Thursday, April 15, 2010

Friday 11am Section

Kyongwon Yoon's essay he writes about about the changing language of Korean text messages. He says that some Koreans believe, “mobile phone precipitate the degradation of the Korean language…increase in the use of new abbreviations and acronyms and also the frequent use of Arabic numerals and English instead of Korean characters in text messages” (Pg. 113). Korea is a country that wants to be extremely technologically advanced, but also retain its cultural and national identity. I feel that the Japanese parallel this desire to be ahead of the game while still upholding its traditional customs and beliefs. How is it that these Asian countries (Korea and Japan) have successfully industrialized while other countries such as China, which is the home for many more people, failed. Is it because of their disciplinary actions? Also, if you think about the United States and how much progress we have made technologically, does the democratic law we live in today act as a catalyst for new and innovative ideas? I know that we talked about this awhile ago but I remember our discussions about Foucault's Panopticism and what it means to live in a highly disciplinary society. The Chinese have always lived under a large, censored regime. Could it be that the threat of punishment could lead, not to productive, efficient workers, but rather, stunt inevitable progress?


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