What does Buddhism say?

Summary 

According to "Are there health benefits to going vegan?" (Brown, 2020), we do not need to eat meat for health reasons, since all but one nutrient humans need are easily found in vegan a diet, which has no meat, eggs, milk or other animal products. Protein, minerals and the carbohydrates we need are all available in a well-balanced diet of plants. The exception is vitamin B12, for which it is suggested that vegans take a supplement pill or eat foods to which B12 has been added artificially, especially when a baby is being fed a vegan diet. Brown says the evidence suggests that a vegan diet might be healthier than one with meat, with reduced risks of heart disease, although a slightly higher risk of a stroke. But fast food is usually unhealthy whether it's plant or meat based.

My first draft was 166 words, as checked by Google Docs' word count tool (on the Tools menu of Google Docs). That was too many words, so I revised. The second draft was 153 words – still over the 140 word limit. Version 3 was 146 words. Finally, version 4 was 139 words, just inside the maximum of 140 words allowed. 
As you will probably realize, writing a strong summary that reports the main ideas of a source in your own words is challenging, but that's what makes it such valuable writing practice for us. 

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Response 

My friend's son enjoys living
and dead meat as much as I do.

I normally read the news with my morning coffee, and that's what I was doing around 8:00 AM this morning. Having gotten up a little after 6:00, I had a small yoghurt with my large black coffee. I'm not vegan, and I prefer an Australian brand of Greek style yoghurt that is full fat; it's delicious, goes well with my morning coffee, and it's very convenient — I just have to take it out of the fridge and peel off the cover from the tub. Also with my morning coffee today, I had a quick online chat with the 12-year-old son of my friend who I'm meeting for lunch today. We're going for one of our regular pig-out meals at a nearby hotel, where the excellent Sunday brunch buffet includes oysters, prawns, foi gras, mussels, duck, lamb, beef and lots of other delicious meat to eat. 

I'm definitely not a vegan. I love meat, and eat at least a little every day. And I always have ever since my parents gave me a healthily varied diet when I was a child growing up on our farm in Australia, where we grew a lot of our own food, including chickens, ducks, pigs, cattle, and plenty of vegetables and fruits. The BBC article I decided to summarize as another example blog post did not catch my eye because I want you become vegan. It was a bit like the article we read and discussed in Skillful yesterday, "How Permanent Is Your Personality?" That is, Brown's article in the BBC presents evidence which suggests that a common belief is wrong. I think many people believe that you need meat to be healthy, but the evidence seems strong that that belief is false: we can be perfectly healthy without ever eating meat, although if you don't eat eggs either, you might need to make sure you get enough vitamin B12, which is the only thing available only in meat or animal products. 

What really interested me as I read the article was a question related to Thai culture, specifically, the Buddhist aspect of traditional Thai culture. The first precept of Buddhism asks Buddhists not to kill, but of course, if you eat meat, you are killing, and if you do not need the meat for health reasons, that means you are killing only because you have a desire for tasty animal flesh. But is this what good Buddhists should be doing? Of course, many Buddhists, perhaps a majority around the world, do not eat meat precisely because it does mean killing animals, but it seems to me that Thai Buddhists reject this First Precept of Buddhism in favour of enjoying delicious meat every day, which means a lot of killing. And since this directly relates the ideas in the article to our own daily lives, I thought it made an interesting article to summarize and respond to, hence my question below. 

As we have previously practised, write your response in a comment. 

Although it's much longer, because the rules are much more relaxed for the response part of these blog posts that summarize and respond to an article on the BBC, this was much easier for me to write, even though it's 500 words, which is very comfortably over the 250 word minimum.  
 

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Question

Should Buddhists normally abstain from eating meat? 

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Reference

• Brown, J. (2020, January 23).  Are there health benefits to going vegan? Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200122-are-there-health-benefits-to-going-vegan 

Going nuclear (if you think of a better one, you can change your initial title)

Summary 

According to "Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029" (Harrabin & Prescott, 2020),  this is not finished. I now have to write my summary in 140 words or less. This is formal, academic writing. Although it is not due until Sunday night, I decided to publish it now to show what we did in class today.

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Response 

250 words or more. See the page "Blogging template & instructions" for full instructions. Delete these notes. I still have to write this, but the response is not due until Monday night. 
 

