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Liberal English Introduction to this Bilingual Course. Main Points. What is Liberal English? What is liberal education? Why should language-learning be combined with liberal education? Why liberal education gives more emphasis on literature and history?
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Main Points • What is Liberal English? • What is liberal education? • Why should language-learning be combined with liberal education? • Why liberal education gives more emphasis on literature and history? • Is it really useful or necessary for us to know something about the culture or history behind a foreign language?
What is Liberal English? • Liberal English is a combination of English learning with liberal education. • It tries to broaden your spiritual horizon, enrich your minds, cultivate your personalities while at the same time develop your English skills.
It has never been so named and so taught in China and elsewhere. The two words, liberaland English, are put together for the first time by Feng Chuan, a wise old man in Jincheng College. It is a self-coined（自己铸造的）name for a new college course which will run for the first year you are going to spend here, although sometimes it has to be studied by yourselves under the guidance of your teachers or advisers.
Liberal education is a project of education that tries to empower individuals with broad knowledge and transferable skills, thus develop their viabilities and adaptive capacities. Usually it encourages students to be familiar with literature, history and philosophy. Traditionally, liberal education was regarded as something useful for students to enlarge or enrich their minds.
Educators in ancient times thought it can make people both excellent in individual development and in public affairs. So, it’s not only connected with individual self-realization, but also with community-serving. In ancient Greece, it stressed on Homeric epics （荷马史诗）on the one hand, and philosophy on the other hand.
Apart from these, it emphasized rhetoric（修辞学）and oratory（演讲术）, that is, the science and skills of language-using. So, it is combined with language study from the very beginning.
In ancient Greece, liberal education aimed at two goals: One is “to know your self”, and the other, “to be excellent.” The wisest men of that time thought philosophy could help people reach the first goal, because philosophy could bring wisdom to students.
Socrates （苏格拉底）, Plato （柏拉图）and Aristotle （亚理斯多德）were three great philosophers during that time.
Homer （荷马）was the greatest poet of that time. His works, the Iliad（《伊利亚特》）and the Odyssey （《奥德赛》）made a strong influence on Greek people ---- and later, on European history. His work has built itself as the sample of great literature, it has won an unshakable place in the history of Western literature and Western culture. From then on, Greco-Roman literature has been regarded as canons or classics that should be well-studied in any project of liberal education.
In ancient China, Confucius （孔子）stressed the importance of education, especially that of poetry, history, music, ethics and ritual. Later, in Song Dynasty, The Great Learning, The Doctrine of Golden Mean, Analects and The Book of Mencius were regarded as Four Sacred Books or Four Canons. （ 稍后，在宋代，《大学》、《中庸》、《论语》、《孟子》被尊为 “四书” —— 四部圣典。）
In Confucianism, humans are teachable, improvable and perfectible through personal and communal endeavor （通过个人和社会的努力） --- especially through self-cultivation and self-creation. According to Confucius, liberal education is a lifelong education which aims at “going toward perfection or consummation”（止于至善）. It sometimes reminds us another maxim （格言）favored by young Carl Marx, “ I am a human, all the perfection that have been achieved by humans I should have.”
Why study language? • As above mentioned, liberal education tries to expand the student’s scope of knowledge. Now, almost all knowledge is produced, taught and stored in language. A language student, while learning language by reading literary works or historical stories, is being informed with useful knowledge about man, woman, nature and the world.
Language and transferable skills • Another aim of liberal education is to empower students with transferable skills. • Transferable skills are skills that can be used in different fields. • The only weapon that can be used in any field is language. • If you have mastered a language (and the culture behind that language), you are the master who has transcended his own confinement. • To put it another way, language is the magic key that can open every locked door. And behind every door, there are treasures to be found.
Language and Thinking • Language and Thinking are closely connected with each other. Learning how to speak and write correctly is to learn how to put words and things in order. In this sense we may say: to train language skills is to train proper thinking. Only when things are in order in your brain, you can have them in order in reality. That is to say, only those who have thought on their plans vividly and rationally in their minds can take effective actions to fulfill them in reality.
