It is reported that by April 2006 China has a population of 110 million of internet users, 80% of which are below the age of 30; and by 2010, the number will rise up to 230 million. It is also reported that the population of internet users at age 15+ is about 74,727,000, ranking second after the United States, where it is about 152,046,000. And the total number in the whole world is about 694,260,000.

A recent research conducted by the Ministry of Education and National Linguistics Work Committee reveals that the rapidly increasing number of internet users are in fact bringing about changes in the Chinese language:

Netizens prefer using symbols to words when chatting online.

And,

These unique net lingo creations embody the netizens’ intelligence and creativity. For instance, they use “88,” which pronounces similar to “bye-bye” in Chinese, as well as “3166,” which sounds like “sayonara,” Japanese for “bye-bye.”

The Chinese Internet lingos are usually sets of commonly recognized numbers, symbols, letters and abbreviations, and in some cases, combinations of different languages or witty use of symbols for sounds. The top 20 Net Words are (ranked by popularity from the news report):

• 顶(support)
• 555. It is used jokingly to represent the sound of sobbing and sadness.
• ding (support)
• mm/MM (young girls)
• LZ. The person who publishes a post.
• DD/dd (young boys)
• 88 (bye-bye)
• 偶(I)
• 马甲(online alias)
• ID (identification)
• 版主(BBS moderator)
• 恩 (okay)
• 汗或寒(sweating or cold). It is used when something strange or unacceptable has been said.
• 晕 (faint). People use the word when they see something unordinary, confusing, funny or meaningless.
• ps/PS (abbreviation of Photoshop)
• 灌水 (flood-blogging). It means posting an essay online.
• ddd (support in a strong tone)
• bs/BS (despise)
• 楼猪 (the person who publishes a post)
• 滴 The word is similarly pronounced of auxiliary words “的” and “地”

While popularity of internet lingos is increasing, the number of frequently used Chinese characters are decreasing; while the netizens are enthusiastic about using symbols, numbers and letters over the normal words and characters, people outside the internet sphere found it more and more like somthing astray from the normal language. The fast evolving internet lingos is widening the ‘digital gaps’ between the netizens and non-netizens.Controversies around these cultural phenomenon are naturally raised as to what extent it can be tolerated to ‘challenge’ this language characterized by using only characters, and the debate has been focused on the question of the purity of the Chinese language. While a ban was proposed for use of internet lingos in government documents, and books are published talking about the Crisis of Chinese Language, Others regard it as something that “embodys the netizens’ intelligence and creativity“.

As a matte of fact, besides the lingos used by netizens, people would use “3G” instead of “第三代移动通信技术“, even in the media and government documents. The influence of internet is far beyond just language. The repid development of information technology and the fast spread of internet have already changed the people’s way of communication, and have imposed deep and great impact over the society as a whole, and will continue to bring about more changes along its way of development.

In October 2005, Mckinsey (MGI) published a report entitled Addressing China’s Looming Talent Shortage, which pointed out that

“Despite China’s enormous pool of university graduates (3.1 million in 2005 alone), MGI research suggests that fewer than 10 percent of Chinese job candidates, on average, would be suitable for work in a foreign company, and the fast-growing domestic economy absorbs most of those who could.”

Addressing the same issue, the post entitled Bridging the ‘talent gap’ with training on this blog also gives analysis on the culture gaps in some areas between domestic Chinese companies and multinational companies and stresses the need for Chinese graduates to be more intercultually competitive.

The term of intercultural competence is expressed as international understanding, or global awareness in most cases in China. With repect to talent development, it is often referred to as talent globalization. In 2005, when ChinaHR, one of the biggest internet job hunting and recruitment websites in China, and Monster, one of the biggest internet job search engines on the web, launched their partnership, a semniar entitled Conference on China Talent Globalization 2005 Beijing was held to mark of the start. The theme was, as a matter of fact, the intercultural competance of talents!

