textbook recommendation

[Pavel Samsonov]

> Dear Ryan,
>   While I totally agree with you, I want you to be aware you cannot
> persuade politically or emotionally motivated people. Whatever your
> intentions may be, if someone feels having been hurt by your language,
> you should either adapt to them or disassociate with them.
>   Japanese feel insulted when addresssed as Jap, and the Japanese
> Olympic committe decided to print the name of the country on athlete's
> clothes as Nippon, not being aware that Nip sounds even worse in
> England (but not to the uneducated Japanese ears).
>   The government of Communist China always makes great noises whenever
> someone in Japan uses a traditional Japanese name for China (Shina), and
> demands every Japanese to say "centrum mundi" because no other
denomination
> can satisfy them.
>   As a principle, I always try to keep away from people who do not
> understand that any word can have any emotional contents. I heard
> blackman was normal a hundred years ago, but was replaced by negro,
> and again to the first (I haven't heard African in England since they
> usually come from the Carribean). Everytime the word was changed, the
pretext
> was with neutral, non-emotional, -- rather euphemistic -- term.
>
> Cheers,
> Tsuji


Actually we run here into the area where no "scientific criteria" (if such
do exist) can be applicable. It is "correct" versus "politically correct"
(and what is "correct?"), it is emotions against reason.
If Ukrainians feel that the definite article is detrimental for the image of
their newly independent state - they probably know it best. Nationalist
feelings are among the most intimate and irrational and they are hard to
approach from the positions of "reason" or "science". It is just like
Forrest Gump who was told that his father was "on vacations", and that made
him proud of his father.

When I read articles on the history of Belarus written by nationalists I
sometimes find many things hard to agree. A lot seems too far-fetched and
mythical. But if these myths are likely to boost the national pride of
Belarusians and promote their national consciousness - this probably is
fine.

When I hear that black Africa was highly developed and culturally and
scientifically sophisticated and then the white colonizers came and ruined
everything, well... I feel I'd better hold my tongue. On the one hand, I
don't want to be labeled as "racist", on the other - well, I believe people
should be always proud of their ancestry no matter what it has been in
"reality" (I have no definition of "reality", just like I have no definition
of "the truth").

Pavel

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