Over the past three decades people here have enjoyed the highest levels of prosperity, peace and health in the two millennia of Chinese history, reaching a "Materialistic Golden Age." Yet there is nothing we can show for all this effulgence. In culture, arts and education, we have hit one of the darkest nadirs ever reached in during this time frame. Why, in a society that claims five thousand years of uninterrupted civilization, should this be so?
It is because our civilization has in fact been interrupted, not by any foreign conquests of which we have seen plenty, but because of an internal cultural suicide committed in the May Fourth Movement led principally in 1919 by Dr Hu Shizhi (
First, they had a good thing: popular education. With new democracy won in 1911, China won universal literacy. Everyone had a right to education. Then came the breakdown: Reformers found classical Chinese (
In fact it is just as hard to master written characters in the vernacular as in the classics. To speak in the vernacular was not enough; these monstrous pundits had to bury the past with this overblown May Fourth Movement -- and our too-fragile link with it. Classical Chinese became a hated, optional class taught by uninspired people who themselves had lost touch with its subtleties, its cultural uniqueness, its elegance and unequalled beauty -- qualities that made Chinese literature "civilized."
My generation is deprived of this precious link with the past that had been a palpable reality only a generation previously. Each May 4 I am in mourning (as much later I have come to mourn also June 4). Returning to a Chinese environment after some 40 years in Western climes, I find colleagues and students in Taiwan entirely alienated from that magnificent and irreplaceable heritage that should have been their birthright. No one in their fifties or below here has command of their past as had my father's generation. Instead, there is overblown self-interest generated by misguided notions of democracy which here is taken to mean "my rights and privileges." But never "my obligation to society." Not what I can and must contribute to society but always what I can get out of my present situation. How to make or take the most out of my job. So students want a quick degree, and teachers exploit their position to advance their standing outside, garner lucrative commissions, or move to a more prestigious university. Never in my 20 years teaching, from Taiwan University, Tsing Hua University to the College of Graduate Arts Institutes, have I witnessed meetings where faculty discuss the future of students, standards of excellence we should set, the relative position of our graduates in either the microcosm of Taiwan or the global one. There is nothing like an "educational policies committee" or a "faculty academic standards evaluation committee" as there are in the West. Why should this be so?
Because it is believed that in a democracy, a new PhD holder, no matter of what academic level or quality or from what type of university, equals PhDs who may be of considerably higher academic standards or from far better institutions. (I have examined to my horror a passed PhD thesis that has virtually no footnotes and only half a page of bibliography consisting of general surveys.) Here degree equals degree. Taiwan's vernacular democracy has obliterated all differences in standards or in quality, and Taiwanese justice has become impartial to wisdom or experience. Thus the voice of a new teacher has weight equal to that of academics long versed in research, teaching and administration. A new PhD without teaching experience joining a department can insist on exercising their "equal rights" in decisions affecting the long-term future of the institution or matters of standards and quality. They even have the gall to pretend they are able to evaluate far more senior and experienced colleagues. Less competent faculty (or even legislators) are always in the majority, they always decide the vote, and usually drown out the wisdom, the well-considered judgment or counsel of senior members. Is this irresponsible democracy worth it?
This so-called educated nation, with its banal vernacular school texts devoid of any trace of China's magnificent literary heritage, with its built-in dedication to higher spiritual values and to an aristocratic giving of one's best for the public good, has made a country of cowardly self-serving mediocrity, with uninspired and irresponsible cultural leaders who unthinkingly stick to paths of least resistance and avoid the threat of responsibility.
The tragedy of the May Fourth Movement is the complete severance with our past, the total denial of nobler aspects of Chinese civilization, for all Chinese, and for all generations to come.
Joan Stanley-Baker is a professor at the Institute of Art History and Art Criticism, Tainan National College of the Arts, Kuantien.
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
The US and other countries should take concrete steps to confront the threats from Beijing to avoid war, US Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview with Voice of America on March 13. The US should use “every diplomatic economic tool at our disposal to treat China as what it is... to avoid war,” Diaz-Balart said. Giving an example of what the US could do, he said that it has to be more aggressive in its military sales to Taiwan. Actions by cross-party US lawmakers in the past few years such as meeting with Taiwanese officials in Washington and Taipei, and
Denmark’s “one China” policy more and more resembles Beijing’s “one China” principle. At least, this is how things appear. In recent interactions with the Danish state, such as applying for residency permits, a Taiwanese’s nationality would be listed as “China.” That designation occurs for a Taiwanese student coming to Denmark or a Danish citizen arriving in Denmark with, for example, their Taiwanese partner. Details of this were published on Sunday in an article in the Danish daily Berlingske written by Alexander Sjoberg and Tobias Reinwald. The pretext for this new practice is that Denmark does not recognize Taiwan as a state under
The Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan has no official diplomatic allies in the EU. With the exception of the Vatican, it has no official allies in Europe at all. This does not prevent the ROC — Taiwan — from having close relations with EU member states and other European countries. The exact nature of the relationship does bear revisiting, if only to clarify what is a very complicated and sensitive idea, the details of which leave considerable room for misunderstanding, misrepresentation and disagreement. Only this week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) received members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations