Intellectuals at US universities have become China-friendly. After decades of huge profits from an influx of Chinese students.
Today academics from these US universities offer a Chinese slanted version of today's facts.
Case in point Aldo Musacchio an expert on Brazilian business at Brandeis University.
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It didn't start today. It started as soon as Deng opened up. i
CHINA'S LEAP TO AMERICAN CAMPUSES
November 15, 1981,
This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996.
Wang Qing's 'most unforgettable moment' in the United States was her introduction to hamburgers, pizzas and hot dogs. The Chinese nutritionist, who arrived here last year to study food science at Queensborough Community College, was overwhelmed by the fast foods she had read about while working in Peking. She dashed off a letter to her colleagues in the Peking Food Research Institute: 'Just now I'm seeing them and tasting them. Terrific! Delicious! I regret to say, however, the more I eat the more I feel sick in my stomach. I hope that the painfulness in my stomach is the result of the time difference rather than the eating habits.'
Wang Qing is one of 6,500 students from the People's Republic of China who are experiencing life in the United States for the first time. For many like her, the reaction initially is one of discomfort. Some of the Chinese students have managed to adapt to life here with astonishing ease, but most have remained isolated and alienated from American society.
A little over three years ago, there were virtually no mainland Chinese students here. But since then, students and scholars have arrived in the United States to study everything from ballet to nuclear physics to capitalist recessions. During that time, they have witnessed the election of an American President, discovered that hot dogs aren't really dog meat, and realized that foreigners are as easily the victims of urban crime as the rest of the population.
What the students learn about this country and how their view of China changes hold tremendous potential for the future. Most will return to their homeland to assume positions of influence at a time when the Chinese Communist Party is emphasizing technical expertise over political orthodoxy. Sidney Rittenberg, an American who has lived in Peking for more than 30 years and who is currently an adviser to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences there, says, 'Professional and academic talents are in demand there now to an unprecedented extent. These trained intellectuals will likely take over leadership posts from old bureaucrats.'
Most Chinese here today are unaware of the historical precedent to this exchange. A little over a hundred years ago, in 1872, the Qing dynasty began a program to send annual contingents of 30 youths to stay in the United States for 15 years. The aim, like that of the Chinese Government today, was to learn Western know-how. Although the program was ended abruptly nine years later when conservatives opposed to Western teaching came to power, it proved a wise investment for the West, producing a group of influential Chinese sympathetic to the United States.
The present group of 6,500 Chinese in the United States exceeds the total number of mainland students now in Britain, France, West Germany and Japan. (In comparison, between 1950 and 1963, China sent only a total of 8,000 trainees to the Soviet Union and the Easternbloc countries.) At present, the Soviet Union has only about 50 students in the United States and none in China.
Throughout the United States, the Chinese students are now attending more than l60 universities and colleges, with large numbers in New York, California, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. More than 500 are now in New York City alone.
A disproportionate number of these students are the offspring of high officials. The son of Huang Hua, the Foreign Minister, is a Harvard sophomore. A daughter of a Deputy Prime Minister is at Brandeis. The daughter and grandson of the president of the Chinese Academy of Science are both at New York universities. Some high Chinese officials, like Song Renqiong, who heads the Organization Department of the Communist Party, have several children and their spouses studying here at the same time. These students' firsthand accounts of this country will naturally be of great interest to their powerful parents. Some have told Americans that they expect to inherit the mantle of power one day.
Deng Zhifang, 30, the son of Deng Xiaoping, China's paramount leader, arrived in January last year on a Chinese Government scholarship. Mr. Deng, who is studying for a doctorate in physics at the University of Rochester, got high grades during his first term and won a teaching fellowship. Thin, with long hair parted to one side and a hint of a mustache shadowing his upper lip, he wears Chinese glasses with heavy black plastic frames that almost obscure his eyes. On a Thursday afternoon, after classes have finished for the semester, he is hunched over a desk in the sun-filled physics library, wearing green plastic slippers and a denim Chinese worker's outfit. Piled around the desk are heavy bound volumes of scholarly journals, a stained plastic mug, a dog-eared English-Chinese dictionary and, 'to improve my English,' a copy of Newsweek.
Although he is one of the best students in the department, Mr. Deng insists he is 'just ordinary. My opinions and experience are the same as all the other Chinese students'.' Despite his father's position, Mr. Deng is in many ways typical. He studies in the library every day, including weekends. Sometimes he lets himself in with his own key before the librarian arrives in the morning, and he often stays past closing hours at night.
