Here are some audio links to interesting debates on BBC.
Is a free media essential for development?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/specials/1512_debates/page12.shtml
The Business of Climate Change
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/specials/1512_debates/page13.shtml
Exercise
Refer to the passage below. Attempt the following AQ.
Steps :
1. begin with Text Analysis and the Mapping of Main Ideas (refer to previous page)
2. Active Reading should have taken place.
| Personal Response | Text | Textual Analysis |
|
S’pore govt ensures that the citizens have adequate funds for retirement through CPF savings.
Most Singaporeans own a HDB flat and 90% of the households in S’pore own the homes they live in.
It is compulsory by law (through Maintenance of Parents Act) for adult children in Singapore to provide for their aged parents.
Women in such societies have less rights/ status than men?
Societies that are fundamentally Confucianistic in nature tend to have great respect for the elders.
Likewise, the Chinese practise ancestral worship to ensure blessings and protection for their families.
Is the wisdom of the old still relevant in this age of technological advancement?
| Adapted from AJC JC1 Common Test 2003
THE REWARDS OF OLD AGE
1) Old age is a period of dependence. It is a period of dependence on others, but it is also a period of dependence on the particular social and political system in which old men live. In some societies, old age is a time of unequalled power and wealth; in others, it is a time of degradation and despair. The reason for this dramatic difference is fairly simple. In some societies, the old retain control over resources, wealth, land and women. They are courted by the young, who depend on their favours for land to cultivate, for money or for wives. In other societies, the old give up their control of resources or they are allowed to retain little. They are a burden on their descendants.
2) This is a contrast familiar to Western societies for centuries. The contrast between the treatment of the old in industrial slums left to the tender mercies of institutions and the pampered and humoured treatment of their contemporaries in the propertied classes was described by such writers as Galsworthy in the Forsythe Saga and is stark indeed. The reasons are not hard to find. Those whose wealth was their ability to work are of no interest when their strength has diminished with time; those who hold the family property control the young with threats and promises of what their wills might contain.
3) The same contrast holds true for many different aspects of societies. The Siriono are a primitive group of people in the forests of Columbia. Because they hunt freely and gather wild fruits and plants, they do not own land, and they have no major possessions they can use to control the young. When they are old or inform and cannot hunt animals or gather food effectively, they literally become nothing but burdens; and are simply abandoned.
4) Not all old people are treated in this way in hunting and gathering societies. Among the Tiwisa group in Australia Aborigines, the old men wield very great power. They do not have land or property with which to do it- the way they do it is by controlling women. A man promises his daughter in marriage to another, sometimes even before she is born. He does this to gain political alliance with another man, who may seal the pact by giving him his daughter in exchange. Since it is the old men who have all the wives, nobody else but they would normally have wives, or therefore daughters to offer.
5) This theoretical situation is modified by the fact that the old also need the physical support of the young men. They obtain this by promise of wives which they make to the young men in return for their services of all kinds. In this way, by promising their daughters, they control the young. The young have to work so hard and so long to obtain wives that by the time they have wives and, more importantly, daughters by these wives, they too have become old men so the system repeats itself.
6) Many African societies are organised into small clans of people who live together and farm together. These clans hold their land in common as a holy trust from their ancestors of the clan. In such a clan the eldest members are seen as the natural leaders because they are closest to the ancestors. They are only like managers of the common property, but this gives them great power. They can at any time re-allocate the land between the members of the clan and since everybody depends on this land for their very survival, this means that they will not be offended lightly.
7) The powers of the elders extended into the realm of the supernatural. The elders were closest to the ancestors and so if a young man offended them, the ancestors would be angry at this lack of respect towards their representatives. It was believed they would send diseases or other disasters to their descendants and these could only be averted or the diseases cured if a sacrifice were made to the ancestors.
8) In most of the traditional societies of the world, the old not only have the prestige because they control such resources as land or money, or because of the religious power which derives from their closeness to the ancestors, but also because they are thought to be wise. The wisdom of old age depends on a relatively stable type of society. The philosopher of ancient China or India or Europe is always thought of as an old man. In pre-literate villages when things go wrong or a new problem arises, the young talk to the old for advice to see if they can remember a similar situation. An example can be found among the hill peoples of Vietnam. Like many other simple peoples in the world they practise shifting cultivation. This means that in order to cultivate efficiently, these people must remember in detail the way hundreds of different patches of forest were used, when and by whom. In such a situation a detailed memory of the past is essential and thus the old hold distinct advantages. The same principle applies to nomadic tribes: the older men will know the routes to avoid and the ones to take for water and grazing.
9) Yet it is not in practical matters that the memory of the past is important in traditional society. It is also often vital for social and political issues. In many cultures those who are allies and those who are enemies are likely to depend on the type of family links the ancestors of the group had to bind them together. In such situations the old, because they are likely to be the only people who will remember the family histories, will enjoy considerable respect and prestige.
Adapted from ‘The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Mankind’
|
Old age:period of dependence →burden
contrast aged with power vs aged who are a burden
reason: access to resources
similar contrast western societies
reason for contrast: access to family property
similar contrast The Siriono
reason for contrast: land ownership
Reason for power: women →ability to control the young
wives and daughters of the old exchanged for services from the young
African societies older members → closer to ancestors →more power
Ancestral worship
Offenders → retribution
wisdom and knowledge of the old valued
e.gs
Knowledge of history puts the old at a greater advantage |