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Question

Write one (not two) question for your classmates to comment on in response to your blog post. Write a question that needs more than a single sentence for a strong answer. See the page "Blogging template & instructions" for full instructions. Delete these notes. And an interesting question is not due until Tuesday night. 

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Reference

• Harrabin, R. & Prescott, K. (2020, January 24). Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/business-51233444 

Music to die for

Summary 

According to "Eminem lyrics: Rapper says album was 'not made for the squeamish'" (2020), rapp singer Eminem has defended his use of an offensive comparison to the bombing at the Ariana Grande concert, which killed 22 people, in the song “Unaccommodating” in his latest album, Music To Be Murdered By, which he says is not for people who are easily upset. This is not the first time the rapper’s language has offended people; anti-gay language has previously angered some. In his defence, Eminem admits that the words in his new album are shocking. He argues that he intended to shock to make his listeners aware of how common violence is in modern society. He suggests that shocking his audience might cause them to act to reduce violence in society, which would be a desirable outcome.

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Response 

still hits  1,000 years on 

First, I have to admit that I have not listened to Eminem's song that is upsetting people. In fact, I have listened to rap music except in films like Bad Boys, where it features heavily. I don't dislike rap, which does often sound OK. In the films I've enjoyed watching, it fits the themes well. But these days I usually listen to music that I enjoyed when I was a student, first in high school and then at university. This means I like rock such as the music by the band Queen, whose song "Bohemian Rhapsody" is one of my all time favourites, also the work by David Bowie, the Beatles, and some Australian heavy rock groups from the 1970s and 80s. None of this is recent music. Even older are my classical music favourites, and the really old music I enjoy are Gregorian chants, which go back many centuries to mediaeval monks. 

Although I can understand why some people are offended by Eminem's latest songs, I don't think that is a good reason to ban them. I suspect he wanted to upset people to get their attention, which will boost his sales, but artists have always done that. Shakespeare, for example, wrote several plays about killing kings, especially his famous plays Hamlet and Macbeth. And his Romeo and Juliet would probably have serious legal problems today because it's about teenage sex: Romeo is a teenager and Juliet is only thirteen years old when he meets her at a party and falls madly in love after breaking up with his old girlfriend. None of this is the sort of thing that nice people think teenagers should be watching today. When a TV series shows young people having sex, there is often a big fuss in the media saying that it's inappropriate. I wonder whether the people who complain about such shows even know just how violent and full of naughty sex classic literature is. And Eminem is seriously wrong about violence in modern society. There is much less violence today than in the past. Murder rates are lower and decreasing almost everywhere compared to a few decades ago. And centuries ago, there was a lot more killing, fighting, rape and other violence. Things are much better now. 

The Nazi flag that causing outrage
in Australia recently

Finally, even though things are disgusting, sickening, and generally offensive, I don't think that is a good reason to ban them. If we agree that democracy is the best form of government, we have to accept the basic right to free speech, and if we only want the law to allow things that we think are acceptable or nice, then we do not actually respect the right to free speech, which means do not really support democracy. For example, in my country, Australia, there has been a big controversy over an ugly Nazi flag that a couple of people flew over their home. The Nazi symbol is disgusting, and it certainly upsets a lot of people, but I don't agree with those who think it should be illegal. In Germany, it would be illegal, and I think the German law is wrong. If ugly, filthy things cannot be expressed, neither can they be argued against. It seems to me much healthier for society to let offensive things be said so that they can also be publicly criticised and condemned, and so that the often false beliefs they are based on can be proved wrong and corrected. If we can't say something because it offends some people, then our own mistaken beliefs cannot be corrected, and that is not good for society. 
 

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Question

Should the law allow singers or other artists to say things that seriously offend a lot of people?  

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Reference

• Eminem lyrics: Rapper says album was 'not made for the squeamish'. (2020, January 23). Retrieved from  https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-51226817 

Skillful 3: Reading and Writing, page 17 - Critical thinking, q.1-3 = permanence of personality

Summary 

In the reading "How Permanent Is Your Personality" (2018, pp. 15 - 16), the authors present research showing that contrary to popular belief, people's personalities do typically change over time, and they give some implications for why this might be important.

