Lifestyle |
Chinese language learning gains global traction | |
|
|
Young sinologists, scholars and ambassadors to China from all over the world participate in the celebration of the 14th UN Chinese Language Day on April 20, hosted by the Center for Language Education and Cooperation (CLEC) Once he starts talking about his China experiences, Wilson Barroso Díaz from Cuba simply cannot stop. He speaks about his standard Chinese studies but also discusses his opinions on the country's economy and social development. His mastery of the language is impressive—he can articulate his thoughts very well. Díaz, who used to teach at Pedro Portuondo Primary School in Havana, was motivated by a friend to study the Chinese language before enrolling in a related course at the Confucius Institute at the University of Havana. Confucius Institutes, named after the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius (551-479 B.C.), are nonprofit public institutions that aim to promote the Chinese language and culture in foreign countries. He took second place in a national Chinese language competition in 2015. His achievements won Díaz a scholarship to pursue postgraduate studies at North China Electric Power University in Beijing. And today, he is a Ph.D. student studying international relations at the capital's Renmin University of China. "Unlike most learners, it's insufficient for me to just be fluent in everyday conversation. I have to reach a certain linguistic level to grasp the courses on political science and economics," Díaz told Beijing Review. When it comes to the language learning part, Patricia Castro Obando might disagree with her fellow Latin American. This Peruvian arrived in China in 2003 fueled by her fascination for Chinese culture and she embarked on anthropology studies at Peking University. "My mentor told me there was no need to learn a language beyond conversational proficiency. To utterly understand Chinese culture, you need to travel around the country," the former journalist told Beijing Review. In the past two decades, Obando has traversed the breadth of China, traveling from Hong Kong Special Administrative Region in the south to Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, northwest China, and finally to Henan Province along the middle reaches of the Yellow River, one of the cradles of Chinese civilization. What Díaz and Obando do have in common, however, is their passion for the language and the stories behind it. Their studying in China was made possible by the China Studies Program Ph.D. Fellowships initiated by the Center for Language Education and Cooperation (CLEC), a nonprofit organization under the Ministry of Education established to facilitate Chinese learning. On April 20, the CLEC invited the pair, along with young sinologists, scholars and ambassadors to China from all over the world, to participate in the celebration of the 14th United Nations Chinese Language Day. The purpose of UN language days is to celebrate multilingualism and cultural diversity as well as to promote equal use of all six official languages throughout the organization.
A student delves into the art of paper cutting during an event celebrating the 14th United Nations Chinese Language Day (April 20) at the Confucius Institute at the University of Nairobi in Nairobi, Kenya, on April 18 (XINHUA) On the curriculum "Cuban people are becoming increasingly interested in learning the Chinese language, partly because of the friendly cooperation between the two countries. Now they have goods from China, they're meeting Chinese experts and they're making Chinese friends. They have to learn it," Díaz said, adding Cuba needs more Confucius Institutes to cover all those who want to learn the Chinese language in the country. According to the Chinese Ministry of Education, as of December 2022, over 180 countries and regions had launched Chinese language education and 82 countries had included it in their national high-school curricula. The number of people learning Chinese overseas exceeded 30 million. "In the past few decades, the trend of mutual language learning between China and Arab countries has greatly improved, indicating the increase in mutually beneficial cooperation and friendly exchanges between the two sides," Xue Qingguo, a professor of Arabic studies at Beijing Foreign Studies University, told Beijing Review at the CLEC event on April 20. "For example, it's said so many Egyptian students are learning Chinese now that some universities in the country have even turned their parking garages into classrooms," Xue said. As interest in the Chinese language continues to grow worldwide, more countries are expanding their related education programs to meet the needs of language learners. In an interview with Southern Weekly, a newspaper based in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong Province, in December last year, French sinologist Joël Bellassen said, "If you ask me 'what's been the trend of the Chinese language teaching in France and Europe over the past 15 years?', I would say it's been growing in a way a plane increases its speed to get off the ground. The year 2004 marked a major shift where more countries began to include learning [standard] Chinese as part of their basic high-school education. And France is taking the lead among all countries." A new call With the world becoming more and more globalized, language skills are essential for younger generations to succeed in the future. Chinese proficiency not only offers people a portal into an ancient, wide-ranging culture but can also help create countless economic opportunities. In 2022 alone, 12 new centers homing in on teaching Chinese language and vocational skills were built across 10 countries, including Cambodia, Argentina and Nigeria, with course topics ranging from hydropower to lithium energy. On top of international Chinese language education, the need for vocational language teaching is rising as China has become many countries' top trading partner and saw more countries join the Belt and Road Initiative, which China first proposed in 2013 to boost connectivity along and beyond the ancient Silk Road trade routes. The CLEC event in honor of UN Chinese Language Day witnessed the release of the Vocational Chinese Language Standards. "Our attention has focused on general language teaching, but not on vocational language education. Now, Chinese-funded companies overseas are having a difficult time finding Chinese-speaking skilled locals. The standards are essential for designing vocational Chinese language courses and creating related textbooks," Song Jihua, a professor at the School of Artificial Intelligence at Beijing Normal University, told Beijing Review. Two themes, logistics services and management as well as automobile repair, have already been developed based on these standards. Combined with digital technology, they will make the language more accessible, thus enabling more students to learn standard Chinese, according to Song. "The standards are necessary," Díaz said. "When I returned to Cuba for a short stay after a year's study in China, I once interpreted for Yutong Group, a Chinese bus maker, and I couldn't name any of the specific parts and accessories. We need skilled staff who speak both languages, so surely we needed the standards to be put in place first." (Print Edition Title: Proficiency Opens Portals) Copyedited by Elsbeth van Paridon Comments to liwenhan@cicgamericas.com |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|