“Englicization” under the flag of internationalization: a case study of Shanghai University
WANG Xiaoming (Translated by JIN Li)
Abstract Today’s higher education in mainland China is commonly seen as being unable to meet the needs of the society. Among the methods chosen by the central government to improve the quality of education, a reform named as “Internationalization” has been strongly implemented in a top-down way since the early 2000s. This article will discuss the implementation of this reform with Shanghai University, where the author is teaching, as a case study. Focusing on the new-made word “Englicization,” which is the most visible result of the reform in university campuses, I assess the real effect of the reform, accompanied by an explanation of why “Internationalization” actually into turns “Englicization” in the university campus.
Author’s biography
Wang Xiaoming [王曉明], Professor of Cultural Studies at Shanghai University, Shanghai and Distinguished Adjunct Professor at Lingnan University, HK, is the author of 16 books published in Shanghai, Beijing, Taipei, HK and Seoul, which focus on today’s cultural, and urban, situations in mainland China as well as the modern thought and literature of China.
Translator’s biography
Jin Li [金莉] holds a PhD on East Asian Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University; her research is on late imperial and modern Chinese literature. After teaching in the US and Norway for some years, she now lives in China, doing translation-related work.