Meet Yi Tang, the new Chinese director of the Confucius Institute at Queen Mary. In her profile, she tells us about her plans for the Institute, celebrating Lunar New Year and learning the piano.
On 29 December 2020, Queen Mary and the Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (BUPT) signed a cooperation agreement to develop the Confucius Institute Since last year, I have had the honour of being the Chinese Director of the Confucius Institute, and I came to London earlier this month. Before coming to Queen Mary, I was the deputy director of the Teaching Affairs Office at BUPT, responsible for undergraduate programme reviews, curriculum design, teaching and learning consultation, and assessment.
The Confucius Institute makes an important contribution to both Queen Mary and BUPT by strengthening and deepening the cooperation between both institutions through enhancing academic and research collaboration.
As the new Chinese director, I have four aims for the coming year: enrich teaching resources and to lead our lecturers to teach in a systematic and structured way, provide more training to local Chinese language teachers, help Queen Mary colleagues to include Chinese in the Modern Languages BA, and, support international cooperation and partnership among students and staff in both universities.
Like the eponymous zodiac animal, people born in the Year of the Tiger are vigorous and ambitious, daring and courageous, enthusiastic and generous. I like those qualities and am very happy to start my new career during the Year of the Tiger. The Confucius Institute will be putting on a Lunar New Year concert at Octagon in the evening on Thursday 3 February. Welcome to our lunar new year eve.
I heard that there will be the lion dance performance at the National Maritime Museum on 29January, in China Town on 1 February and in Trafalgar Square on 6 February. The National Maritime Museum in Greenwich is also holding a fantastic Lunar New year Celebration. Back in mainland China, it has become a tradition to watch the New Year's Gala on New Year's Eve.
The first thing that drew my attention when I visited Queen Mary was the diverse cultural backgrounds of my colleagues and students. Having the chance to work in such a multicultural environment is the best thing about my current job. My Queen Mary colleagues are of different nationalities and races, and are from different cultural backgrounds - working with them offers me a precious opportunity gain a greater appreciation of the world’s diverse cultures. Our colleagues are so friendly and inclusive, and I have a lot from being part of a multicultural group.
The most amazing place on campus must be Queen's Building and Octagon. When I heard about Queen Mary years ago, the elegant and magnificent building in the pictures impressed me. I am really honoured that our Confucius Institute office is located in the Queen's Building. The Octagon, with it’s brightly coloured leather bound books has prompted me to explore the history of these place.
It is really inclusive. Students in the same class are from different countries and regions, of different ages, and in different programmes. This environment will expose students to diverse cultures and prepare them to be open-minded global citizens. The co-existence of different customs and rituals on this campus reminds me of a famous Chinese saying: “A single flower does not make spring, while one hundred flowers in full blossom bring spring to the garden”.
If I hadn't been the Chinese director of Confucius Institute, all I would have liked to be a museum volunteer. When I visit a city, the first thing I do is to explore the local museum. Museums are incredible channels for me to learn about a city or a country. Each artefact tells its own story and I want to explore the rich histories, write them down, and convey them to other people.
I learnt to play the piano when I was in my 30s. But my skill is still limited. I spend most of my leisure time listening to classical music. My piano teacher, Thomas, was an Austrian graduate student who came from Vienna University to China as an exchange student. The amazing thing was that he taught me piano in Chinese. Yes, I learned from him that European people were linguistic geniuses. At that time, we learned from each other – I was so inspired by him and decided to devote myself to helping more overseas students learn Chinese.