"My feelings of inferiority towards English" by 'Gorisan'
Hello, everybody!!. I'll write about my inferiority toward English ability. I go to the graduate school of a certain private university. My major is clinical psychology. Where, I also take a lesson of TOEIC (Test Of English for International Communication). I study and practice how to listen and speak in English in a practical situation. I enjoy the lesson with several undergraduate students. I once disliked listening, speaking, reading, and writing in English. Whenever I heard someone speaking in English, my inferiority toward English ability was keenly stirred up.
The reason is that my father was a teacher of English in a high school. He considered that a Japanese without English ability is incompetent in this competitive society. And he assessed famous figures on the basis of only his/her English ability, such as "prime minister Miyazawa Kiichi is an excellent politician, because he was very good at English". Also, this way of my father's educational attitude made me "perfectionist". He extremely overemphasized the importance of academic career. I had an obsession that "I must get an English ability, otherwise nobody wouldn't treat me as a member of this society."
However, it's quite reasonable that the English ability is mere one of the great many abilities of us. And there are many competent and wonderful person who cannot understand English. Now, when I can understand what he/she says in English, I feel very glad, excited. It is because my self acceptance has been enhanced. Even if we couldn't understand English, or we don't have any prestigious academic careers, we have absolute rights to live in our society. And we could lead happy lives. It's quite natural. I came to understand such a common sense in these years. That's why my "stupid" obsession toward English ability disappeared. Also, when my perfectionism toward English ability disappeared, I can study and practice English very relaxedly. I don't have to listen and understand all of what you said in English. And I can make mistakes. In fact, without any mistake we cannot improve our English ability.
Now, English ability is no longer the absolute scale assessing a person for me. I'll study English within the extent I could, and enjoy communicating with people from other countries not only in English but in Japanese.
P.S. If I write in wrong or impolite English, sorry.
Response to: "My feelings of inferiority toward English"
With great interest, I read the essay from the following perspective: I am a retired member of the U.S. Coast Guard. (From 1978-79 I was stationed in Okinawa where I flew rescue helicopter with the U.S. Air Force). In 1972, while stationed in Miami, Florida, I met and married a young college student named Hideko who was born in Japan. Her mother, Hanako, is Japanese and her father is American. In 1954, when Hideko was 5 years old, she immigrated to the United States. At that point in time, she could speak only Japanese (and, due to World War II, there was much anti Japanese sentiment in the United States). Consequently, because her mother desperately wanted Hideko to fit into American society, she was no longer permitted to speak Japanese. (Hideko was also re-named "Peggy"). Because of this, Hideko can no longer converse in her native language with her maternal relatives in Japan due to the fact that she very quickly lost her Japanese speaking skills. For the past 13 years, Hideko has worked as a college academic counselor. For the last 10 years, I have worked as an Assistant Professor of Business Law. Because both of us frequently work with recent immigrants from all over the world, we are very familiar with the problems encountered by students whose second or third language is English. Typically, like Gorisan, they are very demanding of themselves, yet uncertain about their English language skills. However, in the vast majority of cases, Hideko and I both feel that these students actually have a better command of the English language than most America born, non immigrant students. After reading Gorisan's essay, we think his command of the English language is also much better than most of our America born, non immigrant students. (arens@javanet.com)
