Cultural diversity and dynamism in demand, in dilemma, and in the mend: modernity and multiculturalism in Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei.

Chen, Shudong

Why do I teach humanities? Does it mean helping students to see the broadest possible picture of humanity or making them sensitive to cultural phenomena that reflect subtle but vital differences beneath well-observed similarities and essential but overlooked similarities behind noticeable differences? Does it mean teaching students to be critical and creative thinkers to enable them to detect and discover the richest possible connection of humanity where least expected or to find the road not taken not only beyond but also within the road well trodden? Does it also mean to teach students how to think locally as well as globally--between, beyond, beneath and behind any specific local phenomenon? Does it mean cultivating all-rounded humans, not merely manufacturing specialized "utensils" (Confucius) or breeding a "specially trained dog," as Einstein so emphasizes? If so, none would be possible, as Einstein would also emphasize, without the crucial "personal contact with those who teach" humanities. (2) It means humanities must be taught through instructor's crucial personal contact, using his/her professional and personal strengths, to enhance, enrich, and enliven students' critical and creative perception, judgment, and understanding not only in terms of their own cultural traditions but also cross-culturally.

To make this mission possible, it is crucial that those who teach humanities themselves must be further enriched and enlivened and enlightened especially nowadays in this increasingly incorporated and but also fragmented small world of ours amid the irreversible trend of globalization. This is why I consider this trip enormously helpful with regard to our mission of teaching about humanity through teaching humanities or making our divided and diversified world well connected in and through our classrooms. In each section below, I outline the rationale and measures of implementation regarding how to transform my professional and personal experiences from the trip in ways applicable to the humanities courses I teach.

This paper includes the following sections. (1) Statement of purpose. (2) Measures of implementation. (3) The concept of modernity as overarching ideology of globalization. (4) Multiculturalism as response to modernity. (5) Islam as response to crises both globally and domestically for cultural, national, and identity. (6) American history and literature as serendipitous points of reference. (7) China, Japan, Korean as additional personal and professional references. (8) Reasonable optimism and pessimism in assessment. (9) Themes for study. (10) Mechanism and types of multiculturalism. (11) General questions and (12) Specific questions, both for brainstorming and overall study guides.

(1) Statement of Purpose: With multiculturalism as the focal and organizing theme and Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei as the basic examples, the curriculum project intends to paint a broadest picture of humanity as it has been so enriched and enlivened worldwide in the forms of human responses to modernity and the role of literature as the key measurement and embodiment of human development. The project will therefore examine the very nature of multiculturalism in relation to modernity, as it has been the case in these three countries within the context of world humanities regarding its necessity, possibility and mechanism for success as well as its actual and potential problems beyond, beneath, and behind its observed and observable instances of success.

(2) Implementation: The project, so defined in the above statement and detailed in the following rationale, will be, first and foremost, implemented "wholesale" as a new course on Southeastern Asia once considered acceptable in a community college setting through a regular new course proposal and examination procedure. Otherwise or meanwhile, it will be be incorporated into three existing courses that I have been teaching. For my Introduction to Humanities, a popular genre-based course on art (visual, audio, and performing) and literature, I will use probably 10% or 20% of course time to explore the materials from the trip. I will explain to students, for instance, how and why the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur are so important as the unique artistic and architectural monuments that define Malaysia as a young Muslin country with regard to its national aspiration and its economic achievement so artistically confirmed and consolidated, this way, as it tries to modernized itself rapidly. For my Introduction to World Humanities, an increasingly popular course on world civilizations and cultures on a chronological base, I will use approximately 15% or 25% of course time, with materials from the trip, to cover a wide arrange of issues regarding Islam, Southeastern Asia, Islam in China, Abrahamic religions, modernity, and multiculturalism, etc. For my Eastern Civilization, an equally popular course with a focus on China, Japan, India, and Korea, I will use about 20% or 25% of course time on Southeastern Asia and discuss Islam in China with Southeastern Asia as comparable and historical reference.