Language, Thinking andAction • In most cases, language help us imagine passionately, think clearly, plan carefully, and then, take proper, thought-out actions effectively. • This explains why liberal education pays so much attention to literature. For literature can sharpen and polish our language ability, and thus increase our power of thinking, and then, our power of action.
Why study a Foreign language? • One reason is that studying a foreign language can make us more sensitive to whatever expressed by words and sentences. • And being sensitive to words and sentences means knowing things and humans much better than those who are not so sensitive. • Foreign language learning can also make us more sensitive to our own language.
However, the only way that leads to lingual sensibility （语言的敏感）is to read more and more both in a foreign language and in our own native tongue. This means to be a bilingual master（双语大师）, or, to be excellent both in Chinese and in English.
Why study fictional stories? • There are so many interesting stories in literary and historical books. Keeping in touch with them is the best way for us to be equipped with knowledge about the past. • The knowledge about the past is the knowledge for the present and, for the future. • So wise are those story-tellers that we always feel inspired and enlightened when we read their wonderful works.
Why study Greek myths? • Greek mythology is the fountainhead of Western literature, art, history and culture. • It laid a foundation for the later development of Western ideas. • To have some knowledge about Greek mythical stories is to share some wisdom or useful experiences with Western people. • These stories are so interesting that I am afraid I cannot find more beautiful, more simple, more pure, more meaningful and more illuminating stories for you to read.
Language and literature • Language and literature are closely connected with each other. • The shortest answer to the question “what is literature” is: Literature is a product of words. It differs from other such products by paying more attention to the art and skills of choosing, arranging and structuring words and sentences.
Why Study History ? • History is for human self-knowledge. Knowing yourself means knowing, first, what it is to be a person; secondly, knowing what it is to be the kind of person you are; and thirdly, knowing what it is to be the person you are and nobody else is. Knowing yourself means knowing what you can do; and since nobody knows what they can do until they try, the only clue to what man can do is what man has done. The value of history, then, is that it teaches us what man has done and thus what man is. ---- R. G. Collingwood
Time in its irresistible and ceaseless flow carries along all created things and drowns them in the depths of obscurity（遗忘的深渊）, but the tale of history forms a very strong bulwark （防波堤）against the stream of time, and does not allow all those valuable things to slip away into the abyss of oblivion.
Why Study Western History ？ • Western history is a mirror or a lamp which may help us know our selves and our world. • Western history is a grand tragic drama. The West has forged the instruments of reason that makes possible a rational comprehension of physical nature and human culture, conceived （孕育出）the idea of political liberty, and recognized the intrinsic worth of the individual. • But the modern West, though it has made great progress in material civilization, has been less successful at finding rational solution to social ills and conflicts between nations.
Science, a great achievement of the Western intellect, while improving conditions of life, has also produced weapons of mass destruction（大规模杀伤武器）. Though the West has pioneered in the protection of human rights, it has also produced totalitarian regimes that have trampled on individual freedom and human dignity （人的尊严）. And although the West has demonstrated a commitment to human equality, it has also practiced brutal racism. In this sense we can say, to study Western history is to prevent us from making the same mistakes in our way toward our future.
Language and literature • Language and literature are closely connected with each other. The shortest answer to the question “what is literature” is that Literature is a product of words, its makers usually pay more attention to rhetoric, that is, to the art and skill of how to choose and structure words and sentences.
Most literary works are narrative literature (叙事性文学) • Since many of literary works are narrative literature, so, to some extent we can also define it as “ the art of storytelling ”. • When I say narrative literature, I mean myths, legends, fairy tales, short stories, novels, etc. • What characterizes all these different forms of literature is storytelling.
Story-telling can benefit us more than what we could imagine • Educators have long known that such an art can contribute to students’ academic and social success as well as their emotional and spiritual well-being. • What a wonder, try to fancy it. No special equipment beyond the imagination and the power of listening and speaking is needed to create those vivid, artistic images.
