international models like Hessler -- this week, double Academy Award winner Hilary Swank has also been under the spotlight for attending a birthday party in Chechnya for president/despot Ramzan Kadyrov.

Kadyrov is a known Chechen leader with a slew of accusations for torture, abductions, executions, and other egregious human rights violations under his belt. But apparently nobody in Swank's team of agents/managers/assistants (or even Hilary herself) could be bothered to perform a simple Google search on either the region they flew out and partied in, or even the name of the guy whose birthday they celebrated. Nobody?

Swank wasn't the only celebrity to attend -- Jean Claude Van Damme and Seal also celebrated in the ignorant spectacle -- but unfortunately she has been the one to receive the brunt of the public blame. She has since given up her six-figure paycheck to charity and has also fired much of her staff, except her agent boyfriend.

So the word "Chechnya" doesn't ring a bell…at all? To any of these privileged individuals? With all the people and money involved in these big jobs, you'd think these flashy characters at least have someone on their team who advises them on the things these stars are not interested in enough to google on their iPhones -- things like what goes on in the rest of the world outside of their bubble, who is involved, etc.

A few minutes of cursory research could have easily saved Swank and her staff a load of trouble for tainted branding and damage control mongering, but it's probably going to take a few more of cases like Swank's and Hessler's to make all of these insular personalities realize the actual scope of their roles when it comes to taking on jobs abroad.

But I suppose this is the inevitable process when the parochial bourgeois attempt to get involved with the global politics game -- it ends with a big, embarrassing spanking.

Occupy Going Global: Seoul

Social protest in downtown Seoul is a common occurrence (spend a week there and you're likely to catch one), as Koreans have a history of orderly yet effective public demonstrations that have worked in their favor. So not surprisingly, local activists in South Korea have embraced the Occupy Wall Street movement and plan a sister protest in Seoul to take place this Saturday afternoon.

A map of the Occupy protests in North America:

What's smart about Occupy Seoul is how they're actually combining to join another anti-establishment rally already planned for the same weekend. You'd be surprised at how often "public" protests fail to connect with other like-minded demonstrations even if they have the same time frame, which is just plain weak.

Tokyo plans to have one this week as well, so perhaps we can expect this to spread throughout Asia in the coming weeks.

And don't worry, the white substance in the 1st photo is just milk... [AP]

Talk to me in Korean

From last night: A typical neon cafe sign in Koreatown, Los Angeles

I live close to Koreatown in Los Angeles, so I'm very accustomed to seeing signs on the streets in both English and Korean. And as a Korean-American I often get questions about what these signs say, which sometimes leads to a conversation on the difficulties of learning the Korean language.

I admit that I often imply that learning Korean is not that difficult because it's "phonetic," but this is hardly the case and only those who understand Korean would know why I claim this. When it comes to reading signage, a few words in Korean can indeed be easy to pronounce as long as you have learned the alphabet (the top photo is a perfect example of this).

It takes way longer to learn Korean than other "phonetic" languages [Source]

However, this doesn't mean that you actually understand the sounds/words that are coming out of your mouth. And once you get past this very basic level, the linguistic nuances in the Korean language are much more on par with the character system of Mandarin and Japanese. Even the text in Korean newspapers, for instance, often use Chinese characters in them as a formality.

The lack of tones and a pictoral writing system -- and the very logical Hangul system -- is still a bonus in learning Korean. But the grammar is where Korean most resembles its linguistic counterparts like Arabic, Japanese and Mandarin (and though Korean lacks formal tonal linguistics like Mandarin, sentences can be spoken in different tones in order to change their meaning, similar to Japanese).

I should also add that we use 2 different numerical systems, also depending upon the context: "3" doesn't always mean only "three," if you get what I mean.  Similarly, an "egg" you are about to eat is an entirely different word from the "egg" that is in a bird's next.

This site is a great, easy-to-use resource for learning basic Korean. And don't forget this Sunday, October 9, happens to be Hangul Day!

Globe to Globe 2012: London as Cultural Agent

London's about to get some major global cultural kudos in 2012. Hip hop, Maori and sign language aren't really things one would automatically expect to be a part of the upcoming Globe to Globe festival (which is a part of the city's World Shakespeare Festival and "Cultural Olympiad" for next year's Olympics), but times are evidently changing.

[Reuters photo]

People the world over already travel to the UK for this Shakespearean experience but this time much more attendees will be able to personally participate because the focus isn't on the mere beauty of Shakespeare's works, the city of London or even the UK itself. Instead of glorifying the mere local setting of the event, this time the artistic direction encompasses a very international sensibility (quite fitting for London).