(My summary = 37 words in one sentence)

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Response 

As usual after a reading, Zemach and Rogers invite us to respond critically to some of the issues raised in the reading, to agree or disagree with them, to apply them to our own lives and experiences, or to extend them in other ways.  
 

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Questions

Choose one of the three questions in exercise E, Critical Thinking, on page 17. Which of the three most interests you? Think about your chosen question for about two minutes, and then write your response in a comment below. Write your six minutes. 

The three questions are: 

1. Did the results in the study surprise you? Why or why not? Do you believe the results?  
2. What are some factors that could cause someone to change (his or her) their personality? 
   The link is to a note on singular "they" in the grammar section of Lexico. You might like to follow that up later. 
    
3. What do you think the results of this study imply for ascribed, achieved, and chosen identity traits? Can they all change do you think? Why or why not?  

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Reference

• Rogers, L. & Zemach, D. E. (2018). Skillful 3: Reading & Writing (2nd. ed.). London: Macmillan Education

Skillful 3: Reading and Writing, page 12 - Critical thinking, q.3 = strongest traits

Summary 

The third critical thinking question that Rogers and Zemach ask us to discuss follows up the ideas in the classification of identity traits into three categories, which is in section 1 of the reading on page 11, "Types of Identity Traits" (2018).

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Response 

As we have just done, for question 1, we will discuss Rogers and Zemach's question in a comment, giving us a more permanent record of our ideas in addition to getting in some practice writing for fluency in a less academic style, but still writing our ideas in grammatically complete sentences that clearly state our ideas. 
 

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Question

After planning for a minute or two, write down your response to Rogers and Zemach's critical thinking question 3 on page 12 in a comment below. 

"Which of your identity traits do you think are the strongest: ascribed, achieved, or chosen? 

  Do you think this is typical?" (2018, p. 12)

Again, a strong answer will relate this to your own experience with specific examples to support your main ideas. 

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Reference

• Rogers, L. & Zemach, D. E. (2018). Skillful 3: Reading & Writing (2nd. ed.). London: Macmillan Education 

Skillful 3: Reading and Writing, page 12 - Critical thinking, q.1 = rivalries

Skillful 3: Reading & Writing, p. 6

Summary 

In her "Introduction to the Student" on page 6, author Dorothy Zemach twice uses the adverb critically, reminding us that, in both academic work at university as well as in tests such as IELTS and TOEFL, critical thinking skills are important. Each unit of Skillful, accordingly, has critical thinking exercises that invite us to expand on issues raised in the readings and relate them to our own life experiences.

In section 3 of the reading on page 11, "Dangers of Social Identity," the article introduces the idea of rivalry (Rogers & Zemach, 2018).

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Response 

There are two reasons for doing Rogers and Zemach's critical thinking exercises as blog discussions. First, there is solid evidence that putting ideas in writing, especially online, improves the quality and variety of ideas since each person can formulate and write down their ideas independently, so that a single strong personality does not dominate the group and thereby suppress ideas that we want to get (Chamorro-Premuzic, 2015; Markman, 2017; O'Connell, 2010). Second, this is a reading and writing class, so it's sensible to practice putting our ideas down quickly in writing, which also gives us a chance to review them before publishing for others to read and respond to. 

Note: my cited sources on the value of independent and online brainstorming, which I think also apply to our critical thinking exercises, are all from the Harvard Business Review. Don't read them now, but if you are interested in following them up, the full reference citations, including the links to each, are in the list of references below. 
 

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Question 1

In their first critical thinking question following the reading "Social Identity", Rogers and Zemach ask us to respond to the question: 

"What are some benefits of rivalry? What are some problems?

Give specific examples." (Rogers & Zemach, 2018, p. 12)

Think for a minute or two, making some quick notes if you like; then in a comment below, write a short paragraph or two to tell us your ideas in response to this question.

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References

• Chamorro-Premuzic, T. (2015, April 2). Why brainstorming works better online. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2015/04/why-brainstorming-works-better-online
    
• Markman, A. (2017, May 18). Your team is brainstorming all wrong. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2017/05/your-team-is-brainstorming-all-wrong
   
• O'Connell, A. (2010, February 4). Sometimes, it’s better to brainstorm alone. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2010/02/when-its-better-to-brainstorm


• Rogers, L. & Zemach, D. E. (2018). Skillful 3: Reading & Writing (2nd. ed.). London: Macmillan Education 

Introducing Otto

My identity in person 

As you knew that I’m a mathayom 4 student so, in weekdays I usually wear a student uniform. The uniform included white shirt, black short pants, black belt, white socks, and black shoes. In the weekends and holidays I often wear a white or black t-shirt. I randomly select my pants some day I wear blue jeans, some day I wear shorts. I have 2 shoes, sneakers and slippers, I prefer sneakers a little bit more than slippers.

