ISSN 1472-6653 May 2005 Number 10 Tim Wright, Professor of Chinese Studies, is researching a project entitled The Impact of the Great Depression on Manchuria. Since commencing the project in November last year, he has undertaken archival and library research in northeast China, Beijing, Nanjing, Hong Kong,Taiwan, and Japan. “The project is part of my research for a book on the impact of the 1930s world depression on China. Manchuria’s experience is an important case study because it illustrates the significance of China’s use of a silver currency during the period and because it was a major factor behind Japan’s expansion into China and the outbreak of war. In addition to working on this project,Tim Wright has continued his research on the history and political economy of China’s coal industry, most recently on the issue of safety. With the continuing spate of mining accidents in China, he has become a regular media commentator. Email [email protected]Glenn Hook, Professor of Japanese Studies, has been awarded an ESRC grant for a project entitled Norms, Threats and the Japan-US and South Korea-US Alliances. Dr Son Key-young, a specialist on the international relations of South Korea, will also be working on the project. “The project’s aim is to contribute both theoretically and empirically to our understanding of how norms and threats shape the behaviour of the weaker partner in an alliance.The focus on Japan and South Korea will enable us to shed new light on the similarities and differences in how their alliances with the United States function.” The project, which will commence in July,is part of the ESRC’s New Security Challenges Programme. Professor Glenn Hook is a specialist on Japan’s international relations and has written extensively on security affairs. He is the editor of the Centre for Japanese Studies/ RoutledgeCurzon publication series and immediate past president of the British Association for Japanese Studies. Email [email protected]New ESRC projects on China and Japan Two School of East Asian Studies professors were recently awarded grants by the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council) for new research projects on China and Japan. Professor Tim Wright speaking at the Conference on the Chinese Economy (1911-1937) within the Global Economic Framework, held at Nankai University in Tianjin last year. EastAsia@Sheffield 1
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ISSN 1472-6653 May 2005 Number 10
Tim Wright, Professor of ChineseStudies, is researching a projectentitled The Impact of the GreatDepression on Manchuria.Since commencing the project in November last year, he hasundertaken archival and libraryresearch in northeast China, Beijing,Nanjing, Hong Kong,Taiwan,and Japan.
“The project is part of my researchfor a book on the impact of the1930s world depression on China.Manchuria’s experience is animportant case study because it
illustrates the significance of China’suse of a silver currency during theperiod and because it was a majorfactor behind Japan’s expansion intoChina and the outbreak of war.
In addition to working on thisproject,Tim Wright has continued his research on the history andpolitical economy of China’s coal industry, most recently on theissue of safety. With the continuingspate of mining accidents in China, he has become a regular media commentator.Email [email protected]
Glenn Hook, Professor of JapaneseStudies, has been awarded an ESRCgrant for a project entitled Norms,Threats and the Japan-US andSouth Korea-US Alliances.Dr Son Key-young, a specialist on theinternational relations of SouthKorea, will also be working on theproject.
“The project’s aim is to contributeboth theoretically and empirically toour understanding of how norms andthreats shape the behaviour of theweaker partner in an alliance.Thefocus on Japan and South Korea willenable us to shed new light on thesimilarities and differences in howtheir alliances with the United Statesfunction.”
The project, which will commence inJuly, is part of the ESRC’s NewSecurity Challenges Programme.
Professor Glenn Hook is a specialist on Japan’s internationalrelations and has written extensivelyon security affairs. He is the editor of the Centre for Japanese Studies/RoutledgeCurzon publication seriesand immediate past president of theBritish Association for JapaneseStudies. Email [email protected]
New ESRC projects onChina and JapanTwo School of East Asian Studies professors were recently awarded grants by the ESRC(Economic and Social Research Council) for new research projects on China and Japan.
Professor Tim Wright speaking at the Conferenceon the Chinese Economy (1911-1937) within theGlobal Economic Framework, held at NankaiUniversity in Tianjin last year.
EastAsia@Sheffield 1
The School of East Asian Studiesheld its first Taster Day on 10 November. Over thirty studentsand staff from Wales High School,Lady Manners School and FrederickGough School came to find outmore about our degree programmesand experience a day in the life ofour students.
All the participants had the chanceto learn some Korean and Chinese.“The language classes were veryenjoyable and well organised,” onestudent commented.“This tastersession has given me backgroundknowledge of the Chinese languageand I’m very interested in learningmore.”
Students were also able to take partin seminars and discussions ontopics including war and peace inEast Asia, business in East Asia,women in East Asia, and Japaneselanguage and literature. Accordingto one teacher:“The lads were veryimpressed by the business talk andliked the lecturer’s approach; hespoke to them as though they wereadults and they appreciated that.”
In addition to attending classes, thevisiting students and staff also hadthe chance to meet some of ourcurrent students and take a lookaround the campus, the Union andthe School itself. Another teacherlater told us: “My students werereally enthused on the way home.They’d enjoyed being able to makeuse of the Union facilities, givingthem a really full taster ofuniversity.”
A second East Asian Studies TasterDay will be held in November.Schools interested in taking partshould contact us on 0114 222 8400or Email [email protected]
JJoohhnn CCrruummpp 11994444--22000055Staff of the School of East Asian Studies were very saddened to hear ofthe death of John Crump who died on 3 March following a brief illness.John came to Sheffield’s Centre of Japanese Studies as a “mature age”student in 1970, having qualified as a dentist and worked in the schooldental service for some years.While at Sheffield, John met his wifeTaeko (Midorikawa), a Japanese assistant in the Centre. Aftercompleting his PhD, also at Sheffield, he worked in the PoliticsDepartment at York University; his last position was as Professor ofJapanese Studies at the University of Stirling. During the course of hiscareer John was the author of a number of publications on socialistthought and on anarchism in Japan. His last book, Nikkeiren andJapanese Capitalism, was published in 2003 in the Sheffield Centre forJapanese Studies/RoutledgeCurzon Series.
Note on namesFollowing East Asian convention, the family name precedes the given name/s inChinese, Japanese and Korean names, unless the particular person uses theWestern word order (given name followed by family name) in his/her publicationsand/or everyday life. Examples of the latter in this issue are Dr Masaaki Hatsumiand Mrs Sadako Ogata.
Dr Hugo Dobson, senior lecturer on Japan’s international relations, discussesissues of war and peace in East Asia with visiting students.