Storytelling can • Encourage us to explore our unique inner world; • Heighten our ability to express our thoughts and feelings in an articulate, lucid manner. • In our fast-paced, media-driven world, such an art can remind us of “our inborn talent”. • It can also make us realized that our well-organized words are powerful, that listening is important, and that clear communication between people is an art.
One Benefit of Storytelling is Gaining Verbal Skills • And, becoming verbally proficient can contribute to our ability to resolve interpersonal conflict nonviolently. • Negotiation, discussion, idea-exchanging are peacemaking skills. • Being able to express our thoughts and feelings lucidly is important. Clear communication is the first step to live in this world.
Another Benefit is Developing Imagination • Telling a story and listening to a well-told tale encourage us to use our imaginations. • Developing the imagination can empower us to consider new and inventive ideas. • It can contribute to our self-confidence. Believing we are competent and able to accomplish our hopes and dreams can lead us to success.
Still Another Benefit is Passing On Values and Wisdom • Storytelling based on ancient mythology is a gentle way to guide young people toward constructive personal values. • It is also a way to hand down human wisdom. • We need not experience everything for ourselves and we know what is good and wise by being in imaginative situations in which the outcome of both wise and unwise actions and decisions can be seen.
The Meaning of Storytellingin Old Times • Storytelling is one of our oldest skills. Long before modern media entertained us, storytelling was a common pastime, and a good storyteller was a valuable member of the community. • Myths and folktales are one of the oldest educational tools, through which a culture can have values and knowledge passed down from one generation to the next generation.
Listening Can be a Pleasure • Listening to stories can be a vivid creative experience. Wonderful pictures take place in the imagination of the listener. • Through the magic of language and the storyteller's skill, stories can create a lifelike world as colorful as the listener wishes.
How to tell stories in English? • All the secretes and skills lie in stories that are told over and over again in the past. • Before telling stories in English you need first to read, listen stories written and told in English. • The more you do this, the more skillful you are.
ExampleA BOX FULL OF KISSES • The story goes back some time ago, a man punished his 3-year-old daughter for wasting a roll of gold wrapping paper. Money was tight and he became infuriated when the child tried to decorate a box to put under the Christmas tree. Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift to her father the next morning and said, "This is for you, Daddy."
The man was embarrassed by his earlier over reaction, but he was angered again when he found out the box was empty. He yelled at her, “Don’t you know, when you give someone a gift, there is supposed to be something inside?” The little girl looked up at him with tears in her eyes and cried, “Oh, Daddy, it’s not empty at all. I blew kisses into the box. They’re all for you, Daddy.” The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little girl, and he begged for her forgiveness.
Only a short time later, an accident took the life of the child. It is also told that her father kept that gold box by his bed for many years and, whenever he was discouraged, he would take out an imaginary kiss and remember the love of the child who had put it there. In a sense, each one of us, as human beings, have been given a gold container filled with love and kisses from our family members, friends, and classmates. There is simply no other possession more precious than this.
The Golden TouchA Tale from Ancient Greece There was once a king named Midas who did a good deed for Dionysus, the god of wine, and was granted a wish by the god. For his wish, Midas asked that whatever he touched would turn to gold. Although Dionysus tried to dissuade him, Midas insisted that the wish was an excellent one, and then, it was granted!
Excitedly, Midas went about touching all sorts of things, turning them into gold. Soon Midas became hungry. He picked up a piece of food, but he couldn't eat it, for it had turned to gold in his hand! "I will starve," moaned Midas, "Perhaps this was not such a good wish after all!" Midas' beloved daughter, seeing his dismay, threw her arms about him to comfort him, and, she too, turned to gold immediately! "The golden touch is no blessing," cried Midas, “Oh god, please take off this damned spell and have my daughter returned!” Sorry, I will not tell you how this story ends. you can give it a wishful end.