(3) The concept of modernity as overarching ideology of globalization. So what is modernity? To teach the course as so intended, what I need, first and foremost, is a working definition of "modernity." But however challenging as it always is to define modernity, here is one that may help my students to understand the fundamentals in a broadest possible sense. For me, modernization, globalization, democratic capitalism, westernization, Americanization, Islamic nationalism, and revolutions, such as Russian and Chinese revolutions, etc., are all inevitable responses, both positive and negative, to modernity. They are all, in other words, observable or manifested impacts of modernity, which is, simply put, an overarching ideology, a discourse and mindset that is obsessed with scientific models and standardization for clarity, purity, and efficiency, and therefore controllability with no tolerance for ambiguity and paradox. It is the mindset that prevails, as Stephen E. Toulmin describes in Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda ofModernity, often at the expenses of healthy doses of humanism, skepticism and tolerance through ideological indoctrination, abstraction, action of intolerance, and even violence. In the creation of such a discourse of modernity that stresses rationalization or systemization for maximum efficiency and controllability, as Toulmin also analogizes, it is quite deplorable for us to have simplified "Montaigne" into "Descartes," reduced "Leviathan" into "Lilliput," transformed "reasonable" into "rationale," turned "ideas" into "ideology," and, for me, to sacrifice understanding for knowledge. (3) Wittgenstein probably makes the concept clearer when he argues in Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus that "the whole modern conception of the world is founded on the illusion that the so-called laws of nature are the explanations of natural phenomena. Thus people today stop at the laws of nature, treating them as something inviolable, just as God and Fate were treated in past ages. And in fact both are right and both wrong: though the view of the ancients is clearer in so far as they have a clear and acknowledged terminus, while the modern system tries to make it look as if everything were explained" (1961,143).

(4) Multiculturalism as responses. With the concept of modernity so defined, the next step is for students to understand that multiculturalism is not born out vacuum but is an inevitable critical response to modernity. At the different phases of globalization, there are always "identity crises" popping up to confront us as individuals and as nations. Indeed, our understanding of one another, contrary to what we like to assume, does not automatically increase, if at all, following the trends of modernization and globalization. Instead, the old stereotypes persist, as people become more and more concerned about their ethnic, national, and cultural identities with the pressures of globalization, which tend to pigeonhole people as commodities, customers, or mere statistics.

While our world grows smaller and smaller, it also becomes more and more fragmented. There are also deep-rooted resentments, an ingrained victimization mentality, surreptitious and cynical exploitation of history for political gains in and through globalization that often fans nationalism and xenophobia rather than cultivating goodwill and mutual understanding among peoples. Clearly, our contemporary world has long been infested with embittered, die-hard feelings and haunting memories. They are all coming back alive with vengeance amid tides of globalization or modernization. As I have observed during this trip, for instance, in response to the trends of globalization and, quite ironically under the umbrella of multiculturalism, certain cultural aspects in a multicultural society, such as Islam in Malaysia, could often be singled-out, simplified, exaggerated, or reinvented to be the dominant cultural/ national "identity"--at the expense of or on a collision course with other cultural components. At the same time, multiple cultural aspects are meticulously allocated, as in Singapore, to maintain perceived economic and political advantages both domestically and internationally. Multiculturalism, perhaps, is not just a simple matter of demography, nor a stagnant equation, but rather a dynamic act of im/balance in motion as a response to both interior and exterior influences and pressures. It can also be a "politically correct" policy to adopt, as in Brunei, to pursue an enlightened, benign Islamic centered multicultural society.

From multi-co-existing cultures to multiculturalism, there is also a hidden emphasis on ideology. As a response to modernity, multiculturalism, however drastically different on the surface from what modernity stands for, is ultimately, or quite paradoxically, conditioned by the very paradigm of its opponent's ideology. However post-modern sounding, multiculturalism, in other words, is virtually on the same hinge with modernity. Multi-co-existing cultures are facts, but multiculturalism is an ideology, an ideological interpretation of or approach to the given facts or situations with a methodological implication or assumption that things, however complicated or complex, by nature, can eventually be clustered or lumbered together by means of efficient deduction or categorization according to a certain political principles, order, priority and values. At this point, "naming," such as Malaysia from Malaya, as our students should understand, is also a political gesture or power-endowing process within the entire scheme of national responses to modernity. So multiculturalism, in this perspective, is both a paradigmatically cultural and political response to modernity, often in a quite ironical way, since it also tends to lump things together in accordance with the same overarching cognitive paradigm that legitimizes the perceived political order and power structure. With such a multicultural response to modernity, certain ethnic components, tensions, differences and similarities are often downplayed or exaggerated for political privilege and persuasion in terms of the perceived and desired clarity, order, superiority, and maximum level of controllability. It is because there was simply no such need for "naming," nor was there the necessity to emphasize the importance for co-existence, since all cultures there were already in a natural state of co-existence as in the case of Malaya before the arrival of the British and the new names, such as "Malaysia," were given to impose or instill the "modern" system of order and hierarchy. (4) As an ironical consequence, "multiculturalism" also quite often reflects people's natural instincts for cultural self-preservation amid perceived and/or actual identity crisis in order to maintain to "marinate" their political and commercial interests.

