The Economist says learning Chinese is "a fad for misguided fools"

[yonglin]

I think the reason that people in some parts of Europe learn English better than Americans learn, say, French or Spanish, is attributable almost entirely to incentive effects, and has very little to do with the school system. Since I'm Swedish, I'll take my own experience as an example. If you're a Swede, you either learn English or... die. (Maybe not that harsh, but you might at most get a job as a cleaner really: even in the most simple service profession you'd be expected to be conversational in English to serve tourists.) If you attend university and study anything besides Scandinavian languages (or teaching), your textbooks will at least partly be in English (because the market isn't big enough to translate them all). And well, no research papers are ever published in Swedish. If you're browsing the Internet, you'd be seriously limiting yourself if you stick to Swedish-language websites alone.

Contrary to others, I think that being fed with English language popular culture throughout our youth wouldn't have made all that great of a difference had not the idea that we'd be screwed if we didn't learn been so firmly instilled. So, in my opinion, the average American won't manage learning a foreign language unless you can convince her that there is a really strong reason for doing so (and learning about different cultures won't apply to all).

I started learning English in fourth grade (about 10-11 years old?). Classes were almost without exception conducted by non-native English speakers, whose level of English was decent, I suppose. (I looked back at a some assignments from school a few years ago, and realised that quite many of my mistakes had just not been marked out... don't know if this was because of teacher incompetence, or just some kind of pedagogic strategy.) Overall, teaching quality was not that great.

On learning foreign languges in general, I think it would be splendid if you could choose to learn some major immigrant language in your country at school. This might involve learning Spanish in the US, Turkish in Germany, or Farsi in Sweden. Chinese could be another option, since there are plenty of Chinese overseas communities all around. The point would not be taking away the incentive for immigrant communities to learn the language of their new home country, but rather to promote cultural understanding and create a peaceful and non-polarized community. Moreover, it would be easy to find competent teachers, and students would easily find opportunities to use the language in their everyday life. One could even do homestays and cultural exchanges on a local scale. Moreover, if you are an immigrant, seeing people in your new home country caring to learn about your language and culture would really instill a sense of respect in you, making you more willing to learn their language and understand their culture as a result.

[zozzen]

That isn't all true about the Economist report. Chinese language skill is still very important at building guanxi and breaking xenophobia esp with the gov't. I met a very fresh westerner who was granted a gov't project about the Performing Arts and it was his chinese skills and knowledge about China that helped him convince the provincial gov't that he would bring them to the "world".

[gato]

On learning foreign languges in general, I think it would be splendid if you could choose to learn some major immigrant language in your country at school. This might involve learning Spanish in the US, Turkish in Germany, or Farsi in Sweden. Chinese could be another option, since there are plenty of Chinese overseas communities all around. Moreover, if you are an immigrant, seeing people in your new home country caring to learn about your language and culture would really instill a sense of respect in you, making you more willing to learn their language and understand their culture as a result.

You Swedes are so sweet. You are natural socialists, or something. Have you seen the movie Tillsammans (Together)?

[yonglin]

You Swedes are so sweet. You are natural socialists, or something. Have you seen the movie Tillsammans (Together)?

This may or may not be the case.

Personally, I find that Sweden has many social problems, and that the segregation of immigrants (especially in the labour market) is severely interfering with overall efficiency of the economy. For instance, many well-educated people from abroad (doctors, engineers, architects, etc.) are stuck doing unqualified jobs - not because they want to or because they don't know Swedish, but because they're discriminated against. I often say that if I actually marry my boyfriend and take his clearly foreign-sounding last name (as one usually does in most western cultures), I won't be able to find a job in Sweden anymore. And to be fair, there is actually some substance in this claim. Thus, gaining some understanding about other cultures in general, and immigrant cultures in particular, is not really part of a socialist agenda. In fact, I would describe myself as a pragmatically oriented libertarian.

And yes, I have seen the movie, but I can't say that it left a particularly deep impression or that I remember it very well.

[carlo]

I agree that for a native English speaker, learning *any* foreign language doesn't make strict economic sense. A language that is close to English (like Dutch) could be learned more quickly, but this also means that 80-year-old Dutch grandmothers will speak better English than you'll ever master Dutch. Languages like Chinese or Arabic are an even greater waste of time.

