Month: January 2024

WHO RATES OUR TEACHERS?

There is actually a law  governing academic research. It’s like a Murphy’s Law for academics and it’s called Hanggi’s Law. 

Clearly, the good Hanggi had time on his hands because his axion states “the more trivial your research, the more people will read it and agree.”  

Close but no cigar. 

An academic paper on Malay maritime history – trivial, not to mention staggeringly boring by any yardstick – by two University Putra Malaysia (UPM) researchers has not met with agreement. 

Instead, it’s being questioned with its two researchers accused of misrepresenting facts about Malay maritime history.

The allegations go to the heart of intellectual integrity in some Malaysian universities and echo repeated accusations that the  history in Malaysian textbooks is often rewritten to suit the Malay political narrative.  

Among other things, the paper seemed to suggest that the ships used by Malay sailors during the Malacca sultanate were comparable to their counterparts from China or Portugal.  

Serge Jardin, a French historian who’s co-authored several books on Malaccan history, criticised the duo for misrepresentation. He called it “a shame,” asking darkly:  “How low can academics go?” 

Among the points he noted in a Facebook post, Jardin alleged that an image used in the UPM paper to show a model of a Malay Jong (a type of sailing ship originating from Java, Indonesia) was, in fact, a Foochow Pole Junk (a type of cargo vessel) from China.

If plagiarism is a mortal sin in academe, misrepresentation isn’t far behind. But instead of saying it would “investigate and get back,” the university defended the duo.  

UPM said the article complied with its policy of being peer-reviewed but added blandly that social science and humanities studies were often “open to interpretation.”

In response, the French historian called the university’s defence “a joke.” He wasn’t laughing though.

According to the NST, Monsieur Jardin challenged the expertise of those who conducted the blind peer review for the duo’s paper, saying UPM’s defence could be easily disproved. 

“How is it possible for an expert not to see the difference between a Chinese junk and a Malay jong?” he asked, adding, “Have you ever seen a Malay boat with a pair of eyes at its bow? That belongs to the Chinese culture.” 

There were more questions. 

“How can a maritime expert confirm the galley (ghali) was used in Melaka, in the Sultanate of Melaka fleet, before the arrival of the Portuguese and the Ottomans in Southeast Asia? There is no historical source to sustain that affirmation.”

But the Frenchman’s most damaging allegation was aimed at the duo’s choice of publication.

Jardin questioned the journal, saying it was a “pay to publish” journal and that its publisher, Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, was listed as “predatory” in Beall’s List.

Beall’s List, originally created by University of Colorado librarian and researcher Jeffrey Beall, is a widely used and referenced list that identifies potential predatory publishers and journals.

“UKM (Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia) has even put up a list of predatory publishers/journals, which can be found on its website,” said Jardin, adding that the journal – used by the duo – appears on the list.

“‘It is not recognised by UKM but is good enough for UPM?” he questioned. 

He isn’t the researchers’ only critic. James Chin the Head Of Asian Studies at the University of Tasmania dubbed the research “bunkum.” 

The debate is unlikely to die down. But higher education in the country needs to be reviewed. There are questions about our tertiary education. Too many PhDs, unemployed graduates… The hits just keep on coming.  

And there is, of course, a question about the quality of faculty, its research.  

Or do we need foreigners to check?

ENDS

THE MAN ON THE RUN 

Whenever I see the Most Wanted lists, I often have this thought: if we’d only made them feel wanted before, maybe they wouldn’t be wanted now. –  Comedian and singer Eddie Cantor.

A joke being sent around yesterday gave me pause.  

It showed a picture of the former leadership of Malaysia’s once-ruling United Malays National Organisation clustered around its former leader, Najib Razak.

In the photograph, they are convulsed with mirth not least because Najib, his head thrown back, is laughing, presumably all the way to the bank. 

And a caption above reads: “Iswaran took what?? Football tickets?”

To the average Malaysian, the joke is painfully self-evident. On Wednesday, Singapore’s ex-Transport Minister S Iswaran was charged with 27 counts of bribery and corruption involving more than S$384,000 (RM1.34 million). It included over S$160,000 (RM560,000) in event (football, the theatre) and flight tickets from, billionaire Ong Beng Seng.

The alleged transgressions pale beside Najib’s epic theft from 1MDB, a sovereign wealth fund he set up when he was premier. The exact quantum of the loot isn’t clear, but the sums were heroic and in the billions. In contrast, it made Mr Eswaran’s alleged wrongdoing almost pointless, even vaguely Winnie-the-Pooh’ish. 

