5/14/2018 0 Comments Being "Obedient" is Nice? Or Not?Imagine that you were a five-year-old kid. Would it make you happy to hear adults call you “obedient”?
Here is another example of lost-in-translation concept. In Chinese culture, it is not uncommon to hear remarks like “s/he is such a 乖(guai) kid/boy/girl”, which is, most of time, received positively and considered as a compliment to the sweet temper of the child. There is very little negative connotation, if any. However, even after looking through dictionary and talking to many American friends, I still can’t find a proper translation of the concept “乖(guai)”, used to describe someone who follows the instructions (particularly instructions from the parents/teachers) and does not cause unnecessary trouble. “乖(guai)” is an adjective and most of time, used to describe a personality trait. The most common usage is on children and pets, but it can be used to describe employees in the work context as well (from the supervisor’s perspective). If you have read this far, you may already start wondering why such a concept cannot be translated directly into English. It is certainly not the case that following instructions and not causing trouble are discouraged or never found in American culture, right? Can you imagine how most workplaces function if the employees don’t follow instructions? Can you imagine how schools would function if students do not follow the instructions of the teachers? It should be apparent that, even though not all employees/students follow instructions very well, such behaviors are clearly desired, encouraged, and rewarded in most contexts. A supervisor is more likely to promote an employee that follows instructions without causing trouble to the company, and a teacher is more likely to reward the students who follow instructions with good grades. So why can’t I find a translation of the concept 乖(guai)? How do Americans describe it? The challenge actually lies in the usage of 乖(guai). As I mentioned, in Chinese culture it is used as an adjective that describes a personality trait. A personality trait is considered as inherent to the person, thus defining his/her characteristics. Describing someone as 乖(guai) thus implies s/he is a person with this trait, and will continue being like this across the contexts. In a collectivistic culture like Chinese culture, being 乖(guai) is good, as it indicates the easiness to fit into a group and a hierarchy. The opposite 不乖(bu guai) implies going against the crowd and potentially causing trouble as one asserts his/her opinion above what the group has agreed on/what the leaders have decided on. To make sure that the benefit of the group is prioritized, we need many people with the 乖(guai)traits, as they make great followers who get the job done. When I tried to find an adjective like 乖(guai) in English, I searched in vain. The closest I could find (which is also the translation in the dictionary) is “obedient”, which is sometimes used to describe pets but very rarely used on children, let alone employees. This might be because the implication of using “obedient” as an adjective. Once someone is described as obedient, it is viewed as a personality of that person, hence there is implicit expectation that this person is going to obey the orders across all contexts, blindly. The image of humans following orders like robots is repulsive to Americans who strongly value individuality and creativity, and no one wants to be called “obedient” as if they were robots without their own judgment. The image seems less appalling when a dog, instead of a human, is labeled obedient. Maybe dogs are not expected to have their own judgments anyway. Interestingly, the behaviors associated with the trait 乖(guai) are often seen in American culture, and in most cases, encouraged or even explicitly required (e.g. in job postings or training). Americans are not less willing to follow instructions in a group or a workplace than their Chinese peers, but they do not want such “collective” behaviors to define themselves. Ironically, this means that the American society rewards someone who can display 乖(guai) behaviors but is not inherently a 乖(guai) person—someone with his/her own thoughts and judgments but nevertheless goes along with the group order. Isn’t this a little counterintuitive? Maybe it’s easier to think of it as someone who can play the role of a 乖(guai) employee in the right context but can be quite independent and assertive outside that context.
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