Climate Ramblings

Infinity and Beyond!

After a storm, comes a calm before the storm, after a storm comes . . . ad infinitum.

With British-style commas thrown in for free!

Offer invalid where parallel lines cross.

European Trilemma?

Purple People Eater?

Eeyew!

Illustration by Chris Van Es

Project Syndicate

I think I've previously blogged about Harvard professor Dani Rodrik's views on the problems faced by the European Union (EU), but why should that stop me from posting again? In an article "The Truth About Sovereignty," written for Project Syndicate (October 8, 2012), Rodrik explores what he calls the EU's trilemma:

That is where my political trilemma begins to bite: We cannot have globalization, democracy, and national sovereignty simultaneously. We must choose two among the three.

By "We," he means the EU. But why can't 'we' have all three? Does Rodrik mean that a democratic nation-state cannot participate in globalization? If so, then is he implying that a world government is necessary for globalization to take place? He seems to understand globalization in primarily economic terms, as a large-scale integration of the world economy. But for that to work, there must be rules that can be enforced by one political center, and that excludes democratic national sovereignty. The world is the EU writ large, it seems. But wouldn't globalization also exclude nondemocratic national sovereignty? You'll have to read the article to try to follow his argument.

I do think that the EU faces a trilemma, but I wouldn't use the term "globalization." I'd refer to "economic union," instead. If the EU wants economic union, then national sovereignty doesn't seem to fit, as we see in Europe's current economic difficulties. But that means that democracy at the nation-state level won't have much authority over fiscal policy, so to save democracy in the EU, the EU will need to ground democracy at the EU's political level.

But is globalization the same as economic union? Can any reader clarify this for me?

Baylor University wants my opinion . . .

Summer 2011

Volume 9, Issue 4

(Image from Baylor Magazine)

. . . and the opinions of thousands of others.

In a brief article on page three of the hard copy, Baylor Magazine asks "Why does the world need Baylor?":

More specifically, what makes Baylor University distinct? What would be missed most if Baylor suddenly ceased to exist? We want to hear from you.

I have a few thoughts, but let's first read the fine print:

As part of the university-wide strategic planning process now underway, Community Input Sessions all across the country posed similar questions, and many of those answers will help direct Baylor's course over the next decade or more.

Now, we at Baylor Magazine want to hear from you. Why does the world need Baylor? Why is it important for Baylor to be a part of the academic landscape in the world today? Why is it worth your support? We'll share responses in the next issue.

The basic question asks why the world needs Baylor. That's an unexpected way of putting a question about the significance of Baylor University. Why 'unexpected'? It suggests that Baylor is attempting to formulate a global vision of its purpose. This an extension of its earlier vision, which can be seen through its motto in the above image: Pro Ecclesia, Pro Texana. For Church, For Texas.

There was an earlier extension, probably less clearly articulated, by which Baylor's vision extended beyond Texas to the American nation as a whole. I'm just guessing here, but I imagine that my decision to attend Baylor was a result of that national vision, for I'm not from Texas.

The extension of Baylor's vision probably stems from the "Pro Ecclesia" half of the motto. Originally, that may have been understood as referring to the Southern Baptist Church of Texas, though I don't know how old this motto is, but Baptists have always insisted that the Church is an invisible institution known fully only by God and therefore not subsumed under any particular denomination. The Church extends throughout the world, so Baylor's vision was always, in principle, global.

The risk for Baylor in asking this question -- "Why does the world need Baylor?" -- is that the focus might become 'worldly' rather than global.

If I were to post a response, I'd probably say something like this:

Baylor University can be significant for the world if it successfully accomplishes three things that it's been attempting ever since I studied there in the latter 1970s. It must continue its commitment to the goal of being a great teaching institution. It must strengthen its commitment to the goal of being a great research institution. It must maintain its commitment to the goal of being a great Christian institution. Holding to these three will not be easy, for the tendency of other Protestant Christian universities, as they have developed into significant, respected centers of education, has been to lose their focus as Christian institutions, eventually secularizing themselves. Some might say that the attempt to reach the highest intellectual levels while remaining Christian is like trying to square the circle, for intellectual inquiry is an open-ended search for truth, whereas Christian doctrine is grounded in an unchanging revelation of truth. If Baylor can manage to do this, and also continue as a great center of teaching, then it has something significant to offer the world.

Yeah, I'd probably say something like that. If anyone else has things to say on this issue, Baylor is eager to hear from you:

Please submit your answers HERE.

See, I told you . . .

Gary Kennedy on Obstacles Faced by Foreign Professors in Korea

Foreign Professor in a Korean University

(Image from JoongAng Daily)

A British friend of mine, Gary Kennedy, whom I got to know through the international church that I attend, SIBC, and who also taught the same time as I at Kyung Hee University, has recently published a thought-provoking article in the JoongAng Daily on Korean education, "Foreign profs face obstacles in Korea" (August 30, 2010). His experiences don't exactly parallel my own, for he's in the sciences, whereas I'm in the humanities, so I have no need of the lab space for research that he requires, but some obstacles that we've encountered have been similar:

As a professor at two universities in Seoul for the past five and a half years, I've noticed that Korean universities in recent times -- instead of focusing on improving their education quality -- have been hurriedly employing foreign professors to improve their ranking so they can appear to be global players.