Editor’s noteThis issue includes a number of articleswritten by Sheffield graduates andcurrent students on their experiencesand research: from working in a localcompany and teaching migrant childrenin China, to teaching English andworking as a translator in Japan, helpingto produce a film about North Korea, andinvestigating the histories of a Chineseschool and of resident Koreans in Japan.The views expressed in the articles arethose of the individual authors.
This is the tenth issue ofEastAsia@Sheffield and, with mypending retirement from the University,the last one to be published under myeditorship. The new editor will be Dr Hugo Dobson who has been anenthusiastic contributor since he cameto Sheffield four years ago. Email [email protected]
Best wishes to all my present and formercolleagues.
Beverley Hooper
When I agreed to volunteer forHongshan School for Migrant Workers’Children as an occasional Englishteacher, I was completely unprepared.All I knew was that “Teacher” Zhao, ayoung woman whom my Chinesefriend “Teacher” Wang liked, wasorganising something to do withmingong – migrants from rural areaswho come to the cities to seek work –and that I was needed to save his faceas he’d promised to find a flexiblelaowai (foreigner).
Within ninety minutes of beingsummoned, I was greeted with silenceby my first class. I had deliveredspontaneous lessons before, but neverin Chinese. And never to children withsuch complex needs as mingongchildren.
In Britain, educators often talk of thedispossessed urban teenagers ofThatcher’s economic reforms, trappedin an insensitive school system thatoffers them nothing. In a contest, they lose hands down for thedisenfranchisement prize to themingong children of Deng Xiaoping’seconomic reforms. The children atHongshan were, indeed, a class abovetheir peers in that they were actuallyreceiving some education. Manymigrant children, no longer theresponsibility of their home provinces’educational authorities, don’t – letalone the fact that their parents havetaken them from familiar guanxi(connections) and local dialects for the sake of insecure, dead-endconstruction jobs on the Nanjing metro system.
Teacher Wang told me not to worry:it’s more important to show up andcontribute than to deliver a decentlesson, he said. After all, the teachersonly earn 500 yuan (around £33) amonth, so everyone’s pretty laid-backabout it all.
In truth, I doubt Teacher Wang couldhave more profoundly misread thesituation. The teachers are liberal byChinese standards, but they arecertainly engaged. With so many kidsfatigued by poverty and someuncomfortable with speaking Mandarin(many had little prior education), theyhave to be. On first glance, I estimatedmy first class to be around fortypupils, a manageable number. Butmoving towards the back of the classfor one-on-one conversation drills,whole rows of students seemed toemerge from nowhere. Many I felt likesending home to get some sleep.Teacher Zhao had to translate myquestion in Mandarin into Zhejiangdialect for one girl, and even then shewas too shy to answer above awhisper. This was hardly work to belaid-back about.
I guess Teacher Wang was actuallyreferring to the unsettling passivity ofmany – an opposite manifestation ofdisaffection from the rowdiness ofdisaffected kids in the West. In hiseyes, it suggests they’re probably a bitdim, but at least harmless. In my eyes,it’s what we’re here to tackle.
My favourite moment so far has beenhearing a thirteen-year old, who beforehad physically hidden under his desk,say: “Me – Anhui boy. You – Beckham”.Nobody could understand why Iappreciated that more than the boywho sat at the front with his handpermanently raised.
The school clearly appreciates ourcontribution to a class of children all-too-often overlooked. Yet I was waryof the initial feel-good factor. Theinflexibility of some of my fellowvolunteers to the pupils’ needsundermines our desire to help. True,the one-off picture of a skinheadlaowai got the issue of migranteducation onto the front page of aNanjing newspaper. But this kind oftemporary glimpse into the underworldof China’s “floating population” canjust as easily reinforce prejudices asdispel them. I admire the genuinecommitment of the teachers and theschool body.
Still, it will take both a cultural andlegal shift in China – not mere do-goodgimmicks – to gain a fair deal formingong children.
Richard, “Teacher” Zhao (centre) and another volunteer, “Teacher” Sui.
“My first day in class”
Richard Buckley is a second year Chinese Studies student.Along with his Sheffield classmates, he is currentlyspending his “language year abroad” at Nanjing University.
“It was amazing to be able toconverse for hours on end with aperson who had inheritedthousands of years of martialtradition. Dr Hatsumi alwaysmanaged to bring his art across thecenturies to contemporarysituations, and I then had tointerpret across the culture gap forWestern practitioners.Thegrandmaster often speaks – and writes – in riddles, and trying tomaintain those without applying
my own interpretation was one ofthe greatest challenges.”
Since returning to the UK in 1990,Ben has run a successful Japanesetranslation, interpreting andtypesetting business, as well asorganising the Thanet Music &Drama Festival and helping topreserve a Kentish tradition calledHoodening. His website is atwww.ozaru.freeserve.co.uk
Ben first met Dr Hatsumi, whilestudying at Sheffield, after an invitationto an international Ninja seminar inOhio arrived fortuitously in thedepartment. Ben attended the seminarand obtained permission from thegrandmaster to train with him inJapan. He began doing this as soon ashe arrived in the country on Sheffield’sexchange visit with Hosei University.Ben’s Japanese skills led him tobecoming Dr Hatsumi’s choseninterpreter, and he accompanied himon many trips around the world.
Ben Jones, who studied Japanese at Sheffield in the mid-1980s, isthe English-language translator of Masaaki Hatsumi’s book TheWay of the Ninja, published last year by Kodansha International. Inthe book, Dr Masaaki Hatsumi, the only generally acknowledgedNinja grandmaster in the world today, reveals the hidden realitybehind Ninjutsu, a mysterious and fascinating martial art whosetrue essence is far removed from its Hollywood image.
Students studying the moduleJapanese Business andManagement enjoyed a break fromnormal lectures in November whenthe School welcomed Mr IsakaYoshihiro (Minister, Finance) and Mr Matsumura Hiroshi (Minister,Commerce) from the Embassy ofJapan. The two senior diplomatsgave presentations on their areasof expertise.
A common theme in the module, acore component of the MSc in EastAsian Business, is to explore howtraditional Japanese business andmanagement are responding toboth external and internal changes,and what new “realities” are beingestablished. According to themodule coordinator, AndrewStaples: “The diplomats’presentations were a golden
opportunity for students to learnfrom senior bureaucrats about thelatest developments in theJapanese economy in general andthe financial sector in particular.”
