The Medium is Not the Message (I)

One aspect of my life that changed since being in China is media consumption. Media reflects the society from which it comes, and in China the media is understandably different from that of western countries. I got used to that.

I don't have a TV, and I don't watch movies. I also don't listen to music. The only time I have internet at home is when my neighbors are kind (wink!). It may seem like I’m withdrawing from society, but I think the opposite has happened. I'm more aware of what's happening in the global community and less focused on my several hundred Facebook friends and their lives.

It's about the way you use media, right? So instead of limiting myself by always being online or inundating my mind with popular American culture, I think I'm freeing myself to learn about other things and to see the world from a different perspective.

What's the point? There are two things going on here. The first is that in China, I lived without these media as they existed in that country. And it wasn’t a big deal. Chinese TV was way too dramatic, and they spoke too fast, referencing historical and cultural references that I knew nothing about. My main internet usage was an online Chinese dictionary that I love.

The second aspect is that I was not only living without these Chinese media, I was also not using these English/American media. I didn’t have access to them, and even Facebook was usually blocked online. When I came back to the U.S., I wasn’t able to seamlessly jump back into the world of entertainment media, let alone all the conversations about the latest movies and music and TV shows. It was way too much work to go back and find out what I had missed, especially when I've never been all that into entertainment media, anyway.

And now I'm going to go read some Marshall McLuhan.

Bones to Pick

I’m surprised by certain attitudes I come across in China. Attitudes are hard to explain and describe, but this past week my teachers said some things that make certain Chinese attitudes very clear.

Example one.
During my Chinese speaking class, the teacher started talking about China’s Taiwan. “If you go to China’s Taiwan this, and in China’s Taiwan that, and China’s Taiwan is very whatever.” My English classmate Andy, who is not afraid of anything, said, “China’s Taiwan? What about Taiwan’s own Taiwan?” (Andy is my hero.) The teacher said, “China’s Taiwan. Do you have a problem?” Yes, I do.

Example two.
During my Chinese listening class, we were discussing the Chinese phrase for “world famous.” The teacher asked us to give some examples. We mentioned the Great Wall of China, the Terracotta Warriors, and Qingdao beer. Then one student said, “And Jackie Chan!” The teacher frowned a little and then completely straight-faced said, “No, Jackie Chan cannot be considered world famous. See, in Africa they don’t know about him. In Africa, they have no movies and no TV. They are very poor. Jackie Chan is not world famous.” WTF??? My teacher is a graduate student.

I’m not even going to comment on these examples… I will leave that up to you.