Abstract
This article examines the case of minority language education in China, an area of enquiry that has received increasing attention as new studies report on how the lack of institutional recognition that minority languages receive erodes ethnic minority identities and disempowers social actors living in minority areas. Drawing on Williams’ (Marxism and literature, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1977) notion of “structures of feeling”, as well as on Woolard’s (Am Ethnol 12(4):738–748, 1985) critical take on the concepts of integrated linguistic market and culture hegemony, we empirically analyse individuals’ engagement with normative meanings and values linked to language policies. In particular, we focus on situated practices at a secondary school located in an ethnically diverse city in southwestern China in which Tibetans constitute the largest ethnic minority group. Our data show emergent communicative forms, or “structures of feeling”, through which school actors enact, challenge and shape an institutional logic that marginalises the Tibetan section within the school while constructing Tibetan language education as a pedagogical space with no room for Tibetan religious content. In so doing, our analysis sheds light on complex on-the-ground dynamics, with focus on shifting values on what constitutes appropriate knowledge and a “good” minority language school vis-à-vis wider socio-institutional processes of transformation.
Similar content being viewed by others
Change history
14 September 2019
Multilingualism and policy making in Greater China: ideological and implementational spaces
Notes
In this paper, the city where the school is located, the school, students and teachers are all referred to by pseudonyms.
All interviews presented in this paper were conducted in a local variety of Mandarin Chinese.
Minzu universities (民族大学) are universities in China that mainly target ethnic minority students through preferential admission policies. Besides providing courses that are commonly found in other universities, minzu universities are also specialised in ethnic studies.
The Leadership Group for the Coordination of Tibetan Education in Five Provinces and Regions (五省区藏族教育协作领导小组) is an organisation supervised by the Ministry of Education and the State Ethnic Affairs Commission. The five provinces and regions include Tibet Autonomous Region, Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan, all of them have a large number of Tibetan population. This organisation is in charge of the coordination of Tibetan education in these regions, including teacher training, textbook compilation, policy research, and education reform. It has a central office located in the city of Xining (Qinghai).
Besides funding from local government, STS is also eligible for funding opportunities provided by local, provincial and national Ethnic Affairs Commissions, in the fields of infrastructure improvement, and teacher training. In addition, a series of scholarship for students have been established over the years, using donations from Tibetan entrepreneurs.
The United Front Work Department (统战部) is an agency under the leadership of the central committee of China’s Communist Party. Its main function is to coordinate the non-communist party groups, such as ethnic minorities, religious groups, intellectuals, commercial interest groups, and overseas Chinese, in support of the rule of the communist party.
The first author was not a speaker of any variety of Tibetan, thus a majority of classroom observations were conducted in junior grade one, when Putonghua was the main language of instruction. As a result, a limitation of this study was that classroom dynamics in other grades could not be fully captured.
References
Adamson, B., & Feng, A. (2014). Models for trilingual education in the People’s Republic of China. In D. Gorter, V. Zenotz, & J. Cenoz (Eds.), Minority languages and multilingual education (pp. 29–44). Netherlands: Springer.
Beckett, G. H., & Postiglione, G. A. (2012). China’s language policy for indigenous and minority education. In G. H. Beckett & G. A. Postiglione (Eds.), China’s assimilationist language policy: The impact on indigenous/minority literacy and social harmony (pp. 3–17). London: Routledge.
Blachford, D. (2004). Language spread versus language maintenance: Policy making and implementation process. In M. Zhou & H. Sun (Eds.), Language policy in the People’s Republic of China: Theory and practice since 1949 (pp. 99–122). New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Dello-Iacovo, B. (2009). Curriculum reform and ‘Quality Education’ in China: An overview. International Journal of Educational Development,29, 241–249.
Doorne, S., Ateljevic, I., & Bai, Z. (2003). Representing identities through tourism: Encounters of ethnic minorities in Dali, Yunnan Province, People’s Republic of China. International Journal of Tourism Research,5(1), 1–11.
Dwyer, A. M. (2005). The Xinjiang conflict: Uyhur identity, language policy, and political discourse. Washington, DC: The East-West Center.
Feng, A., & Adamson, B. (2015). Researching trilingualism and trilingual education in China. In A. Feng & B. Adamson (Eds.), Trilingualism in education in China: Models and challenges (pp. 1–21). Netherlands: Springer.
Feng, A., & Sunuodula, M. (2009). Analysing language education policy for China’s minority groups in its entirety. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism,12(6), 685–704.
Gao, F. (2010). Bilingual education among ethnic Koreans in China: Ethnic language maintenance and upward social mobility. Chinese Education & Society,43(1), 82–92.
Goffman, E. (1981). Forms of talk. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Hansen, M. H. (1999). Lessons in being Chinese: Minority education and ethnic identity in Southwest China. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.
Heller, M. (2007). Distributed knowledge, distributed power: A sociolinguistics of structuration. Text & Talk,27(5–6), 633–653.
Hillman, B. (2003). Paradise under construction: Minorities, myths and modernity in northwest Yunnan. Asian Ethnicity,4(2), 175–188.
Lam, A. S. L. (2007). Bilingual or multilingual education in China: Policy and learner experience. In A. Feng (Ed.), Bilingual education in China: Practices, policies, and concepts (pp. 13–33). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Lin, J. (1997). Policies and practices of bilingual education for the minorities in China. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development,18(3), 193–205.
Ma, R. (2007). Bilingual education for China’s ethnic minorities. Chinese Education & Society,40(2), 9–25.
Ma, R. (2014). Bilingual education and language policy in Tibet. In J. Leibold & Y. B. Chen (Eds.), Minority education in China: Balancing unity and diversity in an era of critical pluralism (pp. 83–106). Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
Mackerras, C. (2003). China’s ethnic minorities and globalisation. London: Routledge.