Mr Isaka joined the JapaneseMinistry of Finance in 1979 andhas served in various posts thathave included directing theInternational Office of the FinancialSupervisory Agency. He has alsoworked overseas at the WorldBank and the European Bank forReconstruction and Development.In his presentation, Mr Isakareported on key aspects of Japan’sfinancial architecture in the wake ofthe late 1990s financial crisis andoutlined the measures employed tocontend with globalisation anddomestic restructuring.
Mr Matsumura, originally fromMETI (Ministry of Economy, Tradeand Industry) and now directingcommercial affairs at the Embassy,focused on Japan’s post-bubbleeconomic policy and specificchallenges to the economy in theform of Chinese expansion andglobal competition. An interestingdebate developed in the discussionsession around issues ofdemographics, gender and foreignworkers in the Japanese economy.
The School was delighted towelcome the two distinguisheddiplomats from the JapaneseEmbassy, with which it has alongstanding relationship.
On 1 December 2004, the Presidentand First Lady of the Republic ofKorea arrived in London at the startof the first-ever State Visit to the UKby a South Korean head of state.
The bilateral relationship between theUnited Kingdom and Korea formallydates back to 1884, and the UK hasenjoyed strong ties with the Republicof Korea since it was established in1948. The events last Decemberfollowed the State Visit to Korea by theQueen and the Duke of Edinburgh inApril 1999 and a series of high-levelofficial visits including those made byPrime Minister Tony Blair and formerSouth Korean President Kim Dae-jung.
The relationship was greatlystrengthened by the UK’s support forKorea during and after the 1997financial crisis. The UK was the firstcountry to send an investment missionto Korea following the crisis andcontinued to develop trade andinvestment links through the recoveryperiod. In 2003, visible bilateral tradeamounted to more than £4 billion,comprising £1.5 billion in UK exportsto Korea (led by electrical machinery,pharmaceutical and medical products,chemicals, fashion and Scotch whisky)and £2.6 billion in imports from Korea(mainly telecommunicationsequipment, shipping, cars andelectrical appliances).
More than 100 Korean companieshave invested in the UK, includinggiants such as Samsung and LG aswell as small- and medium-sizedenterprises. UK companies, includingTesco, AMEC, BP, Shell, StandardChartered and HSBC, have also beeninvesting in Korea. In addition, thereare strong educational links betweenthe two countries, with 17,000 Koreanscurrently studying in the UK. Morethan 160,000 Britons and Koreansvisited each other’s country in 2003.
During his three-day visit, PresidentRoh Moo-hyun met the Prime Ministerand other politicians, business leaders,academics, and representatives of the35,000 Korean residents in the UK. Ina joint statement issued by DowningStreet, Tony Blair and President Rohmade a commitment to work togetherto develop their countries’ “warm andforward-looking friendship”.
The diverse nature of the bilateralrelationship was apparent from thebroad range of events arranged for theState Visit. President Roh attended aRound Table meeting with the chiefexecutive officers of leading Britishcompanies, opened the 5th UK-KoreaHigh Technology Industry Forum,signed a Science, Technology andInnovation Partnership agreement, andvisited the Korean War Memorial in St Paul’s Cathedral to pay tribute tothe 4,300 British soldiers who lost theirlives during that conflict.
In a separate programme of events,the First Lady visited the KoreanGallery at the British Museum, theRoyal Institution of Great Britain, and
the offices of Scope, the disabilityorganisation in England and Waleswhose focus is people with cerebralpalsy.
The University of Sheffield Vice-Chancellor, Professor Robert Boucher,and two School of East Asian Studiesstaff members attended events linkedwith the President’s State Visit.Professor Boucher and James HGrayson, Professor of Korean Studies,were invited to a banquet at Guildhall(hosted by the Lord Mayor andCorporation of London), and I receivedan invitation to the State Banquet atBuckingham Palace.
At the State Banquet, the Queen paidtribute to the “spirit of the Koreanpeople” as shown in theirdetermination to overcome thefinancial crisis of 1997. Responding tothe Queen’s toast, President Rohexpressed his gratitude to the Britishpeople for their support for Korea intimes of crisis, and noted the potentialfor even greater cooperation betweenthe United Kingdom and the Republicof Korea.
South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair at their joint press conference.
Dr Judith Cherry is the author of Korean Multinationals in Europe (Routledge, 2001). She hasserved as Chair of the Korea Trade Action Committee and as a member of the UK-KoreaForum for the Future, and was awarded the MBE in 1999 for services to British exports toKorea. Judith attended the State Banquet at Buckingham Palace for the South KoreanPresident and Mrs. Roh Moo-hyun.
6 EastAsia@Sheffield
Dominic Phinn“After completing a BA in
European Studies at the
University of Hull in 2002, I
decided to put off the rat race
for a while and sample life as an
English teacher abroad. After 16
months teaching in Taiwan, the
friction between the island and
the mainland ignited an interest
in Chinese politics and culture.
This, combined with the fact that I also wanted to learn the
language, made further study seem a natural choice, and
Sheffield appeared to be the best place to do it.”
With the growing economic importance of East Asia,including the much-publicised emergence of China onthe global scene, more graduates are looking to careersinvolving this dynamic region. The four MSc degreesoffered by the School of East Asian Studies are designedto provide a sound foundation for future careers, whetherfocusing specifically on China or more broadly on theEast Asia region.
• MSc in Chinese Language, Business and International Relations
• MSc in Chinese Business and International Relations• MSc in East Asian Political Economy• MSc in East Asian Business
The first two degrees are also available by distancelearning, using the same lecturers as the in-housedegrees as well as the resources of the School’saward-winning Distance Learning Centre.
Here we profile four of the students currentlyenrolled for the MSc in Chinese Language,Business and International Relations. The degreeincludes a summer semester in China, wherestudents further develop their language skills at theBeijing Language and Culture University as well asundertake a project on aspects of China’s politics,business and international relations.
For full details of Sheffield’s in-house and distance learning postgraduate degrees, including the MSc degreesand a range of MA degrees on China, Japan and Korea, see www.seas.ac.uk/PostgradTaught/
Masters degrees on Chinaand East Asia
LLooookkiinngg ttoo ccaarreeeerrss……
Jennifer Whittaker“I graduated from Sheffield in
2001 with a Spanish and
Business degree. I lived for a year
in Brazil, working first as a
teacher coordinator and then a
marketing manager in Sao Paulo.
After that I worked in Moscow
for a year. I’d wanted to learn
Chinese for a long time. I chose
this course because of the
opportunity to study in China and the way that learning
about Chinese politics and culture is included along with
the language.”
