Cultural Transformation of Chinese Pedagogic Discourse
Prof Wu Zongjie
Zhejiang University
Presented at PANEL A: ASIAN PEDAGOGIES, in the 2nd International Education Conference (Redesigning Pedagogy: Culture, Knowledge and Understanding), 28-30 May 2007, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
Abstract
With the progress of modernisation of the Chinese society starting from early 20th century, the Chinese language in terms of discourse has experienced a fundamental change which meanwhile has transformed the mode of Chinese pedagogic practices. Modern Chinese discourses, no matter whether of social or scientific practices or even on China’s intellectual heritage, are articulated to a large extent in westernised discourse that were normalised as their own. This is not merely referring to the fact that modern Chinese language fills up with new terms translated from the West, but more importantly to the fact that others’ discourse strives to transform its inner structure, cultural connotation, ways of practice and essentially the forms of life. In this contribution, I will first explore the cultural differences of linguistic worldviews on knowledge and education between the East and the West, and then examine the impact of the cultural transformation of pedagogical discourse on education in the Modern China. The question for this inquiry is to ask what kind of pedagogy is embraced by a language traditionally absent of abstraction and generalisation such as liberty, rule, politics, freedom, ideas, which are essential to the western tradition of pursuing truth. My point of interest is to recover the Chinese identity of pedagogic discourse where language merely serves to name the unspeakable, but strives to withdraw itself to complete forgottenness. What remains in terms of emptiness of symbolic meaning is the essence of pedagogic intelligibility.
PPT is available at Laohong's corpus stuff folder.
Prof Wu Zongjie
Zhejiang University
Presented at PANEL A: ASIAN PEDAGOGIES, in the 2nd International Education Conference (Redesigning Pedagogy: Culture, Knowledge and Understanding), 28-30 May 2007, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
Abstract
With the progress of modernisation of the Chinese society starting from early 20th century, the Chinese language in terms of discourse has experienced a fundamental change which meanwhile has transformed the mode of Chinese pedagogic practices. Modern Chinese discourses, no matter whether of social or scientific practices or even on China’s intellectual heritage, are articulated to a large extent in westernised discourse that were normalised as their own. This is not merely referring to the fact that modern Chinese language fills up with new terms translated from the West, but more importantly to the fact that others’ discourse strives to transform its inner structure, cultural connotation, ways of practice and essentially the forms of life. In this contribution, I will first explore the cultural differences of linguistic worldviews on knowledge and education between the East and the West, and then examine the impact of the cultural transformation of pedagogical discourse on education in the Modern China. The question for this inquiry is to ask what kind of pedagogy is embraced by a language traditionally absent of abstraction and generalisation such as liberty, rule, politics, freedom, ideas, which are essential to the western tradition of pursuing truth. My point of interest is to recover the Chinese identity of pedagogic discourse where language merely serves to name the unspeakable, but strives to withdraw itself to complete forgottenness. What remains in terms of emptiness of symbolic meaning is the essence of pedagogic intelligibility.
PPT is available at Laohong's corpus stuff folder.