折扣卡A Brief History of English Language Teaching in China

A Brief History of English Language Teaching in China

Joseph Boyle

Among the many different aspects of China which have fascinated the West are the sheer size of its

population, its remote and mysterious culture, and the intricate difficulty of its language. Equally,

the West has always intrigued China, with its technological advancement despite its

cultural diversity within a small space, and the way in which one of its languages

- English - has

managed to become the lingua franca of the world.

China originally felt no need of the West, in fact deliberately avoided all contact, for fear of cultural

contamination. The bombing of the Chinese embassy during the Kosovo war was a terrible setback

in relations which had been steadily improving. However, despite this, partly because of its desire to

join the World Trade Organisation (WTO), China has welcomed and listened politely to leaders of

Western countries as they gave their views on democracy and human rights. The language in which

President

Clinton

spoke, during his

visit

to

China, was

of course English. President Jiang

Zemin

made his replies in Chinese. But each was backed up by a team of first-class interpreters, who made

smooth communication possible.

Formal training in interpretation is comparatively recent in China. It was only in 1978 that the first

programme for Translators and Interpreters started at the Beijing Foreign Language Institute. The

programme subsequently developed into the prestigious school of translation in the Beijing Foreign

Studies University.

The learning of English in China, however, has a longer history and now occupies the attention of

millions

of

its

people.

How

many

million

is

hard

to

say,

since

much

depends

on

the

level

of

proficiency

one

takes

as

the

norm

(Crystal,

1985).

But

there

are

probably

in

the

region

of

three

hundred million actively engaged in the job of learning English.

China's reasons for learning English were well summed up twenty years ago by a team from the U.S.

International Communication Agency after visiting five cities and many educational institutions in

China:

Chinese

view

English

primarily

as

a

necessary

tool

which

can

facilitate

access

to

modem scientific and technological advances, and secondarily as a vehicle to promote commerce

and understanding between the People's Republic of China and countries where English is a major

language

This

basic

motivation

has

not

changed,

as

can

be

seen

from

the

Report

of

the

English

2000

Conference in Beijing, sponsored jointly by the British Council and the State Education Commis-

sion

of

the

People's

Republic

of

China,

in

which

reasons

for

the

learning

of

English

by

Chinese

were summarised:

the majority of research journals. They learn it because it is the neutral language of commerce, the

standard currency of international travel and communication. They learn it because you find more

software in English than in all other languages put together

language learning is not uniform throughout China. Maley (1995:7) warns anyone embarking on a

study of contemporary China about the difficulty of

China

is

not

one

place

geographically,

but

many

The

learning

of

English

in

the

mountainous

provinces near Tibet is very different from the way it is studied in the cities of Nanjing, Shanghai or

Beijing. Nevertheless, there are sufficient general characteristics about the history of the learning of

English in different parts of China to justify a brief review, if only to remind us of the pendulum

swings of China's history this century. Those who wish to find the story more fully told may consult

Dzau (1990) and Cortazzi and Jin (1996). Although there is mention of English language teaching

(ELT)

in

China

in

the

mid

nineteenth

century

during

the

Ching

Dynasty,

it

first

figured

in

the

syllabus

of

schools

in

1902

in

Majesty's

Teaching

Standards

for

Primary

and

Secondary

Institutions

ELT

was

traditional,

with

emphasis

on

reading

and

translation.

There

was

much

grammar

and

vocabulary learning, with pronunciation learned by imitation and repetition. This was the norm for

about the first twenty years of the century.

In 1922 there was a change of direction, with a swing away from the Japanese system of education,

and

towards

more

Western

models.

Schools

were

obliged

to

follow

the

for

School

Syllabuses of the New Teaching System

There was more use of the target language and of the new teaching resources offered by the mass

media. The best schools tended to be Christian missionary schools, which gave more class-hours to

English than other schools.

1949 was a crucial date in the history of China - the founding of the People's Republic of China.

Education had now to serve the proletarian purpose. All textbooks became vehicles for government

propaganda,

loaded

with

messages

of

service

to

the

people

and

the

motherland.

The

Ministry

of

Education issued a new

English

language

learning

was

clearly

stated

as

being

to

serve

the

New

Republic.

All

capitalist

thinking,

especially

educational

ideas

from

the

United

States

and

Britain,

were

condemned

as

unpatriotic. The place of English was taken in school syllabuses by Russian and by 1954 Russian

had become the only foreign language taught in Chinese schools.

This

phase

did

not

last

long,

however,

since

China

was

already

trying

to

extend

her

markets

throughout the world and immediately felt its lack of English. Accordingly, in 1955 the Ministry of

Education announced that- English teaching should be restarted in secondary schools. In big cities,

like Shanghai, it was also reintroduced at primary level. Initially the textbooks were based on the

former

Russian

models,

which,

like

their

Japanese

predecessors,

were

very

traditional.

Methodology too was backward:

the

teacher

was

seen

as

the

provider

of

knowledge

and

the

students

dutifully

assimilated

the

teacher's words of wisdom, working their way ploddingly through the textbook.

However, in the late 1950s and early 1960s, a minor revolution in education took place in China, as

the need to open up to the international scene became more urgent. The importance of English was

accepted

and

a

significant

step

was

taken

in

1962

when

English

became

part

of

the

entrance

examination

for

colleges

and

universities.

New

teaching

materials

appeared,

with

listening

and

speaking again given prominence. The Ministry of Education issued guidelines for textbook writers,