Anne Low “My undergraduate degree was
in Biology with Management and
I graduated from Imperial
College in London in 2004. I
realised in my management year
that I wanted a career in
business and, as a British-born
Chinese, I decided to do the MSc
in Chinese Language, Business
and International Relations.
From my family’s business, I have learnt that China is
becoming increasing important in trade. I’m now learning
the language and culture needed for developing business
relations – and for my future career.”
Colin McCulloch“I have a Cambridge MA in
Engineering and over 25 years
experience in various UK and
overseas companies; I’m a
member of both the Institution
of Mechanical Engineers and the
Institute of Acoustics. I see China
as an up-coming global force in
business and technology, as well
as low-cost manufacturing. I
hope to combine my Chinese language skills and business
studies with my existing know-how and experience, in a
consultancy, training or business-development role, with
Chinese or foreign-invested companies.”
EastAsia@Sheffield 7
In today’s China the character chai(literally “pull down”,“dismantle”)
features prominently on many oldbuildings and courtyard houses inBeijing and elsewhere.
Much to the dismay of some Chineseand foreigners (residing in or visitingChina), these old buildings are in theway of China’s fast road tomodernisation. The officiallyrepeated argument is that they are“too old”. More tothe point, they areoften primeproperty,conveniently locatedin the middle of athriving city or town,or in one that hashigh hopes of joiningthose ranks, andtherefore theybecome important toproperty speculators.
Exchanging the oldfor the new can be avery positivedevelopment insome cases, but itmay also leavepeople with a senseof “lost history”.Fortunately, noteverywhere in Chinaare people so readily disposing ofbuildings of historical interest.
As part of my fieldwork I recentlyspent eight months in ShandongProvince in eastern China. My workis mainly concerned with thedevelopment of rural education – atheme to a certain extent connectedwith urban education.While I was inShandong I received an email fromDr Gary Tiedemann, my formerlecturer at the School of Oriental andAfrican Studies, suggesting that I getin touch with some people at a
nearby school. Jude Small, anAustralian teacher who worked atZhoucun No 6 Middle School, hadfound Dr Tiedemann on the internetand contacted him for help with aproject to rebuild the school’shistory, as they were approachingtheir centenary in 2005.
For ideological reasons, history inChina is often looked at in terms oferas. Thus continuities in modern
Chinese histories are often renderedinto discontinuities to fit the pattern.I became curious as to what thiscentenary celebration was about. Itturned out that the currentheadmaster of No 6 Middle School,Mr Fang Ming, was setting out toretrace continuities.
The school was established at thebeginning of the twentieth centuryby British missionaries of the BaptistMissionary Society. Since then it hadchanged names and grown a lot bothin size and student numbers. It is
currently considered the best seniormiddle school in this area ofShandong Province (measured bythe enrolment rate in highereducation of its final year students).Two buildings of the original schoolthat was established one hundredyears ago are still standing, and Mr Fang led a determined effort topreserve and restore them. Justbefore I left Shandong, this work hadbeen completed.
Restoring thebuildings provedeasier thanrecovering thehistory of the school.Since all thedocuments thatrelated to the schoolwere burnt duringthe CulturalRevolution, it hasbeen an arduous taskfor the staff of No 6to do any research.While on a shortbreak from myfieldwork back in theUK, I managed tofind some fascinatingmaterial relating tothe school in anarchive of the Baptist
Missionary Society at OxfordUniversity. Name lists of students, aswell as photographs of the schooland nearby places, emerged out ofthe papers of the missionaryeducator, Margaret Irene Thomas,who spent most of her life inShandong Province.
Thus I found myself as a part of achain of events that led to mycontributing to historicalrediscovery. (Wo)men make history,but not always in circumstances oftheir own choosing.
RReeddiissccoovveerriinngg hhiissttoorryy iinn CChhiinnaaKerstin Lehr has a BA in Development Studies and Economics and an MA inChinese Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies. She holds aUCCL (Universities China Committee, London) PhD scholarship and is currentlyat Sheffield researching rural education in China’s Shandong Province.
Restoring one of the original buildings of Zhoucun No 6 Middle School, November 2004.
8 EastAsia@Sheffield
Translation in Japan is almost anindustry, with fully-fledged translationcompanies, translators, editors andcheckers. Japanese companies seldomhave in-house staff capable of writinggood English, which inflates thedemand for outside translationservices.
My main work for translationcompanies – like that of maybe halfthe Japanese-English translation donein Japan – has been the translation ofcorporate and financial material. Thiswork is fairly well paid (around500,000 yen – approximately £2,500 –a month) and straightforward once youknow the basic balance sheet andbusiness jargon.
But the translator also faces an obstaclecourse. The biggest problem isperhaps a surprising one, consideringthe prestige of the written word inEast Asia. Japanese business writing isfrequently of poor quality, with vaguestructuring, chronic repetition andhuge chains of sub-clauses. It can befrustrating and draining trying to crafta sentence that uses the wordkaihatsu (development) seven times!
The problem is partly due to culturalfactors.While English prizes brevityand abhors run-on sentences, manyJapanese people (especially companypresidents) think that short sentencesare childish and complex ones erudite,however difficult they are to read.Business Japanese is also more formalthan business English, so literal Englishtranslations can sound stuffy. But muchof the problem is just poor writing, asJapanese checkers will often confirm,perhaps because composition skills arenot widely taught in Japanese schools.
A further problem is the notion, stillwidespread among more insular
Japanese, that no foreigner can trulymaster their language. There is a lotless of this now than there used to be,but I still found an advertisement inthe Japan Times last year for aJapanese-to-English translator who hadto be a Japanese national – not a nativespeaker of the target language. (Theconventional professional practice isthat one translates into one’s ownlanguage.) A veteran colleague at onecompany I worked for told me that, formany years, my boss had assumed theforeigners on his translation team werejust polishing English drafts translatedby Japanese, and was astonished tofind out that they were doing it allthemselves.
Such attitudes can create a problem oftrust. Japanese companies are afraid ofdamaging their image and sometimesinterfere almost obsessively in atranslator’s work. This may bejustifiable, as some translators neitherhave the basic financial knowledge norunderstand their customer companies’products adequately, but it canseriously affect the quality of the finalEnglish.
Of course there are also upsides forthe translator working in Japan. Mostcompanies that translate their materialsinto English usually have leading-edgeproducts and technologies, sotranslators learn about the latest, say,mobile phone functionality before therest of the world. And in someimportant ways, Japanese clients aretolerant. Deadlines are nearly alwaysreasonable, questions are accepted, anddeep technical knowledge of thecompany’s products is not expected.These are generous concessions thattake a lot of the stress out oftranslating corporate materials.
