Dear International/Exchange Students
You may be interested in the following Human Library taking place on Oct 11 & 25, Mon, 10:30-12:15, LSK208 & Oct 28, Thu, 12:30-2:15, WMY406.
All three sessions will be in my class titled Intercultural Communication Through English. As an international/exchange student, I think you’ll find this semi-structured conversation rewarding. This may be your chance to ask ‘rude’ or ‘silly’ questions such as ‘Why do Hong Kongers seem so rude?’
What’s a Human Library?
Take a look at this 1:30-min video of a Human Library in Singapore.
Click Here
What will happen in the Human Library?
You will meet, in person, 4 small groups of Hong Kong students, each for about 15 mins. You will take turns to share your personal stories of cultures and identities.
Our theme: Cultural Identities and Power Distance
- What assumptions do you think others have of you/ your sub/culture and vice versa?
- How do these assumptions / perceptions influence our behaviour?
- Give specific examples of questions asked or statements made about you/ your sub/culture?
- Give specific examples of how you fit/ don’t fit your sub/culture’s stereotypes.
- How is power perceived or distributed in the places you’ve been?
- How do you react when others show disrespect?
- Give specific examples of disrespectful behavior (e.g., staring, distancing, sneering, use of ‘please’) towards you/ your sub/culture.
You can rely on your gut reactions to these questions. But if you want to think them over, that’s fine too. We have to play it by ear, as I don’t know what questions or reactions there will be from HK students. The discussions may go off-topic or take an unexpected turn!
You could show HK students photos of the region you’re from or share with them one thing they must know if they were to visit your region.
You could ask questions too, especially how and why questions (e.g., How would such behavior be seen in your college/town? Why is it seen that way? What do you mean by ‘cool’, ‘powerful’?)
You may also assume unequal English language proficiency. Perhaps slow down your usual speech rate, offer guesses when you’re not sure, write out words that seem to cause confusion? Please bear with some silence. It may mean ‘I’m thinking and putting together my sentence.’
Please feel free not to answer questions you’re not comfortable with, and even take the opportunity to find out what may have motivated such questions.
Heads-up: I tend not to introduce you to the class (e.g., I don’t tell students where you’re from, even if I knew), I’d like my students to guess and find out for themselves. You could perhaps ask what’s behind their guesses. It’d be interesting to see what assumptions we have. But let’s try to keep the guessing game under one minute.