08/10/2005 - 08/11/2005

chinese etiquette a headache for the chinese!

For those travelling to China on business worried about making a cross cultural faux pas - don't worry. Apparently the whole area of etiquette is just as much a headache for the Chinese.

Some 40 percent of people starting out on their careers according to the latest survey conducted by recruitment website Zhaopin.com of 6,000 working people, stated that office etiquette was a headache.

In the results, 23 percent of novice employees are at a loss as to how to address their bosses and colleagues, while one-third said they have quickly managed to get accustomed to their companies' style of address. Only 5 percent saw it as no problem at all.

cultural awareness training - 'iron-clad business case'

BBC director-general Mark Thompson is to set up and lead a new diversity leadership council at the corporation. Speaking at Pearn Kandola's conference, Selling diversity in your organisation, Andrea Callender, the BBC's head of diversity, said diversity at the BBC was spread over 17 divisions and more than 200 initiatives.

"Whatever the culture, work with it rather than positioning diversity as something to go against," she said. "You have to understand the context so that you can understand what really moves people - and it's very rarely the iron-clad business case."

scots speak perfect english (?)

Manchester United boss Sir Alex Furguson praised South Korean new boy Park Ji-Sung - then told the listening Korean Press to go to Scotland for English lessons.Park played only 25 minutes of the 3-0 win over Hungarians Debrecen and afterwards Fergie waxed lyrical about the midfielder - though reporters didn't understand his broad Glaswegian accent. After being asked to repeat himself, the Scot said: 'Do you know the most perfect English in the world is spoken in Scotland? That's absolutely correct. 'If you go up to Inverness for a day you will learn how to speak English perfectly.

babelport.com calls for papers

Babelport.com, a translation industry information and project portal, invites professionals, academics, freelancers, and agency representatives to publish their articles and essays on topics related to the translation industry on the babelport.com community website.

Papers focussing on the market of translation and localization, their tools, applied linguistics and related subjects are welcome by the steadily growing community of language professionals and language service providers. The babelport.com community offers a free to use resource of information and tools available for the translation industry and provides a platform to freelancing and in-house translators to share and discuss issues of and experience gathered from working in language related businesses.

The Chinese website

China is constantly in the news at present due to its phenomenal economic expansion. With more and more businesses wanting to invest in China and more Chinese businesses wanting to export abroad, the Chinese market is booming. In short, China is on the fast-track to becoming a world economic heavyweight.

The potential for lucrative business ventures within the country are unquestionable. One avenue that offers businesses huge inroads into the country is the internet. A Chinese website, properly structured and considered, provides a point of contact to millions of potential new clients and customers. All the signs are pointing to the fact that companies that act now in getting their websites translated into Chinese and properly marketed using local search engines, stand the best chance of capitalizing on a fairly young economic gold mine.

rebrading the british population

Ethnic communities in Britain have reacted with shock and dismay to a move by Home Office Minister Hazel Blears to 'rebrand' their identities in a bid to inspire greater patriotism.

Blears is said to be at the forefront of a proposal to rename Asians in Britain as Asian-British, Pakistani-British or Indian-British, rather than simply as 'Asians', and has announced that she would present this idea to Muslim leaders soon.

Sarah Joseph, the editor of the Muslim magazine EMEL, said: "I think we should decide ourselves what to call ourselves. Are we trying to create grades of being British? I'm sure Hazel Blears has good intentions but the Government has been faced with a problem and it's grasping at straws. The issues we are facing are complicated and we can't spin ourselves out of the present dilemma or rebrand ourselves. We are not a margarine. Instead of rebranding ethnic minorities, the Government should be fostering a sense of belonging."

word of the day: nugatory

nugatory \NOO-guh-tor-ee; NYOO-\, adjective:
1. Trifling; insignificant; inconsequential.
2. Having no force; inoperative; ineffectual.