WWoorrkkiinngg iinn JJaappaann …… TTJapan offers a range of work opportunities for Japanese Studies graduates and, to time living in the country. Many gaijin work as translators or teachers, two occup
http://crossroads.net/honyaku/
AA JJaappaanneessee--EEnngglliisshh ttrraannssllaattoorrIan Channing has lived in Japan for twelve years, working first as a news editor and later as atranslator. He is currently enrolled for the MA in Advanced Chinese Studies, resuming studies hebegan in China during 1988-89, and intends adding Chinese-English translation to his expertise.
Websites containinginformation on workingas a Japanese-Englishtranslator include:
Institute of Translation andInterpretingJapanese Network, J-Netwww.iti-jnet.org.uk/
Society of Writers, Editors, and Translatorswww.swet.jp
Japanese TranslationAssociationwww.jta-net.or.jp/
Japan Association ofTranslators www.jat.org
www.crossroads.net/honyaku/
EastAsia@Sheffield 9
TThhee ccuullttuurraall cchhaalllleennggeessa lesser extent, for English-speaking Westerners who simply want to spend some
pations in which they regularly face the challenges of Japan’s workplace culture.
The trade union movement in Japan isa topic rich in content for any essay orthesis. Many books and papers havebeen written on the role of the unionin Japan and the system of companybased unions. Over the past threeyears I have been involved not withthe theory, but in the front line ofindustrial relations issues in Japan,representing foreigner workers in theGeneral Union movement.
The General Union (GU) is a tradeunion that anybody can join(www.generalunion.org). This is quiteunique in Japan where unions areprimarily company based (onecompany, one union). The majority ofmembers are foreign workers in Japanwho, like migrant workers in anycountry, are vulnerable to poorworking conditions and organisationaldiscrimination. This might sound likea situation common to unskilledlabourers, but it also applies to one of
the most respected professions inJapan – the teacher.
In the past, foreign teachers in Japan –whether in schools or universities –for the most part have been transient,working for a few years and thengoing back home. However the personwho wants to stay for the long haul isoften stonewalled by the system. Mostforeign teachers in Japan are onlimited-term contracts, many with non-renewal clauses.This is in contrast toJapanese school and universityteachers who are practically all onopen-ended contracts.
A major role of the General Union is to represent teachers who arefighting their termination. Last year the Fukuoka General Union, with which I’m involved(www.fukuoka.generalunion.org/), hada major victory when, after collectivebargaining, we persuaded a public
university to abolish a rule stating thatforeign teachers must quit after fiveyears.
The Labour Standards Law is one ofthe few laws that prohibitdiscrimination based on nationalitybut frequently the union has had toconfront companies who ignore thislaw. Grievances that the union hasdealt with recently include an Irishteacher on the JET (Japan Exchangeand Teaching) programme who wastold to speak with an American accentby her team teacher, a British teacheremployed by a conversation schoolwho was transferred for being late onthe day a typhoon hit the city, and auniversity teacher whose position wasterminated after fourteen yearsbecause she had become too“Japanised” and the university neededa “fresh foreigner”. Employers aresomewhat surprised when a team offoreign union reps – well versed in thelabour laws – arrive at their companyfor collective bargaining!
Suing for unfair dismissal in court isexpensive and it can take years toreach a verdict, so the union can be aviable alternative for getting quickresults.At the moment the FukoukaGeneral Union has fifty members andwe have managed to settle mostgrievances.
After reading this article you mightthink that Japan doesn’t seem such agreat place to work, but I mustemphasise that in my union position Ionly deal with people who have work-related problems. Japan is actually agreat place for Westerners to live andwork – this is the main reason we arepulling together to try to iron out thecultural creases in the workplace.
AA uunniioonn ttoo pprrootteecctt ffoorreeiiggnn tteeaacchheerrssSince graduating from Sheffield with an MA in Advanced Japanese Studies, Chris Flynn has beenworking as an Associate Professor at the Kyushu Institute of Information Sciences where helectures on English language and the media. Although his university work keeps him on his toes, he has become increasingly busy with his union activities.
Chris Flynn outside the Fukuoka General Union office, shared with a number of otherNPOs (Non-Profit Organisations).
10 EastAsia@Sheffield
Graham Healey was one oftwo recipients of the 2004Japan Society Award. Theawards (normally one in theUK and one in Japan) arepresented annually topeople who have made anoutstanding contribution toAnglo-Japanese relations.
Closely involved with thedevelopment of Japanese Studies inthe UK for more than thirty years,Graham has been on the organisingcommittee of the BritishAssociation for Japanese Studies(BAJS), including a period asPresident, and the BritishAssociation for Korean Studies(BAKS). He has been a member ofthe UK-Japan Mixed CulturalCommission, the UK-Korea MixedCultural Commission and the UK-Korea Forum for the Future. He hasalso been on the selection boardfor the JET (Japan Exchange andTeaching) Programme and itspredecessor BETS (British English Teachers Scheme) fortwenty-five years and received aCommendation from the JapaneseForeign Minister for hiscontribution to these programmes.
Graham began teaching inSheffield’s Centre for JapaneseStudies in 1967, after studyingChinese at Oxford and Japanese atWaseda University in Tokyo. Overthe years he has taught a range ofcourses on Japanese language,literature, history, politics andcinema. Most recently Graham hasbeen Academic Director (JapaneseProgrammes) in the School’sDistance Learning Centre, whichhe set up and developed withAlison Churchill. In 1996 thedistance learning MA in AdvancedJapanese Studies was awarded aJapan Festival Prize.
Over the course of his academiccareer Graham has been a visitingresearcher and teacher at KyotoUniversity and at Hosei,Wasedaand Hitotsubashi Universities inTokyo. He was joint editor-in-chiefand one of the principal translatorsof The Iwakura Embassy, 1871-73, the first English translation ofthe report of the early Meijigovernment’s mission to theUnited States and eleven Europeancountries. The five-volumepublication was awarded the JapanSociety of Translators Prize for BestTranslation of the Year in 2002.
Graham Healey receives the Japan Society Award at the Society’s 2004 Annual Dinner from Mrs SadakoOgata, a former UN High Commissioner for Refugees, diplomat and university professor.
