English Literature and The Creation of a Malaysian Education System (1951 – 1979)

Tracing the Source:
The creation of a Malaysian Education System (1951 – 1979)

Since Independence English Literature has continued to lose its recognition as a vital tool in the nation-building process due to a greater emphasis on the national language. The post-May 13 climate further reduced the significance of English, and needless to say Children’s Literature in English.However, in an ongoing research which i am involved in, we hope to highlight the great potential and impact Children’s Literature in English could have as a nation-building tool in a highly pluralized post-colonial Malaysian society, thus inspiring the quest for an identity in a globalized era.

The earliest documents which form the backbone in the creation of a National Education System, dates back to the early 50’s.The entire study of the various education reports begins from the Colonial Central Advisory Committee on Education (Pre-1957) right up to the Post-Colonial Education Committee of the Ministry of Education (Post-1957) covering an entire decade. This is with reference to the Study of the Fenn-Wu Report on Chinese Education and the Barnes Report on Malay Education in 1951 and subsequent Razak and Rahman Talib reports which were published in 1956 and 1960 respectively. Finally in 1979 the Mahathir Report or the Cabinet Committee Report reevaluated the entire national education system in Malaysia giving it a new look. The committee begun its work in 1974 and published its report in 1979. These reports were the foundations upon which a comprehensive Malaysian Education System came into being.The primary purpose of examining these reports is to examine the direct and indirect effect of subsequent policies towards Children’s Literature in English, if any.

Mileage Boost

Investigators at Temple University have thinned fuel by attaching an electrically charged tube to a diesel engine’s fuel line near the fuel injector. This is possible thanks to a well-known effect in which electric fields reduce the viscosity of a liquid. Reduced fuel viscosity allows much smaller droplets to be injected into the engine, leading to more efficient combustion. Road tests have shown electric fields to boost a car’s gas mileage by up to 20 percent. Expect the device to be in all kinds of internal-combustion engines in the near future.

View your Dreams on a Computer!

Dreams Imaged, Scientists Claim

Robert Roy Britt

Editorial Director

LiveScience.com – Thu Dec 11, 2:15 pm ET

Japanese researchers say they've imaged thoughts and dreams and displayed them on a computer screen.

At the web site of the journal Neuron, where the findings are to be published, the researchers summarize their work: "The results suggest that our approach provides an effective means to read out complex perceptual states from brain activity."

Brain imaging is nothing new. And the images are reportedly very simple, but the researchers claim the technique could lead to the ability to unlock the secrets of dreams.

"By applying this technology, it may become possible to record and replay subjective images that people perceive like dreams," the scientists are quoted as saying in The Telegraph of London. In one experiment, test subjects were shown the six letters of the word "neuron," and the subsequent brain activity was used to reconstruct the letters on a screen.

Scientists mostly agree that dreaming happens during the phase called Rapid Eye Movement (REM). Some researchers think you dream about tasks and emotions that were not dealt with fully, and that dreaming can help solidify thoughts and memories.

Even animals dream. And some people think they can control their dreams. The jury is still out on that, but studies show that some dreamers can communicate with researchers during a dream.

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Population of South East Asia!

The Pie chart below shows the distribution of population among the nations of Southeast Asia and among the islands of Indonesia

The approximate population of South East Asia as of 2004 is estimated to be about 568,300,000 people.

Reference:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeast_Asia

The Next Generation of Mobile Phones!

The Nanotechnology concept Morph

Introducing NOKIA'S Morph Phone conceived through nanotechnology:

Flexible materials, transparent electronics, self-cleaning surfaces, ability to observe local environment and harvest energy.

