Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Outline
I am going to be writing about Dutch culture. I will cover the different festivals and customs along with schooling and the main language that is spoken in their culture.
-Body
-Language, schooling, history, the different countries that have Dutch culture
- food, specialty entrees , why most of their meals contain some sort of potato
-Festivals, customs, traditional clothing, festivals such as the harvest festival
-conclusion
I plan to make a summary of what I have found and how the Dutch culture differs from the culture of the United States.

sources
http://www.nga.gov/collection/gallery/gg50/gg50-main1.html
New Netherland : a Dutch colony in seventeenth-century America By jaap jacobs

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Eating Habits around the world

In this paper I will be writing about the differences and changes in eating habits around the world.
-Preparation of food
- History
-Current
-Pro's and Con's of how things have changed
Change in Family Habits
- Time with family during meals
-Location of meals
-examples of culture application
Eating as a life style Issue
-Fast Food
-Use of preservatives
-Not home grown/ pre made foods
In conclusion eating habits around the world have changed immensely.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

south korea group project

final paper

i am going to write about the communication over facebook and the effects it can have on a person, reputation, school work, and job.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Interview 1 transcript

Interview
Me- Hi I’m Brad
Soyun- hi I’m Soyun
Me-Thank you for taking time to do this interview with me.
Soyun- My pleasure
Me-So where are you originally from?
Soyun- I’m from South Korea and it takes like 14 or 17 hours by airplane.
Me- Where in South Korea are you from?
Soyun- You mean the city?
Me- yea
Soyun- I’m from Busan, which is second capital of Korea. The capital of Korea is Seoul, Busan is pretty big enough.
Me- So how long have you been here in the U.S.?
Soyun-I came here last august so this semester is third. I have been here for just under a year, it will be a year since I went back to Korea last summer break for three months.
Me- do you have any family here in the U.S.?
Soyun-No I don’t I came here alone. So yea sometimes I get homesick when the weather is cloudy and rainy, it makes me depressed. That’s why I went to a host family last winter break. I picked that host family because the mom in that family is from South Korea so I can talk with her in Korean. Also I have the opportunity to have Korean food so I felt more at home and it was really good.
Me- that’s good, so do you talk with your family often?
Soyun- yea sure like on the internet like scype, mostly my mom call me and asks if it’s a good time to talk or if she can talk on facebook or scype , we talk a lot.
Me- how often do you talk with her?
Soyun- Umm with mom like 3 times a week.
Me- Do you talk with anyone else or is it mostly just your mom?
Soyun- Mostly my mom, or like once a week with my dad and once a week with my brother.yea I have one older brother
Me- ok how much older is he?
Soyun- He is three years older and he still goes to university in Korea.
Me- Would you say that family is a pretty important part of your culture?
Soyun- yea sure, since I am from Korea its not popular to do things alone, its custom to take care of whole family and community. Yea we are not that individual, we are more family oriented.
Me- What are some things that you and your family do together? Like any activities?
Soyun- Like in Korea, yea when I was young we spent time together a lot , we went to climb a mountain, went hiking, fishing, but after I went to the university which is in Jeonju. Jeonju which is far away from Busan, it takes 5 hours by car, yea so because of that reason we can’t do a lot after that time and I came to college.
Me- What holidays did you celebrate growing up? Or traditions?
Soyun- Ahh Christmas yea we also have Christmas and also thanksgiving which is Chuseok in Korea. For Chuseok and Christmas the whole family, like big family, like mothers and fathers family all get together and spend time. We all live far away from Busan, because they have grown up and gotten married, separated and we don’t have enough time except for Chuseok or New Year’s Day.
Me- So are there any other specific ones that are different than here in the U.S.?
Soyun- Nothing much maybe just food and in Korea we wear Korean traditional clothing during Chuseok and new years. Hanbok is Korean traditional clothing, it is very colorful and looks totally different that just casual clothing, there is a long skirt with a shirt that has long sleeves. It is very pretty, I wore it for Halloween one of my friends thought I was a snow princess. They are very expensive. They are almost 300 dollars; you can buy cheap ones for about 100 dollars. My mom said I should wear it when I get married.
Me- what was your main deciding factor in coming to the U.S.?
Soyun-I am studying in linguistics here in the United States but in Korea my major is English education, I hope to become an English teacher in Korea so I can teach all English to my students. So I thought it would be helpful for me to come here and speak English because in Korea I don’t have the opportunity to speak in English, I would speak in Korean all the time, even in the university during class time. Like we were studying English but were speaking Korean, it is kind of irony.
Me- Ok I see, so most of the time while you are here you are speaking English.
Soyun- Yea , so last year since I came here with my friends from Korea at first all we did was spoke Korean, then I said no this is not the reason why I came here so I said no more Korean. I am speaking English most of the time and sometimes Korean.
Me- What made you choose St. Cloud State?
Soyun- As an exchange student my university in Korea has a program with st cloud state university so I picked it, even though they have a lot of schools in the states I thought the saint on St. cloud sounded cool and when I looked it up on Google it showed like winter and welcome winter and snowy weather. I never see blizzard though. We also have snow in Korea but not much, here it piles up sometimes even as tall as me.
Me- How was your schooling like high school and under? Was it pretty hard or not to bad? How many years did you go?
Soyun- In Korea the elementary school program has 6 years and middle school has 3 years and high school takes 3 years. I heard in the states that it depends on the state because some state has 3 years in middle school or 2 years in middle school but in Korea every school has the same 6 years in elementary school, 3 years in middle school, and 3 years in high school. Elementary school was easy, no studying just play around. When I started going to middle school and high school it starts a different time, we had to study, study, study. If you have met any Korean friends you may know that all Korean students are crazy about studying which I hated. There is a thing that I am kind of sad about and that is that even though Korean students came to the states to study English and to know how to speak English fluently they go to the library and read a book all the time. Which is not good to help you speak English, if you want to speak it then speak, just play with students and talk with them all the time, don’t go to the library. It is kind of habit though for Korean students, they can’t help it they feel they need to go to the library to study all the time.
