Rice

Info goes here.

Link to [|wiki page]

I found this great [|video about rice].

I found this picture of a [|rice paddy].

Here is another [|picture of a rice paddy]. And [|one more picture].

// MORE ABOUT RICE (AND CULTURE)  While reading tonight’s hw I came across the paragraph on page 32 about how labor intensive it is to cultivate rice. When I read this I remembered my dad telling me that this topic came up in a book called Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. I went online and found the overview of the discussion of rice paddies in the book. It explains that Gladwell believes that the stereotype of Asians being so much smarter than everyone else is rooted in the hard work done in the rice fields. I found this [|article] (I'm providing an excerpt below)////.

He also brings up a stereotype about Asian people that most people wouldn’t even want to touch. Gladwell not only puts it out there…he tries to give us an explanation. One has to do with how the Chinese language deals with numbers—numbers are shorter and so it’s easier for kids to pick up. That means they start counting before we can—you could also file this away under luck. But the real answer lies in the rice paddies of China. Turns out there is a huge difference between farming culture as we think of it and the rice-farming culture of China. When I think of farming, I think of some grueling months of hard work followed by months of inactivity and “hibernation.” The rice paddies aren’t like that—Gladwell tells us that the average workload for a rice farmer is around 3,000 hours a year (that’s around a 60-hour workweek, 52 weeks a year, no time off…). This is the way it’s been since back in the day, so it’s become part of the culture.

(posted by Mr. G for Caroline W)//