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basis of the 'School for Language in Education' (p. 229) that she mentions as the first of the Schools formed in the Institute of Education.
It is not true that the British Hong Kong Administration considered that knowledge and use of the Chinese language were not necessary to their work in Hong Kong (p. 244). From the beginning, there was considerable consciousness of the need for Chinese Language skills, and considerable effort was made to provide for appointees who would study the language and also, whenever pragmatically possible, to appoint persons who had studied Chinese already. At the time of the return of Hong Kong to Mainland China, westerners in the Administrative Service and the Police Force were still required to have or to acquire these skills.
——
It is not true that 'the policy of mother tongue instruction' (i.e. the policy of using the mother tongue as the medium of instruction) in Hong Kong was ‘introduced only in 1997' (p. 244). The policy had been in place for decades, but in the face of parents' and teachers' objections, the British Administration had judged it inappropriate to do more than highly recommend compliance.
Introducing her earlier book, the highly-commended China's Universities, 1895-1995, Hayhoe explains (new edition of 1999, p. xiv) that her objective is to tell a story, not a history, and she admits that, while she had conducted hundreds of interviews with well-informed, relevant witnesses, she had not burrowed in the archives as a historian needs to do. To some extent her Autobiography seems to have followed a similar method and to be based on the same assumptions. For this, however, she did have the inestimable treasure of all her letters home to her Mother, written twice-weekly in her early years away, and handed over to Hayhoe not quite six years after her Mother's death. -- Her own diary, unfortunately, Hayhoe lost during a move. -- But she also had her early, unpublished creative writing, written in 1970s Hong Kong and the 'torrent' of her published academic writing.
Whether writing history or story, however, a mind trained by a Classical education to operate like a steel trap (Full Circle, p.196) can lead to discomfort for its owner as well as for others if the facts it bases its operation on are not scrupulously correct. An exclusive or very heavy reliance on oral history (China's Universities, op. cit., p.
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basis of the 'School for Language in Education' (p. 229) that she mentions as the first of the Schools formed in the Institute of Education.
It is not true that the British Hong Kong Administration considered that knowledge and use of the Chinese language were not necessary to their work in Hong Kong (p. 244). From the beginning, there was considerable consciousness of the need for Chinese Language skills. and considerable effort was made to provide for appointees who would study the language and also whenever pragmatically possible -- to appoint persons who had studied Chinese already. At the time of the return of Hong Kong to Mainland China, westerners in the Administrative Service and the Police Force were still required to have or to acquire these skills.
——
It is not true that 'the policy of mother tongue instruction' (i.e. the policy of using the mother tongue as the medium of instruction) in Hong Kong was ‘introduced only in 1997' (p. 244). The policy had been in place for decades, but in the face of parents' and teachers' objections, the British Administration had judged it inappropriate to do more than highly recommend compliance.
Introducing her earlier book, the highly-commended China's Universities, 1895-1995, Hayhoe explains (new edition of 1999, p. xiv) that her objective is to tell a story, not a history, and she admits that. while she had conducted hundreds of interviews with well-informed, relevant witnesses, she had not burrowed in the archives as a historian needs to do. To some extent her Autobiography seems to have followed a similar method and to be based on the same assumptions. For this, however, she did have the inestimable treasure of all her letters home to her Mother, written twice-weekly in her early years away; and handed over to Hayhoe not quite six years after her Mother's death. -- Her own diary, unfortunately, Hayhoe lost during a move. -- But she also had her early, unpublished creative writing, written in 1970s Hong Kong and the 'torrent' of her published academic writing.
Whether writing history or story, however, a mind trained by a Classical education to operate like a steel trap`' (Full Circle, p.196) can lead to discomfort for its owner as well as for others if the facts it bases its operation on are not scrupulously correct. An exclusive or very heavy reliance on oral history (China's Universities, op. cit.,
p.
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