As I have also observed particularly in Singapore and Malaysia, the more things are mixed up within the given system, order, or hierarchy, the stronger are the tendencies for each culture thus lumbered together to focus on certain most desirable cultural aspects in order to emphasize ethnic and cultural identity, originality, purity, tradition, or heritage, imagined or real, through competitive exaggeration or creative reinvention. But such competitive and multicultural environments often become the best cultural repertoires that preserve certain cultural aspects or heritage long gone in their birthplaces. In Malacca Malaysia, for instance, I saw so many well-preserved or reinvented religious and cultural practices no longer available in China itself. But, on the other hand, what has been identified as Chinese, Malay, or even Portuguese are real only in their respective names, because everything has already been so mixed up to be truly taken apart from one another. The so-called Chinese cuisine is actually so Malay in taste and even in style, and so is Malay so much Chinese. The authentic Portuguese food turned out to be so disappointingly as well as interestingly "Chinese." Similarly, things that do not previously exist in their identified birthplaces, such as China or India, or exist only as some kind of minor local practices, like the Hungry Ghost Festival, are practiced and preserved as to become the very symbols of the cultures par excellence. Often, as in Malaysia, people do not mind or even enjoy staying together but want to be different--however much there is such increasing pressure from top down to lumber them together with a common "identity," which they didn't have, don't' care much to have. For multiculturalism to truly become a bottom-to-top grass-roots phenomenon, the problem is how to make people care, not the governments.

(5) Islam as response both globally and domestically for cultural/ national identity. In Studies on Chinese and Islamic Inner Asia, Joseph Fletcher argues that the great Muslin uprising in China in 19th century was "apparently deeply affected by the neo-orthodox fundamentalist thinking in the Middle East, and among the Naqshbandiyya in particular" (1995, XI 31). It is, in other words, partially motivated or inspired by a worldwide trend of Islamic revivalism, a kind of inward-turning, fundamental-leaning, self-withdrawing, and soul-searching response to modernity following Islam's diminished influences and status in world politics under the ever growing shadows of Western dominance. "How "accurate" is this scenario so depicted worldwide nowadays? How does Islam continuously influence other crucial regions, such as these three nations, and in ways, apparent or subtle, as through growing numbers of tourists from other Muslin nations to Malaysia, particularly from the Middle Eastern countries, i.e., Saudi Arabia?

For my World Humanities class, this will be a major focal area on issues related not only to these three nations in question but also Islam in general. "However clearly or unclearly Muslins perceived the sum total of these facts," also according to Joseph Fletcher, "non-Muslins must surely have promoted some degree of feeling among Muslins that all was not right with their political order, and such a feeling would presumably have led to a little soul-searching" (23). Is this still a relevant statement worldwide and in the Southeast Asian nations? Does Islam help consolidate a "national identity" crucial to the Muslims, i.e., in Malaysia, at the expense of non-Muslim population? How do we also explain such phenomena that Muslims in Malaysia tend to consider themselves Muslims first rather than Malaysians? They seem to have more trust in Islam rather than in the nation-state. It seems to be easier or more logical for them to relate to Islam and/or to their local tribal cultures than to Malaysia, the modern nation-state, as "Malaysians." This should also be the issue to be re-examined in terms of the worldwide Islamic response to modernity.

