China Thwarts U.S. Effort to Promote American Culture on Campuses

[Eugene]

Source: New York Times

China Thwarts U.S. Effort to Promote American Culture on Campuses

By Jane Perlez and Luz Ding
Dec. 30, 2018

BEIJING — The American ambassador to China, Terry Branstad, wanted to make what in most nations would have been a routine trip.

One of his favorite schools, Iowa State University, had opened a center to promote American culture in an inland Chinese province, and the laid-back former governor of Iowa was eager to take questions from Chinese students.

The center’s program, largely financed by the State Department, was deliberately benign so as not to offend Chinese government sensibilities. Politics was off the agenda. English lessons focused on fashion, music and sports. An essay-writing contest was called “Bald Eagle & Panda” after well-known fauna in both countries.

But Henan Normal University, a campus set on the Yellow River with a prominent statue of Mao Zedong out front, denied Mr. Branstad permission to visit the center this fall — and offered no explanation.

The rebuff underscored how the United States and China compete not only in trade and technology, but also over the values and beliefs that define their societies, an echo of the Cold War with the Soviet Union.

-snip-

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/30/world/asia/china-american-centers-culture.html

[bitterross]

1. Good for them.

Would you want to turn your country into Trump's America by letting us in to preach the values the GOP preaches here. Anyone appointed by Trump has got to be unwelcome.

[silverweb]

2. Exactly.

It's fine to have "cultural exchanges" to learn about each other, but it is not cool to go into another country to try to change their culture to be more like ours. It's rude and disrespectful, very arrogant, and quite frankly, disgusting.