The word ‘culture’ has a broad and vague meaning in Chinese language. So as ‘intercultural’. Intercultural is still a ‘new word’ in the language and a new concept in some sense. Currently, it only appears in some specialized academic subjects of media and communications, and related subjects like language studies. In daily life and daily readings, the concept is expressed with international/global understanding/awareness.

Since China’s opening-up more than 25 years ago, people have gradually realized the importance of intercultural/international competence. It is both the cause and outcome of the necessity for communications with the outside world. And, it also represnents the practical individual needs to pursue better jobs.

In the past few years, as the result of the dramatic enrollment expansion in late 90’s, universities and collages are producing more graduates, taking the competition of the job market up to a new level. Meanwhile, as reported, more international talents are coming into the country. By the statistic of the Ministry of Labour and Social Security that the number of expatriates working in China has doubled to 150,000 in the last three years. The reason for the increase, according to Bridging the ‘talent gap’ with training, is due to the inability of the educational system to produce enough suitable talents.

Graduates lack of intercultural competence has been a longstanding issue in China. Interestingly, although it appeared that people both inside and outside the educational system know about the question and measures were taken, it is obvious that more reform measures in education need to be taken to “produce not just more graduates but more suitable ones” (by MGI report), more suitable ones with intercutural/international awareness and competence.

Intercultural/international competence, as personal ability, is important for every individual graduate. And, as Mckinsey suggested, it is also important for China “to avoid this talent crunch and to sustain the economic ascent of the past 20 years”, and “reforms in the educational system – including greater emphasis on practical and language skills – will help the country fill its skilled-labor gap.” (Mckinsey, Addressing China’s Looming Talent Shortage)

Update: Here is a moving yin-yang diagram (July 23, 2006).

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The title of the post is borrowed from an article in this excellent blog: A Taste for Good Life, which, according to the author who is originally from China, Helen Wang “is about the beauty of life”. While holding a number of senior research and business executive positions both inside and outside China, Helen actually maintains several blogs writing respectively about “the beauties of life” and about business Across the Pacific. Kindly recommended by the author, I am very impressed by the insightful cultural findings cited in daily life in her article entitled Two Sides of One Coin. And, the concluding remark is particularly notable:

“Seemingly opposite to each other, I see the east and west are the ying and yang of the universe. Chinese culture has more emphasis on feminine energy of the universe (ying), which includes humbleness, patience, letting be and motionless; while American culture accents masculine energy of the universe (yang): proactive, aggressiveness, goal-oriented, and taking action. They are two sides of one coin and we need the both to be one.”

To Helen, the origins of “the cultural differences of the east and west are deeply rooted in religions and people’s belief systems”, and she believes “they are two sides of one coin and we need the both to be one.” I entirely agree. And I think her extensive experiences both in the east and in the west have helped her to obtain those very outstanding intercultural insights which eventually contributed to her business successes and accomplishments.

I also like the Yin-Yang Diagram in her post which actually best illustrates her perspectives (linked above). Coincidentally, when I am reading the article in Asia Business Law, with which I had some discussions recently through posts and comments around the topic of the role of cultural awareness in business successes, I noticed there is also a Yin-Yang Diagram (linked on the left). In the discussions (and also with China Law Blog), I found it interesting to look at the unique perspectives by China experts from the west who are actually culturally sensitive and experienced in the cultures in the east. Although we come from positions that are not the same, we all agree that ” Cultural knowledge and business skills should not be weighed equally or even separated.”

Back to Yin-Yang, just as what ‘two sides of one coin” is saying, Yin-Yang represents the ancient Chinese understanding of how things work, and is actually a fundamental principle in Chinese belief systems which still affect people’s way of thinking today. “They are not completely black or white, just as things in life are not completely black or white, and they cannot exist without each other (from The Meaning of Yin-Yang)”. Amazingly, we also found from this blog this picture (linked above on the left), which in reality is an island in New Zealand.