Language is the most important tool for human communication. People are going to preserve and transmit the achievements of human civilizations by language. As an exchange medium of people’s ideas, language comes into effecting on politics, economics...
Language is the most important tool for human communication. People are going to preserve and transmit the achievements of human civilizations by language. As an exchange medium of people’s ideas, language comes into effecting on politics, economics, societies, technologies and cultures. As the most populous language used in the world, people are realizing the importance of learning the Chinese Language with the acceleration development of “Global Economy”. To enable the Chinese Language become the Second Language in the world, China is expanding the Chinese Language education and spreading the Chinese culture to the world by the Confucius Institutes.
322 Confucius Institutes had been established till October 2010 and they were located in 91 countries and regions in the world. Among them, 30 Asian countries established a total of 81 ones. South Korea and Japan, which belong to the “Cultural Circle of Chinese Characters”, established two largest numbers of Confucius Institutes in Asian countries, separately in 17 and 12.
The current situation of Confucius Institutes which were established in South Korea and Japan by the end of October 2010 will be the object of study in this paper. This paper is going to analyze and observe the merits and drawbacks in education process, then, put forward countermeasures to existing problems. In this paper, the education process is limited to dominate the present status(eg: education purposes, education contents, education methods etc) in the Confucius Institutes’.
In introduction, I'd like to describe the necessities and purposes of this research, and also its contents, methods and antecedent observations.
In chapter 2, I'd like to divided the backgrounds of the Confucius Institutes’ rapid expansion into three and make descriptions, politics, economics, and social cultures.
In chapter 3, I'd like to study on the Confucius’ images and the reasons of nominated Confucius Institutes. Taking the time for distinction, this chapter will study on the current situations of the Confucius Institute in South Korea and Japan, and make the dates into chart, analyze the characteristics of the Confucius Institutes in the two countries.
In chapter 4, I'd like to introduce the present status of the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan.
In chapter 5, I'd like to make analysis on the study of the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan, put forward some enlightenment. And the comparative study on the Confucius Institutes’ operational status with coming that the main lower variation factors included education purposes, education contents and education methods.
In chapter 6, I'd like to give an account of the summary and research results in this paper.
The researches of this thesis are not only lies in exploring the development direction of the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan, but also hope to put forward some significancies to the further researches of the Confucius Institutes.
Based upon a comparison of the Confucius Institutes’ operational status in South Korea and Japan, now here reached the conclusions as following:
Firstly, the aim of the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan are going to propagate the Chinese language and culture to the world and to meet the needs of learners on academics, occupations, interests and other aspects at the meantime. However, the Confucius Institutes in South Korea are mainly to meet students’ academic requirements when the Confucius Institutes in Japan are mainly to satisfy employees’ occupation demands.
Secondly, the educational contents of the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan are mainly composed of three aspects, training for Chinese language teachers, Chinese language education and Chinese culture. The Chinese language education of the Confucius Institutes in South Korea varies in curriculum, but no details in phase division. Therefore, the situation of the Confucius Institutes in Japan is opposite to that in South Korea.
Thirdly, based on the traditional classroom-education method, the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan use kinds of modern mass medias(like radio, television, network, CD, IT and so on)for teaching flexibly. The Confucius Institutes in South Korea create an active and comfortable learning atmosphere by using modern mass medias flexibly. On the other hand, the Confucius Institutes in Japan carry out educational activities actively through combining the modern mass medias with their advantages.
Fourthly, the Confucius Institutes in South Korea and Japan both have the problems of lacking of funds, professional teachers, suitable teaching materials and so on. What different problem between them is that the Confucius Institutes in South Korea need to enhance the lower competitive ability than those private colleges in society while the Confucius Institutes in Japan have to deal with those who names after “Confucius” actually is a kind way of “cultural aggression”.