Why aren't more people in the West learning Chinese?

Hi there guys, I recently came across a rather biased report on CNA about why Mandarin is on the decline in the West but still popular in other Asian countries, they interviewed a professor from the Chinese department of an Indonesian university for crying out aloud - would that guy say, "nah don't bother studying Chinese, it is a complete waste of time. My department is going to be closed down in few years and I'll have to look for a new job eventually." They really should have interviewed someone who doesn't have a vested interest, like the CEO of a big company in Asia to see if they would rather hire someone with good Chinese language skills or if there are other more important factors they would consider. So as a business owner in London who does speak Mandarin, allow me to address this topic and do it justice. 

Let me be blunt: those who bothered learning Chinese ten to 20 years ago have not found it to be useful at all, or at least the benefits are at best marginal. The fact is very few people bothered learning Chinese until 2000 because it was very hard to find any decent Chinese classes. It was a supply and demand issue back then, as the demand was so low back then, Chinese schools struggled to find enough students to fill their classes and run it as a business - it was mostly the Chinese diaspora who sent their kids to Chinese classes in the evenings and weekends whilst it was not available as a subject within the national curriculum in these Western countries. If you didn't live in a big city like London, Sydney or New York, then the nearest Chinese school might be hundreds of miles away. But all that changed after 2000 when Chinese was slowly introduced into the national curriculums across all of these countries but there was a problem: Chinese was a bloody difficult language to learn, especially when compared to other European languages like French, Spanish and Italian. Everything from the tones to the complex characters confused the students who approached it as a foreign language and the teachers realized just how steep the learning curve was for these students. It's not like the students were lazy or stupid, but even the best students with a gift for languages struggled. As a result, the exams were dumbed down to reflect the kind of progress the students were making which resulted in a very unequal situation: if you look at a French exam for a 16 year old in the UK learning French as a foreign language and the equivalent exam for Chinese in the UK, you would notice that the French exam is a lot more difficult than the Chinese exam. I remember rolling my eyes and saying to a Chinese teacher in London, "even an 8 year old Chinese kid in Singapore can ace this exam, it's too easy." His reply was, "I know it is very easy for you, but if we made it any more difficult, then all the kids would fail and no one would want to study Chinese. So we had to pitch it at a level whereby most of the kids will pass and a minority of the kids will fail, So we have the situation where there are 16 year old British kids who score As for Chinese at school but still struggle to even have a basic conversation in Mandarin." Thus parents have a choice: if their child studies French for four years, the child will reach intermediate standard and probably be quite fluent, but if their child studies Chinese for four years, that same child would barely get past the basics in the same time. 

In the last 20 years, there have been a whole generation of students who can say, "I spent so many years learning Mandarin, I didn't learn much and I didn't get far - it was a waste of time as I simply don't speak it well enough to use it in a work context. "I should have done French or Spanish instead, at least I would have actually mastered those languages as they are easier". So if you are a parent in the UK in 2024 wondering if your child should learn Mandarin, there are plenty of people you can ask and the feedback would be overwhelmingly negative. This is not because Chinese isn't considered useful per se, but rather it has proven to be such a crazy difficult language that most students don't get very far in it - certainly not far enough to be able to use it in any meaningful way at work. So the conclusion is simply, if you are going to learn a foreign language, avoid Chinese. This is not based on any kind of racism or the perception of the relative strength of the Chinese economy, but simply on the success rate of those who have studied Chinese as a foreign language in the West for the last 20 years. The fact is these students in the West are far more likely to master a foreign language like French or Spanish than they will master Chinese - if all you want is a foreign language to boost your employability, then you may as well pick one which you have a greater chance of success at. Are there white people who are totally fluent in Mandarin? Yes they exist but virtually all of them have lived and studied in China for at least a few years. The ones who have put in that level of commitment have done so because of a genuine love for the Chinese language and are willing to do whatever it takes to become totally fluent. This is why white people who speak Mandarin fluently are still something of a novelty even in 2024 and often are able to get a lot of attention on social media. My Chinese is actually good enough to use in a work context but it is extremely rare that I actually meet a white person at work who speaks Mandarin - in fact, when it happened that one time years ago with my friend Max Sleigh, I was so impressed that I decided to do a Youtube video with him to talk about how he learnt Chinese. Otherwise all my other colleagues in the UK who spoke Mandarin are mostly from China (or other parts of Asia like Hong Kong, Singapore or Malaysia); they're not white people who have mastered Chinese to a very high level. If a company needs an expert who can speak Mandarin, they'll just hire a Chinese person - not a white person who studied Chinese as a foreign language. 