While this may result in a better ranking, it is detrimental to students and limits severely the career tracks of foreign professors.

Today, once a foreign professor is employed, he or she simply teaches a standard quota of classes -- the same as Korean professors do. But many obstacles prevent effective teaching and learning.

First, students' English language ability is insufficient. Second, the technical content is difficult (particularly in science and engineering). Third, the student doesn't want to or can't communicate with the professor during question-and-answer sessions. Fourth, the traditionally minded university student believes he should get high scores while simultaneously believing he's on a four-year holiday after working hard to enter university. Fifth, the student focuses on memorization rather than understanding the material and applying new knowledge to real problems. And finally, the student expects the professor to feed him all that he needs to pass the exam comfortably.

It is also incredible that students are never held accountable for poor performance, while at the same time they are allowed to make judgments on professors. These class evaluation can significantly affect the contract renewal of foreign professors. In addition, Korean students' evaluations are taken seriously even though they've never developed effective study skills. As a result, students have little motivation to adopt effective learning strategies for the benefit of their future careers, creating a "mission impossible" situation for foreign professors who are trying to teach their students effectively.

As I stated above, some experiences differ. Unlike my friend Gary, I've had a number of excellent students whose English is quite good and who are interested in more than rote memorization, but this privilege comes from working as a professor in departments of English language and literature, where English skills would understandably be better. Nevertheless, I concur with Gary that the general problem of the disinterested student who expects a high grade for little effort and low quality exists also in the humanities, and such students can abruptly derail one's academic career by submitting low teaching evaluations as revenge.

Obtaining tenure in a Korean university is extremely difficult for a foreigner, and I speak from experience as a foreign professor who has published at least two articles per year for the past ten years while teaching in Korean universities. Once, I even had a tenure position as Assistant Professor (조교수, i.e., Jo Gyo Su) that was altered to a contract job as Visiting Professor (초빙교수, i.e., Cho Bing Gyo Su) when the university decided that no foreigner could hold tenure. I was informed that the Korean National Assembly had passed a law stipulating that limitation on foreigners, a 'fact' that I doubted but decided not to contest at the time because I had a wife and two young children to support and couldn't run the risk of suffering penury.

I would add to Gary's article the point that foreign professors often find themselves caught in the crossfire of Korea's culture war between 'conservatives' and 'progressives', and being pegged as one or the other -- often for mystifying reasons -- translates into implacable opposition by either the 'progressives' or the 'conservatives', a consequence almost invariably fatal to the career of a foreign professor lacking in the Korean connections to counter such opposition.

At any rate, any non-Korean interested in pursuing a career at a Korean university will definitely want to read Gary's entire article.

Expat Living: "Broke bankers: move to Kansas"

Small Change?

Unneeded in Kansas. . .

And You Can Bank on That!

(Image from Wikipedia)

At last, another "Expat Living" article by yours truly has appeared in this morning's edition of the Korea Herald. I fear that today's column will therefore look rather familiar:

Broke bankers: move to Kansas

Despite the world's recent economic downturn, I have no wish to traffic in the dismal science. Mine is the sunny science of loquacious economics, and this being a language column, I offer manifold words of advice. These might not amount to verbal economy, but I do truly desire to help those who have suffered the most in the current economic crisis: New York bankers.

Therefore, in the disinterested interest of helping this select few of those rendered unemployed or at least insolvent by the recession that has accompanied the ongoing financial mess, I offer as free advice the following tip: Move to Kansas and take up farming.

"But," you may well protest, "I'm a New York banker who knows nothing about running a farm."

No problem. You knew nothing about running a bank either, but that ignorance never kept your confidence in check. If you can simply regain that level of ignorant arrogance, you will be well-qualified for the farm "job" that I suggest.

Here is the deal, which I shall elaborate in my ramshackle style. My "Cousin Bill," a Kansas native, was recently on one of his "Weekly Ramblings" through Kansas and vicinity, taking in the broad vistas that stretch from one grain elevator to the very next one 20 kilometers off in the majestic distance. Up close, these elevators can be quite elevating. Cousin Bill, for instance, had an elevated conversation with a local grain-elevator farmer in the town of Offerle and offers us this synopsis in his "Weekly Ramblings" newsletter:

"At an Offerle service station, I briefly talked farming awhile with a tall, lean, elderly, baseball-hatted grain-elevator farmer obviously in need of communication with someone other than a prairie dog. He advised that his farming now consisted of collecting a monthly check from the state of Kansas, that entity paying him more to idle his ground than he was making with his corn and alfalfa crops. He did tell us that the main reason Kansas did that was 'cause they found he was pumping out way too much ground water for irrigation, and said if he'd shut off the pumps they'd just pay him not to grow. He was a nice guy, interesting and would have talked for several hours if we'd had the time."

This nice, interesting farming kind of guy would undoubtedly have had a lot more fascinating things to reveal to Cousin Bill, but the important point to note here is that you need only threaten to pump ground water to irrigate your Kansas farm, and the Great State of Kansas will pay you a good money not to pump that water.