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My identity online 

My IG profile pic

My online profile is separated into Facebook Line and Instagram. My Instagram name is ottokoosg, I don’t post much but I post in Instagram stories instead. I post about football(soccer), traveling, studying, funny moments in school, etc. My identity online is being a friendly person which quite similar to my real life identity but I just don’t talk very much to a person who I had just known such as everybody in this EAP class but I will try to talk to everyone soon. I haven’t post in Facebook for about 2 years so far, so there’s almost nothing in my Facebook.

My profile picture in Line and Instagram are meme pictures. I actually don’t have any reasons to explain why I chose these profile pictures.

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More

My favorite sport is football(soccer). When I was in mathayom 1, I played it everyday after school with my friends. But the sport that I hate is swimming. I loves pizza. I hate fresh ginger(gingerbread is okay). I came to study EAP because I am going to AFS exchange program in USA. I have to improve my reading and writing skill. I am very excited to go to USA because I haven’t been to USA or Europe before.

Introducing FAH

My identity in person 

I am a person who is easy going. My outfits can shows a lot about me.I wear a T-shirt with a pant and sneaker as usual. Exactly I like fashion and would love to be designer. I like to watch fashion show reality. I don't want to dress it only want to design it but unfortunately I am not good at in Art. In my wardrobe, most of my clothes is red color but actually I like white color but I don't know how comes is Red!. My body language seems to be a shy person and when I listened to my voice. I was surprise that is my voice! It looks like a child. Sometimes I think my voice is useful  when I would like begging mom something but it useful only just my mom!

My identity online

My identity online is my real identity. I used my picture and my name to shows in profile. I often use SNS to contact my friends in chat box but hardly ever to post on timeline. Most things that I posted in my SNS is what I interested in that time such as music or movies and some picture or some stories which I would like to keep it as my memories.My friends in my SNS is from my school ,university and work place. I was surprise that until now I met a lot of people in my life but some person I also don't know them. Many times I used my SNS to contact my old friends to hanging out together .That's quite useful !

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More about Me! 

I am Fah . Now I work as a Purchaser at Yamaha Motor Asian Center. I came this class to improve my writing and reading skills. When I worked . Mostly I wrote only just short sentence in an email and hardly ever to read any long stories. So from this year on , I planned to improve these skills and came to this class to made some inspiration to start it . I do not like any sport because I am not good at in sport . I always spent my free times with Movies in Netflix and Music. I love to watch Korean reality TV and Movies. As I am the person who interested in Korean a lot . So, My first work place is Samsung (Korean Company) and got new Korean friends a lot . Now I got a chance to learn more about Japanese culture . I really enjoy when I worked and talked with the person who different culture with me. I think it was color of the world that have various counties.  So, I would like to travel around the world once ! 

Introducing Pin

My identity in person 

My outfit style

My outfits can explain well about myself. I'm the person who loves to dress up and also loves to mix and match my clothes with some accessories. The outfit style which I usually wear is Vintage. Moreover, I like the brown color so that most of my clothes will be brown. My clothes will change everyday like someday I will wear T-shirts, brown pants and slippers and another day I will wear a green dress with sneakers. Sometimes my outfit can make many people misunderstand about my faculty because it's similar to the architectural students or fashion students but actually I'm the political science student. Although my outfit style seems as I'm confident in other people's views, I'm a kind of shy person. My body language is important to me as well because I'm the person who likes to pose for taking a photo and body language can help me to explain easier because I always use my hand when I'm talking and presenting the projects to the public but sometimes I think that I use my hand too much because my friends always imitate my body language when I'm talking. but, I need to use it otherwise I can't think of what I say.