(6) America as a serendipitous point of reference. To further explore the issues as above and to teach our students, at the same time, how to take the road not taken within and beyond the road well-trodden as critical and creative thinkers, they must understand that here is an indispensable point of reference near at hand--the U. S.. Nowadays, of course, it often seems to be quite "politically correct" or even fashionable overseas to dismiss anything American as "arrogant" and "ignorant," kind of "Bullshitism." Is it, however, also "intellectually correct" to do so--without being equally arrogant and ignorant? Despite its unpopular foreign policies, America, nonetheless, is still the indispensable source of reference, especially for young nations, such as Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei, on many issues, such as the ones regarding modernity, multiculturalism, and nation-building, particularly in terms of such fundamentals as choice of national language and cultivation of national literature that embodies and enlivens national spirit, aspiration, and worldview. Moreover, it certainly makes perfect sense to say that literature reflects reality, but more often it is reality that reflects literature. Reality sometimes tries to match up with the Reality so perceived and perfected in literature, simply because literature contains such uniquely enriched deposits of human experiences and wisdom. Like in ancient Greece, China, and India, reality is often the result of our human desires to repeat, re-live the heroic events in the past glorified in literature. Literature enriches and enlivens reality, not just passively reflects it. My recent trip in Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei, is, indeed, very much like a great journey through the rich text of American literature. It is American literature that helps me better understand all these exciting but also often quite mind-boggling multicultural societies behind, beneath, and besides all their much talked about, wonder-making economic growth towards modernization.

American history, particularly its literary history, does help me to see how crucial it really is to balance economic development with a long term plan for national literary creation and education indispensable for these multicultural societies to continue prospering with a gradual but fully cultivated, consistent, coherent nation all cultural identity, a live sense of togetherness, not simply remaining being jumbled together in a colonial legacy. Economic growth thus should not be prized at the expense of such a long-term plan. America, once so bent on its utilitarian principles and single-mindedly pursuing wealth and prosperity, even initially turned down the Statue of Liberty, a great gift from France, on the ground of being too costly to install it. Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei are, now, more or less on the same track. "Growth, growth, growth, and growth [nothing else or at any costs?]!" the very mood, mode, and momentum for economic growth is perhaps truly expressed with this simple slogan from Mr. Mahatir, the former prime minister of Malaysia, the architect of Malaysia's miracle economic turnover. But this growth also contributed as well to various social problems, such as corruption, renewed ethnic and religious tensions among the Muslin Malays and other ethnic components of this multicultural society, such as the Chinese, and Indians. Despite its economic growth, from Malaya to Malaysia, there is still long, long way to go. But whether the journey or transition would ever be successful, it depends very much on whether and how a strong and coherent national and cultural identity can be cultivated and endeared to all the ethnic groups, or ideally the "Malaysians," through a certain well-balanced and implemented literacy and literature education.

With useful reference to what happened in America, we can clearly see how crucial such a balance for literacy and literature education really is for any young nation with a multiethnic background, simply because it is a crucial benchmark regarding how "mature" or independent the nation truly becomes. Don't we still remember what Emerson tries to argue then that America would never be truly independent if it still has to depend on the old Europe for its own literary expression and artistic voice and vision? But such a balance, or the very necessity of it, is yet to be realized in these nations at least in terms of what I have observed. Wherever I went or whenever I had the opportunities during the trip, I often asked questions about the literary and artistic developments in the nations, especially when economy, plus related issues on social and political infrastructures, became such an over-dominant topic or subject that seemed to define Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei per se. When for instance, I asked our well-informed, prominent speakers to mention one or two novelists or poets of national status beloved to people of all ethnic groups, it usually turned out to be a very difficult moment for them. They knew more of Shakespeare or Milton, or some very local, ethnically specific literature of each ethnic-group to which they belong, but none of any "national" authors. There is something apparently missing--a sense of togetherness, coherent national conscience and consciousness, cultural identity "legitimized" or "eternalized" by a significant body of national literature and art that consolidates and confirms any given nation as its inexhaustible well of wisdom, inspiration, a unique repertoire of national aspiration, voices, and vision. Such a body of literature is especially crucial for a true multicultural society to develop and mature its maturity because together without a coherent sense of togetherness so "literarily" substantiated is very much like "a tray of sand," since sum, as Rousseau suggests in Social Contract does not equal to total.

