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Karen, Francois, Nicola, et al: Design may not be "merely" about language, but insofar as designs must accommodate culture (amongst other things), and language is very very strongly coupled to culture, then language is one of the important tools that designers have to understand and be influenced by the contexts in which they work and in which their designs will "live". Understanding another culture is far easier if one is armed with the local language. Example, many people who don't know French (or another romance language) well tend to find the French "snooty". I have the fortunate capacity of consciously 'switching' between a european sensibility and a canadian one. I find the french are snooty only when I swap into my canadian mode. But when I 'think italian' (my own roots), I find snootiness becoming more of a certain style of elegance. I have heard this same sort of thing from countless others, and I've read enough about language and cognition and culture to know that there's good reason to believe this is 'true'. So I would advise that language learning is the best way to learn another culture. Takes longer. But you get better results. Cheers. Fil Karen wrote: > At 05:05 PM 7/1/2006, Francois-Xavier Nsenga wrote > >> >> >> True, I agree with Nicola, such a complex issue of Design in China or >> anywhere else cannot, and should not, be reduced to a mere issue of >> language. >> >> .... > > I can understand the frustration and probably my fault was to get > worked up about language issue. So sincere apologies there on my part. I > was trying to get points out but was concerned about how the global > group of people here on the forum would feel. But part of the future > strategy is about learning the language, albeit a long term strategy. > The short term remedies are to understand how the culture of working, > learning, and businesses are doing and more importantly how one would > fine tuned themselves to that change. Along with it are the issue where > how Chinese in different parts of the country would see and want out of > a product/service. That would involve how people think and perceive > about forms and traditional preferences for certain objects of desire. > On a Marco level, the government strategies towards how a country should > take shape to grow with the rise of China. How do you work along with > China or you could work against China. That would be up to the individual. > > [...] -- Filippo A. Salustri, Ph.D., P.Eng. Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Ryerson University 350 Victoria St, Toronto, ON, M5B 2K3, Canada Tel: 416/979-5000 ext 7749 Fax: 416/979-5265 Email: [log in to unmask] http://deed.ryerson.ca/~fil/