Mr. Deng says he jogs and rides his bicycle to keep in shape. He shuns parties and concerts but, according to a physics-department secretary, he recently took time off from his books to attend the campus wedding of a Taiwanese couple.
About half of the Chinese studying here - 3,250 - are officially sponsored by the Chinese Government, which allots them travel expenses in addition to a monthly stipend of about $600. More than 70 percent of this group are visiting scholars, a classification that entitles them to audit courses tuition-free. The rest are degree-seeking undergraduate or graduate students, many of whom have received tuition waivers from their American universities.
Unlike the Chinese who were sent to study in Canada in the early 1970's, only a small minority of the students here are members of the Chinese Communist Party. Most are chosen for their seniority or ability, rather than political reliability. In a group of 31 Government-sponsored students who came last fall, only two were party members.
The vast majority of the students sent by the Government are studying science and technology, with only about 15 percent majoring in the social sciences and humanities. These students are typically in their late 30's or 40's, university graduates, and male. Almost all are married, and their families in China continue to receive their regular salaries in their absence, which is normally two years in duration.
The independent students have managed to come here by dint of personal enterprise, private scholarships or generous relatives. Like the Government-sponsored students, only a minority are party members. They are generally younger, unmarried, and a larger number of them are women. Some were college students in China, but others have been ordinary factory workers, their salaries stopped in their absence. Many are studying English, but some have decided to major in such diverse fields as nursing, Middle Eastern history, music and business administration.
The majority of the Chinese students are as studious as Deng Zhifang, but not all reach his level of achievement. The results have sometimes been tragic. Last year, a 41-year-old mathematician at Rutgers left a suicide note before electrocuting himself. A few months later, another student at a small private college in the Boston area also committed suicide. Both were apparently depressed over their academic performance.
'The students come with high expectations of getting A's, of being stars,' says Michael Baron, an American political scientist and former coordinator of Columbia University's exchange program with China. 'But then they get C's and D's. That is a serious problem for them emotionally.'
One professor at a university in New York, mindful of the recent suicides, worried over how to terminate the studies of one of his Chinese graduate students who was doing poorly. Finally, he hit on a solution that would allow the student to save face. He said that funds for the student's scholarship had run out.
A recent survey indicates that an inadequate knowledge of English is the main problem for the Chinese students. Nearly 60 percent need additional language training after they arrive in the United States. Briefings, organized by the Chinese Ministry of Education or the Academy of Sciences, offer crash courses on American culture, explaining customs such as Thanksgiving and St. Valentine's Day. Still, the courses have proved woefully inadequate for the strange new world the Chinese encounter.
One of the greatest sources of culture shock has been the difference in sexual mores. Most of these Chinese students are disconcerted by what they see as the decadent, immoral behavior of their American classmates. But, free of their past constraints, a few are eager to try out this style of life themselves.
One 40-year-old student from the University of Missouri headed for Times Square upon arriving in New York for a vacation. For $3.50, he watched three hours of hard-core pornographic films. 'They showed everything,' he says with amazement. 'I wish my wife could have seen it with me.' Then he quickly adds, 'If they showed films like that in China, the young people would commit crimes.'
China today is still very puritanical: Premarital and extramarital sex is rare; offenders are usually publicly criticized. Homosexuality, virtually unheard of, is against the law. Divorce is more often than not denied by the courts.
As a result, the encounters of Chinese students with Americans of the opposite sex have often been awkward. 'Chinese men are up-tight about even talking to a woman,' says Columbia's Michael Baron. 'When a woman is friendly, they don't know what to do. Is this a come-on, or is she just being nice?'
For example, a 25-year-old Chinese student at Columbia University posted a small notice on a department bulletin board for a share in an apartment. One morning on a crowded elevator, to his intense embarrassment, a vivacious student who said she wanted to learn Chinese offered to let him move in with her. She babbled on about the location and rent until he escaped, blushing, three floors later.
Some students say their Government discourages them from romantic entanglements with Americans. As one visiting scholar says, 'If a student planned to marry an American, he would marry first and tell the embassy later.' Li Cunxin married Elizabeth Mackey, an 18-yearold Floridian, two days before he was to depart for Peking.
