Reflection for Wk 9

Shoua Her

May 31, 2012

Reflection Paper for Week 9

ASA150E

            In the first presentation, there was a lot of new info presented about how Chinese individuals view Vietnamese individuals and how that affected government policies. It was interesting to note from the video clip that after China gained lots of publicity from holding the Olympics in Beijing, they became arrogant and wanted to invade other countries just because they felt more superior. Another topic that I did not know much about was the situation in which the governments were blocking internet sites like youtube and google; I have heard about this occurring but did not know why and in which countries. I did not know about this situation until it was presented in class. It would have been more helpful if the presenter had provided a reading to give more in depth information about his presentation or the situation that is going on because it was sort of hard to follow along with the presentation. He did not discuss much of the research that he is doing and I felt that if he had done so, it would have provided more information that was not just all background information and would have included his analysis of the research that he was doing.

            In the second presentation on how variety shows affect Vietnamese individuals, she did a really good job in explaining what the variety shows were and how they are used to maintain relations to the culture itself. She did a great job in presenting her research because she provided background information and then went on to talk about the methodology and who the individuals were. She also went into depth in explaining what the interviews or findings of the surveys were however, I felt like it could have been summarized because after a certain point, I started to get lost in the findings because she was discussing so many different findings all at once. She did a great job in explaining the math and stats part of her research but there did not seem to be much analysis of the findings.

            I can sort of relate to this because even though we do not have variety shows in the Hmong community, we still have movies and music videos that are made in Laos and Thailand and while growing up, I remember my parents always playing these videos. They would always play in the background even when we have guests over, eat dinner, or just doing chores. I grew up in this environment and I felt like I had some sort of connection to my culture even though the Hmong people do not have a country of our own. Growing up, I never really thought much about why I still watched them and throughout high school, whenever my parents put the movies on, I would tell them to turn it off because I would get annoyed. However, it was not until I attended college that I started to understand and embrace my culture more.           

In the third presentation by Justin, he discussed the film, “Hot Boy Noi Loan” and also discussed the queer community and the discrimination that they, the queers, encounter. Because he provided so much information altogether, I was lost and confused about what he was talking about. Again, if a short reading was provided, it would have provided a basis or background to his presentation. I thought the film was really interesting and it was good how he was able to tie it in with transnationalism and also provided the reasons why and how they demonstrated these concepts. He seemed really engaged in his topic and it was good because it allowed me to see and understand his concepts even though I was lost at times. A question that I was wondering is, has the film been publicized much in Vietnam and in the United States?