Minority Education in China: Balancing Unity and Diversity in an Era of Critical Pluralism, edited by James Leibold and Chen Yangbin. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2014. xx + 405 pp. HK$250.00/US$35.00 (paperback)

Autor: Ildikó Bellér-Hann
Rok vydání: 2015
Předmět:
Zdroj: The China Journal. 73:214-217
ISSN: 1835-8535
1324-9347
Popis: Minority Education in China: Balancing Unity and Diversity in an Era of Critical Pluralism, edited by James Leibold and Chen Yangbin. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2014. xx + 405 pp. HK$250.00/ US$35.00 (paperback).In addition to the Introduction, this book comprises 15 original studies which probe the states ongoing educational projects and their discursive and practical reception among Chinas minority populations. The 21 contributors include an unusually high number of scholars based in China, several of them belonging to ethnic minorities, who present a broad spectrum of perspectives. Most authors rely on empirical methods of data collection (interviews rather than anthropological fieldwork) and on the theoretical insights of international scholarship into educational reform, minority policies and multiculturalism. James Leibold and Chen Yangbin set the scene by pointing out the tensions created by the states simultaneous emphasis on national unity and its recognition of Chinas ethnic and cultural diversity.The papers in Part One look at the broader theoretical issues surrounding minzu policies. Gerard Postiglione warns that the conservative model of "plural monoculturalism", based on a fixed and rigid minzu identity, entails the entrenchment of ethnic identity among minorities, privileges assimilation over diversity in policy, and undermines the very aims of the educational reforms, namely, better educational outcomes and ethnic harmony, both indispensable for the realization of "harmonious multiculturalism". Especially in Chinas western periphery, among the Tibetans and Uyghurs, ethnic relations have reached the phase of "critical pluralism", characterized by an increasing emphasis on ethnic differences among minorities as a result of "growing economic disparities and unequal opportunities in the marketplace, workplace and school" (p. 31). He Baogang argues that, rooted in the historical spread of Chinese characters closely accompanied by cultural and political expansion, Chinese linguistic imperialism constitutes another obstacle to the realization of a truly multicultural education system in China. The Mongolian scholar Naran Bilik suggests that the homogeneous notion of monocultural centrism which informs current educational policies can be corrected by familiarizing Han students with both the diversity and the value of different cognitive systems, as exemplified in his chapter through the complexity of the semantic fields of Mongolian terms for concepts such as Zhongguo and minzu.The five papers in Part Two focus on case studies situated in Chinas western periphery. Ma Rong's analysis of bilingual education in the Tibetan Autonomous Region highlights the conflicting opinions of minority parents and state officials concerning education. He contends that bilingual education should be adjusted to local conditions, but insists that failure of minorities to learn the majority's language is a recipe for ethnic conflict. Focusing on the challenge of providing modern education to nomadic groups, the contribution by Postiglione, Ben Jiao, Li Xiaoliang and Tsamla suggests that vocational training, culturally sensitive textbooks and a teaching design planned with the involvement of the households concerned could ameliorate the situation. Relying exclusively on official statistics, Zuliyati Simayi, a Uyghur scholar from Urumchi, makes a case for individualoriented rather than group-based education which, she argues, would result in better educational outcomes for minorities and the creation of equal citizens across ethnic boundaries. Discussing prevailing conditions for trilingual education in southern Xinjiang, Linda Tsung blames the inadequate distribution of resources for the unequal educational attainment in English between Han and Uyghur students, and characterizes current linguistic education in China's northwest as colonial. In contrast to her outspoken criticism, Teng Xing, Yang Hong and Yang Qixue, all from Minzu University, present a successful nine-year-long experimental project, supported by the Ford Foundation, among Lahu girls in Yunnan who have been able to integrate successfully into mainstream society and who simultaneously take pride in their minority language and culture. …
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