Can a traditional Confucious family keep their traditions in a completely foreign land? I'm asking this question because Chen and his family are working to keep their culture alive in the UK, but it is not clear how long that will last.
No. For a time, they could. But eventually, as the time passes by, traditions must end. Eventually, things will fall apart. Even if the family in your scenario is extremely uptight about their beliefs, at one point, the host society will no longer be able to function with the traditional society. But what would the traditional society be by then? The traditions CAN survive, but only if they change. But that's the whole meaning of NOT surviving - changing. And at what point will the traditions in the foreign land (if isolated and, say, kept perfectly) become different from the traditions in the original country? Countries change quickly, but by not changing in a different country, they end up changing relative to the original country. And in any case, human nature (in my opinion) would rather conform to groups around them, so eventually one kid is going to stop speaking their language and move on to the host countries', or stop doing one small tradition (how bad can it be?). In any case time is the ultimate destroyer - nothing can escape its grasp, even tradition. What began as necessity, became formality, and eventually was lost to convenience.
No. For a time, they could. But eventually, as the time passes by, traditions must end. Eventually, things will fall apart. Even if the family in your scenario is extremely uptight about their beliefs, at one point, the host society will no longer be able to function with the traditional society. But what would the traditional society be by then? The traditions CAN survive, but only if they change. But that's the whole meaning of NOT surviving - changing. And at what point will the traditions in the foreign land (if isolated and, say, kept perfectly) become different from the traditions in the original country? Countries change quickly, but by not changing in a different country, they end up changing relative to the original country. And in any case, human nature (in my opinion) would rather conform to groups around them, so eventually one kid is going to stop speaking their language and move on to the host countries', or stop doing one small tradition (how bad can it be?). In any case time is the ultimate destroyer - nothing can escape its grasp, even tradition. What began as necessity, became formality, and eventually was lost to convenience.
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