However, I don't believe in 'strict economic sense'. If economists were right, markets would be perfect and I would have never been unemployed. I found knowing Chinese useful in my finance career (in China) for at least two reasons:

1. I can do independent research much faster nad more creatively than I could if I couldn't read Chinese books and newspapers, ask casual questions to people met randomly (the driver that tells me all about the local real estate market that the party secretary wouldn't say), and so on.

2. I find it much harder than other expatriates to live in an isolated 'expat bubble' with a distorted perception of what happens around me, which helps I think in preserving my sanity, hence the quality of my work.

[Lu]

I think the reason that people in some parts of Europe learn English better than Americans learn, say, French or Spanish, is attributable almost entirely to incentive effects, and has very little to do with the school system. Since I'm Swedish, I'll take my own experience as an example. If you're a Swede, you either learn English or... die. (...) If you attend university and study anything besides Scandinavian languages (or teaching), your textbooks will at least partly be in English (...). If you're browsing the Internet, you'd be seriously limiting yourself if you stick to Swedish-language websites alone.

You are right, but I never really thought of that when I was learning English, and I don't recall ever hearing anyone at school talk about English that way either. Those are the things the government and perhaps the school think about when they make learning English obligatory, but I don't think the kids give it much thought. They just study because otherwise they'll have bad grades, not because otherwise they won't understand their university textbooks.

If incentives were such an important factor, then the Chinese would have fantastic English. They are incredibly motivated, and believe knowing English will make or break their chances at the labor market.

[yonglin]

If incentives were such an important factor, then the Chinese would have fantastic English. They are incredibly motivated, and believe knowing English will make or break their chances at the labor market.

You should notice that I was referring to Americans learning French or Spanish in this example (compared to Europeans): i.e., holding the proximity between the mother tongue and the language to be learnt equal. Of course, acquired language skills of any particular person would be a function of incentives, the quality of teaching they receive, personality type, difficulty of the language which they've attempted to learn, etc. Apart from incentive effects, however, I believe that Europeans and Americans learning their first foreign languge are quite similar in these respect. Therefore, it makes sense to explain the difference between them in terms of incentive effects.

For the Chinese on the other hand, other factors are not equal. The difference between Chinese and English is much larger than between, say, Swedish or Dutch and English. So on average, we'd expect Chinese people to have lower levels of attained language skills for this reason (so even if there is an incentive effect, we might not be able to observe it in real life since it's cancelled out by other factors). In addition, one could argue that teaching quality in the mainland is lacking: for instance, classes in primary/middle school are huge (which might be okay for teaching something like maths, but is obviously quite detrimental to language teaching), and teacher quality is lacking in many instances (take my word on this point: I've met plenty of people - foreigners and Chinese alike - with quite miserable English, working as English teachers). On the other hand, I don't think that differences in teaching quality are that great between English-speaking and non-English speaking countries in Europe/North America.

And yeh, I'm not saying that kids at school in Sweden or the Neterlands think about incentive effects directly, but that they are influenced by the people surrounding them: e.g., parents, teachers, friends, etc. -- there is a shared understanding that it's important to learn English.

Phew. If I'd just have more time, I'd hunt down some data and write down a model for attained proficiency in one's first foreign language. For now, I will stop here.

[gato]

The chance that an average Western European needs English for a job is perhaps very high, varying with the size of one's country (the bigger one's own "national market," the less the need to learn a foreign language) -- though maybe not as high as "master English or die."

The chance that an average mainland Chinese needs English for a job is not nearly as high, though that varies depending on where the person lives. The need for English in Changsha, Hunan, for instance, is probably lower than that in Shanghai.

The chance that an average Westerner needs Chinese for a job is much, much lower.

Just talking about averages here, which are only meaningful for determining the need for mass language instruction. Individual needs, of course, vary.

[NickyR]

You need to say don't judge me, I'm a lawyer because as soon as I saw those 3 words it was too late and I hadn't seen your warning about not judging you.

Rookie error! Sorry!

Quote:

Originally Posted by NickyR

And even thoughlaw firms currently have little scope for major work in China (market too closed), I'm sure they are all chomping at the bit to get going once it opens up. They are already doing work for big Chinese companies who are buying out western companies. All this work requires language skills on both sides, not just the CHinese side.

There are already many foreign law firms and lawyers working in China. See this article

http://www.legalweek.com/Company/476...the+charm.html

Asia: Three’s the charm

Author: Dominic Carman

Published: 30/08/2007 01:00

Thanks for posting that article - interesting!.

