UNDERSTANDING CHINA a Diplomatic and Cultural Monograph of Fairleigh Dickinson University by Amanuel Ajawin Ahmed Al-Muharraqi Talah Hamad Alyaqoobi Hamad Alzaabi Molor-Erdene Amarsanaa Baya Bensmail Lorena Gimenez Zina Ibrahem Haig Kuplian Jose Mendoza-Nasser Abdelghani Merabet Alice Mungwa Seddiq Rasuli Fabrizio Trezza Editor Ahmad Kamal Published by: Fairleigh Dickinson University 1000 River Road Teaneck, NJ 07666 USA April 2011 ISBN: 978-1-457-6945-7 The opinions expressed in this book are those of the authors alone, and should not be taken as necessarily reflecting the views of Fairleigh Dickinson University, or of any other institution or entity. © All rights reserved by the authors No part of the material in this book may be reproduced without due attribution to its specific author. THE AUTHORS Amanuel Ajawin is a diplomat from Sudan Ahmed Al-Muharraqi is a graduate student from Bahrain Talah Hamad Alyaqoobi is a diplomat from Oman Hamad Alzaabi a diplomat from the UAE Molor Amarsanaa is a graduate student from Mongolia Baya Bensmail is a graduate student from Algeria Lorena Gimenez is a diplomat from Venezuela Zina Ibrahem is a graduate student from Iraq Ahmad Kamal is a Senior Fellow at the United Nations Haig Kuplian is a graduate student from the United States Jose Mendoza-Nasser is a graduate student from Honduras Abdelghani Merabet is a graduate student from Algeria Alice Mungwa is a graduate student from Cameroon Seddiq Rasuli is a graduate student from Afghanistan Fabrizio Trezza is a graduate student from Italy INDEX OF CONTENTS Title Page INTRODUCTION by Ahmad Kamal 01 CHINESE BASICS by Ahmad Kamal 03 CONFUCIANISM by Fabrizio Trezza 11 HERO WORSHIP by Hamad Alzaabi 29 FAMILY TRADITIONS by Molor Amarsanaa 45 DYNASTIC HISTORY by Jose Mendoza-Nasser 53 ETHNIC DIVERSITY by Haig Kuplian 75 HEARTLAND AND PERIPHERY by Seddiq Rasuli 87 RESOURCE BASE by Lorena Gimenez 107 OVERSEAS CHINESE by Abdelghani Merabet 119 RELATIONS WITH MONGOLIA by Zina Ibrahem 131 COMMUNISM TO CAPITALISM by Amanuel Ajawin 139 MAJOR CONTRIBUTIONS by Baya Bensmail 149 HUMAN RIGHTS DIALOGUE by Alice Mungwa 159 ART IN CHINA by Talal Alyaqoobi 169 CHINESE CUISINE by Ahmed Al-Moharraqi 179 Introduction Ahmad Kamal INTRODUCTION Considering the undoubted importance of China in the world of today, it is absolutely astonishing how little effort has been put into a study of its basics – the quality and variety of its land mass, the size and diversity of its population, its enormous resource base, its percentage of global trade, its 5000 years of recorded history and civilization, its mastery in art and craftsmanship, its great contributions to the world in the form of paper and silk and gun- powder and the compass, the list can go on and on. Few, even among the most educated, can say any one or more than one word in Chinese, fewer can name any one or more than one Chinese dynasty, and even fewer can express an informed opinion about the history and particularities of the Chinese character. Our knowledge is severely limited to sound bytes about the ―emerging threat‖ or the ―under-valued yuan‖, even though Feng Shui has somehow entered into the consciousness of the more fashionable amongst us. And yet, no one can deny how much even the richest countries of the world depend on China today -- as a banker constantly extending credits to an indulgent Western society steeped in over-consumption, as a highly efficient producer of all types of goods under enormous economies of scale, as the custodian of almost the entire mass of critical rare-earth minerals so vital to our high-technology equipment, as the well-head of a Confucian philosophy that dominates the thinking of almost a third of humanity, as an expanding power spreading its intellectual and economic influence not just into Asia and Europe, but also deep into the distant continents of Africa and Latin America. For some, China is seen as an emerging threat to the comforts of their own dominance, even though that status-quo itself is so totally dependent on Chinese credits. For others, China remains a wonder, in its work ethic, in the total success that it achieves in anything that it sets its mind to, in its extraordinary rise within two decades as the largest English speaking country in the 1 Introduction Ahmad Kamal world, and in the exceptional respect that it receives throughout the Third World. This collection of research papers by a group of committed students and diplomats is an effort to bridge that yawning gap in our knowledge about China. Unlike other works about China, these papers do not repeat those aspects of current events that are so summarily dealt