With useful reference to American history, our students, if we want to teach them to be responsive and responsible thinkers, should also know that this literature issue is also the language problem that confronts these young nations in terms of which language to adopt as a national language endeared to all ethnic groups. Yes, this is, indeed, a crucial "To be or not to be" question, which can be easily translated into "To speak Chinese, English, Malay, and/or ... this is great problem." Like Americans, who finally decided to adopt English, the language of the enemy then, as its national language, instead of its initial favorites, i.e., Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, ones that were considered best representing the New Republic's cultural heritages and political aspirations, Singapore and Malaysia, for instance, have similar problems with their choices of official languages. To have adopted English as Singapore's official language is, as some of presenters argued, the wisest choice ever made by the former Premier Lee--of course, from the point of view of economic growth. But it may not necessarily be the case from cultivating a national identity and pride and sense of togetherness. As the language of a former colonial master, English, while bringing people together for daily business, is not, nonetheless, a language of heart or of daily business in its most "trivial," private and personal sense. Instead, it has such lofty or sublimely alienating impacts on people. Catherine Lim, a noted Singaporean author of Chinese origin and political activist, originally from Malaysia, told us how hard it was initially for her even to imagine writing about her "fussy Chinese" stories in English, such a lofty language of Shakespeare, Milton, and Jane Austen. But, however much Lim may have overcome her initial awe and successfully found her own voice and vision in the master/ed tongue, whether English would eventually become a language of heart or emotion for all Singaporeans, which is a great must for a genuine national language to be and a national literature to emerge, is still a question. Malaysia, meanwhile, is still debating and exploring the possibility, as well as the necessity, to bring back English as the national language, to make itself as much linguistically accessible and available both domestically and internationally for the obvious financial and economic advantages that Singapore, its chief rival and former "Malaysian," has been enjoying so much as one of the English-speaking modern nation-states. It is also because English is literally the de facto national language, no matter how Malay remains as the official one--but still not the tongue of heart for many ethnic groups other than the Malays.

The eventual success of a truly multicultural society in Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei, as our students should also understand, depends not just on their economic strengths but on their yet-to-be-cultivated literary voices and visions.

(7) China, Japan, and South Korea as references: With reference to Japan and South Korea, we can see how each nation responds differently to modernity or whatever perceived and actual threats from outside. China and Korea, for instance, were exposed to a similar kind of threats in 19th century as Japan: the Western imperialism. But their responses were very different. Why? It's partially determined and influenced by such crucial elements as geography and history and culture. If so, how do we characterize the Southeast Asian countries in terms of its response to modernity? Clearly, "the hand that opened the door was as important as the one that produced the knock from outside (Hall 1965, 36). With reference to Japan and South Korea, we can also see various thought-refreshing myths, miracles and miseries that have taken shape in these two nations as they head toward modernization in speed and scale that seem to be echoed or duplicated in Singapore, Malaysia, even in Brunei. However true these two nations are homogeneous by nature, what make their versions of modernity unique is their exploration and exportation of each national and cultural resources, literature and art particularly in their popular versions, in addition to their well-known hardware products, i.e., automobiles. South Korean soap operas are now, for instance, so overwhelmingly popular in Japan, its former colonizer who tends to look down upon the Koreans as inferior, and China, its cultural overlord. Meanwhile, I also know that so many people who become attracted to Japan and want to learn Japanese language are not primarily impressed by its industrial products but its mangy culture and games. Multiculturalism eventually needs cultures to go on or move along with. The issue that should also be explored at this point is whether or how Islam provokes and promotes literature in general and literary production in the Southeastern nations in particular--in ways and social functions compatible to or measurable in terms of those in the West and in China, Japan, and Korea, or in its own ways--in parallel with, in other words, the traditions and genres that we are familiar with, such as epic as "serious literature" and soap opera as popular one.

(8) Optimistic and pessimistic assessments: What is the fixture of multiculturalism in Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei? Is multiculturalism really exemplified in the region? If so, to what degrees, in what ways, and with whatever probably exaggerated and/or overlooked positive and negative aspects? I still want to see whether or how "Confucianism" adapts itself there while interacting with Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam. I still want to observe how "lazy" Malay, "greedy" Chinese, and "untrustworthy" Indians manage and mend their ways for the colorful societies and cultures that they all share. But I do think that I have seen quite enough in Singapore and Malaysia to have some optimistic assessment, for the time being, particularly with regard to the on-going processes that often reflect good intentions and endeavors regarding what governments have done or have been trying to do amid generally democratic framework or through certain measurable procedures in overall peaceful environments--in addition to their admirable economic successes. In Singapore, multiculturalism, for instance, has been so meticulously implanted or embedded in everyday businesses and activities, i.e., amid or through housing project and urban designing. I have also seen how multiculturalism is reflected in ordinary citizens' daily social and religious conducts. I saw, for instance, how people in Singapore paid tributes to a Hindu temple on their way to worship the goddess in a Chinese Buddhist temple--half a block away from the Hindu temple.