MacPherson, S., & Beckett, G. H. (2008). The hidden curriculum of assimilation in modern Chinese education: Fuelling indigenous Tibetan and Uygur cessation movements. In Z. Bekerman & E. Kopelowitz (Eds.), Cultural education/Cultural sustainability: Identity, tolerance, and multicultural issues in minority, diaspora, and indigenous education (pp. 103–122). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Ministry of Education and National Language Commission. (2012). Outline of China’s national plan for medium and long-term reform and development of language Works 2012–2020. Retrieved from http://old.moe.gov.cn/publicfiles/business/htmlfiles/moe/s7246/201301/146511.html
Ministry of Education and National Language Commission. (2016). Thirteenth five year development plan of national language works. Retrieved from http://www.moe.edu.cn/srcsite/A18/s3127/s7072/201609/t20160913_281022.html
Pérez-Milans, M. (2013). Urban schools and English language education in late modern China: A critical sociolinguistic ethnography. New York; London: Routledge.
Pérez-Milans, M. (2018). Metapragmatics in the ethnography of language policy. In J. W. Tollefson & M. Pérez-Milans (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of language policy and planning (pp. 113–139). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Postiglione, G. A., Jiao, B., & Manlaji, (2007). Language in Tibetan education: The case of the Neidiban. In A. Feng (Ed.), Bilingual education in China: Practices, policies, and concepts (pp. 49–71). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Rampton, B. (2013). Micro-analysis and ‘structures of feeling’: Convention & creativity in linguistic ethnography. Tilburg Papers in Culture Studies, 77, 1–14.
Schluessel, E. T. (2007). ‘Bilingual’education and discontent in Xinjiang. Central Asian Survey,26(2), 251–277.
Schnack, H. C. (2016). Testing the spaces of discretion: School personnel as implementers of minority-language policy in China. Journal of Current Chinese Affairs,45(1), 43–74.
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China. (1982). Constitution of the People’s Republic of China. Retrieved from http://www.npc.gov.cn/npc/xinwen/node_505.htm
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China. (1984). Law of People’s Republic of China regional national autonomy. Retrieved from http://www.npc.gov.cn/wxzl/gongbao/2001-03/03/content_5004447.htm
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China. (2000). Law of the national commonly used language and written script of the PRC. Retrieved from http://www.npc.gov.cn/wxzl/gongbao/2000-10/31/content_1481418.htm
Tollefson, J. W., & Pérez-Milans, M. (2018). Research and practice in language policy and planning. In J. W. Tollefson & M. Pérez-Milans (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of language policy and planning (pp. 1–32). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tsung, L. (2014). Trilingual education and school practice in Xinjiang. In J. Leibold & Y. Chen (Eds.), Minority education in China: Balancing unity and diversity in an era of critical pluralism (pp. 161–186). Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
Tsung, L., & Cruickshank, K. (2009). Mother tongue and bilingual minority education in China. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism,12(5), 549–563.
Tsung, L., Wang, G., & Zhang, Q. (2012). Bilingual education in China: The case of Yunnan. In G. H. Beckett & G. A. Postiglione (Eds.), China’s assimilationist language policy: The impact on indigenous/minority literacy and social harmony (pp. 105–120). London: Routledge.
Wan, M., & Zhang, S. (2007). Research and practice of Tibetan-Chinese bilingual education. In A. Feng (Ed.), Bilingual education in China: Practices, policies, and concepts (pp. 127–144). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
Wang, P. (2016). Assessment on language rights in education domain: shift-oriented, maintenance-oriented or something else? International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism,19(1), 89–107.
Williams, R. (1977). Marxism and literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Woolard, K. A. (1985). Language variation and cultural hegemony: Toward an integration of sociolinguistic and social theory. American Ethnologist,12(4), 738–748.
Yu, L., & Suen, H. K. (2005). Historical and contemporary exam-driven education fever in China. KEDI Journal of Educational Policy,2(1), 17–33.
Zhao, Z. (2014). The trilingual trap: “Imagined” empowerment among ethnic Mongols in China. In J. Leibold & Y. Chen (Eds.), Minority education in China: Balancing unity and diversity in an era of critical pluralism (pp. 239–257). Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
Zhou, M. (2001). The politics of bilingual education in the People’s Republic of China since 1949. Bilingual Research Journal,25(1–2), 147–171.
Zhou, M. (2004). Minority language policy in China: Equality in theory and inequality in practice. In M. Zhou & H. Sun (Eds.), Language policy in the People’s Republic of China: Theory and practice since 1949 (pp. 71–95). New York: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Zhou, M. (2012). Historical review of the PRC’s minority/indigenous language policy and practice: Nation-state building and identity construction. In G. H. Beckett & G. A. Postiglione (Eds.), China’s assimilationist language policy: The impact on indigenous/minority literacy and social harmony (pp. 18–30). London: Routledge.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Appendix: Transcription conventions
Appendix: Transcription conventions
- Kelsang :
-
Interview participant
- Italics:
-
Reported speech
- Underlined:
-
Loud talking
- /:
-
Short pause (0.5 s)
- //:
-
Long pause (0.5–1.5 s)
- []:
-
Turn overlapping with similarly marked turn
- ---:
-
Prolongation of the immediately prior sound
- ↑:
-
Rising intonation
- =:
-
Two utterances closely connected
- {xxx}:
-
Researcher’s comment
- (xxx):
-
English translation of the interview
- (()):
-
Non-understandable fragment
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Zhang, J., Pérez-Milans, M. Structures of feeling in language policy: the case of Tibetan in China. Lang Policy 18, 39–64 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10993-018-9469-3
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10993-018-9469-3