Maybe, but frankly most of us are really busy with our own lives, studying, being active in student life, working etc. We don’t have the time to do in-depth studies about the conflict of Darfur(except of course if you are a History or PolSci student). And really you are young only once. Why break your head in worrying so much about world affairs when you already have it all.

Did u get it all because of intelligent, brown parents who worked hard, who were adventurous coming to a new land with temporary papers and whose accent shames you?

78 · Colleen said

I don’t think it is ridiculous, however, to expect kids to understand that there are birds in India or that it is not a land filled with tigers. I don’t really think that is too much to ask.

Yeah, I found that really bizarre. I mean, what person doesn’t know that India is tropical = ergo, lush rainforests, thus plenty of trees AND birds. What kind of person thinks there are no birds or trees anywhere in the world save for the polar regions? (And even there there are birds) What do they teach them in geography class? Slightly late, but:

I only know three things about the Netherregions:

That’s a new one. Is that what they call it in the States these days? Are you trying to worsen its sleazy reputation already? What will the aunties think next?

Aunties are having a good time, going Dutch with nice American men. This is a great place to retire in after having worked in India. No one observes my love affairs er nether regions. Now if only u young ones didn’t make me so mad….

Sometimes fiction is a complement to history, but there is also fiction that does not need history. Crime and Punishment taught me next to nothing about Russia, but that is so not the point. Then there is poetry, that can make nothing happen- and that’s a good thing .

The only thing I don’t like is fiction as the supposed shortcut to a culture. It can be a complement, but it cannot stand on its own.

Toyota has done more for the Japanese image in the USA than Murakami and Mishima combined.Toyota has done more for the Japanese image in the USA than Murakami and Mishima combined. And isn’t that sad in a way, Sakshi? your comment #38 seemed very unusual, and apparently, your morning-after experience confirmed that.

Yes, I guess it is kind of sad, but I am not one to argue with people’s personal preferences or value systems. Also, I only regretted my last comment about english majors: I stand by the rest.

A few writers are exceptions, but fiction is not the way to learn about a different place or time: non-fiction is. yeah, but contemporary fiction is a fantastic primary source for the era one is trying to study. second, fiction really highlights the human fall-out of events. we all know about how indian soldiers fought for the allies during the second world war, but doesn’t ondaatje’s kip character in the english patient renders that fact solid, more concrete? just the existence of such a character makes you realize what a crazy thing imperialism was and the extent of its moral and tangible toll. even treatises on human rights and international law cannot sometimes capture moral complexities and implications that fiction (books and movies too) can drive home with a light touch. statistics, records, archives, and broad narratives that populate non-fiction are indispensable, but let’s not give short shrift to kind of learning or debate that fiction provokes.

But how would you understand the human fallout if you do not even know the events? How would you have read The English Patient if you knew next to nothing about WW2, and had hardly met an Indian in your life? Fiction by itself is a bad primary introduction to a new country/culture.

When I read To Kill a Mockingbird as a kid in India, I didn’t know about slavery or about segregation, or about the gruesome practice of lynching. My understanding of the book was completely different when the mob attacks the prison to capture Tom, I read it as an aberration, it came as a complete surprise: an American OTOH might be expecting something like that to happen. Similarly the wrongful accusation of rape on a black man did not have any cultural resonance for me. A little later I found Faulkner’s ‘Intruder in the Dust’, and was surprised by how similar the two stories were: I never finished Faulkner’s book for that reason. It never occurred to me, as a member of an ‘inferior’ country and culture, that something like this could be a serious problem for enlightened and modern America: my preconceptions completely warped my reading, in a way that was very forgiving of American culture. I can see how someone coming from a ‘superior’ culture could go exactly the opposite way. Now perhaps I was not the most perspicacious reader, but that is sort of the point of this post, isn’t it?

Literature is in a sense a conversation a culture has with itself: eavesdroppers are allowed of course, but they need to figure out the context for themselves, and it is not always straightforward. I don’t think many people realize this: I have friends who believe reading a book of fiction, even one book of fiction, about a country provides them with an understanding of the country. So Reading Lolita in Tehran is the stand-in for Iran, The Kite Runner for Afghanistan, Midnight’s Children for India, and so on. I don’t think it is that simple: it took me some time after I arrived to realize I had no clue about the US. And even 3 years later now, I am not sure how much I know. However I do believe history is the place to start: fiction comes last.

Btw, my peers are some of the most idealist ‘younguns’ I think to exist in a long time. I think they’re comparable to the teens in the Sixties. A lot of them are really politically involved, and also want to travel the world, rough it out, helping out in ecoprojects and orphanages along the way.

I’m all for travel, adventure, and active involvement in your community, but you should check out this book and this film before you hit the road. Real, meaningful change happens at the local, grassroots level–it’s not quite as sexy as a global insurrection, but it’s far more tangible.

The counter culture is just the cutting edge of capitalism. It should come as no surprise when hippies (individualists to the extreme) wake up one morning as yuppies–that is the natural trajectory. It should come as no surprise when the most rabble-rousing anthems are appropriated by advertisers.

mate, every generation thinks the same. It is a rare person who is not idealistic at 21 and an even rarer person who is idealistic at 50.
You see the world in black and white but others see several shades of gray.

I’m thinking of taking a gap year and touring Asia myself.

and how is this idealistic? Give thanks that you can do it. There are hundreds of millions of young people of your age who struggle for the next meal.

I think I’m going to call my parents tonight and apologize to them for my own arrogant know-it-all phase.

Btw, your need to apologise to your parents says more about you than about me…

84 · Meena said

But, what were you doing when you were 21? Pray, tell.

Hey, meena…I recall a couple of years ago you claimed you where 19. Now your age suddenly changes to 21. Hmmm? you must be one of those dishonest women who walk down 5th ave in high heeled shoes complaining about the social construction of the patriarchy.

You’re right, real, down-to-earth, imported-from-desh women don’t age :<( that’s one of their perks…

Btw, I think there is a miscommunication here. By ‘you’ in my original post I meant it in a general way. Otherwise I’m lost how my comment could be ‘read’ as condescending while jaya‘s was not. Perhaps because her age group and older is in the majority here?