I have also seen and heard equally enough to form a not-so-optimistic, if not quite pessimistic picture regarding the fixture of multiculturalism in Malaysia. How is multiculturalism to be eventually embodied in the actual governmental policies? Does it mean everything for somebody or everything for everybody? Does "equality" mean "until everyone is equal" according to the die-hard Malaysian governmental policies, which push for pro-Malay regulations as the prerequisites for multiculturalism? Whether in Singapore, Malaysia, or in Brunei, could it be possible that ultimately what really turns out as a winner is not multiculturalism but an all-purposeful and all-pervasive government? Does multiculturalism need to be so meticulously planned and carried out through the overwhelming authority of governmental power from top down as, for instance, in Singapore? A true multiculturalism, as Confucius would probably suggest, should be a society built on a kind of relationship best described as "conflicting complementarity" (harmonious despite differences). (5) But I have seen in Malaysia, it is rather a relationship of conflicting similarity (sameness devoid of harmony). For linguistic and cultural reasons, the crucial transition from Malaya to Malaysia has not really occurred completely there. Malaysian is a term yet to be substantiated Yes, people there are together, but are not really bound by a heart-felt togetherness. Muslins often consider themselves first Muslins rather than Malaysians and the Malays as Malays. There are also silenced concerns and unvoiced subtexts. As a colonial legacy and product of modernity as well, could ethnic violence again lead to blood baths among ethnic groups once together as good neighbors or even friends for generations, who, nonetheless, could become each other's cold-blood murderers overnight? This has happened in the Balkans, Africa, and in other Asian regions as well. In addition to my own observations, our presenters also seemed quite divided with regard to how optimistic and/ or pessimistic they are, especially in Malaysia, concerning the very past, present, and future of their multicultural societies. The dust has not yet set.

(9) Themes for study: Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei as foci of study regarding the (1) Roles of government, (2) Lasting impacts of colonialism, (3) Influences of Islam and of China, past and present, and other ethnic components, (4) Islam to China through Southeast Asia with Islam back to Southeast Asia through Chinese immigrants. This latter can be seen in terms of the following: the "Silk Road" via sea, Mongol invasions, Zheng He's visit, Chinese migrations during the Qing Dynasty, Chinese migrations during the Colonial period, and Chinese migrations as a whole. More current themes include the Malaysian Chinese substantial support for China during Sino Japanese war, the Chinese resistance movement during Japanese occupation, and the Communist revolution in China with its perceived threats. Today we can see the continuation of these themes through China's Rising: Singapore's investments in China, Chinese studying and working in Singapore and Malaysia, Singaporeans and Malaysians studying and working in China, and Singaporean and Malaysian models for Chinese government.

(10) Mechanism and types of multiculturalism amid dilemma and irony: capitalistic authoritarianism for multicultural democracy. 1. Multiculturalism and democracy. Democracy as an open society that needs multiculturalism and multiculturalism depends on democracy. 2. Multiculturalism and authoritarianism: Authoritarian regulation as "necessary evil"? Multiculturalism, language, cultural/national identity: English, Chinese, Malay, and ... 3. Multiculturalisms and available models: Government implemented multiculturalism. This includes the Islam centered multiculturalism of Malaysia and Brunei and liberal capitalistic multiculturalism. 4. Multiculturalism and implemented mechanism. Multiculturalism is implemented, imbedded and enforced though constitutions, housing projects, architectural design, public religious/heritage celebrations, the education system, and as food preparation and consumption as daily rituals celebrated and confirmed as people eating and enjoying different ethnic foods. Education is pursued not just for what is being taught but the ways things are being taught, which matter in the long run, in implanting or implementing social and cultural values. 5. Multiculturalism and globalization.

