Another Chinese export: the language

[Harold F. Schiffman]

>>From the NYTimes, January 11, 2006

Another Chinese Export Is All the Rage: China's Language
By HOWARD W. FRENCH

SHANGHAI, Jan. 10 - Conquering the world is not supposed to be easy, but
that's exactly how things must look some days to Xu Lin, head of the
government's new effort to promote the Chinese language overseas. Ms. Xu
is creating a global network of Chinese cultural centers, called Confucius
Institutes, to teach foreigners throughout the world a language with a
forbidding reputation for difficulty. But far from having to round people
up, Ms. Xu is finding they are beating down her door. "There is a China
frenzy around the world at the moment," she said. "The launch of this
program is in response to the Chinese language craze, especially in
neighboring countries."

For decades, people in those countries have viewed China with deep
suspicion. But now mastering Chinese as a door to lucrative business
opportunities, or simply as a matter of popular fashion, is suddenly all
the vogue - not only there but in the United States and Europe as well.
Just as new, though, is the decision of the Chinese government to ride the
wave, not just capitalizing on the newfound chic that surrounds the
language but also determined to perpetuate it as a way of extending
Chinese international influence and good will toward the country. For
some, the choice of a slightly fusty name like Confucius Institute, which
evokes images of anything but a rising new power, might seem odd given
Beijing's increasing penchant for high-tech imagery and slick public
relations. Yet the carefully selected label speaks volumes about the
country's soft power ambitions.

Among other things, using the name of the country's oldest and most famous
philosopher avoids reference to the official ideology, which remains
Marxism. Confucius, who was an educator and quasi-religious figure, also
stands for peace and harmony, values that China insistently proclaims
today, hoping to disarm fears about its rapid rise. Judging by the
reactions of its long-wary neighbors, the effort appears to be paying off.
Indonesia, which for three decades banned the teaching of Chinese because
of Beijing's support for Communist rebels, recently lifted the
prohibition. Vietnam, which has long had strained ties with Beijing, has
accepted a Confucius Institute amid a boom in Chinese language
instruction. In South Korea, an American ally that fought alongside the
United States in a war against China's troops a half century ago, Chinese
has reportedly outstripped English as the most popular foreign language
among students.

"Chinese is as popular in Korea today as English is in China," Ms. Xu said
enthusiastically. Although Chinese language studies may be most advanced
in neighboring countries, where the ability to understand the Mandarin
dialect has traditionally been considered a mark of cultivation, they are
making huge strides farther afield. Eleven Confucius Institutes are up and
running, in Europe and Africa as well as Asia. One center is already
operating in the United States, at the University of Maryland, and five
others are expected to open soon in Honolulu, Kansas City, Mo., San
Francisco, Chicago and New York. Twelve more are under discussion.

Even before that first center opened, the College Board, the body that
administers advanced placement exams, added Chinese to its list of foreign
language tests, the first time an East Asian language has been included in
its testing. In a 2003 survey of American high schools, the College Board
found that 50 said they would like to add advanced placement courses in
Russian, about 175 said Japanese and 240 said Italian - and 2,400 said
they would prefer Chinese. "We had no idea there was such an incredible
interest out there,"  Tom Matts, a College Board official, told CNN. Ms.
Xu said that "education officials from several states, actually several
dozen states, have sent us requests" to help them establish Chinese
language programs.

In many respects, China's Confucius Institutes seem like a throwback to
the 1950's and 1960's, when the United States, the Soviet Union and
leading European countries were competing intensely for international
prestige and influence. Moscow distributed magazines like Soviet Life
through its embassies, and others promoted their languages through
cultural organizations like the Alliance Franaise, the Goethe Institute
and the Cervantes Institute. As China becomes a major economic and
military power and its diplomacy becomes more assertive, Beijing is also
working harder at winning friends and influencing people. Indeed, taken
together with China's recent launches of manned space flights, and the
huge push to build world-class universities and to produce prize-winning
scientific research, some have called the language initiative part of this
country's "Sputnik moment,"  after the first artificial satellite,
launched by the Soviet Union in 1957.

But where Sputnik fed a sense of alarm in the United States and elsewhere
about the rise of an aggressive new superpower, the Confucius Institutes
are intended to do almost the opposite, elevating the country's prestige
while easing anxieties over the arrival of a new power. "They are using
Chinese culture to create a warmer, more positive image of Chinese
society," said Nancy Jervis, vice president of the China Institute, a
nonprofit Chinese-language study group that will be home to a Confucius
Institute in New York City. "That's probably why the State Council has
funded them, and why they've given a fair amount of money in turn to the
College Board."

China's re-entry into the contest for global influence reflects the
broader strategy of a nation that is still poor by many measures but is
moving fast and making a big impression. The approach often involves
advancing with frugal means through lots of hustle and word of mouth. "The
British Council spends over 3 billion pounds a year," or more than $5
billion, Ms. Xu said, adding that China is spending only about $12 million
on the Confucius Institutes. Instead of building expensive new
headquarters in each city, the institutes team up with local partners,
taking space in their buildings or getting foreign governments to pay for
their housing. Instead of sending teachers who will instruct foreigners
directly, the institute sends teacher trainers who can help upgrade the
skills of local Chinese teachers.

"The vision for this sort of thing has existed in China for a very long
time," said Wu Yongyi, deputy dean of the International College of Chinese
Studies at East China Normal University in Shanghai, who has been involved
in overseas language instruction missions since the 1980's. Mr. Wu said
China worked hard to promote its language among third world nations from
the 1960's to the 80's, when he got his start teaching in Africa and
elsewhere overseas. Today, about 90,000 foreign students come to China
every year to study the language, he said, with 30 million more people
around the world studying Chinese.

"After China's economic reforms started, we discovered we had an urgent
need for communication, and we found that it's not enough that we learned
foreign languages," he said. "Communications could be better if other
people could speak Chinese. We need two-way communications, and now that
our economy is strong, we can support this."


Copyright 2006The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/11/international/asia/11china.html