Reflection

In this class we often write a blog about UK such as schools, languages, social class system and etc. I learned many things from this class.



What I learned first is to make blog better. For example, last semester I didn't use images regarding each topic. Blog that I didn't use images looks boring and didn't attract readers. In fact, when I read those blogs I feel tired. However if I read blogs with images I feel easier to read.

What I was surprised is England still has class system. I have been in Japan for 21 years and I haven't seen such a class system in Japan. I was surprised at the fact that their life is different from each class. It's like Edo era in Japan.

What I became interested in is New Zealand. I am interested in the nature, culture and especially Maori. We learned about Maori a lot and now I would say I would like to go to NZ to meet Maori people. One day, I will do it.

We discussed with each student about each topic. To mention each opinion is very important. Although I don't know if they could understand my opinions I could mention my opinion a lot.

I really enjoyed this Zemi class. I appreciate Simon.

Minority Languages in UK

Introduction

Now there are many languages which are about to disappear from the world. In the UK Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, Lowland Scots, Cornish and Irish. Those are very important things in the world as culture. I would like to introduce you a language being about to disappearing focusing on Welsh.

Welsh

Welsh uses two languages, which are English and Welsh. When you get to Wales, you will see signs written invitation in two languages. However those who speak Welsh are not so much. Why is it disappearing? I will explain below.

It is said that Welsh was taught by Celt before Roman attacked Britain island. In 1284, Wales was dominated by England. In 1536, Wales became a part of England. By this, Wales was banned to speak their language, Welsh. After that, those who speak have been disappearing gradually. In, 1801 the rate of people who speak Welsh was more than 80%, however, in 1960s about 20%. But recently those who speak Welsh is increasing a little by movements to save it. The Movement Graph and The Rate of people using Welsh Here.

England didn't allow Welsh to speak their language in public places such as court, school and etc. But interestingly, in a church, it was allowed because England wanted to spread their religion in Wales immediately. To spread it, it is convenient to use Welsh in Wales. The book about England's religion was published. Welsh used it to learn their language at that time. There were discrimination against people speaking Welsh. Sometimes, teachers hit their students with stick when students used Welsh in school.

Welsh is often used in the middle and the north part of Wales, but it is hardly spoken in the south area, where industry flourish. now by the movement to protect Welsh, a number of people who speak welsh is increasing a bit. 20% of welsh speak it.

Solutions

How can we protect them? I think we should use media such as TV, newspaper, Internet, radio. We have to use those things to get information. So if minority languages is used, they have to remember. I think it is the best way. And other solutions are like, to build museums, to make a opportunity to meet who speak minority languages, to make signs using Welsh languages in the city. If famous people speak those language on TV, it must become major language.

references: wikipedia

:http://aitech.ac.jp/~yoshiga/WALES/WALES.html

Harrow School

Introduction
I would like to introduce Harrow. Harrow is privae school which you have to pay a lot of money to enter. You have to pay £ 23.625.
13 to 18 years old people go to here. I will write about the history of Harrow and paticular words used only in Harrow.

History
There are 800 boys in Harrow school. Harrow was established in 1243, so it has many traditions and rich history. Of course, there are many famous people who graduated from this school. I would like to mention about that below.

Harrow Words
At Harrow, there are many wards used only there. I would like to introduce some of them below.
Beak-teacher
Bill Book- a small book which includes aspects of Harrow.
Ducker- swimming pool
Tosh- a bath of shower
Shell- the youngest year group at harrow
Remove- the second year group at Harrow.
see other words here

Harrow has their important song written by John Farmer, who was head of music, in 1864. Boys sing it every term in their houses and whole school students sing it to audiences of Parents. Twice a year Harrow invites previous Harrovians to hold concert and Churchill song is sung in Autumn.

Harrow has their original sport called Harrow Football. It is played by eleven player. Player have to score goals more than opponents. the ball is made of leather. Player mainly use their feet but they may use any part of their body to propel the ball.

If you think about Harrow, you may think is to study hard. However there are not only study but also outside activity such as music, drama, visual art, sport and other activities. I saw a movie that Harrovians was playing Judo. They are doing a lot of activities. more activities here

University of Oxford

I would like to introduce about University in England. There are universities less than Japan, however, they have the oldest university in the world. It is Oxford University.