(11) General questions: 1. What is multiculturalism? What does multiculturalism mean? 2. Does it mean everything and something for someone or everything and nothing to anyone? 3. What does multiculturalism try to achieve or what do we try to achieve through multiculturalism? 4. Does multiculturalism mean peaceful con-existence for common wealth and prosperity? 5. Is multiculturalism an idealistic or realistic response to reality, or a version of reality being so perceived in the name of multicultural society or community? 6. Is it a compromised or compromising response to a dynamic and often volatile reality? 7. What is the mechanism of assurance for its success or implementation regarding whatever its perceived and expected function and results? 8. What are the inevitable problems of multiculturalism? 9. What are the possible measures to deal with these problems? 10. In history we often see what makes a civilization or nation great is also what makes it vulnerable as in the case of ancient Greece, Rome, and modern Japan in the wake of Admiral Perry's historic visits. What makes ancient Greece great, for instance, brings it down as well--with its arrogance overblown following its rapid overflowing achievements, its democracy degenerated into demagoguery, and majority rule turned into mob rule, etc., especially after the death of Pericles. Is it possible that what makes multiculturalism successful could also lead to its failure?

(12) Questions on Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei. 1. Is multiculturalism really so successful in Singapore without any perceived or potential problems that would undo all or part of its successful story? If any, what are they? 2. How could it be dealt with accordingly? 3. With regard to the cases of Singapore and Malaysia, could or how could multiculturalism succeed without a distinguished body of literature and work of art that often not only reflects but also confirms and consolidates the very culture, or, in other words, culturally legitimizes any given culture from which it is born, at least according to Ralph Emerson? 4. Is multiculturalism in Singapore and, to a greater degree, Malaysia, a measured and or radicalized response to reality and modernity? 5. How much could multiculturalism be achieved through governmental authority and power--through authoritarianism, democracy, or other "isms" through foresight of planning and implementation or with false conviction and blind idealism? 6. How and why does multiculturalism succeed in Singapore the way it does? 7. Is it a success? Does or how does it succeed in Malaysia? 8. So what is typical of Singapore as a nation and Singapore as a people? 9. Does English, which seems to be a working bond, really help creating a lasting national cohesion or a sense of nationhood in Singapore? 10. Is Singapore a "melting pot" that does not melt? 11. Is multiculturalism in Singapore and Malaysia a choice out of zero choice, both an end and means? 12. Is there a national identity of Singapore as might be reflected in stereotypical perceptions within and without? (6) 13. Is Brunei really a multicultural society the way our host presents us for our brief two day visits? 14. Is a benign and enlightened monarch, as our speakers so emphasize, really the assurance of peace and success of a multicultural society with Islam as the guiding beacon?

References

Ames Roger T. & Henry Rosemont, Jr.. 1998. The Analects of Confucius: A Philosophical Translation. New York: Ballantine Books.

Einstein, Albert. 1982. Ideas and Opinions. New York: Crown.

Pears, D. F. & B. F. McGuinness. Trans. 1961. Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Ludwig Wittgenstein. Introd Bertrand Russell. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Fletcher, Joseph F.. 1995. Studies on Chinese and Islamic Inner Asia. Ed. Beatrice Forbes Manz. Aldershot, Hampshire, Great Britain, Variorum, 1995.

Hall, John Whitney. 1965. Changing Conception of the Modernization of Japan in Changing Japanese Attitudes Toward Modernization. Ed. Marius B. Jansen. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton UP.

Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick. Ed. Charles Feidelson. New York, The Bobbs-Merril Company, 1964.

--, 1967. Letters to Nathaniel Hawthorne in Moby-Dick. New York: Bantam.

Toulmin, Stephen. 1990. Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity. New York: Free Press.

(1) For this wonderful learning experience, I am so grateful to George Brown and Joe Overton, our devoted and fearless leaders who truly knew how to herd the most difficult species, the academicians, often with such a special sense of humor and a particular gift of understanding. I am also grateful to Professors Barbara and Leonard Andaya for being so helpful and responsive to our questions and requests with their engaging and encouraging comments and advice. For Betry Buck, Roger Ames, and Peter Hershock, who has indeed so personified ASDP, I am always grateful for their exemplary roles in having re-shaped me personally and professionally from a mere close reader of literature to an enthusiastic participant of cross-cultural dialogue since the summer of 2000. Furthermore, what is particularly meaningful as far as the trip is concerned is that I have not only learned so much from our presenters but also from all other participants who made our group such a live learning community--everyday. For this, I want to thank all my fellow participants, particularly, my dear roommate and friend, David Jones, as he had to put up with not only my amateurish gibberish on philosophy for the day but also my thundering snoring for the night- for the five entire weeks, with kindness, with humor, with stoicism, and, certainly, with quiet despair or heroic resignation. To the editors and reviewers, here are also my sincere thanks. Finally and as always, I thank Carolyn Kadel, my forever resourceful and supportive colleague and Director of International Education for this unforgettable trip.