That was the joke, but it could be on us. Such was the scale of the 1MDB plunder that it’s inspired books and even a 2023 Netflix documentary – Man on the Run – gripping enough to scream Malaysia’s name on to the world stage. 

By cracking down on its powerful, even for misdemeanors, Singapore sends out a compelling message about its values. Would that we might do the same. 

Not even close. There are those who are currently agitating – or secretly hoping – for the First Felon’s early release. 

Jibby has so far served 17 months of his 12-year sentence for corruption, and he faces more charges in three separate criminal trials. Even so, he has seemingly had enough and, through his lawyers, has indicated he wants out through a royal pardon. 

And, no kidding, it’s being taken with all the gravitas of a Lord Denning argument.   

When it comes right down to it, it could boil down to education. Najib’s co-conspirator in the 1MDB saga is the Man on The Run himself, Low Teck Jho, a corpulent crook who’s now on Interpol’s list of wanted fugitives. 

Nevertheless, he is a very rich fugitive. Add to that, educated: the substantial swindler was reportedly an alumnus of the Wharton School of Business, one of the most prestigious business schools in the world: its finance programme is widely considered the gold standard internationally. 

It must have been, for the paunchy pilferer hit on the idea for a sovereign wealth fund to steal from. We will never know but perhaps he was inspired by Dr Mahathir who, when he was premier, often exhorted his countrymen to “Think Big”. 

Jho Low went one step further. He Thought Galactic enough to grace the screens of Interpol and end up as a plausibly deniable guest of the virulently anti-corrupt Communist Party of China. 

It all goes to show the truth of what Theodore Roosevelt observed over a century ago: “A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a university education, he may steal the whole railroad.” 

ENDS

MANNERS MAKE THE MAN 

I learnt the lesson on what goes where in a formal dinner setting the hard way – by screwing up.

It was some time in the mid-1990s and the foreign publication I was working for was due to host a dinner for then-deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim. I’d been busy ferrying the boss from Hong Kong around Kuala Lumpur for most of the day and was properly starved by the time dinner rolled around. 

I was seated next to the country’s then-Attorney General, the imperturbable Abu Talib Othman.

Metaphorically speaking, however, I was between a rock and a hard place.  The rock was starving while the hard place couldn’t remember which of the side-plates of bread rolls belonged to me. 

I waited an anguished couple of minutes hoping someone would initiate proceedings, but no one did. It was a 50:50 thing so the odds were reasonable that I wouldn’t make a hash of it. 

But I did. As the tortuous minutes went by, I resorted to the old eeny-meeny-miny-mo trick and devoured the roll on my right. 

After I came to, I noticed that everyone was buttering, or eating, their rolls except the good Tan Sri on my right. Upon my questioning look, he indicated, with the merest tilt of his head, the roll sitting forlornly on my plate’s left. 

An aghast understanding dawned, and I swiftly transferred said roll to the right. He picked it up and calmly began buttering it while initiating conversation on the perils of journalism in the region. Such was his aplomb that no one at the table noticed and my blushes were spared. 

That’s class for you, the courtesy of a true gentleman, or as Twain observed, “the noise you don’t make while eating your soup.” 

It takes an experience like that to drive the lesson home for life, and I’ve never forgotten the BMW rule for formal dining ever since. It stands for “Bread, Meal Water” which is how said dinner items should be positioned before you, going from left to right. 

Even so, the polished, good manners displayed by bygone generations seem to be going the way of the dodo. Standing up for a woman or holding the door for one can sometimes be viewed negatively because of New Age sensibilities brought about by feminism and gender equality. 

But there are those who’d argue that politeness is half good manners and half good lying, like the guy who disguises his boredom by learning to yawn with his mouth closed.

Of course, all this refers to the Western norm of good breeding. It is wholly different in other cultures which may be one reason why the writer Paul Theroux had occasion to remark: “The Japanese have perfected good manners and have made them indistinguishable from rudeness.” 

The observation may have stemmed from his first visit to any ramen joint in 

Tokyo: all that slurping is blatantly at odds with the “noise you don’t make while eating soup.” 

But it’s de rigueur in Japanese culture where the sedentary slurper slurps and having slurped, moves on to slurp some more.  

Omar Khayyam might think it bad form, but the poor sod hadn’t supped nor slurped ramen. 

Even so, even Omar might have disapproved of Homer Simpson; “Look Marge, you know it’s rude to talk when my mouth’s full.” 

ENDS