Tygiel's forte as a historian is his eye for what may appear nugatory or marginal but, when focused upon, illuminates the temper of a given moment. --Roberto Gonzlez Echevarria, "From Ruth to Rotisserie," New York Times, July 2, 2000

Jacoby's offense was no offense -- or an error so nugatory as to demand no more than a one-sentence explanation. --Lance Morrow, "In Boston, a Foolish Consistency of Little Minds," Time, July 19, 2000

Intercultural dialogue key to global food problems

The Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) has announced that 'Agriculture and intercultural dialogue' is set to be the theme of this year's World Food Day.

The UN agency claims that the theme reflects the contribution of different cultures to world agriculture and argues that sincere intercultural dialogue is a precondition for progress against hunger and environmental degradation. "Intercultural dialogue between developing countries facing similar food and agriculture problems is an important way of sharing expertise and technologies," said the FAO.

Conference to grapple with major cultural issues

Some big questions surrounding the politics of culture, will be raised at a conference being hosted by the University of Canterbury’s School of Culture, Literature and Society next month.

The Biculturalism or Multiculturalism conference, run in association with the Association for Canadian Studies in Australia and New Zealand (ACSANZ), is being held in Our City O-Tautahi from 1 to 3 September and has attracted a distinguished line-up of speakers from throughout New Zealand and overseas.

College backs multi-cultural police drive

A local college is helping the police recruit more officers from Indian, Pakistani and Caribbean backgrounds. In a new partnership programme led by the Met Police's Positive Action Team, the College of NW London, which has a Wembley Park campus, was one of only four London colleges chosen for a pilot scheme to help and encourage applicants from minority groups.

uk judicial diversity

Lord Falconer, Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs, today said a diverse judiciary that reflected the diversity of the nation was essential to maintaining public confidence in the legal system. Launching a consultation paper on judicial diversity, he said appointments would continue to be made on merit and there was no conflict between merit and diversity.

preserving dying languages

Every two weeks or so the last elderly man or woman with full command of a particular language dies. At that rate, as many as 2,500 native tongues will disappear forever by 2100.

David W. Lightfoot is helping spearhead a government initiative to preserve some of these dying languages, believing each is a window into the human mind that can benefit the world at large. ``If we are going to lose half the world's languages that endangers our capacity to understand the genetic basis of language,'' said Lightfoot, who heads the directorate of Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences at the National Science Foundation.

bayern munich f.c. launch chinese wesbite

Bayern Munich launched the Chinese language version of the club's homepage Wednesday, as the Bundesliga champions look to increase their exposure in the growing Asian market.

"There is no other country with a greater number of Bayern fans than China," club manager Uli Hoeness said as he presented the new site, www.fcbayern.com.cn, where Chinese fans can learn all they need to know about the club and its players.

korean internet use

Four out of every ten Koreans have blogged, and one in ten is currently hosting their own weblogs. The average number of email accounts per capita is 1.7, and 3.4 out of every ten Koreans have used internet banking services.

The Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC) announced these finding Wednesday. The figures were the result of a nationwide survey of 17,698 Koreans over the age of 6, conducted by the ministry and the National Internet Development Agency of Korea during the month of June.

The survey suggests that 32.57 million Koreans are Internet users -- 71.9 percent of the total population. This is up 3.7 percentage points from the same month last year and up 1.7 percentage points from December 2004.

word of the day: sojourn

sojourn \SOH-juhrn; so-JURN\, intransitive verb:
To stay as a temporary resident; to dwell for a time.
noun: A temporary stay.

Though he has sojourned in Southwold, wandered in Walberswick, dabbled in Dunwich, ambled through Aldeburgh and blundered through Blythburgh, Smallweed has never set foot in Orford. --Smallweed, "The trouble with hope," The Guardian, April 14, 2001

Yet he is now an accomplished student and speaker of English, a literary editor and television producer, someone who has sojourned in Paris and attended the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. --William H. Gass, "Family and Fable in Galilee," New York Times, April 17, 1988