From Chicago-based hip hop acting group Q Brothers (you might recognize them from a recent Lollapalooza tour) performing their urban take on Othello, to a special theater group from the newly independent South Sudan performing Cymbeline (the group actually sent a 20-page document requesting to participate in the festival!) the world of Shakespeare will be interpreted by different cultural perspectives that are uniquely un-British.

An impressive aspect of this daily 6-week event is how each Shakespearean work will be performed in so many different languages other than English. In order to maximize the viewership/participation, official Globe "ambassadors" will venture out to various local communities (the South Korean community in Kingston-upon-Thames; Brazilians in Stockwell, etc.) to encourage ex-pats to experience these plays in their own languages. To my knowledge, this hasn't ever been done before.

Most festivals or exhibitions of this scale just use the same boring templates done by so many before them, and expect the masses to simply come. The public "ambassador" effort to attract new communities strikes me as thoughtful, effective and progressive -- characteristics that too-often get lost in the shuffle of large-scale events.

The biggest social profit of the festival's inclusion of so many foreign communities? The agency of large-scale cultural experience vis-a-vis the realities of today's globalized world. Art in general is much less relevant without this context now, though this might be news to many art world characters even in 2011.

The notion that the US and UK are both currently riding a downward spiral of cultural cogency is something I've heard rather often lately, mainly in casual but robust conversations about globalization and the unavoidable balancing game that occurs with this idea. I think such an assertion is definitely premature right now, but I see where this claim comes from. It isn't too hard to notice that the leaders of the Western-dominated 20th century have a very different status in the international arena today. But come next April, London is probably going to be quite an exciting and dynamic place to be.

Lots more information here!

Soft Power Channels

Wrestling and Baywatch...is that how most of the world still views the US and Americans?

It's easy to default on the notion that the internet is the best way to get information -- and while this is true for many Westerners, most of the world still relies on radio and television to receive news. International broadcasting, a thoroughly understood concept by now, is on the decline, and US soft power needs to refocus on this classic subject (perhaps with a fresh perspective):

I remember having an Afghan general tell me that the only thing he thought about Americans is that all the men wrestled and the women walked around in bikinis, because the only TV he ever saw was Baywatch and World Wide Wrestling. So, we are in an information war, and we are losing that war. I’ll be very blunt in my assessment. Al Jazeera is winning. The Chinese have opened up a global English-language and multi-language television network. The Russians have opened up an English-language network. I’ve seen it in a few countries, and it’s quite instructive. We are cutting back. The BBC is cutting back.

That's a quote from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and all politics aside, she's right in her assessment of our declining communication. Al Jazeera and China understand the importance of global communication on the most fundamental levels; it's time the US revisit our soft power channels as well.

Wishful Thinking

The best part of this short but biased LA Times op-ed on "aggrieved white folks" is the writer's convenient omission of the Asian community -- a factor which happens to completely refute his theory on the cookie-cutter racial struggle for status and respect.

At least many of the hundreds of commenters were there to remind us of the entire picture, not just a selective slice of it.

Brits Make an Important Move in South Korea

Talk about an impressive move by the British Embassy and British Council in South Korea: they have launched "English for the Future," an English-language training program with internship and study overseas opportunities for North Korean defectors.

The program is open to North Korean settlers over 18 years of age who are interested in learning English as well as participating in corporate internships and obtaining scholarships for postgraduate study in the United Kingdom. The scope of the program hones in on key areas that the typical North Korean defector would not have much experience in -- learning English, working in large organizations, and traveling for study.

In a society as competitive and fast paced as South Korea, knowing the English language has become exponentially important. With over 20,000 North Korean defectors now in South Korea, it is no secret that these people continue to struggle to acclimate to such a foreign and modern lifestyle. Even with the "settling into South Korea" packages the government already gives the new defectors, they often simply aren't enough to truly immerse in the South's contemporary society.

The British Embassy and British Council have definitely taken on quite an inspiring and astute direction in the Korean lifestyle with this program; their efforts will surely be recognized by various sectors of South Korean society -- not an easy feat. And, particularly from a long term cultural angle, such an initiative is certainly the beginning for a new phase of Britain's post-post colonial presence on the world stage.

Now, if only the US had an entity like the British Council!...

[Image of British Ambassador Martin Uden]

The Real Deal

You won't find this kind of "street art" in your local museum...yet.

This expression of dissent wasn't created by a yuppie designer-artist looking to impress his corporate and "edgy" minions.

The reward here is not a corny collabo project or even social capital. The reward here is highly personal on the individual level...and simply TBD on the global level. That's what makes this the real deal.

[Photo]