My identity online 

My identity online is similar to my real identity because I always spend time with online applications such as Instagram, Line, and Facebook. My name account will use "pinpompam" which my friend always calls me by this name. For my picture profile, I will use my picture in every application and I post my picture on my timeline as well. However, I like to share a funny video about the animals or photos rather than my picture on my Facebook timeline and I often update my stories and post photos on my Instagram such as the foods, the traveling, and my pictures. On my accounts, I have many friends who are the people that I don't know and also my close friends.

My Facebook timeline 

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My achieved identity

My friends and I at university

I decided to present my achieved identity because I'm the kind of person who has many goals that I would like to achieve and some of them can be achieved now. so, I would say that my personal identity can lead to my achieved identity. To elaborate, when I was in high school, I would like to study at Thammasat university because I like political science and social study subjects and this field is popular at this university. Moreover, as I mentioned earlier in my personal identity section, I like to dress up and, this university also allows the students to wear anything which doesn't need to wear uniforms which you can see my friends and me outfits in the photo. Therefore, I decided to take a test for entering this university and I can currently achieve in being Thammasat students in the field of political science which I expected to study. Actually, I'm so proud of this achieved identity because I tried really hard for entering this university both reading books and studying everyday.

Introducing Rina

My identity in person

  I like to wear anything that is very comfortable and easy to move. Mostly, I wear a T-shirt with hoodie over it and a pants. I also like to wear sweatpants. I barely wear skirts or dress except when I really feel to wear it or when my pants aren’t in closet yet; it’s not dried yet or some any other reason.
The way I pick my clothes each day is that I choose my pants first followed by a shirt, then I will make sure wether the color and design will suit together. I have a lot of hoodies and sweaters at home so there’s no problem if some of it are in washing machine, these fabric are difficult to dry compared to T-shirt so sometimes it may take up to two days in order to make it completely dry with Thailand’s heat power. For the body language, I’m not a person who uses a lot of hand gestures but I find it really cool when I see people using it smoothly.

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I

My identity online 

  I don’t get online very often but I do have an account on apps such as IG, LINE, and FB. For the account name, I simply just use my name. I use a picture of myself for the profile pic but sometimes I change to the picture of cute animal. I post a picture that is a good memory to me so that I can reflect back to it brings me back to the time! I post more stories rather than a post, my stories will be pictures such as beautiful sky especially sunset, picture of ocean waves and it’s fantastic view, picture with my friends, and also a snap of food or music that I like.

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Beautiful sky🥰

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Hamburgers 😂

More about Rina

  I am half Thai/Japanese. My top favorite food are sushi, Krapao moosub, ramen, and steak.
I’m a golfer so I spend most of my time practicing or traveling all over the world for golf tournaments. I love golf. I also like other sports such as soccer and badminton which I got to play at school during break time. During my free time, I enjoy listening to music or watching movies and some funny videos on YouTube. I love music too. I live in Thailand since I was 3 years old but I also have a house in Japan which I go back once in a while. Last year I went back to my home in Japan quite often because I had tournaments around there. My grandma and my older brother lives there so whenever I get to go back and visit them, I’m so happy. My younger sister is still in elementary and she’s in Thailand with me and the rest of our family.

  I like to listen to pop songs, rock, and hip hop. I will really enjoy our communication with my friend if we share the same interest. I like funny people and an outgoing person. I enjoy meeting new people and be friends with them.

Introducing Namfon

My identity in person 

When I’m outside, I usually wear pants and almost always t-shirt with slippers or sneakers. I’ll wear a skirt or a dress only for student’s uniform or the events are required. It’s comfortable to do activities. At home I always dress up with shorts and t-shirt or sportswear. I’m going to move my hands to support what I want to explain which I cannot speak out, I have a problem with how to explain what’s in my mind to the others for example, In fundamental design class, I’d presented my project and teachers with the guest asked me about the project, but I couldn’t explain them as I want, while they were keeping asking me, one of teachers understood my project concept and everyone in class laughed that I’ve taken long times to explain, but they understood my project from my models. After this class, teachers and guest told me to explain as the process that I had done the project. When I have no idea, I will just smile and try to avoid eye contact. Most of my friends imitate my sound when I’m arguing, but it sounds like an angry bird and I don’t think it’s my sounds. They did it cause they prefer to interrupt me while I’m talking, so I’ll stop and deviate attention to them who are imitating. I like the way that my friends won’t let me arguing too long and try to deviate my attention to another thing.