Me- so you think they would be better off just going out and talking with people and using English.
Soyun- yea, I think the reason why they feel they need to study is because of the exam which is for the entrance university, this exam in Korea is the lifetime exam. This exam could change my life, so because of this one exam students just study like crazy from middle school to the graduation of high school. People just go to school and after school they go to academic institution to study more. For example they wake up at like 7 o’clock they are supposed to go to school before 820 then they are done at 4 or 5 except a senior is done at 10 then they go to the academic institution to study more until 2 am or even 4 then go to bed and wake up at 7. This can be routine for seniors in high school. This is what I did too. It was a suffering time, I don’t want to go back to that time.
Me- so that test you were telling me about, can you retake that test or is it a onetime deal?
Soyun- you can retake it but this exam is once a year so if I failed it I would have to wait a year before I could take it again. There are a couple people they retake it 6 or 7 times, they just kept taking it.
Me- is there a certain score you need to get on it?
Soyun- Yes it actually depends on the university, the score is not standard; Harvard is a high repetition, so it requires students to have high score.
Me- How high was the minimum score to get in here?
Soyun- I didn’t have to take a test to come here, I just applied for exchange student program and took the tofel test for applying it, I took it and did my best and got a good score. It worked well.
Me- was a second language mandatory in your schooling?
Soyun-Actually we don’t consider English as a second language, English for us is not mother tongue but kind of between that and 2nd language, in high school and middle school we learn English as many times as Korean. It is mandatory for English.
Me- do you know when you started with English in your school program?
Soyun- Yes in 3rd grade is when they start learning English, but I bet if an infant they start learning when they are in their moms they will learn better English. Even though the school program starts them in 3rd grade.
Me- do you think they should start earlier teaching English?
Soyun- yes because I started learning in 7th grade, if I would have had a chance to learn other than that time I would speak much more fluently.
Me- have you had any issues here in the US having people understand what you are saying.
Soyun- ya, not issue because I’m from Korea so my accent is not the same as here, so my friends keep asking me what I say. And this year I start working at front desk in Laurence hall, whenever residence come to me and ask questions I got what they want but when I say it the y say what, I’m sorry, it makes me feel like yes I need more time.
Me- do you think working at the front desk has benefited you English?
Soyun- yea I think so, yea defiantly, the reason I chose to work at front desk is because last year I just stay in my room and go on face book all the time, and it got boring, I thought front desk assistant would give me a chance to speak English more. (goes on about a story about working at front desk.)
Me-In South Korea did you have a job?
Soyun- no I was a full time student, in Korea a lot of students are just students, they have part time jobs but they mostly just study, study ,study, I did part time job for a month in my lifetime, I worked as a convenience store worker, I would sell stuff, since I love to meet people, my boss was so glad because I was so good at customer service. It was a good experience. I quit because I didn’t have enough time to work at the time. I focused on study for toefelll test, working at store was a minor thing not a major thing like studying for toefell test.
Me- How much did you make while you worked there.
Soyun- I worked for just weekends, just Saturday and Sunday, I got maybe 280 dollars for 8 days. It was good, just 8 days.
Me- what would you say the main business, like the main source of income for the country?
Soyun- Electric, LG, Samsung is from Korea, like electronics, last spring break I went to New York and when I went there, there was a lot of Samsung, LG and Hyundai, I was so proud of you guys.
Me- What do your parents do for work?
Soyun- My dad is a mechanic engineer, my mom supports him. My dad is the boss in the company so my mom kind of supervises, my dad says I need more time to rest and she is like no come here. My mom is a supervisor, or secretary.
Me- so they work at the same place?
Soyun- Yea which my dad doesn’t like, my dad needs his private place. At home and work place she is there.
Me- so when you were growing up were they home a lot or gone most of the day?
Soyun- Yea, my dad went to work at 845 ish and my mom went to work at 2 or 3, she doesn’t have any specific schedule to go by.
Me- when you were growing up did you have a lot of family dinners?
Soyun- yea except the fact that I go to university in jeonju, but when I come home from university we have all family dinners. Which Is good for me because when I stay at home for summer break she doesn’t make delicious food for me, because when I go home for a couple days my mom would say take more of this food, yes I’m leaving in two days make more food for me. When I come home for summer and winter break she says no Soyun your mature, you have two arms and two legs so cook, cook by yourself, im not going to cook for you, mom no.
Me- If you don’t mind im going to change the subject a little bit.
Soyun-it’s ok
Me- at what age would you say people start dating in South Korea, is it accepted for teens to date?
Soyun- Yea it is accepted, even elementary students date. Do you have any school before elementary school.
Me- yea we have preschool.
Soyun- yea even in pre- school they start dating, there is no specific time to start dating.
Me- so parents really don’t have a problem with people dating?
Soyun- It depends on the parents I guess, parents who are really conservative don’t like their children to start dating. But most parents don’t care I guess. Just once their daughter or son brings their girl or boyfriend home I think it doesn’t matter.
Me- what is the legal drinking age?
Soyun- In Korean age its 20 but in American age its 18.
Me- do you think it’s a good age to be at or should it be 21 like here?
Soyun-I think it’s a good age because at 20 we go to university so yea.
Me- so you then drink before you go to the university?
Soyun- We are not supposed to.
Me- so at what age can you get you license?
Soyun- umm its also 20 years old, I think in Korean 20 years old is adult. So when we turn 20 we can do whatever we want without any control.
Me- Do you know what you have to go through to get your license?
Soyun- I guess it’s kind of tough, we have the same system. Except we don’t drive with our parents, we just drive with instructor.
Me- Do you know if it is pretty cheap to get it?
Soyun- I heard it is more expensive than here, I think a thousand or maybe alittle bit less.
Me- Ok well I think that is pretty much it so thank you so much for taking time out of your day to do this interview.
Soyun- Yea no problem.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