I realise that many firms have offices in CHina. My firm has 3 - Honkers, Shanghai and Beijing. Most major British firms have had offices in Honkers for years. But Honkers is a completely different kettle of fish because the legal system in Honkers is based in the British common law system. This is not the case for the offices on the Mainland. The restrictions on work that can be done by foreign firms are jurisdictional restrictions.

The effect of this can be seen in the different sizes of the offices (Hong Kong: c.27 partners, 100 lawyers and 160 support staff; Shanghai: 4 partners and 20 odd lawyers; Beijing: 3 partners, and 12 odd lawyers in the case of my firm, which is one of the world's largest).

I would have been very interested to see that article differentiate between the Hong Kong and the Mainland's CURRENT legal market more clearly - they simply cannot be considered as one "Chinese" unit yet, even if firms do "aggregate" the performances of their offices in their figures. Other than that, the article really gives a sense of momentum in the CHina direction. At the moment, the big work coming out of China still has to be undertaken by European or American offices.

[liuzhou]

If incentives were such an important factor, then the Chinese would have fantastic English. They are incredibly motivated, and believe knowing English will make or break their chances at the labor market.

One of the biggest problems teachers face in China is the lack of motivation.

[gato]

I would have been very interested to see that article differentiate between the Hong Kong and the Mainland's CURRENT legal market more clearly - they simply cannot be considered as one "Chinese" unit yet, even if firms do "aggregate" the performances of their offices in their figures.

Here are some examples of the work that one of the big UK firms is doing in mainland China:

http://www.debandt.com/locations/spain/english/newsanddeals/newsdetail.asp?newsid=3013&Localnavigationid=1060

[jujubeans119]

very interesting thread! just stumbled on it now. id have to say that i somewhat agree with the economist article, although its not always that black and white as the article paints it to be. learning chinese (or any foreign language for that matter) is not a be all and end all, it will still largely depend on each person's context ( as all of you gave excellent examples of) and how a person uses that skill to his/her advantage.

[dan ni er]

I disagree with a lot of what has been said here. I work for one of the large accountancy firms and all the positions they advertise to non-Chinese nationals require proficiency in Mandarin. If you want to work in China, unless you're a partner, it's absolutely essential in my opinion.

[roddy]

Dan ni er, and anyone else in similar situations - how easy do your companies find it to get foreign staff with Chinese proficiency and whatever professional skills / qualifications your sector requires. Are there lots of Mandarin-fluent qualified lawyers and accountants floating around, or do you end up employing people who have 'fluent' on their resume but end up saying things like '请给我end-of-month report'?

[rob07]

I work for a leading Australian law firm that aims to be a leading Asian regional firm, and has offices in Shanghai and Beijing comparable in size to some of the largest UK and US firms.

They regularly hold presentations and send out firm-wide encouraging people to apply to work in their Asian offices, including Shanghai and Beijing. If you have two or three years of experience in a transferable area like M&A, they have made it very clear that no language skills at all are required as a lot of the work is done in English and they employ several full time translators.

[dan ni er]

Roddy in answer to your question, from what I can tell there are some fluent mandarin lawyers and accountants, however, I think they're mostly ABCs, BBCs etc. I suppose it would be difficult for someone who didn't grow I speaking chinese at home, to reach fluency in Chinese and manage to fit in getting a professional qualification along the way.

In reality, you are correct that the Chinese speaking foreigners end up saying stuff like "qing gei wo nei ge annual report". But I think most chinese would say that too these days!

Rob7 - I suppose if your firm has full time translators then working in China would be a lot easier, but I suppose M&A is a very international area of law. It may be a lot harder if you specialised in say trade & customs, where meetings with the local government authorities would be conducted in Chinese.

[venture160]

as for working at a law firm... I think at the top international law firms here in Beijing a good half of the partners speak decent Chinese. As for legal assistants, usually a partner has a team of assistants, of which maybe 1-3 are foreign, of which usually 30% have good Chinese. If you are 22-27, have decent Chinese (including reading) and are a graduate from a western university finding a job paying 20K rmb a month shouldn't be a problem. But don't forget you will NEVER get off work before 7pm and will work weekends. you will be owned. This is coming from friends of mine who work in law firms.

[dan ni er]

Without meaning to digress, 20K for a chinese speaking foreign lawyer seems very low. I would have thought it would at least be double that for someone with a couple of years experience behind them.

[venture160]

well they are legal assistants not an actual lawyer or partner