On the sad occasion of Nelson Mandela’s death, it’s worth recalling his words on languages: “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his...
KEEP READINGThe CPD Blog is intended to stimulate dialog among scholars and practitioners from around the world in the public diplomacy sphere. The opinions represented here are the authors' own and do not necessarily reflect CPD's views. For blogger guidelines, click here.
China’s PD: Promoting Chinese Language Studies
The cover story in Time's Asian edition highlights an important part of China's public diplomacy that is not yet well understood in the West -- promoting Chinese language studies.
After an initial rocky start trying to promote Chinese language studies in the late 1990s, the Chinese government, including its ministry of education, seems to have realized the need to divorce language studies from explicit government support. Hence the name of the Chinese language programs -- Confucius Institutes -- betrays no links to China's own political system or modern history; in actuality, Mao tried to disown Confucius' legacy. Hence, also, although the Chinese government has paid for at least the first year of a number of these language programs overseas, it does not highlight the government support, and generally allows local universities to take the lead.
The language studies promotion has been working well -- particularly in the less developed nations on China's borders, where Chinese language schools tend to be better-equipped than the local public schools. In Cambodia, for example, I found on a recent trip that one Chinese-language school has over 10,000 students, and the capital is proliferating with Chinese-language schools, some of which get at least initial funding from the Chinese government.
Visit CPD's Online Library
Explore CPD's vast online database featuring the latest books, articles, speeches and information on international organizations dedicated to public diplomacy.
POPULAR ARTICLES
-
October 21
-
November 21
-
November 7
-
November 5
-
October 24
Join the Conversation
Interested in contributing to the CPD Blog? We welcome your posts. Read our guidelines and find out how you can submit blogs and photo essays >.