Another key reason that less white people are learning Chinese is because there are enough young Chinese graduates out there who speak English quite well - now before you bitch that the vast majority of Chinese people in China can't speak English, allow me explain the very specific circumstances I am referring to. I am currently dealing with a Chinese company whom I shall call 'Taiyang (that's 'sun' in Mandarin)  who are a leading supplier of technical components within the solar energy sector, they are selling internationally and thus they need someone to deal with their international clients in English. They have hired this guy called Mark who is Chinese but attended university in America and has spent 5 years in America, so his English is flawless. Does Mark represent the typical Chinese worker in China? Hell no, he is exceptional - he is from a family rich enough to pay for his education in America and he is a lot more educated than the average person in China. However, there are enough people like Mark in China so that when Chinese companies like Taiyang want to deal with the outside world in English, they just hire someone like him to handle all their corporate communications in English. Does every single person in Taiyang speak English? No, he is the exception but he is the one responsible for dealing with clients abroad. Chinese companies like Taiyang will hire someone like Mark, they will not bother trying to hire a white person who has studied Chinese as a foreign language at school. How is a white person who studied Chinese language to a high level ever going to compete with Mark, who is a native speaker of Mandarin? This is something we call the "eliminate the obvious rule", so a classic example would be if you need to enter a house - the most obvious thing to try first would be to try to see if you could open the front door instead of trying to climb through the second floor window like a burglar. Both options would eventually achieve the objective of getting you into the house but it is just common sense to try the most obvious option in the first instance as it would be a lot faster, easier and less risky.. Hence Taiyang will simply go for the obvious option and hire a Chinese person like Mark who has spent many years in the West to perfect his English. Besides, it isn't just companies like Taiyang in China hiring people like Mark, if the equivalent company in the West wants to target the Chinese domestic market, they would once again hire someone like Mark rather than a white person who has studied Chinese. Millions of young Chinese adults have graduated from universities in the West, whilst only a very small number of white people have actually enrolled in a Chinese university. 

There is another issue of course that I have already mentioned at the beginning of this piece: It is totally misleading to ask a university's Chinese department whether or not it is a good idea to study Chinese - that would be like interviewing the chief marketing officer from KFC and asking them if fried chicken is delicious. That is hardly going to be an objective view of the situation and the interview was a car crash in any case as the professor from a university in Indonesia struggled in English and he give a couldn't even give a simple example of when translation apps cannot replace a real human being when speaking Chinese. Good grief, the interview should have been done in Bahasa Indonesia or Mandarin instead of English if the professor can barely speak English! He should have been given all the questions in advance and the segment should have been pre-recorded and not live, so when he was totally inarticulate and struggled to get the words out, the director could simply say, "don't worry, start from the beginning again, we will edit it to make you look good." In any case, academics from such universities are so far removed from the real business world they are really the wrong people to ask about job prospects for young adults these days - no, for that you need to ask business owners like me instead and as a business owner in London who happens to speak Mandarin, I am in an ideal position to give you my perspective on the topic. When I am hiring someone, I would like to see candidates who have gone above and beyond what was expected of them within their academic curriculum and have understood the need to make themselves stand out in a crowded market. Learning a foreign language is one such way but we also want to see young people who are strategic in picking their goals. I once met this white British guy Lionel (not his real name) at my gymnastics club and he did Chinese at school, but he didn't get very far with it - he was barely able to form basic sentences in Mandarin and struggled to understand me even when I spoke very slowly despite the fact that he had studied Chinese for six long years. I shook my head in despair, I told him, "that was a total waste of time, wasn't it? You took on a challenge, invested a lot of time, money and effort in it and then totally failed, you're not going to impress me by telling me that have studied Chinese for six years, you can only impress me by having a real conversation with me in Mandarin." I may have been rather harsh with Lionel but that is exactly how he would be judged by employers out there. 

