外国研究生向美国学生学习美国文化

 

Foreign Graduate Students Learn American Culture from New York Students

外国研究生向美国学生学习美国文化

 

One hundred 40 graduate students from 80 nations recently met with one of the world's most diverse student populations, New York City secondary school students.

 

The foreign scholars are part of the U.S. government-funded Fulbright program, studying for graduate degrees at universities across the nation. They traveled to New York to learn about American education, and the immigration experience and to tell the students about their own countries.

 

Computer science student Zeeshan Usmani brought a Pakistani flag and taught the students how to say hello in Urdu. He also brought a message.

 

Zeeshan Usmani: I want to create mutual¹ understanding. I want to declare the uniqueness of Muslims, Muslims are not terrorists. Some of the terrorists are, unfortunately, Muslims, but that does not mean that all of the Muslims are terrorists.

 

Small groups of scholars met with students at New York secondary schools with large international populations, schools like Manhattan International High School, which is dedicated² to students who have lived in the United States for less than four years.

 

Mechanical engineering student Yee Kan Koh also had a special message for the students when he made a presentation about his native Malaysia.

 

Yee Kan Koh: I would guess that for them learning English and integrating the culture into U.S. culture is the prime goal for them to come to the school. But I encouraged them also to keep their culture because I think if they have more than one culture and more than one language that is something very good for them.

 

Linda Wafti, a Palestinian studying development, says she wanted to encourage the young people to reach for their dreams.

 

Linda Wafti: I remember when I had speakers when I was young in school and how inspiring it was. And also to make them understand that they can make it in a different culture even if it is hard.

 

English is a second language for all of these students. But Chalak Muhammed, an Iraqi graduate student in public health, found the young people confident and interested.

 

Chalak Muhammed: It is natural to expect the students to have questions about Iraq because they have been hearing for the last two years at least a lot about the war in Iraq and the situation now. And they were interesting questions and I liked the way they were formulating³ their questions.

 

Not all of the questions were serious. Elisabeth Moolenaar a doctoral student in anthropology⁴, says the young people had lots of questions about customs in the Netherlands.

 

Elisabeth Moolenaar: It really seems they are very curious. They ask us all kinds of questions. Let me see. What were fun ones? They asked me about the kissing part. They think that is very interesting that we do all the kissing. And of course they ask about different rules we have regarding marijuana.

 

The scholars also learned about the students and American education. New York officials say students in the city's public schools speak more than 150 languages. The diversity amazed Yee Kan Koh.

 

Yee Kan Koh: In Malaysia we have different races, but not from all over the world. This is really form all over the world. You have [students] from Asia, from Africa, from South America, everywhere. So this is something that I think is very special for New York.

 

Chalak Muhammed was equally surprised by the freedom in the classrooms.

 

Chalak Muhammed: The nature of the classes, the way that the students behave inside the school, the more freedom that they have in posing questions and asking and making a conversation with the speaker, all of these things are a little bit different from the way that we are used to studying in our classrooms back home. So this is a very nice experience.

 

The school visits were part of a Fulbright program on immigration and the idea of the United States as a melting pot.

 

Barbara Schoetzau, VOA News, New York.

 

注释:

Fulbright [5fulbrait] n. 富布莱特法案基金

mechanical engineering 机械工程（学）

presentation [7prezen5teiFEn] n. 介绍

integrate [5inti^reit] v. 结合

formulate⁵ [5fC:mjuleit] v. 阐明

doctoral [5dCktErEl] adj. 博士学位的

anthropology [7AnWrE5pClEdVi] n. 人类学

melting pot 大熔炉

1 mutual   

adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的

参考例句：

• We must pull together for mutual interest.我们必须为相互的利益而通力合作。
• Mutual interests tied us together.相互的利害关系把我们联系在一起。

2 dedicated   

adj.一心一意的；献身的；热诚的

参考例句：

• He dedicated his life to the cause of education.他献身于教育事业。
• His whole energies are dedicated to improve the design.他的全部精力都放在改进这项设计上了。

3 formulating   

v.构想出( formulate的现在分词 )；规划；确切地阐述；用公式表示

参考例句：

• At present, the Chinese government is formulating nationwide regulations on the control of such chemicals. 目前，中国政府正在制定全国性的易制毒化学品管理条例。 来自汉英非文学 - 白皮书
• Because of this, the U.S. has taken further steps in formulating the \"Magellan\" programme. 为此，美国又进一步制定了“麦哲伦”计划。 来自百科语句

4 anthropology   

n.人类学

参考例句：

• I believe he has started reading up anthropology.我相信他已开始深入研究人类学。
• Social anthropology is centrally concerned with the diversity of culture.社会人类学主要关于文化多样性。

5 formulate   

v.用公式表示；规划；设计；系统地阐述

参考例句：

• He took care to formulate his reply very clearly.他字斟句酌，清楚地做了回答。
• I was impressed by the way he could formulate his ideas.他陈述观点的方式让我印象深刻。