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My identity online 

Most of my online accounts, I use the cute drawings with the tone of colour which’s not too much showy. I think it’s comfortable when the others see. In the Line application, I use k-pop idol picture because there are only my friends and my family who have this account, so I use the picture which I prefer to, but in the Instagram account, I use the picture of me. There’re the others who are not close to me and I don’t know them, so it’ll be easy to contact. My account names are my nickname or my first name.

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My sport identity

I’m the shooting athlete in Mahidol university for Freshy Shooting Game 2019. Almost people who have heard that I’m shooting athlete, they were shocked and said that I’m so cool and resolute, but it isn’t at all. I was worrying when I got the shooting tests. I’m not that cool as they said. I’d sweat every times while I’m shooting and also I’m not resolute too. In the match, I almost did not finish shooting in time. I took so much times with each bullets. Sometimes I’m upset that they don’t listen what I want to explain. I’m not that cool or resolute, maybe other shooting athletes are as they said. After Freshy Shooting Game 2019, It was harder than while I was training because I got Bronze medal for single category and Silver medal for team category. When I told them that I’m not as they said, they thought that I’m humble. I just don’t want to let them misunderstanding about me.

Introducing Peter (2 = the one started in class)

My identity in person 

Coffee with my sister.
Gay?

When I look at myself in photographs, I'm often surprised that I look so ... gay. I think of myself as masculine, but in a lot of photographs, my body language seems to me a bit gay. For example, the way I'm sitting in the photograph I posted with my sister on my last blog introductory blog post, or the new one to the right, which was also taken when my sister was visiting last week for New Year. I suspect that the way I move my hands around in class might also have confirmed this for you last Saturday. When I listen to recordings of my voice, that also used to make me wonder: "Is that really what I sound like?" At least I have a better idea of what I say, which I think shows me to be precise and logical. Is that what you thought after listening to me for four hours last Saturday? Sometimes this annoys my friends when we have arguments, which I love to do. I think it's fun talking about important issues, like politics, ethics, history, and so on, which is also part of how I display my identity in person. But I don't usually argue with my students the same way that I do with my friends.

I wrote this first section on Saturday, finsihing it the evning after our class.

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The top of my FB page now

My identity online 

My identity online is not very exciting. On my personal Facebook page, I only 25 friends, but they are all friends I meet in real life. About half are relatives in Australia, and the others are friends here in Thailand, both Thai and foreign, and the things I post I just details about my personal life that would not be interesting to people who don't know me, for example eating, walking around, grocery shopping, what I'm reading and so on. This lets my friends know what I like to read and watch, and we can share our ideas. And it's a nice record of my very ordinary daily life. For example, the photographs and short comments are from lunch I had with an old Thai friend and his son on Sunday, and a couple of photographs I took walking home in my soi. 

A little lower on
my FB page today

I also write a bit online, where I use a screen name that reflects my interests in philosophy, history and literature. As you might already have seen from my first introductory post, my online avatar is a cartoon character from my childhood, and my real face, but when I was much younger than today. 

And of course on Classroom you've seen a couple of other avatars that I use. They were both created by an app on my phone from a recent photograph of myself. I like those emoji creations because they do look like me, and the app created a whole set that I can use for different things, so I chose the one drinking coffee to show a more relaxed me. The one with the question mark tells you that I think it's really useful to question things and to ask questions, which is especially important in an EAP class. And I like the cartoon versions of me because they are clearer than photographs.  

And this section was written on Sunday.
 

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What Peter isn't

When I read it again a few minutes ago, section 3 of the reading "Social Identity" on page 11 of Skillful interested me. It was interesting because when I think of my identity, I don't usually think of what I'm not, but the ideas of tensions and other possible negative effects of how we define ourselves makes sense. I've chosen to live in Thailand for many years, which means I don't live in Australia, for example, and there are reasons why I do not live in Australia. These reasons include the weather in Thailand, which is always warm, unlike the cold weather that I hated when I lived in Sydney. But there are also consequences to my chosen identity as an expatriate in Bangkok, such as not seeing my family very often. I usually go back to visit them once a year, at Songkran. Songkran is a good time to visit Australia because the weather there is pleasantly cool but not cold, and it's very hot in Thailand, which is a good thing to escape for a short spell. 

