Cultural Literacy: Zen

Posted on May 31, 2024 | Leave a comment

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Zen. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of three longish sentences and three comprehension questions. When you open this, I wonder if you’ll find, like I did, that things are a bit crammed together and crowded in this document. It may need some work–perhaps like turning it into a one-page affair.

Of course I would be interested in hearing what you think.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

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Northern Wei Sculpture

Posted on May 31, 2024 | Leave a comment

“Northern Wei sculpture: Chinese sculpture, dominated by simple images of the Buddha, dating from the eral of the Northern Wei dynasty (AD 386-534/535). The art represents the first major influence of Buddhism on China, and may be divided into two major periods. The first style (c.452-494), an amalgam of foreign influences traceable to the Buddhist art of India, is characterized by heavy stylization of blocky volumes. The second style (c.494-535) clothes the Buddha in the costume of the Chinese scholar and emphasizes a sinuous cascade of drapery falling over an increasingly flattened figure.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

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The Weekly Text, 31 May 2024, Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month Week V: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Genghis Khan

Posted on May 31, 2024 | Leave a comment

OK! For the final Friday of Asian American Pacific Island Heritage Month Week, here is a reading on Genghis Khan with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I think it’s safe to assume that I need not belabor the importance of this conqueror and empire builder.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

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Hong-Yee Chiu Coins the Term Quasar

Posted on May 23, 2024 | Leave a comment

“So far, the clumsily long name ‘quasi-stellar radio sources’ is used to describe these objects…. For convenience, the abbreviated term ‘quasar’ will be used throughout this paper.”

Hong-Yee Chiu, Physics Today May 1964

Excerpted from: Schapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.

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Cultural Literacy: Taipei

Posted on May 23, 2024 | Leave a comment

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Taipei. It is, of course, the capital of Taiwan. This is half-page worksheet with a reading of two sentences and two comprehension questions. Short and to the point, as the best of these documents tend to be.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

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Akiko Yosano

Posted on May 23, 2024 | Leave a comment

“Akiko Yosano: (1878-1942) Japanese poet. Akiko’s first volume of tanka, Midaregami (1901; tr Tangled Hair, 1935), startled her contemporaries with its bold affirmation of female sexuality and exerted an immense influence on later poets who sought release from semifeudal morality as well as from conventional idioms of tanka. Akiko’s translation of Japanese classics, such as the Tale of Genji, into the modern vernacular were highly influential, as were her pioneering  and passionate essays on woman’s rights.”

Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.

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Cultural Literacy: Tajikistan

Posted on May 23, 2024 | Leave a comment

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Tajikistan. This is a full-page worksheet with a reading of four sentences–and beware the first one, which is a doozy of a compound with with a series of geographical place names separated by commas. My guess? This will need to be modified for struggling and emergent readers.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

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Mesopotamia

Posted on May 23, 2024 | Leave a comment

“Mesopotamia: Region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in western Asia, constituting the greater part of modern Iraq. The region’s location and fertility gave rise to settlements from c.10,000 BC, and it became the cradle of some of the world’s earliest civilizations. Its seat was the city of Mesopotamia, founded in the 4th millennium BC by the Sumerians. It was ruled by the third dynasty of Ur, and later by Babylon, which gave its name to the southern portion of Mesopotamia. The city declined under the Hurrians and the Kassites 1600-1450 BC. It was conquered by the army of Ashur. Mesopotamia was ruled by Seleucids from c.312 BC until the 2nd century BC, when it became part of the Parthian empire. In the 7th century AD the region was conquered by Muslim Arabs. The region’s importance declined after the Mongol Invasion of 1258. The Ottoman Turks ruled in the 16th-17th centuries. The area became a British mandate in 1920; the following year, Iraq was established there.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

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The Weekly Text, 24 May 2024, Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month Week IV: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on al-Ghazali

Posted on May 23, 2024 | Leave a comment

This week’s Text, the fourth for Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month 2024, is a reading an Al-Ghazali (full name Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad al-Ṭūsiyy al-Ghazali– the diacritical marks are courtesy of a cool copy-and-paste from Wikipedia), the Persian Islamic theologian and polymath, along with its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

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Li Po Approaches Last Call

Posted on May 17, 2024 | Leave a comment

“Beneath the blossoms with a pot of wine,

No friends at hand, so I poured alone;

I raised my cup to invite the moon,

Turned to my shadow, and we became three.”

Li Po,“Drinking Alone in the Midnight” (eighth cent.) (translation by Elling Eide)

Excerpted from: Schapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.

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