PPrrooffeessssoorr LLii XXiiuukkuunn has steppedinto the shoes of Professor LiuChuanping as the School of EastAsian Studies’ visiting professor fromChina. Professor Li is on secondmentfrom the Guangdong University ofForeign Studies where she teachesmodern Chinese, classical Chineseand Chinese written script. As aleading expert on the teaching ofChinese as a foreign language,Professor Li has twice leddelegations to Indonesia to trainlocal Chinese language teachers.
Professor Li has broad researchinterests, ranging from culturalelements in the teaching of Chineselanguage to the interference of localdialects in language learning. She haspublished a number of articles andtwo textbooks, and has alsocontributed to two dictionaries, oneon modern and one on classicalChinese language.
Whilst at Sheffield Professor Li will build on the work of her two predecessors from China,Professors Liu Chuanping and Cui Yonghua. She will focus mainlyon teaching oral and aural skills to undergraduate and postgraduatestudents. She has already representedSheffield at the March meeting ofthe British Chinese LanguageTeaching Seminar, where she gave apresentation on how listening skillsare taught at Sheffield.
EastAsia@Sheffield 11
Whenever I thought about it, whichwasn’t often, I assumed I wouldprobably head back to Korea soonafter graduating last June. After all,where was the demand for Koreanspeakers in Sheffield? The answer, itturns out, is in a small office not farfrom Ecclesall Road, one ofSheffield’s major shopping areas.
Some time in early 2003,Dr Hyangjin Lee, my tutor and aspecialist on Korean cinema, calledme into her office in the School ofEast Asian Studies. I came face-to-face with Dan Gordon, a Sheffield-based film director who had justreturned from the DemocraticPeople’s Republic of Korea, havinghad his luggage lost on the way. Danhad already made one film, theaward-winning The Game of TheirLives, the result of having traced theeight surviving members of the1966 DPRK World Cup football teamthat caused a sensation by beatingItaly to reach the quarterfinals. Hewas now filming a second Koreandocumentary, this time about massgymnastics.Would I be able to try abit of translation?
Before I knew it I was sitting in awindowless edit suite, finger on therewind button, ears straining tocatch bits of Korean picked up byDan’s camera. Gymnasticsinstructors barked out clouds oforders into the freezing Februaryair; a grandfather and granddaughter,hand-in-hand, whispered their wayround the marble halls of theVictorious Fatherland Liberation WarMuseum; two army veterans on a co-operative farm got drunker anddrunker as they reminisced abouttheir days of military service.
For about a year, I built up workexperience with VeryMuchSoproductions, Dan’s small company.In 2004 the film, A State of Mind,was finished and I was offered a full-time job after graduation. I snappedit up.
This job probably has brought memuch closer to the DPRK than if Ihad been in Seoul, barely fifty milesfrom the border.While there willalways be limits to what the countrylets outsiders see, the footagebrought back by our film crew is
fascinating in the way it showseveryday scenes in a place soisolated that it is normally describedin sensationalist clichés: it is the lastStalinist stronghold on earth; thepeople are brainwashedautomatons; the leader is an evilmaniac who guzzles caviar andcognac; and so on.
The unprecedented access toKorean everyday life gained by ourfilm crew dispels such fictions andshows that North Koreans are justordinary people trying to make thebest of their situation, but it’ssometimes sad to see the extent towhich the country’s half century ofisolation has led it off on a tangentfrom so much of the world.Watching the North’s film They Meton the River Taedong (Part 1) afterthe South’s Old Boy gives an idea ofthe yawning cultural gap that hasopened between the two halves ofthe peninsula.
I still haven’t been to North Korea,but maybe one day I’ll have achance to go there and see the duckfactory for myself.
A State of Mind
GGlliimmppssiinngg tthhee DDPPRRKKBen Jackson graduated in 2004 with a BA degree in Korean Studies with Japanese, as wellas the Robert Sloss Prize. He is working for VeryMuchSo productions, a Sheffield-based filmcompany that is currently producing, amongst other films, its third documentary on Korea.
“When I was young, I didn’t know if the USimperialists were good or bad, but through our warin the 1950s I saw the brutal bombing of ourcountry and the atrocities suffered by our people –and I came to feel that we have to rid this land ofUS imperialism completely.”
Pak Hyon Sun’s grandfather, a construction worker,sits in a darkened room in Pyongyang giving aninterview. He goes on to say how, once his teamhas finished Pyongyang’s new market, he will startwork on building the duck factory.
* * * * *
A State of Mind has received critical acclaim at a number of film festivals and was shown on BBC4 inDecember. It is now available on DVD and VHS. ((www.astateofmind.co.uk)
Gymnasts performing at the Kim Il Sung Stadium in Pyongyang(from the film A State of Mind).
12 EastAsia@Sheffield
Sheffield’s Japanese Study AbroadProgramme is currently undergoingsignificant expansion, in response to asubstantial increase in the number ofundergraduate students in JapaneseStudies. The total number ofexchange agreements has beenincreased this year from thirteen tofifteen, with three further agreementsin the final stage of negotiation,hopefully to commence operationfrom September 2006.
All students doing Japanese Studiesdegrees, including dual degrees,spend the third year of their studiesin Japan. Our “sister” universitiesacross Japan provide an excellentlearning environment for ourstudents, who also have the
opportunity to participate in a widerange of community and otheractivities.
Building on their experience of livingand studying in Japan, the studentsspend their final year at Sheffieldfurther developing their languageskills as well as their knowledge ofdifferent aspects of Japanese life(including politics, internationalrelations, economy, society andliterature).
As part of the exchange, Japanesestudents from our sister universitiescome to Sheffield for one year. Thestudents join different departmentsalong with regular students, helpingto enrich the diversified culture of
the University. The School of EastAsian Studies provides a JapaneseExchange Student Tutor (currentlyPhD student Bhubhindar Singh) toensure that the visiting students fullybenefit from the diverse range oflearning and other opportunities inSheffield, and to provide advice onacademic and other matters.
In addition to the student exchanges,our links with Japanese universitiesprovide the basis for a wide range ofacademic co-operation among staff,particularly in research. Sheffieldfrequently hosts academics andresearch students from our Japanesesister universities and Sheffieldacademic staff visit Japan for researchcollaboration.
China’s new Consul-General in Manchester, Mr GongJianzhong, paid a visit to the University of Sheffield on19 January. During the visit he had discussions withChinese Studies staff in the School of East Asian Studiesand presented the School with a selection of recentlypublished Chinese language textbooks and otherpublications.