Living in Thailand doesn't really cause much tension, but the example of arguments over "the best brands of laptop" in section 3 of the reading reminded me that I do have very heated debates with some of my friends: some of my oldest friends share my love of philosophy, especially moral and political philosophy, but whereas I favour human rights and duty based theories, my friends tend to support consequential theories of right and wrong, good and bad, and this sometimes leads to debates over meals that might seem like tense arguments, but actually, we are enjoying the fun of debating. But one of my oldest friends from Australia, who now also lives in Bangkok, refuses to eat with me and another friend together unless we promise not to talk about politics or social issues. I think that means his ascribed identity from his biological makeup that made his personality is very different to mine, but he's been a very good friend for more than thirty years. 

Finally, I came back to conclude with the third section on Tuesday evening. Splitting it up into three writing sessions worked well for me. I think it made them all stronger than if I had tried to do it all in one longer session. 

Introducing Peter

Quick meal with my
  visiting sister last week

My identity in person 

When you meet my in class, I think I might look a bit formal and perhaps boring. I always dress exactly the same way, in a white shirt, grey pants and black shoes. But it isn't too formal: my shirt is not tucked into my pants these days, and I never wear a tie unless it's required, which is rare. When I'm outside of class, the informality is more noticeable. Although I like dressing up for a meal sometimes, I usually wear just wear shorts and comfortable shirts, but never T-shirts. I haven't owned a T-shirt for many decades now. If I had to sum up my identity in person, I'd say I'm informal but like things done in a certain way.

Note: I just downloaded the image from my FB page. My sister was visiting with her boyfriend over New Year.

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My identity online 

I think my identity online fits with my identity in person, but might seem  a bit more complicated, which I think is normal. Most people have more than one online identity. My identity on places like Facebook is pretty standard, although with only 25, I have less friends on FB than anyone else I know, but I do know all 25 in real life; they are my actual friends or relatives, mainly Thai friends these days. Like most people, I want to look good on FB, but I post things that do reflect my interests. That means pictures of food, especially meals with friends, but also the books I read, the silly movies and shows I watch on NetFlix, and so on. At the moment, I'm watching The Big Bang Theory again, so I posted about that on FB. And of course pictures of meals with my sister and her boyfriend when they were visiting over New Year. 

My Felix Qui avatar does include
an ancient image of me in addition
to Felix the Cat

I also have a couple of online identities under screen names that are not the name on my Australian passport or my contract with AUA. The online name I've used the longest is Felix Qui. I like this because it reflects my academic interests and important aspects of my outlook on life. I've used this name for many years now. It originally comes from a line in the Roman poet Vergil's Georgica, which I read decades ago at university.  The line is: "felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causes," and Vergil is writing of the earlier poet and philosopher Lucretius, whose long philosophy poem De Rerum Natura has been one of my favourites since I read it when I was 18. Lucretius did much to introduce to Rome the ideas and ways of logical thinking begun by the Greek philosophers Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, and developed them with his own carefully worked out ideas in a brilliant piece of poetry. I like all of that, so Vergils neat summing up of Lucretius appealed to me as a screen name. And when I was a child, Felix the Cat was one of my favourite cartoons on TV. 

Note: I spent about 15 minutes writing the three paragraphs in the two sections above as I enjoyed my morning coffee before class today. You won't have time to finish yours in class, but can complete them after our class today. And I still have to write my third section below. 
 

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My ascribed identity

It was useful to read the article "Social Identity" on page 11 before I wrote this section of my introduction. In fact, I read it a couple of times and then decided to tell you about one aspect of my identity, my ascribed identity. 

Some of my ascribed 
identity information is
on my passport. 
(Do not post a full
copy of your passport!)

Most of this is on my passport, which tells you not only my age, which is definitely ascribed because it's a direct result of my date of birth, and that something I neither chose nor achieved. Although Western people don't normally talk about their age in this sort of context, I'm old enough that it doesn't worry me, and you might already have made a good guess from what you saw of my identity in person in our class on Saturday: I'm in my late fifties, which is accurate enough. Although some people believe that your date of birth influences your future, I don't generally believe that, with a couple of exceptions, but my birthday is also an ascribed identity trait. Similarly, my place of birth and nationality are not things I either achieved or chose; that I am Australian, born in the small town of Lismore in the state of New South Wales are more ascribed elements of my identity that are recorded on my Australian passport. 

