Thread: daily life in sumbawa

Dear Dr Bruce

Thank you for your quick reply. I shall look forward to reading to your further posts on this matter and if permitted with my lack of merits debating with you.

Originally Posted by Dr Bruce

It seems that you may have misinterpreted my statement about American culture and Indonesian culture. I actually wasn't making an academic statement about either, or I certainly would have been a bit more structured in my comments. They were meant to be observations not a detailed analysis.

My apology if I misinterpreted your post. To tell you the truth I have wanted to debate with you for sometime and perhaps pick your brains.

Originally Posted by Dr Bruce

So no harm, no foul. (I think that's an "American" saying.)

Indeed. “Nothing ventured nothing gained”.

America is sitting on a pedestal and her every action is being scrutinised by the world. Our discussion certainly has no harm and foul motives behind it, but it is a “storm in a tea cup” as most people, in my opinion, have interesting and sometimes very strong opinions about the USA.

Originally Posted by Dr Bruce

Bali is like another planet technologically compared with Sekongkang ………….

Interesting illustration concerning Sekongkang. I have never been there myself, but I am certainly interested in exploring many parts of Indonesia. It would be interesting to see whether I could survive without the comforts of modern technology that I am accustomed with. This reminds me of when I was visiting relatives in Java, I went to the lavatory room and found gold fishes in the water basin (ref: mandi). I was not sure whether to use the water or not, but since there was no other water resources I presumed that was the case. It was a deep “bak” so I made sure I did not harm them and left some water for the fishes.

Originally Posted by Dr Bruce

The second thing would be that I was looking at what specific influence I might be having (this is an anthropologist's general concern [or it should be anyway] when working in another culture) in this small village. Something like Star Trek's Prime Directive.

Would you also be so kind as to perhaps include Sekongkang as one of the case studies on your further answers? The idea of “Star Trek’s Prime Directive” is indeed intriguing : “No expedition may interfere with the natural development of other civilizations”, so the only answer if you do not wish to break the ‘Prime Directive’ is a clocking device. But don’t take your helmet off like Data (ref: Insurrection) :lol:

Originally Posted by Dr Bruce

but there are also regional varients, and the culture sure does change

I am in agreement with you. The USA is so vast and to me quite fascinating. Having lived in several places in the States I do appreciate the differing roots and cultures across the country.

Originally Posted by Dr Bruce

Now, why does mainstream America pick up this linguistic nugget from African-American culture and not something else?

I certainly picked up a few different types of “nugget”(s). I lived in Texas for a short period of time. I remembered my sponsored mother told me that when I left Texas I would love country music. First time I did not believe her, but she was right. I love country music and everything about the wild west. I went to the loc high school and everyone was wearing cowboy boots, so I ended up purchasing a pair and loved them to bits. When I got home from school the country music channels were on in the background with line dancing.

Back to matter in hand, ‘American Culture’. I think it is only fair if I share briefly my opinion of what I think of “Made in America”: the positive ones straight out of my head based on my first impression when I set foot in the States:

1. Freedom of speech.

I was personally impressed seeing students asking thought provoking questions and yet the teachers patiently explaining and debating the subject matter. Having most my pre-university education in Indonesia I can see the comparison, inter alia, whatever the teacher (Indonesian) said is gospel.

I just thought the idea of “Freedom of speech” is important as entices one’s mind to be creative hence new ideas/inventions/discoveries are formed.

2. All men are created equal (I am sure the founding fathers have women too in mind).

This is an interesting one as we know at the beginning in practice not all men in the US have equal rights (ref: skin colours). Interestingly in Britain they don’t have this Maxim. The Queen/King in theory are not equal to but higher than any men and women. As most American founding fathers are British descendents instead using old English Maxim “long live the King/Queen” they created a new unique one.

3. Separation between state and church.

If my memory serves me correctly. This was a heated debate in my American Government class (high school) as my teacher tried to explain that the relation between one and the creator is a personal affair, hence it is not for the state to interfere. Coming from Indonesia whereby “Pancasila” first commandment is “every Indonesian must believe in God”, inter alia at least belong to one of the officially known religions or beliefs, certainly raised my attention.

Many thanks.

Yours sincerely

Ni Luh

Typo:

Originally Posted by pooochie

clocking device.

cloaking device not clocking device.

Originally Posted by Jimbo

A fact that is well known through the entire developed as well as the developing world is that the Engish invented anything and everything that is worthwhile.......unless of course the Scots did it and even then we stole the idea.

The Americans proceeded to make a bigger version and the Japanese a better one.

English is of course the foremost language for communication and to prove how good we are my wife married one. What else is there to say on this subject.

PS. I have to go to the dentist right now to remove my tongue from my cheek.

Dear Ni Luh,

Check out this website, http://www.zompist.com/amercult.html, for some interesting reading about national characteristics, not just Americans, but many others as well. No one has written about Indonesia. Maybe you would like to do it. If you check the site out, you'll find that it is a mixture of seriousness and humor.

I pretty much said everything that I wanted to say the first time, other than that when you wrote "the point is that the American Culture you know is not American," you missed the point about what America is – at least on ideological and technological levels. One of the key concepts behind the “melting pot” is that America takes what comes in and through a dialectic adapts it as its own. A personal illustration would be my late father whose ancestors came from Germany. He used to say (too often for my siblings and I), “if it wasn’t for the Germans, America wouldn’t be America.” My mother, in an excellent comeback, found a newspaper advertisement that read, “If it’s not German, how good could it be?”

By the way, you should really have included the influence of foreign intellectuals: Rousseau, Foucauld, Sartre, Fanon, Einstein, Marx, Freud, the Frankfurt School, Levi-Strauss, Plato, Aristotle, Arthur Koestler, and many more, of course.


Thanks Jimbo, funny as always. I was actually coming up with a response in a similar vein. Something like:

Well, shur them folks was furin, but they all wants to be Amuricans. And if they don't, they're commies and we gots every right in the world to take their stuff.

And Sekongkang. Well more on that another time. I have to get off to Bali in the morning and need to pack.

Regards and happy new year.