Joël Bellassen: Sinology on the French Fast Track
After finishing his dissertation, Joël had to face the reality that his Chinese studies had come to an end. At that time, there were only 10 universities in France teaching Chinese, with 1,000 students studying it. He was momentarily at a loss as to what to do with Chinese, but later welcomed the prospective challenges.
In 1973, cultural exchanges between China and France resumed, including student exchanges. The official batch, with the most people since 1965, consisted of 30 French students coming to China, with Joël Bellassen among them.
Today, French people can learn more about China through travel and books as well as other media. But in the 1970s, little information about China could be found in France. Joël was not able even to imagine what the country would be like at that time. Therefore, he was neither excited nor disappointed when he first arrived in Beijing. He just looked forward to exploring the city and the country.
Those two years in Beijing are indelible in his memory. In his Farewell to China: My Impressions of China of the 1970s, Joël recorded his life in China and his friendships with Chinese people. For example, he recalled Zhang Pengpeng, who co-authored with him Méthode d’initiation à la langue et à l’écriture chinoises, a book about learning Chinese characters.
Relations between China and France developed rapidly over those two years, laying a solid foundation for Joël’s career in Chinese-language research and its transmission back in France.
“You’ll Definitely Come into Contact with China in the Future”
In 1978, China launched its reform and opening-up policy. From then on, more French people became interested in Chinese language. Since his return to France, Joël has been teaching and popularizing the Chinese language. He gave Chinese classes in middle schools and universities. At the same time, he taught basic Chinese to children at l’École Alsacienne de Paris.
While teaching, Joël found Chinese language to be ideal for early childhood education. He believes writing Chinese characters helps in developing children’s coordination, sense of space, and organization skills. The four tones of Chinese language help to sharpen children’s listening skills, while deciphering proverbs or written characters trains their ability to think abstractly.
“The abilities we acquire from Chinese could never be obtained from European languages,” Joël said.“People used to consider Chinese as a complicated and difficult language only suitable for students at the stage of higher education. However, the French media followed closely on my teaching experiments at l’École Alsacienne de Paris and changed such opinions.”
China has become more involved in economic and cultural exchanges with the international community. Many Chinese people started going to France for study, while there has been an increasing number from France streaming into China for work and study. In 1984, the Association for Chinese Teachers in France was established, with Joël as the first president. In 1989, he began to teach Chinese at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales, and publishing his Chinese textbooks.
In 1985, Chinese language was taught in primary schools, making France the first European country to provide Chinese classes in primary and secondary schools. The number of Chinese learners in France has increased by leaps and bounds since 2000. In 1999, 111 French middle schools offered Chinese classes. In 2005 the number increased to 208, and soared to 362 in 2007. Today, 600 middle schools are offering Chinese courses, making Chinese the first language ever to enjoy such rapidly increasing attention in foreign-language education in France. Surpassing Portuguese, Hebrew and Arabic, Chinese has risen to fifth place as the foreign language most used in France.
However, it was not always smooth incorporating Chinese language into the French education system. Joël recalls that, at first most people did not expect the fad for the Chinese language to last long. Therefore, although French people actually became interested in Chinese language and culture two centuries before, it was not until 2006 that the French Ministry of Education created the post of Inspecteur général de Chinois, in response to the ever-growing international craze for the Chinese language.
Before taking up the post of Inspecteur Général de Chinois, Joël was an official on Chinese teaching in France’s Ministry of Education, and made extensive contributions to Chinese teaching. He designed the Chinese instructional program, formulating a specific framework for Chinese teaching in France. Moreover, he worked hard to integrate his valuable teaching experience into this framework. His efforts are one of the reasons France is able to keep its lead in Europe in Chinese teaching.
According to Joël, Chinese teaching in France still has a long way to go. Unlike in Asia, where Chinese has become an international language, in Westerners’ eyes the square-block characters are still mysterious and hard to learn. What’s more, Joël feels that the challenges presented by the growing demand for Chinese learning require the recruitment of more qualified teachers and the revitalization of Chinese textbooks. On the whole, Joël thinks Chinese teaching is still in its primary stage in France.
Thirty years ago, Chinese was distant and mysterious for students in France like a language from the moon, and learning it seemed to have no career prospects at all. But now it is no longer as distant as the moon, and is rapidly popularized. Joël believes Chinese language learning has a bright future in France, and he often says: “You will definitely come into contact with China in the future.” In France, Chinese language and culture transmission is like a satellite moving fast on the right track and constantly speeding up.