Mr Gong took up his position in Manchester inSeptember last year. Before coming to the UK he wasDeputy Director-General of the Chinese ForeignMinistry’s Information Department. A career diplomat,his previous postings included the UK and Iceland.
Japanese Study Abroad Programme expandsTakeda Hiroko Programme director
Japanese Exchange Student Tutor, Bhubhindar Singh (second from left) with some of this year’s exchange students from Japan.
Mr Gong Jianzhong pictured with China historian, Dr Marjorie Dryburgh.
Existing exchange agreements: Chuo University, Doshisha University, Hiroshima University, Hosei University, Kanazawa University,Keio University, Kobe University, Meiji University, Nagoya University, Rikkyo University, Otaru University ofCommerce,Yokohama National University, plus Tokyo University for research purposes only.
New agreements since 2004: Seijo University, International Christian University.
Agreements under negotiation: Sophia University,Waseda University, Ryukyu University.
EastAsia@Sheffield 13
Steve Tingay and Somer Finlay graduated with BA in Chinese Studies degrees in 2004.They were awarded scholarships from the John Speak Trust to gain work experience in China.
OOnnlliinnee aatt CChhiinnaattuunnggsstteenn WWoorrkkiinngg iinn aa CChhiinneessee ccoommppaannyy
We’re living in the “garden city” ofXiamen in the south-eastern coastalprovince of Fujian. Of course more orless every Chinese city has its ownclaim to fame – Xiamen might just haveit right though. It’s been voted “China’scleanest city”, it has some reallybeautiful beaches, and there are placeswhere you stroll along palm-tree linedroads or climb mountains offering thepeace and tranquillity one sometimesmisses in China.
Since September last year we havebeen working for ChinatungstenOnline, one of the first E-commercebusinesses to open in China back in1996. The company specializes in themanufacture and export of tungstenalloy and tungsten carbide, supplying adiverse range of products from dartbarrels to lighting filaments andcounterweights for world class racingyachts. Our main duties involveproduct research, the writing ofquotations and contracts, andtranslations of technical documentsand news articles – yes, all thatprecision translation we did at Sheffieldhas come in useful!
It’s fair to say that we have had ourshare of fine surprises and bitterfrustrations.Working for a whollyChinese-owned company does have itsdrawbacks.The wages are pretty poor,though fortunately the John Speak
Trust scholarships top up our monthlyearnings. Sometimes it can be veryfrustrating when trying to do even thesimplest things, like persuading ourcolleagues to accept our advice ontheir English email messages. And aftersix months we’re still trying to get theEnglish-language website changed from“Chinglish” into accurate English!(www.chinatungsten.com)
The benefits, however, far outweigh thedrawbacks. Steve was asked to write areport on British office culture andmanaged to get us two 10 minutecoffee breaks during the day – on topof the two and a half hour lunchtimebreak everyone gets to xiuxi (rest)!
We have an enormous apartmentprovided by our boss, with a TV andDVD player (complete with fourmicrophones – a social necessity inChina). Electricity shortages and ratsare also part of the deal! As we areliving rent-free and our costs arerelatively low, we do have some extracash for Western treats – such as the130 RMB (approx £10) breakfast buffetat the Xiamen Holiday Inn when wejust can’t resist that urge for beans andbacon.
Despite being told by our workmatesthat Chinese people don’t celebrateChristmas, our boss hosted a largeparty at his house and we prepared a
Christmas dinner as traditional (well, astraditionally British) as Xiamen allowed:turkey, cranberry sauce, sprouts,Christmas cake, and of course plenty ofwhisky, brandy and advocaat. It wasour very first “catering for the masses”experience and we discovered it’s notonly the company’s employees who areconsidered part of the company – it’salso their husbands, wives, brothers andsisters.
As part of our company’s search forguanxi (connections), we’ve haddinner with countless governmentofficials, professors from XiamenUniversity, and even the mayor ofanother district. Interpreting for someimportant Australian customers wasone of the most challenging things wehave done so far, not only from alanguage point of view but also from acultural one. Being repeatedly asked totranslate “do you need more food” wasa bit embarrassing, though in China thisis just a way of expressing yourgenerosity towards your guests.
In our everyday work it’s often easy tothink that Chinese people are doingthings the wrong way round, but yousoon realise that culture is not justlandscape paintings and vases, and thatworking the “Chinese way” is betterthan trying to change things.After all,who are two foreigners compared with1.3 billion Chinese?
Steve and Somer pictured with their colleaguesat Chinatungsten Online.
aarree tthheeyyNNooww??WWhheerree
14 EastAsia@Sheffield
TOKYOEdward BakerMSc in East Asian Business (2004)
I’m working at the Japan office ofIntralink Limited, a British businessdevelopment company. Essentiallywe help foreign companies dobusiness in either Japan or Chinathrough market feasibility studiesor, more typically in Japan,surrogate sales.
My job as “project co-ordinator” ishard to define since what I actuallydo varies according to theparticular project. Generally, itinvolves market research, arrangingmeetings, and reporting to my bossand to our clients. Japaneselanguage ability is a daily andcentral part of everything we do:emailing, cold calling, interpreting,presenting and negotiating all hasto be done in Japanese.
My present position owes much tofortune and to my placement, aspart of my dissertation, with ChubuElectric Power Company lastsummer. As well as providing afascinating insight into one ofJapan’s biggest companies, theplacement provided a usefultraining ground for what are nowcore skills in my current job. I dofeel I’ve been lucky – a year ago Icould not have dreamt myself intoa better position professionallythan where I am now.
BEIJINGClaudia Albertini MA in Advanced ChineseStudies (2004)
My Masters dissertation was onimages of children in Chineseposters and advertisements, and myaim has been to combine myinterest in art with my knowledgeof Chinese and China. Now this hashappened!
I came to Beijing in early March tostart a new job, helping to set upan Italian art gallery in the 798Factory (aka 798 Space and theDashanzi Art District). A few yearsago some local artists startedrenting space in the “factory” – aformer electronics complexdesigned by East German architectsin the 1950s. Now it’s becomequite famous with art studios andgalleries, restaurants, bars,bookstores, and design andadvertising companies.(www.798space.com)
I spent my first few weeks herevisiting artists’ studios, talkingabout prices, discussing newworks, listening to new ideas,practicing a good amount ofChinese – and getting upset whenthings didn’t go the way Iexpected! On 28 March wecelebrated the opening of theMarella Gallery with great success– now waves of curious people arecoming to visit us. It’s certainly anexciting new chapter in my life.