PIKOM PC Fair 2008 (III)

PIKOM PC Fair 2008 (III) - Dates and Venues


5 - 7 December 2008 (11:00 am - 9:00 pm)

-Penang International Sports Arena, Penang - Jalan Tun Dr Awang, 11900 Relau
-Sabah Trade Centre, Kota Kinabalu, Sabah - Jalan Istiadat, Teluk Likas, 88400 Kota Kinabalu
-Central Square, Sungai Petani, Kedah - Jalan Kampung Baru, 08000 Sungai Petani
-Dewan SJK(C) Yuk Choy, Ipoh, Perak - 195, Jalan Sultan Iskandar, 30000 Ipoh
-Berjaya Megamall, Kuantan, Pahang - Jalan Tun Ismail, Sri Dagangan, 25000 Kuantan

12 - 14 December 2008 (11:00 am - 9:00 pm)

-KL Convention Centre, Kuala Lumpur - Kuala Lumpur City Centre, 50888 Kuala Lumpur
-Mahkota Parade Melaka, Melaka - Jalan Merdeka, 75000 Bandar Hilir
-Dewan Suarah, Bintulu, Sarawak - Jalan Tun Ahmad Zaidi, 97008 Bintulu

-Batu Pahat (BP) Mall, Batu Pahat, Johor - Jalan Kluang, 83000 Batu Pahat

19 - 21 December 2008 (11:00 am - 9:00 pm)

-Persada Johor International Convention Centre, Johor Bahru - Jalan Abdullah
Ibrahim,80000 Johor Bahru
-Dewan 2020, Kangar, Perlis - 01000, Kangar

-Dewan Tunku Ibrahim Ismail, Kluang, Johor - 86000, Kluang

Please contact the PC Fair Team at +603 7955 2922 or email us at pcfair@pikom.org.my for further information.


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Japan's Untouchables!

Social Outcasts

By TIM LARIMER and TOKO SEKIGUCHI Wednesday, Mar. 28, 2001

They are Japan's untouchables. A minority group discriminated against while living on the fringes of society.

They are burakumin, or "village people." They may look like other Japanese, speak the same language, eat the same foods and wear the same clothes, but prejudice is always close. And the absence of any information -- and fear of discussion -- about this invisible group serves to perpetuate the prejudice, leaving people to spout untruths and rumors: that burakumin are physically deformed, for example.

The burakumin existed, informally, as a social class as far back as the 6th century, but they were shunted to the bottom of a five-tier caste system during the Tokugawa period (1600-1867), also known as the Edo period. Considered social outcasts, they were typically butchers, tanners and waste-handlers. Japan's Meiji transformation in the late 19th century opened up the country to the outside world, yet the burakumin still exist -- as does the discrimination they suffer.

In Japan, few people are willing to talk about the burakumin. The mainstream media go to great lengths to avoid any discussion of the group, and code words are more the norm. An article about someone thought to be a burakumin, for example, might describe him as someone who likes to attend the dog races. Why the queasiness? The burakumin scare many people.

Justified or not, some burakumin have a reputation for responding to public discussion about them, whether it's on television or in a magazine, with behavior that borders on harassment. "When I talked about burakumin on a TV show," says one reporter, who, predictably, doesn't want his name used, "the station was flooded with calls, day and night, from people wanting my home phone number."

There is one place, however, where talk about the burakumin is freewheeling and unfettered. That place is the Internet. Here, of course, people don't worry about a backlash because they can be anonymous. Channel 2 is a website that hosts many discussion groups -- with topics ranging from food recipes to erotica -- including one on the burakumin. Messages posted on the site include "Tell me the names of burakumin in the entertainment industry" and "Buraku can't intimidate me." There has also been a lengthy discussion about political heavyweight Hiromu Nonaka's burakumin ties.

Says Shigeshi Tabata, who runs an independent, on-line watchdog group called Network Against Discrimination and for Research on Human Rights: "The reason people want this information is to discriminate against people. Policing what is said on the Internet is of course difficult -- and controversial. Tabata has contacted Channel 2's Webmaster about the burakumin postings that he believes to be inflammatory. "I believe he is aware of the problem," Tabata says. "But that was in 1999, and the burakumin names are still posted. Because people can post their comments anonymously, they aren't accountable. Monitoring bulletin boards is an eternal cat-and-mouse chase."

(In the 1960s and '70s, pamphlets were published that listed the addresses and neighborhoods known to be inhabited by burakumin. Family names were also printed. These pamphlets were used by companies, including some of Japan's blue-chip businesses, to weed out burakumin when hiring employees, and by families to investigate the background of potential husbands and wives for their children. In 1975, Japan banned those publications, but the lists are now are popping up on the Channel 2 bulletin boards.)

