Path: ccsf.homeunix.org!ccsf.homeunix.org!news1.wakwak.com!nf1.xephion.ne.jp!onion.ish.org!onodera-news!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!headwall.stanford.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: ysd_m@yahoo.co.jp (masayuki yoshida) Newsgroups: fj.life.in-japan Subject: Re: Gifu bombing anniversary? Date: 7 Jul 2003 01:03:27 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Lines: 66 Message-ID: <545bd492.0307070003.684ecfce@posting.google.com> References: <3F05CA44.9F142BE8@yahoo.co.jp> <545bd492.0307041729.584a4fdd@posting.google.com> <545bd492.0307051812.607d5677@posting.google.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 219.186.4.17 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1057565008 13580 127.0.0.1 (7 Jul 2003 08:03:28 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 7 Jul 2003 08:03:28 GMT Xref: ccsf.homeunix.org fj.life.in-japan:2096 "John Yamamoto-Wilson" wrote in message news:... > masayuki yoshida wrote: > > > What you and Eric want to say in this thread may be so simple that I > > will rephrase as follows: Contemporary Japanese should learn what > > their own nation did as an invader during the war times. > > Well, I won't deny that that is part of it. But I am shocked at how little > aware my students sometimes appear to be of *any* environment apart from the > one they are themselves living in, be it life in modern Mexico or life in > Edo-period Japan. > > > However, how > > to teach history is not so simple. If you tell us what of Japanese > > war history you want to teach Japanese students, it would be > > appreciated. > > I remember some Japanese girls coming to me (as their teacher) when I was > working in a language school in the UK years ago. They were very upset > because a little boy had spat at them and called them "dirty Japs" and said, > "Please tell us who hates us because of history". I guess if Japanese > children could get that kind of information as a standard component of their > education that would be empowering for them. Last week I watched an English film 'All or nothing' (Japanese title: Jinsei wa tokidoki hare) in Hibiya, Tokyo. I knew that British boys of the working class spit at and say 'F**k off!' even to their parents. By the way, I think it should be wrong for Brits to say 'dirty Japs', because Brits hardly take a bath or shower. ;-) > In that case, I got a retired army major to come and talk to them, and he > went through the basics of WWII in a very kind and non-judgmental way, > including an explanation of the fact that many local lads in that area were > in a regiment that ended up as prisoners of war of the Japanese. You may > remember that even the Emperor did not understand, when he went to England, > why about a thousand old men turned their backs on him in the procession > through London. I guess that the Emperor knew such a stupid demonstration and its meaninglessness. > By the way, I don't think it's only Japan where there is a lack of > appropriate information about things one would imagine would form the basis > of an education in the modern world. In this newsgroup we've heard about the > Texan schoolteacher who thought Spanish was the national language of Canada > and there've been reports of Japanese returning from the United States being > asked by schoolchildren things like, "Do you have television?" > > Being from the UK myself, I doubt that all that many British schoolchildren > realise that (for example) the conflict in Northern Ireland resulted mainly > from the British policy of giving Protestants incentives to go and live in > Ireland (not to mention laws depriving the Catholics of the right to own > land or receive an education), much less that faraway conflicts like the one > in Sri Lanka might have anything to do with British colonial policies. > However, information is available, and well-informed people will know what > the issues are, whereas in fjlij we've seen intelligent Japanese people, who > are quite well-informed in other areas, bring up things like Britain's > occupation of Burma (Myanmar) in apparent ignorance of Japan's occupation of > that country (http://tinyurl.com/g4u7, scroll down to the end). Let me ask you a question, John. Which do you think was a more villainous nation as a collonialist, Japan or Britain? Masayuki