Oxford is a university. Students belonging to Oxford have to go to its college. Different from Japan, University is not actually place you learn. It is just generic name of all colleges. So, when they meet the same university's students, they will ask first, "Which college are you from? it is interesting for us.

I will introduce the history briefly. it was build in 11th century. English was prohibited studying in Paris so it was made in England and it developed rapidly. That university has turned out 47 nobel prize winners, six Kings of England and more than 50 medalist.
more history here

There are 39 colleges. Teachers, students are belonging to one of them. According to the internet, there is a college accepting only women or graduate students.

There are unique customs of Oxford Unversity different from other Universties. For instance, there is a dinner that students must wear suit called "Formal Hall" and "Formal Hall" are classified with students status. Like this, there are interesting rules other Universities doesn't have.

Class System

There are four classes in England which shows how rich they are and what kind of job they have. Four classes are Upper class, Middle class, Working class and Under class. According to the internet, it is impossible to change their class in England. Moreover, they don't think that they want to go up because it's impossible. People are living in their class, so they hardly meet people belonging to other class. English can recognize class with how they speak, behave and their fashion. I would like to mention about difference below.



Upper class


Even Upper class, it is divided into two class, upper class and upper middle class. those who are upper class are aristocrats like royal family and politicians. Those who are upper middle class are lawyers, doctors and dentists. They are well educated. They live in dormitory from childhood and learn everything needed for upper class. We can see the difference with the way they speak. when upper class people speak, they don't move thier mouth much. They use polite word in conversation. there is rich list in England. According to it, the richest person have 10,800,000,000 pound and even the lowest person in rich list have 30,000,000 pound. It's amazing.



Middle class

Almost all of pupulation belong to this class. It is classified into more two in Middle class, middle and lower-middle class. I mentioned that it will be impossible to go up the class, but it is said on the internet that It is possible to go up the class within middle class. the jobs of upper Middle class are teachers and something like that. Lower-middle are office worker, small shopkeepers and etc.

Working class

Working class is divided into more two class, upper working class and lower working class. Those who belong to upper working class are working as an electritian, engineers, plumbers or carpentars and they have skilled. However lower working class people doesn't have skills so they are working as a manual workers such as helpers, labourers, cleaners, porters and dish washer, which doesn't need skill. They are not educated well, so the way they speak is very casual. Working class's fation is to put pierce, but mainly they don't care thier fation.

Underclass

Those who belongs to this class are people who doesn't have thier home. Perhaps, they live in box.

I found the web site concerning the living of Japanese in England. It said that if you want to be looked as high class, you had better wear nice cloth and speak slowly gazing at eyes of listener. Anyway, there is class system in England like the past in Japan and Japanese will be hard to imagine those cultures.

usefull Japanese page here

Location & Size

i would like to write about location and size.

First, the size of England is about two third of Japan. the latitude and longitude of capital city, London, are 51゜and -000.10. the size of Japan and Britain are 377.835 square kilometers and 244.820 kilometers. the distance between Japan and Britain is 6220 miles.

secondly i would like to mention about location.
There is a train called Eurostar. you can go abroad from England to Europe soon. For example. England to France takes about two hours and half an hour., London to Brussels takes about two hours.

you can go to Holland from London by ferry managed by Stena Line. it takes about 8 hours. it is not so far.

I introduced how close between Britain and Europe are, so they have closer relationship each other. defferent from Japan they can go overseas easily.

England

I would like to write about England. I don't know much about England but I am going to write mainly three points of it.

First, My image of England is soccer. Now soccer is played all over the world and soccer was born in England. England haven't won in FIFA World Cup but many good player was born in England.

Second, My image of it is that temperature is unstatable. The highest temperature ever is 38.5゜c, and the lowest temperature ever is -26.1゜c. I heard that it starts to rain in the evening even though it is sunny in the morning. So they need to take unbrella even nice weather.

Finally, My image of it is music. I like to listen to foreign music especially US and UK and there are a lot of good musician in England, for exmaple, The beatles, Queen, Oasis, etc. They make unique music and effect with band worldwide. I think the Rock and Roll was not spread without their effort.

These are three points I know about England.