Although my passport does not tell you, you probably also guessed that English is my native language, but as the reading "Social Identity" notes, while English is my ascribed native language, I have also worked to improve the way I use the English language by studying, so there is also an achieved element in this identity trait that makes me the person I am today. Also not on my passport is my family status: I am single, an older brother to three brothers and four sisters, an uncle to a lot of nephews and nieces, and of course a son to my parents. 

Welcome to RW2a and to our class blog

Click to enlarge images

Summary 

Although I've read a bit in preparation for it, this post has a different purpose than summarizing and responding to something I've read. I want to welcome you to your EAP class on Saturdays.

So, welcome, and thank you for registering for the class this term.

Our aim is to cover as much of the material in Units 1 and 2 of Skillful 3: Reading and Writing as we can. In addition to your paper book, there is also a very useful digital version of the text, which includes access to a an online workbook.

As with the Google Apps for Education that we will use and this class blog, it might take a couple of sessions for you to become familiar with these tools, but I am confident that you will find that initial effort worthwhile. By moving some of the work to out-of-class activities, we can then focus our class time on preparation for and discussion of the skills you will practice at home, or wherever you like.

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Response 

The digital version of the book
is very convenient

In her introduction to students on page 6, the series editor, Dorothy E. Zemach, gives some strategies for successful learning, one of which is to "be an independent learner" (in Rogers & Zemach, 2018). As Zemach suggests we do in her comment, it is one way for you to "practice English outside of class." Some of the topics you will write about here are the unit topics, but I also like Zemach's suggestion that "reading for pleasure and using the Internet in English" are important, so your writing here will not be limited to the topics of the units that we study over the next four weeks.
 
Another point that I like in her introduction is Zemach's emphasis on practice, for which she suggests that we do "a little bit each day." The research on this is strong: regular practice in small chunks of time is far more effective than long sessions once or twice a week. But we only meet for one long session once a week! 

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Question

Since we only meet for one four-hour session once a week, what is to be done? What are one or two suggestions you think we can follow to get the most out of our four-week term? 
(Although it's two sentences, this is one question; I've just written the idea twice using different language; that is, sentence 2 paraphrases sentence 1.) 

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Reference 

• Rogers, L. & Zemach, D. E. (2018). Skillful 3: Reading & Writing, Student's Book Pack (2nd. ed.). London: Macmillan Education 

An important aspect of academic writing is citing sources when we use the exact words (quote or use a quotation) from a source, or when we state the ideas from a source in our own words (paraphrase). In my short response section above, I have both paraphrased Zemach's ideas and copied some of her exact words. In addition to making it clear to readers that I've done that, it is also usual in formal academic work to write a reference citation, which gives readers all the information they need to find the exact source that has been quoted or paraphrased.  

Welcome to 2020 and to the second edition of Skillful

Summary (really an introduction)

I've just been reviewing the second edition of the Skillful series of books for academic English, and they are looking good. The first edition of MacMillan Education's series of books, published in 2013, was well designed to guide students competence in both listening and speaking, and reading and writing English in academic situations, such as at university, and the second edition builds on that solid base. 

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Response 

Although still under the overall supervision of Dorothy Zemach, the new edition of Skillful has new authors for the books in the series, and they have not merely made a few small changes: the material has been thoroughly revised, and I think greatly strengthened, so I'm looking forward to using it in my EAP classes at AUA. As an examination of the contents pages for each of the books in the series shows, each unit focusses on a topic to explore and practice listening, speaking, reading and writing skills. The content pages also show that these skills are related to vocabulary and grammar acquisition in a well-planned progression. 

As the description on the front covers, "The skills for success at university and beyond," tells us, these books aim to give students the language skills appropriate to university work. They are not, that is, preparation for an IELTS or other exam, but that said, they will provide a solid foundation in the skills that TOEFL and other exams test, but they go beyond narrow exam preparation to prepare you for work at university or other situations where the academic version  of English is used. 

Having had a chance to also play with them a little, the digital resources complement the books effectively, and include in addition to self-assessment material for students, all of the listening and video files that are used in the course. 
 

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Question

Are you ready for a challenging, and I hope enjoyable, learning experience?