Language Education in China: Policy and Experience from 1949

Abstract

Language Education in China: Policy and Experience from 1949 is unprecedented as a comprehensive study of the multilingual circumstances in China. It tracks policy changes in the learning of Chinese, foreign languages and minority ethnic languages in China since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. On the basis of survey and interview data, the experiences of different age cohorts of learners are presented as "windows" to the realities of language education policy implementation over the last half century. The effects of political changes, language backgrounds and various motivations for learning, at both the national and individual levels, are vividly presented in this composite story of China and learners in China.