I also met another young lady, let's call her Sarah (not her real name) - she did Chinese up till A levels and even took a few trips to China. Her father wanted me to find out just how good her Mandarin was since he can't do that as he doesn't speak the language. So I had a casual conversation with her about her recent trip to Beijing and I was annoyed at how she gave very short answers. For example, I asked if she had a good time in Beijing and she said, 不好 (not good) and so I persisted and asked her what aspects of life in Beijing she didn't like. She said, 污染 (pollution) and at which point, I just switched back to English and I told her, "Sarah, use complete sentences when expressing yourself. I wouldn't just say 'pollution' in English, I'd use a complete sentence like 'the air pollution there was very bad on some days', that would sound more natural." Sarah could speak a lot more Mandarin than Lionel but she failed to impress me because her Mandarin simply wasn't good enough to be of any use in the working world. Thus there are loads of people like Lionel and Sarah who would tell you that there is a massive difference between the sales pitch they have been given by their Chinese teachers about how useful Mandarin will be and the rude awakening they got when they met me. If they had met a Chinese teacher, the teacher would have praised Lionel and Sarah for having learnt some Mandarin and encouraged them to do more; whereas from my perspective as a business owner and potential employer, I told them they had wasted their time, not because Chinese is a useless subject but rather because neither of them could actually speak it well enough to a high enough standard that would serve them any practical purpose in the workplace. The people who have convinced Lionel and Sarah that learning Chinese was a good idea are all from the education industry and they are really only concerned about making sure Lionel and Sarah's parents spend a lot of money on Chinese lessons, they are far less concerned about whether or not Lionel and Sarah can see any real benefits from having learnt some Chinese. My point is simple: if you're going to choose to learn a foreign language, either become properly fluent in it or cut your losses and go spend that time learning something else like coding instead - don't end up like Lionel and Sarah, so pick your battles and Chinese as a foreign language is never going to be an easy challenge for most students. 

The key reason why a student would want to learn a foreign language is to impress a potential employer and as the saying goes, there's more than one way to skin a cat. The fact is whenever a good position at a prestigious company opens up, there will always be loads of applicants for that one position and the gatekeepers are going to ditch most of the CVs as they only want the best to make the shortlist who get invited to an interview. Trying to learn a foreign language and then failing to become fluent in it isn't going to impress anyone, you're much better off picking something you are genuinely interested in and excelling at it. You need to be so passionate about your endeavours if you're going to be spending long hours perfecting your craft, hence there's absolutely no point wasting your time doing something that you think might be useful (like learning Chinese) but lack the motivation to try hard enough to ensure excellent results. Just because students today are not learning Chinese anymore doesn't mean that they are being lazy - no, it simply means that they are doing other pursuits to impress their future employers. We need to look at the wider picture to understand the issue properly: let's look at the basic principle of supply and demand in the job market. You need to see what skills are in demand and valued by the employers out there right now. You then need to make a strategic decision whether or not you can actually acquire the necessary skills that are in demand to get good jobs - so for example, I have an old friend from Singapore whom we shall call Will (not his real name). Will studied English literature at university and got his PhD in it, with the intention of becoming an academic, teaching the subject at university level. Will has managed to get some good teaching positions in the past. However, that all came to a halt in 2018 and just as he was about to line up a new university teaching position, the pandemic hit. He is now stuck doing a job he is overqualified for and being paid a fraction of what he would have earned if he had managed to secure a teaching position at a university. So what is the reason for Will's situation then? There is no doubt that Will is great at what he does, however, given the number of universities around the world offering English literature, there simply isn't a demand for Will's services. He had disregarded the supply and demand factor when picking his career and that left him in this frustrating situation today. So the simple question you have to ask students today is this: would learning Chinese actually land you your dream job? The answer is no, it wouldn't; there is no demand for such skills in the world place and you will end up like my friend Will. 

Let's turn our attention to the other issue about whether or not AI driven translation can replace human beings as it was covered in the CNA interview. It was argued that AI couldn't replace a human when it came to translations in real time - allow me to give you give you a classic example. Imagine trying to translate these sentence in English into another language: "she will park the car here so we can go to the park" and "the crane flew over the crane". Clearly, in both sentences, the words park and crane are deliberately used twice in the same sentence and in these examples, it is clear from the context exactly what is going on. However, computers can get confused with common words like 'right' which can have more than one meaning: let's try this deliberately confusing sentence. Imagine you're asking for directions to the train station, "you're right, you need to turn right at those traffic lights and the train station is right there. But you must go right now, as the last train will depart soon." Humans are still better at computers when it comes to applying some common sense at figuring out the exact meaning of the words using the context if we have had many years of experience speaking the language at native standard. In our sample sentence, the word right is used three times in that sentence but has a different meaning each time. AI is becoming increasingly good at figuring out those subtle differences and it has come a very long way since the early days of Google translate. However, our human brains are only as good as the human in question - in the CNA interview, the professor was asked to give an example of when a human can do a better job that a computer, he just froze in terror and freaked out. He struggled and went into blind panic as it wasn't a question he was expecting, he didn't know how to answer that question and it was painful to watch him crumble. That's a great example of why you would want to rely on a computer rather than a human being because of this factor called human error. In fact this is similar to a topic I had covered on my blog already: one of the most common misconceptions about working in banking and finance is that we need to be really good at maths. But that is completely untrue because of human error, we would never be allowed to work out complex calculations like a student doing a maths exam because of the possibility of human error. No, we simply leave that function to the computers to work it all out as computers would never make mistakes like that. The technology for any form of calculation is so reliable and efficient, it makes absolutely no sense to allow a human to even attempt it and we are getting close to the point where it is the same with languages. 

