Posts Tagged ‘English’

The connection between language learning and liberal thinking

Posted: September 27, 2011 in media, Politics
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Over the past few months I’ve been interviewing dozens of Chinese aged 18-24 for a few articles exploring how the Communist Party is trying to maintain legitimacy among young intellectuals. But the other day a behavioral psychologist I spoke to highlighted a trend in my interviews that had completely slipped under my radar.

When I told him what some of the people were saying, he asked if I’d been speaking to them in Mandarin. I had with several, but I’ve been drawn more to interviewees who speak English well for in-depth interviews. Partly for convenience, but partly because they’ve tended to say more interesting and unexpected things. This wasn’t surprising at all to the doctor.

“Learning a different language, especially a western language, is already engaging in divergent thinking,” E. Thomas Dowd, the behavioral psychologist, explained to me. “When you speak a different language you begin to think differently. People who speak more than one language tend to have a broader range of cognitive abilities, they think more divergently, they’re more creative, and can converse better with people of more diverse cultures.”

When I taught university English in Nanjing I noticed this with my students to some extent. The English majors tended to think much more critically and liberally (ie. against the Party line) than my non-English major students. I always chalked this up to the fact that English majors have foreign teachers and often use western English media to study.

But after talking with the psychologist, I went back and looked at my interviews. Even the good English speakers who hadn’t spent any time with foreigners or viewing western media seemed to have liberal tendencies, suggesting the mere act of acquiring a foreign language played a big role. Meanwhile, the people that spoke little or no foreign language had ideas most similar to the government line. Looking at individuals, the young man who spoke the most idiomatic English said stuff that could probably get him arrested, and one girl who speaks English and Russian said some incredibly critical things too. If I were to make a chart of all the interviewees comparing English ability to thinking that contradicts government scripting, the correlation would be pretty apparent.

There were exceptions and undoubtedly other factors in play. The sample was also too small (around 35) and unscientific to make any concrete conclusions, but there have been studies that show, to a certain extent, language shapes how you see and interact in the world. For instance with German, if you want to say you met your neighbor last night, the language compels you to reveal the gender of that neighbor.

The suggestion that simply learning a foreign language makes you more liberal-minded was news to me though. Important news. It’s tempting to go for the subjects that can speak English well, but it would seem that that doesn’t really give a good representation of Chinese opinion; even in articles that focus on educated elite. It’s good reminder for journalists, but maybe just as importantly, to foreigners who come to China to visit or teach English.

The bulk of their real exposure to Chinese opinion is from foreign language learners. Thus, it’s pretty natural to marvel at how unexpectedly liberal and open-minded Chinese are in these situations; especially in regards to politics. But that picture is likely pretty skewed. If you can speak Chinese and take a walk over to a non-foreign language department of the university, you’ll probably get a very different impression.

China’s English Bubble Almost Ready to Pop

Posted: May 3, 2010 in Business
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Global Times – March 3rd, 2010

Last December the employees and students of the Kai En chain of English training centers in Shanghai arrived to their schools to a very rude surprise: After 13 years of operation, one of the oldest and best known English training companies in Shanghai had suddenly gone out of business.

The directors had fled the country, leaving the employees of the five branches owed months of back-wages and customers without refunds for their expensive pre-paid courses.

When looking at this in the context of Chinese and international trends, it could be a preview of things to come for China’s English language industry.

Most indicators seem to show that China’s English industry is booming. According to the Social Survey Institute of China (SSIC), it’s a 15 billion yuan ($2.2 billion) per year industry and a survey of eight large cities showed that 55.4 percent of the Chinese respondents had received English training, with another 21.2 percent saying that they planned to.

However, the survey also showed that there are over 50,000 private English teaching institutions throughout China, with more opening constantly. So while the English pie may still be expanding, the pieces are becoming smaller and more numerous.

English centers with business models similar to Kai En’s are the most vulnerable. These centers rely on big facilities, highly paid but often unqualified foreign teachers and high tuition fees from students. They are facing growing competition from cheaper and often more effective resources.

In recent years China has expanded public school English education to begin as early as first grade, where it had previously begun in fifth grade or later in much of the country. This has cut off a significant chunk of the children’s English market.

Other sources of English learning are also becoming increasingly available and affordable, such as Skype-lessons with overseas teachers, podcasts, private foreign and Chinese tutors, and even a barrage of fly-by-night schools promising to take students from no English ability to exam-ready in 30 days.

While some of these options aren’t always legitimate, they’re grabbing market share nonethe-less. The ever-increasing foreign population in China also means English learners will need less and less to rely on expensive training centers to meet and practice English with native speakers.

Of course, as long as there’s strong demand in the industry, those centers that offer a quality education at a reasonable price will stay afloat so long as they can adapt their business model to the increasing supply of other English learning mediums.

However, by looking at past international cases, an impending decline in the demand side of the equation leading to mass closures of these centers seems very likely.

During the economic boom of the 1980s, Japan also went through an English learning boom similar to that of present-day China. Across the country English training centers sprouted up and the industry thrived. It seemed a guaranteed way to make money in Japan – for about a decade.

In 1996 the first major English company collapsed. The American Club English School, much like Kai En, had been delaying employee payments for months and eventually the owner fled the country, leaving the employees and students hung out to dry.

In the late 1990s, Japan’s English schools marketed and competed aggressively with one-another over share in an industry that was sinking fast. Many managed to stay afloat – for about another decade. In 2006, the 10th largest English company in Japan, Nippon NCB Co., collapsed under circumstances almost identical to Kai En and the American Club.

Then in 2007, Nova, the largest English school in Japan, with 900 schools and 15,000 employees throughout the country, went belly-up. Upon the collapse, many of the teachers (who had lost months of withheld wages) flooded to the remaining English schools. In one case, 400 foreign teachers applied for one job opening at another company.

While there are differences between Japan’s and China’s markets, the similarities are hard to ignore. Much like in present-day China, Japanese businessmen of the 1980s and 1990s thought English was a “can’t-lose” industry and foreign teachers enjoyed plentiful, secure and high-paying jobs, often with no real qualifications.

Though China’s English industry still appears to be thriving, the collapse of Kai En and the ever-growing competition in the market could be the warning signs that China is following the Japanese trend. Many economists have already observed that the industry is forming a bubble. It’s just a matter of how soon that bubble will burst.