TTAAIIPPEEIISSttuuaarrtt CCooyylleeMSc in Chinese Language,Business & InternationalRelations (2004)
I came to Taipei last Septemberafter being awarded a one-yearTaiwan government scholarship(administered by the BritishAssociation for Chinese Studies) tofurther my Chinese languagestudies. Coming fresh from Beijingwhere I’d spent the summersemester completing my SheffieldMasters degree, I’ve had a greatopportunity to experience twovery different forms of modernChinese culture.
The most striking aspect of Taiwan,for me, is “opportunity”. Whetherone is interested in the language,the culture or the can-of-wormsthat is Taiwanese internal andexternal politics, there arecountless opportunities not just forformal study but for learning fromthe “university of life” – likechatting with taxi drivers aboutwhat they think of the PRC’s anti-secession law, whether Taiwan ispart of one China, or thedisadvantages of chewing betelnut.
Similarly, no matter where one’sextra-curricular interests lie,Taiwanprovides copious outlets forexpression. Like Sheffield,Taiwanseems to be a place that manypeople find very hard to leave.
Resident (zainichi) Koreansin Japan remain a somewhatinvisible minority in Japanesesociety.
There is limited knowledge of themeither inside or outside Japan,although their situation is becomingbetter known with the currentpopularity of resident Korean literatureand a number of films regarding thiscommunity (most recently Sai Yoichi’slatest film Blood and Bones). TheKorean TV drama Winter Sonata hasalso contributed to a “Korea boom” inJapan, with an increased focus notonly on Korea but on residentKoreans in Japan as well.
How did Koreans come to be living inJapan? With Japan’s annexation ofKorea in 1910, many Koreans movedto Japan in an attempt to escape thepoverty at home. From the late 1930s,more Koreans migrated to Japan,both voluntarily and also forciblyrecruited in Korea by the Japaneseauthorities. By the end of World War II,roughly 2,300,000 Koreans were livingin Japan; three-quarters of themsubsequently returned to Korea.
The successive Meiji, Taisho andShowa governments had encouragedan image of Koreans as being inferiorto Japanese, even though Koreanswere classed as Japanese citizensuntil the end of World War II, albeitwith a different family registrationsystem. Just after the end of the war,however, resident Koreans were
stripped of their Japanese citizenshipand in 1952 the Alien RegistrationLaw was implemented.
Since that time the issues ofcitizenship, voting rights, North/SouthKorean loyalties, inter-marriage, alienregistration cards (Korean residents,like other foreigners living in Japan,are still required to carry an AlienRegistration Card with them at all
times) and identity formation havebeen of concern to many members ofthe resident Korean community.
Although Koreans may now apply forJapanese citizenship, many refuse todo so as they feel this is a betrayal oftheir ethnicity. Younger Koreans,unburdened by memories of the warand really only knowing Japanese
language and culture, are more likelyto naturalise. Inter-marriage is alsonow common. While Koreans havetraditionally been looked down on inJapan, it’s now said that youngJapanese do not really mind marryinga resident Korean (and vice versa). Ifthere is any opposition to a “mixed”marriage, it usually comes from theolder generation – whether Japaneseor Korean.
The subject of voting rights forresident Koreans who do not haveJapanese citizenship has become acontentious issue, stemming from thesplit in Japan’s Korean communityalong ideological lines. The NorthKorean community oppose votingrights as they consider themselves tobe foreigners in Japan and alignedwith the motherland (North Korea). Incontrast, the South Korean affiliatedorganization (Mindan) is pushing forvoting rights, and a bill has beenbrought up in the Diet several times,though so far nothing has beendecided.
Some other historical issues refuse togo away and these remaincontroversial. They include the denialof pension rights to those Koreansforced to serve in the JapaneseImperial Army. According to an articlein the Asahi Shimbun in 2001, theSupreme Court threw out a case thatinvolved a Korean man who hadserved in the Japanese Imperial Armyand lived in Japan for 63 years butwas denied a pension.
KKoorreeaannss iinn JJaappaannAn invisible community
For those interested in reading more about the Korean community in Japan, there are a number of books available inEnglish.They include Sonia Ryang, North Koreans in Japan: Language, Ideology and Identity (Westview Press,1997), George Hicks, Japan’s Hidden Apartheid:The Korean Minority and the Japanese (Ashgate, 1997),YasunoriFukuoka, Lives of Young Koreans in Japan (Trans Pacific Press, 2000).
David White studied for a Sheffield MA in Japanese Language & Society by distancelearning in 2000-2001. He is currently carrying out research on a Japanese EducationMinistry scholarship at Nagoya University in central Japan. He writes regularly for Avenues,an English-language magazine published in Nagoya, and has recently been researching theresident Korean community. Email [email protected]
Korean-Japanese director Sai Yoichi speakingabout his latest film, Blood and Bones, at the 2004Pusan International Film Festival.The film wasdescribed by Time Asia (13 December 2004) as thebest Japanese film of 2004.
16 EastAsia@Sheffield
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ForthcomingKorean StudiesConferenceThe 2005 Biennial Conference of theAssociation for Korean Studies inEurope (AKSE) will be held at HalifaxHall, the University of Sheffield, on 4-8 July 2005. The conference will behosted during the 25th anniversaryyear of Korean Studies at Sheffield,which began with the appointment ofthe first Korean Studies lecturer in1980. Information about theconference is available from theConference Organizer, ProfessorJames H. Grayson([email protected]).Requests to attend the conferencemay be received up to 1 June.
The Chinese Proficiency Test or HSK (Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi) is now being held inSheffield, making the School of East Asian Studies oneof only two centres of Chinese learning in the UK tohold the event. (The other is the School of Oriental andAfrican Studies in London.)
The HSK, which is organised by the China NationalOffice for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language,is a test designed to assess the Chinese languageproficiency of non-native speakers from beginners toadvanced level. Not only is it used as a standardevaluation of Chinese language ability; it also provides areference for outside institutions and organisations.
• Elementary-Intermediate (suitable for those who havehad approximately 200-1,000 hours of formal tuition)in which listening and reading abilities are tested;
• Advanced (suitable for those who have received atleast 1,000 hours of intensive tuition in Chinese) inwhich listening, reading, writing and speakingabilities are all tested.
The test at Sheffield will be held annually in April/May.Anyone interested in taking part should contact Dr Sarah Dauncey. Email [email protected]
