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I REFER to the letter, “Religion plays a big role in cultivating a person’s character”, by Timothy Cheah, (Sunday Star, Dec 18).
Cheah depicts Dr Hwa Yung as a sort of theological liberal.
Now in Christian theology, the “liberals” are a very specific family of thinkers, which Dr Hwa is somewhat opposed to.
There are two kinds of religious pluralism, and Cheah fails to clearly articulate Dr Hwa’s position on religion. Allow me to attempt a correction.
One kind of religious pluralism is epistemological pluralism. In this view, all religions are equally valid methods for any human being to access the Truth, which is God ... or whatever you choose to call The-Ultimate-Object-of-Religion.
This is generally not Dr Hwa’s theological position, nor is it the position of the Methodist Church of Malaysia at large.
A different kind of religious pluralism is political-but-not-epistemological pluralism. In this view, a person can believe that only his own religion can give human beings access to the Truth.
Nevertheless, because that person wishes to maintain good social relations with his geographical neighbours, he chooses to live harmoniously in a society with other people who do not share his convictions about the Truth.
If I am not mistaken, it is this version of religious pluralism which is embraced by most religious people in Malaysian society.
I know for a fact that Dr Hwa readily supports this point of view.
HWA YANG JERNG,
Petaling Jaya.
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I READ the article about American colleges of the liberal arts and sciences (StarEducation, Aug 16) with interest and would like to offer some comments.
In the United States, a university is like a bunch of colleges stuck together. Even if you go to Harvard, Princeton or Yale, as an undergraduate you will probably be registered under the university’s college of the liberal arts and sciences. In general, undergraduate institutions are referred to as “liberal arts colleges” and going for your first degree is referred to as “going to college”
Liberal arts colleges are marketed as paying pay more attention to the “breadth” of one’s education rather than the “depth” of one’s industrial specialisation.
Some people argue that education systems which try to emphasise both “breadth” and “depth” sometimes ends up producing only students with mediocre breadth and depth of knowledge, and may hinder ambitious students from highly-focused specialisation in a subject area, or from highly-focused diversification.
At a liberal arts college, out of four years of coursework, students sometimes take more than half their course work outside any particular discipline or department.
This means most major concentrations are the equivalent of one or two years of solid coursework. This is normal in the US and makes it possible for students to acquire double or triple majors with relative ease.
For example, Mathematics and Economics make a good and highly marketable combination. Students with this combination become even more marketable if they take up Physics as well.
If students have a “shopping period” of two years before they need to decide on a major, even at a relatively small college with only 12 departments, students may, within the first two years, overload and end up with six courses per semester and 24 classes (at two classes per discipline or department).
Now, if the departments in the college are well organised and the courses introduce the students to the nature, scope and research methodology of various disciplines, that would be fine.
However, perfect scenarios do not always exist.
In actual fact, most students at liberal arts colleges hardly know anything about what 50% of the available disciplines cover – many do not know that certain faculties or disciplines even exist on their campus.
In short, as long as students know what they want out of their undergraduate education, the four-year liberal arts college can provide the students with a fantastic environment and facilities to pursue their interests or dreams.
So far, this tertiary education option seems to be less popular among Malaysians who are generally obsessed with specialisation at younger ages for quicker marketability.
But I encourage high-achievers to consider a liberal arts degree for their first degree so that they may learn a bit more about world history before specialising for the future.
HWA YANG JERNG Seremban.
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LAST week’s article “Tidak apa attitude rules” (StarEducation, March 14) reminded me of my own political outlook. People get involved in a system only when they believe their actions will make a difference.
My political outlook as a young Malaysian was formed when I was in secondary school. I am a Gen-X/Y child who used to be quite ignorant of politics. I was interested in politics in Form One through Form Three, but after that I stopped following the news because it makes local politics boring.
It wasn’t just the lack of political-philosophical education in schools, but also the media coverage which put me off politics.
Looking on the bright side, it’s better to have apathetic citizens than to have misinformed voters.
When citizens are not politically educated, what results is a class of “leaders” and a
class of “followers”. This isn’t a bad system, mind you, and young people today seem to know it.
Practically speaking, we don’t need a theoretically-pure democracy. Our country is what we have made it to be, and we should be proud of what we have, don’t you think?
I love Malaysia for what it is, simply because I think the system works. I will work with the system to make it better, but that doesn’t mean that everyone should have to bear the burden of civil responsibility.
HWA YANG JERNG
Maine, the United States