"Hold on," you may well say. "I'm already not pumping ground water in Kansas, but I haven't received any money."

Yes, that happens, so I have to ask a personal question. Have you actually threatened to pump water? I thought not. Moreover, and this is the sticking part, you need to actually have some land in Kansas, else the threat will not work. Allow me to anticipate your next objection, that you own no land in Kansas and have no money to purchase any. Well, do not let your New York state of penurious repose shut you out from your Kansas state of pecuniary reward. According to the website "Kansas Free Land" (www.kansasfreeland.com), there's free land in Kansas:

"Several communities in Kansas are offering free land and other incentives. Our goal is to help our rural areas sustain and grow economically. We welcome you to take a look at the various communities."

Just visit "Kansas Free Land," choose your preferred isolation, settle down to the modern farming way of life, and covertly but unmistakably threaten to pump some of that precious Kansas ground water. I guarantee you that this will work if you just have the right degree of ignorant arrogance. Of course, you may have learned something about basic economics from your recent debacle, so you might need to forget some of that. You need only learn to not ask too many questions about whether this all makes any sense and just wait for the money to start rolling in to your account in a local bank (if there is one) in return for your not farming.

Technically, you will still be unemployed, but at least you'll have land, home, and cash . . . a bit like what you had before. Not quite as much money, of course, but beggars can't be choosers.

Jeffery is a professor at Ewha Womans University and can be reached through his blog Gypsy Scholar at gypsyscholarship.blogspot.com -- Ed.

As I warned, this one will have sounded familiar. Faithful readers will also recall my more serious entry concerning Professor Jasper Kim's informative column on the forces that precipitated our current financial crisis.

I'd chat more this fine morning, but I have student debates to judge . . . and grade.

Expat Living: The Spitting Image of 'Globalization'...

Glob-alization

It really does look like a 'glob'

(Image from Wikipedia)

Once again, my "Language Column" has shown up in The Korea Herald -- yesterday, to my surprise. I simply wasn't expecting it . . . but there it was.

I'm not displeased, obviously, for I'm pasting and posting it here, which leave me time for other, pressing pursuits, e.g., correcting Sun-Ae's literary translations from Korean into English, grading thesis statements, reading on Islamism, that sort of thing...

Anyway, here it is, my column on 'glob-alization':

"Facing up to globular reality," The Korea Herald, April 29, 2008

Everyone these days talks about "globalization," but how many of us have truly reflected very deeply upon its meaning even though we expatriates living here in Korea face globalization every time we step outside?

Some of us may rail against this globular reality that we encounter on Korean streets, some of us may even defend it, but all of us recognize its presence and that we can do little but adjust.

Expatriates from lands that have already experienced globalization should not look down on Korea for only now beginning to deal with this globular issue. Indeed, we need only look to our fairly recent pasts to discover that Korea is the spitting image of Western nations.

In America, for instance, Salinas, California still has a law to prohibit spitting on a sidewalk, and South Haven, Michigan even saw fit to legislate against spitting "on any sidewalk or on the floor or seat of any public carrier, or on any floor, wall, seat or equipment of any place of public assemblage," just in case anyone should consider giving in to an urge to spit.

As these examples suggest, spitting was very common even among Westerners not so long ago and only began to decline through pressure exerted by the medical profession, city ordinances, and disapproving peers. Some backwoods regions continued the habit of spitting well into the twentieth century.

As late as my adolescence in the Arkansas Ozarks, for instance, I recall seeing plenty of spittoons -- though usually intended for people who chewed tobacco. And folks did spit. Especially in barber shops, one could find some excellent spitters -- men who had sufficient skill for a sure shot from ten feet away.

Spitting contests of that kind, incidentally, might explain something that had previously puzzled me. One of my uncles tells the anecdote of his induction into the military during WWII. He and others from the Ozarks were sent to Little Rock before heading on to boot camp, but these new draftees first had to get medical exams to test their fitness. They were told to strip down to their birthday suits and stand near the back wall of the room. A sergeant came in with a bottle, held it up for all to see, and began to explain what the men had to do:

"Men!" he barked, "I want you to piss in this bottle."

To which, in utter seriousness, one of the men from my hometown responded:

"From back here?"

Now, maybe this hometown hillbilly was skilled at hitting spittoons, or perhaps he had even been in a few pissing contests, but he was absolutely sincere in his question -- my uncle swears to it!

Anyway, as for spittoons themselves, I'm sure that some spitters used them for oral fluids other than tobacco-enhanced saliva, but most Americans remain unaware that the habit of public spitting has only fully disappeared in the last generation or two. If we just knew a little more about our own relatively recent "nasty" habits, we might be more understanding of the spitting that we see among Koreans.

Finally, for those readers who wish to know about the more technical aspects of globalization, note that the word "glob" derives from the Latin globus, meaning "globular mass."

Jeffery is a professor at Kyung Hee University and can be reached through his blog, Gypsy Scholar, at gypsyscholarship.blogspot.com - Ed.

You can read this at the Korea Herald's website, of course, but you have to go looking through the "Expat Living" posts to find it.