(2) In detail here is what Einstein says regarding why and how humanities must be taught.

 It is not enough to teach man a specialty. Through it he may
 becomes a kind of useful machine but not a harmoniously developed
 personality. It is essential that student acquire an understanding
 of and a lively sense of the beautiful and of the morally good.
 Otherwise he--with his specialized knowledge--more closely
 resembles a well-trained dog than a harmoniously developed person
 ... He must learn to understand the motives of human beings, their
 illusions, and their suffering in order to acquire a proper
 relationship to individual fellow-men and to the community ...

These precious things are conveyed to the younger generations through personal contact with those who teach, not--or at least not in the main--through textbooks. It is this that primarily constitutes and preservers culture. This is what I have in mind when I recommend the "humanities" as important. (1982 65-6, emphasis added)

(3) See particularly chapters 2 and 5.

(4) Often, with colonization and modernization, places, regions, or cultures that have co-existed for hundreds of years or even centuries and have never needed an overarching "name" or "identity," all of a sudden, were given one. So from Malaya, here is Malaysia, a similar process that turned the "nameless" dark-skinned and diverse groups of people on the other side Hindu river into "Hindus" with their multi-religious faiths, rituals, and practices, quite conveniently as well as confusingly afterwards, all clustered under one simple term, "Hinduism, "The story of how Hinduism, the term adopted by and for Hindu nationalism as a kind of all-exclusive counterpart response to modern versions of "isms," is quite illuminating, as an additional reference, because the term is actually derived from "Hindu," an originally derogative reference to these "nameless" dark-skinned native inhabitants over the other side of Hindu river. Not knowing much of them, the outsiders and invaders often indiscriminately call them "Hindus." In Japan, though not a multicultural society, Shinto was elevated to become Shintoism--to be compatible to the all-powerful religious institution in the West, as the nation rushed itself toward modernization. At this point students can also be taught or reminded that cultural aspects are often subject to political manipulation as by these extra-nationalists," not even native-born, of each given culture, such as Napoleon, of Corsica, Stalin, of Georgia, Hitler, of Austria, or the Manchu conquerors of China.

(5) Here is Ames and Rosemont's quite close translation of the original. "The Master said, 'Exemplary persons seek harmony not sameness; petty persons, then, as the opposite"' (1998, 13:23) with further enlightening extended additional note from Zuo Commentary.

(6) Once involved in cross-cultural dialogues and debates, it is now quite common for one to dismiss another along with his/her arguments, "That's stereotype!" By so doing, the person who makes such a judgment seems to imply that behind, beneath beyond the "stereotypes" there is certain pure truth yet to be grasped. Is it possible that no such truth ever exists behind, beyond, beneath the stereotypes but between the so off-handedly dismissible stereotypes? Is it the same case with regard to frequent uses of misunderstanding? Does "misunderstanding" or "misinterpretation" always suggest there is 100% correct understanding there beneath, behind, and beyond the very misunderstanding? Is misunderstanding also possibly a matter of kind of degree? I remember when I asked one of our presenters in Singapore, a political scientist, how Singaporeans were usually perceived or what usual stereotypes of Singaporeans worldwide. For "stereotypes" are often one of possible benchmarks that indicates how a certain nation is "mature" enough as to acquire a "national identity" as we often do so in literature referring to American "innocence," French "arrogance," "English gentlemen," and so on. He hesitated for a while and then decided to dodge my question by saying that as a political scientist he talked about issues only with creditable data Is it possible only with credible data? If so, he only needed probably no more than ten minutes for his talk and then, as Wittgenstein would suggest, just stay silent afterwards. It is because throughout his entire two-hour presentation, with only occasional references to scientific data, he was talking in an utterly non-scientific ordinary tongue filled with innumerous stereotypes, which he himself, finally, had to come to term with or acknowledge from time to time--with occasional self-reflective asides or kind of self-effacing smiles or nods at me, when he, for instance, talked about "arrogance" of Singaporeans without, obviously, any creditable data as his scientific backup.

Shudong Chen, Johnson County Community College (1)