New objectives

-Make sure that all of the recording equipment works before the interview so that i will not have to waste any of their time trying to get it working.
- Be dressed properly by wearing nice clothes.
-Make sure that the location that i have picked is sutable and approved by the interviewee.
-Sit up straight throughout the interview, do not slouch.
-Be an active listener, don't just pretend you are listening to what they are saying.
-If something they say sparks a new question ask it even if it isn't on my original list of questions.
-Make sure i am enthusiastic about what the interviewee is talking about so they know that i am interested in what they have to say.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

group 1 page 530-540

Conducting Research:
-Pose questions worth exploring: Make sure the questions aren't too broad, too bland or too speculative. (i.e. What are the hazards of fad diets (too broad), What are the hazards of low-carbohydrate diets (narrow))

-Challenging questions: Avoid questions that fail provoke thought or engage readers in debate (i.e. What is OCD? (too bland), What treatments for OCD show the most promise (too challenging))

- Grounded question: The central argument of a research paper should be grounded in facts and not be based entirely on believes(i.e. Is it wrong to share files on the Internet (too speculative), Has Internet file sharing affected the earning potential of musicians (grounded))

- Map out a strategy: Ask a reference librarian for help to get started. Try not to do your whole work out of the Internet (Use books). Make sure you search information in newspapers, magazines, website, etc (have a wide variety of sources). Use a search database to locate articles (library) i.e. EBSCOhost and LexisNexis. Use keywords when searching (narrow search).

Hannah M, Brad H, Nicolas HR