Jul 8, 2019, 12:06 PM
Breaking down the BBC’s visit to Hotan, Xinjiang - Sun Feiyang - Medium
medium.com
They also make an issue out of rote learning which is equated with brainwashing. As any student of Chinese as a second language knows, the only way to learn written Chinese and be literate is by rote. That means copy characters incessantly until they become second nature. I started studying Chinese in my 20s and it took 4 years of intensive instruction to gain a middling level of competence.

There are many minority residents from remote areas of Xinjiang who are not fluent or literate in Mandarin Chinese. It is very difficult for them to get the new jobs that are opening up as Xinjiang gets integrated into the BRI. The type of instruction being offered is essential for young Uyghurs to advance and prosper. Otherwise they may well become alienated and susceptible to extremist ideology as a panacea for their isolation from mainstream society.

This is a phenomenon that should be well understood in the US where many people want English to be the national language. In China Uyghur and other minority languages have official status but everyone needs to be conversant and literate in Mandarin Chinese as well.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Jul 10, 2019, 1:13 PM Well, it puts the lie to the common perception that China is this awful place where people are regimented automatons. Of course that is ridiculous but many people in the US actually believe it. Well guess what, it just ain't true. There are just as many flamboyant over the top people in China as in the US and they are not carted off to re-education camps.
Read more
Jul 10, 2019, 11:26 AM The point being, not that China abandon HK, that is admitting defeat and handing it back over to the Empire, which will never happen, but that HK has to solve its own problems. The first prerequisite is that HKers accept the fact that HK is not exceptional or indispensable, but an integral part of China. Until the majority does that and isolates the traitors in their midst, HK will become more and more irrelevant.
Read more
Image
Jul 10, 2019, 12:04 AM Why does new Chinese head of UN food agency feed US suspicion? scmp.com What kind of bogus headline is this? US suspicions? The only one who should be suspect is the US, which never acts as an honest broker, but is always conniving to advance its own interests ahead of anyone else's. Doesn't it say something that support for China's Qu Dongyu was universal among delegates from Africa and Latin America? They know a friend when they see one. Washington, has concern "o ver whether Qu would use China’s position at the FAO’s helm to further the ambitions of the Belt and Road Initiative?" Give me a break, as if the US doesn't use the international agencies it controls to further its own foreign policy goals. And of course all the US can do is impugn Qu's integrity as a last resort. It seems anyone from China is totally beholden to Beijing and has no independence from its dictates. Really? Others don't think ...
Read more