Where in the World Are They?

     World events--2011's current affairs--call for a new vocabulary.  Recently, a fun test was sent to me.  The test? A blank map of Africa with country borders was accompanied by a list of corresponding country names.  The object? To drag the names of the appropriate country, so as to assess geographical knowledge.
     I offer you an entertaining, insightful challenge.  Try the test for yourself.  http://www.rethinkingschools.org/just_fun/games/mapgame.html
Don't worry about being wrong.  Keep trying.  I did.  I did not get the countries correct without making mistakes.  Yet, the test heightened--heightens--my desire to be more attentive than I have been.
    Beyond current affairs that demand our attention are longer-term--more subtle--news.  The daily stock exchanges provide barometers of confidence in world affairs.  State and national monthly unemployment statistics represent additional barometers.  Barometers of what?  Outsourcing.  International trade imbalances.
     Outsourcing and trade imbalances should direct our attention to India, and China.  Cheaper labor, and the form of government.  India is a democracy.  The Republic of China is a communist state.  The Chinese government has firm control of the direction of the country's economy.  I confess to knowing less of India's economy.  I do know that significant outsourcing of computer work has been outsourced to India--keying of data into electronic form, and software   But, I don't know how or why it is that India plays the role it does.  The Philippines is another player in the outsourcing jigsaw puzzle.  The Philippines provides large U.S. corporations with a source of cheap labor to achieve data entry of print data into digital form.
   Our questions will be ever-present.  If we are to have any hope of developing an understanding of other countries, it is essential to have a foundation of primary sources upon which we may refer for information.  Whatever U.S. media is our daily white noise may alert us to pressing issues facing the world in which we live.  Yet, if we do not have reliable native sources of information, we are at the whim of U.S. media, who have bureaus in other countries.