You've Got to be Taught

“It’s just different, and that’s okay.”

Hi all,

Thank you for joining me for today’s song, “You’ve Got to Be Taught” by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. If you’d like to hear the song before you read the background, I’ve included a YouTube video below the article.

Below, you’ll find my interpretation of the lyrics (written in italics). Comments and questions are welcome. For Japanese students, vocabulary words in bold are provided in Japanese below. TOEFL (PBT) 450+, Eiken 2, CEFR B1.

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(484 words)

I had trouble sleeping last night. I was thinking about the song for today, You’ve Got to Be Taught, a song from the 1958 film and Broadway production of South Pacific, by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein.

Human beings (and probably all living beings?) have needed to tell the difference between friends and enemies in order to survive. Over time, people have used this to keep outsiders out and to protect their own spaces. Later, and more recently, this has led to seeing differences based on culture.

We might say they as in, “They drive on the wrong side of the road,” but from their point of view, it is we who drive on the “wrong” side of the road.

In the film and novel, Bend It Like Beckham, the main character, Jesse, wants to play football on a girls’ team in London, but her parents won’t allow it because it wouldn’t look good in their Asian (Indian) community. She tries to explain that there are many Asian players on teams in England.

Jesse says, “Nasser Hussein is captain of the English cricket team, and he’s Asian.”

Her mother says, “Hussein is a Muslim name. Their families are different.”

We do things differently. There is another message here. “And we do things right.”

This applies not only to nationalities but also cultures inside our own cultures, for example, people who are different from us in terms of weight, sex, gender and sexuality, ability, or for some other reason.

And so, from the time we are children, from parents, teachers, textbooks, media and friends, we hear these short phrases, all of which imply that there is something wrong with the differences.

I’m trying to change, but I often catch myself having similar thoughts about various cultures and ways of doing things. And then I recall something that a wise friend told me before I ever left the States, “Just remember that it’s not wrong. It’s just different.”

I wonder how things would change if, every time we thought or heard someone imply there’s something wrong with (whatever), we would say, “It’s just different, and that’s okay.” It certainly would send a different message.

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I was preparing for a class on immigration for my American Culture course. On an old worksheet, I found the lyrics to a 1949 song by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein. The musical was called South Pacific. Part of the story was about a man in the navy who was on an island in the South Pacific. He falls in love with a young woman from the island, but he knows that his family would never accept her. He sings this song about learning racism from your parents and others around you who influence your values.

James Taylor, a singer/songwriter from the 1960s to today, sings this beautiful version.

The lyrics are as true today as they were 70 years ago.

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VOCABULARY

nationality 国籍

imply 意味する

immigration 移民

influence 影響

(Humor, irony, and tongue-in-cheek are often difficult to recognize when learning another language. I have edited this post to avoid misinterpretation.)