with in our media. On the contrary, these papers concentrate on the origins and development of the Chinese character and soul. They remain, however, no more than a basic introduction to a great country and a great people, in the hope that those who read this primer will get a feel for the soul of this country and its people, and be encouraged to delve deeper into a study of its past, its present, and its future. The authors have obviously been given wide latitude in their own research methods and opinions, and have only been guided, but not unduly influenced. Their work should be appreciated as such. With very minor exceptions, this current set of papers on Understanding China does not deal with the well-heeled political and economic themes of China Today. That topic will be dealt with in greater detail in a future project and publication later in the year. 2 Chinese Basics Ahmad Kamal CHINESE BASICS Editor’s Note: The following pages are no more than a quick introduction to Chinese basics, most of which are dealt with in fuller detail in later chapters of this book. Written Chinese About all that most of us know about the Chinese language is that it is written in complex ideograms, unreadable and undecipherable by the average non-Chinese audience. That is enough to deter even the bravest among us from delving deeper into the language. As a result, little or no effort has thus been made to try to have even some basic understanding of this language of one-fifth of humanity. Each ideogram in Chinese represents a complete word or concept. Learning basic Mandarin Chinese requires knowing about 2000 ideograms at least. That number would enable you to read a daily newspaper and reasonably glean the trend of events. However, scholars need to go well beyond that number, and a few have reached as many as 80,000 words. Written Chinese has undergone several simplifications over history. Some words have died out. Elsewhere, recent simplifications attempt to reduce the number of strokes needed to write a word or a concept. Strokes for each ideogram can range from just one to as many as fifteen. Thus : 1 Stroke: 一 yī the number one 2 Strokes: 二 èr the number two 3 Strokes: 女 nǚ woman 4 Strokes: 长 chǎng long or length 5 Strokes: 立 lì to set up or build 6 Strokes: 舌 shé tongue 7 Strokes: 豆 dòu bean 8 Strokes: 非 fēi mistake or error 9 Strokes: 骨 gǔ bone 10 Strokes: 高 gāo height or tall 11 Strokes: 麻 má numb 3 Chinese Basics Ahmad Kamal 12 Strokes: 黑 hēi black 13 Strokes: 鼠 shǔ mouse or rat 14 Strokes: 鼻 bí nose 15 Strokes: 龍 lóng dragon Pinyin The most recent effort at simplification aims at reducing the language into Latin characters, or Pinyin, which makes Chinese relatively easier to learn now. Since Chinese has a richer range of sounds than English, the new Pinyin alphabet has had to allocate some new sounds to standard Latin letters as follows: B = P as in sPin C = TS as in TSar D = T as in sTrange G = G as in Get J = J as in Jam Q = CH as in CHina X = SH as in SHarp ZH = J as in Jasper Z = DZ as in beDS m f n l h s sh = no change Obviously, great care and self-control has to be exercised in correctly pronouncing the ―Q‖ (ch) and the ―X‖ (sh) in Pinyin Chinese, as they are totally different from Western pronunciations. Spoken Chinese Pronunciation is perhaps the most difficult part of spoken Chinese. That is because words are pronounced in four or five different tones, and depending on the tone that is used, the meaning of the word changes completely. For example, the same word – ―MA‖ - can have the following changes in its meaning depending on the tone used: MA Long Flat tone ---- = mother MA Short Flat tone -- = question mark MA Flat then Rising tone __/ = bother MA Falling then Rising tone \/ = horse MA Falling tone \ = scold 4 Chinese Basics Ahmad Kamal A vocal demonstration of this tonal system can be easily heard and appreciated at : http://www.pinyin.org/pinyinTones.cfm Chinese Names Chinese names are normally in three parts. The surname comes first, and is followed by two ―given‖ personal names. This tradition goes back to more than two hundred years when the growing population size made it necessary to give two personal names in order to avoid possible duplications. While one single personal name is still used sometimes, two personal names are much more common. The two personal names are represented by two separate characters. In their alphabetic presentation they can be separated into two separate names, or joined together with a hyphen, or even joined together fully into what looks like a single name. Great care is paid to the choice of the written characters that are to be used for these names.