AI can be so useful in providing a low-cost solution to situations where two parties don't have a common language, a simple example of this when a British tourist goes to China and conducts a simple transaction in a restaurant with the help of a translation app on their phone. This removes the need to struggle on in the language of the country you are visiting for a few days and more to the point, the staff at the restaurant certainly don't expect you to speak their language at all - they are just happy that you have chosen to spend some money there. It only takes you a few minutes to figure out how to use a translation app on your phone, contrast that to spending a few years becoming fluent in a language like Mandarin. Even if the translation provided by AI isn't perfect, it will do in most cases. Will a human translating the language do a better job? Probably, but the real issue here is whether the added value is worth the money. So in the case of our British tourist in China trying to get a meal in a restaurant, will paying for a translator make that interaction easier? Yes of course, but what would be the point of that if the translator is going to cost several times what you're actually spending on the meal? Allow me to compare this to a situation where a businessman paid for a translator and got good value for money: I have an Indian-Malaysian friend whom we shall call Raj (not his real name) who wanted to do a deal in Taiwan, but faced a considerable language barrier there given that Raj doesn't speak Mandarin and the Taiwanese he wanted to deal with barely spoke any English, certainly not well enough to have any kind of meaningful conversation in. Raj approached me for help and through some friends in Taiwan, we arranged for this university student (whom we shall call Cindy) who was bilingual in English and Mandarin to accompany Raj for a few days in Taiwan as his interpreter. The business trip to Taiwan proved to be successful for Raj and he got the deal done with Cindy's help, so let's analyse this case study. Should Raj have learned Mandarin if he wanted to do business in Taiwan and China? The simple answer is no, he already has a successful business to run and has no spare time to dedicate to learning a foreign language at this stage of his life, but Raj does have plenty of money to hire someone like Cindy to help him when necessary and of course, Cindy is only too happy to have a well-paid job like that when she can cash in on her language skills. Hence the moral of the story is that young people like Cindy really ought to learn English, whilst people like Raj shouldn't bother with Chinese - Raj is now very happily doing business in Taiwan without having to speak any Mandarin. 

But there's one person in this story we have yet to talk about - the person that Raj went to Taiwan to meet was Mr Liu and the key question is this: did Mr Liu react badly to the fact that Raj couldn't speak a word of Mandarin? No, Mr Liu didn't mind at all - in fact, he was somewhat embarrassed by the fact that his English was very limited. They have found a solution of course that everyone was happy with - Cindy accompanied them in all their meetings and even when Mr Liu wanted to take Raj out for meals and sightseeing, Cindy was present for all of that. The fact is language simply wasn't a big factor when it came to that transaction - Raj had a great product that Mr Liu's company needed and it was all about Raj being able to solve a problem for Mr Liu's company with this product. Raj was able to offer a technical solution that Mr Liu needed at that time. Without the right product, Raj could have a PhD in Chinese literature and speak the best Mandarin in the world but still wouldn't be able to get the attention of Mr Liu. But with the right product, all he had to do was spend some money on hiring the services of someone like Cindy to facilitate the transaction rather than try to speak Mandarin with Mr Liu. Raj and Mr Liu had initially communicated with the help of Google translate when they write each other text messages or emails, but at some stage, you would have to engage the services of someone like Cindy if there was an important deal to be done. Raj was trying to sell Mr Liu a very large amount of technical equipment, thus given the amount of money he was potentially going to make from Mr Liu, he gladly paid Cindy good money for her services. However, I need to point out to you that whilst Cindy had a lucrative gig for a few days whilst Raj was in Taiwan, her services were no longer required once Raj went back to Malaysia. Allow me to contrast that to my friend TM who is Dutch - TM speaks three languages, French, Dutch and English but he works for Huawei as an engineer. TM is brilliant at his job and that is why Huawei wants to employ him; the fact that he doesn't speak any Mandarin at all despite having worked there for over five years now doesn't seem to be a problem as practically everyone in his team speaks English reasonably well - so if you're as brilliant as TM at what you do, then even a company as Huawei will make it possible for you to work there by surrounding you with people who speak English. Would it be useful for TM to learn Mandarin? Yes, sure it would but has his inability to speak Mandarin impeded his career with Huawei so far? No it hasn't been a problem.