Hiroyuki Nishimura, a 24-year-old computer consultant, is Channel 2's Webmaster. The site, which launched in May 1999, gets some 15 million hits a day, he says. Hiroyuki is defensive about the material on the site, and says it is impossible for him to police every message that is posted. "Right now, very few things on the Internet are regulated by Japanese law," he says. "For instance, it's not illegal for high school girls to post their cell phone numbers on-line for 'enjo kosai' (teenage prostitution). We actively delete these. But for other things, we don't have the manpower to be actively looking for offensive or unethical and immoral postings." Besides, he says, he is uncomfortable with the notion of censorship. "If you regulate what is said on places like Channel 2, that's fascism. I just provide people a place to discuss issues."

On the one hand, discussion about the burakumin is a good thing. Nowhere in Japan are people allowed to confront stereotypes or even ask questions about a group of people that rights groups say number as many as 3 million. On the other hand, unfortunately much of the discussion is nothing more than hate-mongering.

Japan's government has passed laws to end discrimination against the group, and has set up special programs to improve burakumin neighborhoods, and improve their children's education. The prejudice, though, persists. "Around me, day to day, it doesn't seem anyone discriminates against me," says Hiroshi Kanto, a burakumin in Kyoto. "But then one day my daughter came home from elementary school and said some other kids' parents told them not to play with her because she is burakumin."

The question now is whether the Internet revolution will help, or hurt the group. Channel 2's Nishimura is optimistic. "One of the discussion threads was a survey about discrimination people experienced, or from the other side, that they imposed," he says. "You can't do that anywhere else but on an anonymous bulletin board. It's the only place for these two opposing voices to communicate."

time.com

Caste and the question of Identity (Part I)

Caste and the question of Identity I

Indianness

The term untouchables have long been associated with the caste system of Indian culture as a reference to the class of people at the very bottom of the social hierarchy. While extreme interpretation of this system is beginning to fade away due to the changing times and education which has become the main propellant in empowering those from the lowest rung of the social ladder, there is still a large consciousness among the masses of their cast and creed and the seemingly permanent social distinction. The Indian caste system is deeply routed in the ancestral occupational attachment which has sadly become some kind of social imprisonment for those who are associated to the most “unclean” or dirty jobs thus permanently condemned being labeled as outcasts.

Having said that, it is natural for an outsider to assume that in modern times caste would no longer be relevant for someone who becomes empowered to finally become independent by virtue of his education and profession to break away from such social imprisonment. Apparently that is not the case, as there is also a large fellowship who prefer to retain that identity regardless of caste. Even the so called lower classes take pride in their identity and form such comradeship which is reflected in the politics of today.

In an age of globalization and cultural plurality, we somehow find people who firmly hold on to their castes as a vital aspect of their identity. In a multi-layered atmosphere of Indianness, the question of “who am I?” can never have a simple “Indian” for an answer and the whole concept of Indian is corrupt; the entity having sprung out of an artificial union ; a byproduct of a colonial past. Therefore most would generally be linguistically and regionally divided into the almost countless numbers of languages and dialects they belong to, such as, a few among others, the Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam,Telugu, Hindi,Punjabi and Bengali speakers. Their Lingua-Regional identity comes first and then comes the question of caste and creed before even thinking of Indianness. However the term has gained much popularity abroad among the Indian Diaspora, for this term itself is founded upon that very conception and best reflects the identities of Cultures from the Sub-continent. Caste, while being a sensitive issue these days, is extremely important even for those whose sensitivities are most affected .On the other hand, the downtrodden while denouncing it entirely would also uphold it at some time or other.. It should be noted that caste based societies and associations are thriving in Malaysia with approximately 100 registered bodies.

South Indian Sir Names are most certainly a reflection of castes which they belong to and this could explain the reason behind Indians who don’t possess second names Most Indians would not want to be labeled as an advocate of the caste system. However, there are people who are proud of their ancestry and carry the family name (caste) as their sir-name. But the most unfortunate are those who do not want to be ostracized by society thus keep it a secret. To end in a positive note, I am very pleased to say that the new generation of Indians in Malaysia regardless of caste does not emphasize caste as much as their ancestors did with reference to sir-names.