Many of you will be familiar with Martin Jacques remarkable book When China Rules the World. It was first published in 2009 and is now in its second edition, with over a quarter of a million copies sold.
Jacques take on language is both challenging and sobering. He writes:
Languages are not simply a means of communication, but embody and articulate a culture. . . . The international penetration of a language is closely linked to the power and influence of its major patron.
He goes on to make observations about the relative global economic positions of the great powers. He notes that, with the exception of English, the old imperial European languages are now of marginal significance, while the main languages of Asia are as strong as ever. He predicts that the position of English as the regions second language is under pressure due to Chinas growing economic and political dominance.The issue here is not whether Jacques is right in his forecast, but whether Australia is prepared to tackle the challenge of acquiring the language skills necessary to access the cultures that are vitally important to us.
Lets think for a moment about the relationship between language and culture. It is almost impossible for us to imagine what it would be like to be Australian and not to speak a common language. The stories that we tell each other, and our children, define us as people, as families and as a culture. Our songs are distinctive, as is our literature. Whether it is Mary Durack or Thea Astley, Patrick White or Tim Winton, our writers have a certain twang that both reflects and defines us as Australian.
And when we consider the cultures of our indigenous peoples, we find that their languages are the standard bearers of their cultural identity. We celebrate the enormous efforts that our indigenous leaders have put into keeping their languages alive, just as we grieve that so many of the languages of our first Australians have been lost.
Language is the window into culture, and culture is what ultimately provides unity and identity to nations.
Which brings me to China. While the Chinese government recognises some 56 ethnic groups in China, almost 92 per cent of the population of China identify themselves as Han.
That sense of identity and unity is further reinforced by Chinas written language. And in modern China, the unifying character of language is further reinforced through the use of Modern Standard Chinese (otherwise known as Mandarin) as the official language of China. While some 70 per cent of Chinas population speak Modern Standard Chinese as their first language, the vast majority of the population of China use Modern Standard Chinese as the language of government, commerce and, of course, the electronic media.
So, we have a language and a writing system that largely defines the cultural identity of well over a billion people. Or, to put it another way, one in every six people in the world read and write Mandarin.
This is important enough simply as a statistic. But when that one in every six people in the world is also a citizen of a nation that is already the worlds second biggest economy and is headed to overtake the US economy by 2030, it really is time to take notice.
Along with Chinas growth in economic power, there is Chinas growing political and strategic power. China is already a leading political power in Asia, and its leadership role is only likely to grow.
For Australia, there is simply no option but to engage with China. And for that engagement to be successful, it has to be conducted on the basis of what China actually is. And how do we do that? By better understanding China as it is, its culture as it is and its people as they are.
And as none of you needs to be persuaded, language is the key to that deep knowledge.
So to the issue I identified at the beginning of this address: are we as a nation prepared to put in the hard yards to acquire the necessary language skills to access Chinas people and its culture? Or are we just to go on being prepared for China to deal with us on its terms but in our language rather than dealing with China on our terms in its language?
We are desperately monolingual. The picture of the bronzed Aussie speaking loudly and slowly in English to our Asian neighbours may be a stereotype, but it is all too often true.
And the proof is in the figures. While the relative numbers of students studying Modern Standard Chinese vary from State to State, the number studying Chinese language in South Australia in 2015 illustrates the problem. In 2015, according to Dr Orton, there were fewer than 8,000 primary school children and fewer than 1,500 secondary school students who studied Chinese. But the numbers for Year 12 tell the real story. In 2014, the last year for which I have figures, there were 141 students with a Chinese background doing Year 12 Chinese, 53 students, again with a Chinese background, undertaking continuers, but only one student of non-Chinese background taking Year 12 Chinese.
The low uptake of Chinese language is completely unacceptable if Australia is to deliver on the opportunities that are inevitably part of the Asian century.
Your conference is a good starting point for action. As dedicated teachers of Chinese and advocates for the language skills needed for Australia to benefit from Chinas rise, you can be agents of change.
At a time when our economy is transforming from the provision of industrial goods to the provision of professional services, language is essential for success. And it is not just Chinese tourists visiting Australia, or Chinese students accessing our schools and universities, welcome as they are. Services cover the waterfront of professional value-adding. What Australia needs to offer China are those things we are good at. Chinese language skills are essential if we are to sell our services.
And the emphasis here is on skills. A smattering of Chinese a couple of hundred words and a few characters is not what is needed. The standard reached at Year 12 is not nearly enough: it has to be followed up by the kind of intensive, in-depth exposure to language that delivers fluency and the ability to read many characters. And this is not a prescription for life as an interpreter or translator, but for life in commerce, financial and legal services, scientific collaboration and inter-governmental negotiation where business is conducted in Chinese with ease and facility.
There are, I suggest, four main avenues for addressing this issue.
First, we need to step up our advocacy. Instead of waiting for something to happen, we need to cause it to happen. We need to build the kind of momentum for curriculum change that reflects opportunity, rewarding careers and the satisfaction that comes with making our own way rather than having our future delivered to us.
Second, we need a new educational and professional mindset. Chinese language, rather like music one suspects, demands concentrated work and practice.
Some reports suggest students from non-Chinese speaking backgrounds drop the subject because they cannot compete for high scores against those who do come from Chinese-speaking backgrounds. If so our current approach is failing to meet a key target increasing the number of Australians across the board who speak and read Chinese.
And one might ask whether the current approach is actually fair to the students from Chinese-speaking backgrounds, who are being encouraged to do well at a subject in which they are already more than proficient, thereby missing out on acquiring a new intellectual skill.
We need to look at Chinese language education less as an end in itself a subject to be passed and more as a skill that enables higher professional performance. Its a bit like running. You can run in order to be a sprinter, just as you can speak Chinese in order to be an interpreter. But if you cant run, you cant be a footballer or a hockey player, just as you cant be the most successful entrepreneur in China if you cant speak Chinese.
Third, we need a national approach to the teaching of Chinese. This is not a criticism of the way that any of the States are dealing with the matter. Rather, it is a recognition that we have a national problem, one that requires a national solution.
And finally, we do need additional investment if we are to grow beyond the 4.7 per cent figure representing students studying some level of Chinese. In my view, this is less about setting arbitrary goals (such as, say, five thousand students per year graduating in Year 12 Chinese by 2030) than it is about building up the wish to study Chinese (advocacy) and ensuring that Chinese language skills can be taught effectively (capacity building through teacher development).
These ideas are probably not new to any of you. But from my perspective as a politician with a clear focus on Australias needs, if we are to do well in what we like to call the Asian Century, as a person with Chinese antecedents, we do need to generate interest and momentum around the issue of Chinese language teaching.
And since thats precisely what your conference is all about, I take pleasure in declaring it open.