A lot of the issues I have explored in this post are just basic common sense: the Chinese language or any language skill isn't really that useful in today's job market. The issue seems to stem from the fact that many Chinese-Singaporeans have been forced to study Chinese for many years at school and hence they really hope that this has paid off in giving them a precious tool to use in the job market. This reminds me of a TV programme we have in the UK called the Antiques Road Show. For those of you not familiar with the programme, allow me to explain the format: a small group of antique experts will tour the country and set up shop in small towns, where the locals are invited to bring their family heirlooms to be evaluated by the experts to find out how much it is worth. Thus the people bringing objects to the experts are really hoping to be told, "this is worth millions!" But actually, that rarely ever happens. This hope that grandma's vase is worth millions is not based on any real information about the origin of the vase, but rather just wishful thinking that something that they already have in their possession is going to turn out to be incredibly valuable. This was something that my father had waxed lyrical about all his life as he was a Chinese teacher, but I roll my eyes and thought, well if Chinese was such a useful language, then why aren't you in China doing big business deals and making millions then? Why are you working as a humble primary school teacher earning a very modest salary instead? Why aren't you cashing in on your Chinese language skills in the real world? So are Singaporeans ever going to be in a position to compete with people like Cindy and Mark for the kind of role where they facilitate business deals between Chinese/Taiwanese companies and their counterparts in the West? The answer is probably not, the chances of that happening are very low because Mark and Cindy are native speakers of Chinese and Singaporeans are educated mostly in English, not Chinese. Hence the standard of Chinese amongst Singaporeans is simply too low. I have used my Chinese language skills before in my work but let me be crystal clear about this: I am not a translator, I am a corporate finance specialist who happens to speak some foreign languages well. I could do my work entirely in English if necessary, but the fact that I can often deal with my clients in another language is a bonus - though that's not an essential component of what I do. Languages are undoubtedly useful in so many ways, but you really need something else on top of that to access the best jobs out there. 

Finally, I want to address the issue of Sinophobia which was mentioned in the piece in a subtle way, as political tensions between Beijing and the West have been strained over a number of issues such as Beijing's stance on Taiwan, the war in Ukraine and the ongoing trade war between China and America. Quite frankly, I don't see this as an issue that really factors into the equation. Again, I see this as dumb Singaporeans (and other Chinese people) desperately wanting white people to learn their language to turn the tables on them - after all, for decades, Chinese people in Asia have been studying English in school and it is after all, a foreign language for us even if there are those from Singapore like myself who do speak English as a first language. The reason why English has been the number one choice as a second/foreign language in East Asia is because it is the undoubtedly most useful language in higher education, international business and diplomacy. English is a global lingua franca, it is regarded as a prestige language - I remember this incident in a railway station when in Bangkok when I tried to buy my tickets in Thai, a language that I barely speak and the young lady behind the counter looked quite angry and annoyed at me for speaking to her in Thai. She replied in perfect English and as she thrusted those tickets into my hand, I could sense her indignation, how dare you imply that I don't speak English? Did you think that I am stupid or uneducated?  English is and will always be the language of the elite in Asia and Mandarin will never attain that status, thus all these Chinese people from Singapore to Shanghai to Shenzhen frustrated that white people are not learning Chinese and blaming it on Sinophobia are simply wishing to change the status quo of English being the prestige language of East Asia, a part of the world where there are hardly any native speakers of English at all. Is Chinese ever going to be a prestige language in the West? Hell no, hell will freeze over before that ever happens, that's how fucking ridiculous that idea is. However, is this a product of Sinophobia? No, it isn't - the two issues are completely unrelated. White people are not avoiding Chinese at school because they hate China, they are doing it simply because it has proven to be a painfully difficult language to learn. China also sucks at soft power - the very heavy handed censorship within China has stifled creativity to the point where it can never compete with South Korea, Europe or America when it comes to winning hearts and minds through the media. Hence rather than blaming Sinophobia for this situation, Chinese people really need to work on their soft power and learn from a country like South Korea which is much smaller than China, but they are totally brilliant using soft power to spread their cultural influence around the world. 

So there you go, that's it from me on this issue. What do you think? Please leave a comment below, thanks for reading.