【正文】 k fluent english, including every single one of us here. but, have you ever
wondered how many nonchinese are learning chinese? let me tell you, by the end of
2002, nearly 30 million people from 85 countries and regions were learning standard
chinese, putonghua. and who knows about the number of people learning regional
dialects such as shanghainese and cantonese. in these two years, i am sure none of us here will
be surprised that the number is skyrocketing. have a look at feng shui, within seconds google brings you 1,270,000 websites
about feng shui, not in chinese, not from all over the world, but in english, just
within the united states. and i guess some of you still remember, when the previous
american president, bill clinton, first became president. he actually had the
furniture of his office rearranged according to feng shui ideas. our values, language, our feng shui, our traditional medicine and also kung fu
that i have not really talked about, are all parts and messengers of our culture and
values. what does their success in the west tell us? their popularity tells us that,
alongside cheap consumer products, we are exporting to the west, chinese beliefs and,
values.
ladies and gentlemen, globalization, yes it has its impacts on our values. it
is sending our values overseas and bringing in new ones. lets not see the bringing
in of new ones a threat to our own culture. as a matter of fact, the bringing in is
a very good opportunity and time to rethink and reflect who we are and what we want
to be. it is upon us whetherglobalization has a positive or negative impact on our traditional values. ladies
and gentlemen, i see this positively, i know even if our traditional values are
changing or to change, the change is for better, not for worse. thank you very “21世紀杯”全國英語演講比賽亞軍——張京the impact of globalization on traditional chinese values good morning, ladies and gentlemen: before western and chinese civilization came into close contact, chinese people
had always longed for a life depicted in traditional chinese paintings. those
paintings present a harmonious coexistence of people and other life forms. regarded
as the essence of ancient chinese philosophies, harmony has been deeplyrooted in
the minds of the chinese people. on the one hand, it has contributed to the unique
continuity of chinese
civilization. on the other, chinese people became too much contented withtheir achievements to desire any further changes. as globalization deepens, it
is bound to affect our ideal of harmony. first, globalization urges china to speed up its modernization, which threatens
our regard for the harmony between man and nature. for instance, many dams and
hydropower stations are being built for economic benefits at the expense of the
wellpreserved natural habitats. however,ecological malpractice of such kind goes against the notion of harmonious
coexistence in ancient chinese philosophies. more than 2,000 years ago, long before
the concept of environmental protection came into being, dujiang weir, a great
irrigation project was built in southwestern chinas sichuan province. it succeeded
both in controlling floods and in centuryold chinesestyle houses are being demolished to make room for
skyscrapers, shopping malls and eightlane expressways. ladies and gentlemen, to conclude, i would like to quote from british philosopher
bertrand russell. in contrasting chinese and western civilizations, he observed: the
distinctive merit of westerncivilizati