Mr. Li, 20, one of the most promising dancers at the Central Institute of Dance in Peking, was chosen in 1979 for an 18-month apprenticeship with the Houston Ballet. On the eve of his scheduled return in late April, he told the Chinese consul general in Houston that he had married Miss Mackey, a student dancer, and wanted to stay in the country with her. After a 21-hour 'meeting' at the consulate, Mr. Li was permitted to rejoin his bride. United States immigration officials have since granted resident status to Mr. Li. This past summer, he became a soloist with the Houston Ballet.
What has uniformly impressed this first group of Chinese students about America is its abundance: soaring skyscrapers that dwarf the 17-story, deluxe-class Peking Hotel; glittering department stores; supermarkets abundantly stocked with food imported from all over the world - and the immense piles of garbage.
For the Chinese, America's sidewalks strewn with the remains of consumerism are veritable treasure troves. One Chinese mathematician furnished his entire apartment - from bureau to sofa to color television set -from trash piles on the street. To discard even a plastic bag is unheard of in China, where a small heap of garbage represents the refuse of a dozen families.
Although they are delighted by the abundance, the students are alarmed by inflation and puzzled by taxes. While the Governmentsponsored students are safely ensconced in the womb of state welfare, the independent students must fend for themselves. Some supplement incomes by working - albeit illegally, since they are on student visas. They sew in Chinatown garment sweatshops or moonlight as waiters - the way newly arrived Chinese have done for decades. 'The tips are good,' says one student at an Ivy League college who is a part-time waiter at a popular off-campus Chinese restaurant. 'I can usually make between $50 and $100 a day.'
Not all the students think of working to get more money. Struck by the affluence of society here, a minority of Chinese students are unabashedly asking for handouts. As a result, some academics involved with the exchange are growing annoyed by the assumption on the part of some Chinese that university funding is a bottomless pit.
One professor, who prefers to remain anonymous, says that within two months of their arrival, the Chinese scholars in his department wrote a letter asking to be paid for their research work. The original agreement, according to the professor, was that the Chinese Government would pay the scholars stipends and the American university would supply the research facilities. The incident, which ended in the college's turning down the request, left bad feelings on both sides. The professor reports that now there is great reluctance in the department to bring in more exchange students.
For the United States, the exchange is a long-term investment, and an opportunity for Americans and Chinese to learn about each other through firsthand contact. But despite these intentions, the Chinese here are not integrating well. One reason is that they tend to bury themselves in their books. Another is that many prefer to share an apartment with other Chinese rather than Americans, even though their English and their understanding of the United States suffer as a result. 'We have different customs,' one student explained.
Now encouraged by their Government to meet their Taiwanese counterparts, some Chinese students share apartments with them. But while they have a common history and culture, most relationships remain superficial. One reason for the coolness, perhaps, is that the students say they have been cautioned against Taiwanese agents masquerading as students - some Taiwanese students have complained of this intimidating infiltration as well.
Compared with the first Chinese students sent to Canada in the early 1970's, who were closely monitored by their embassy, these students appear to be relatively free from surveillance by Peking. 'There are too many of us now,' one student says matter-of-factly. 'They have no way of keeping track of us.' Most students' contact with their embassy is limited to receiving their monthly stipend and, for those based in New York or Washington, an occasional film or reception.
At Harvard University, Huang Bing, the son of China's Foreign Minister, sat at his small wooden desk this past spring reading a thick economics text and fighting off a bad cold. His spartanly furnished room was the tidiest in the Harvard Yard suite he shared with three Americans. In contrast, their common bathroom was strewn with dirty socks, open tubes of toothpaste, and towels rank with the previous week's sweat. Mr. Huang, then a freshman, plans to major in economics. He is on a full scholarship from Harvard. While he avoids parties, because hard rock 'gives me a headache,' he likes the gentle pop music of the singer John Denver. To relax before going to bed, he indulges in a gin-and-tonic nightcap from a small bottle of Beefeater that he keeps in a desk drawer. Once in a while, Mr. Huang, who speaks impeccable English, goes to a movie at an inexpensive repertory cinema near Harvard Square. His favorite film last spring was 'Star Wars.'
'My roommates are the wild type,' said the 20-year-old, who dresses in jeans and jogging shoes. 'They bring girls overnight every now and then. Sometimes they smoke pot. They've never offered me any pot because they know I'd refuse. But we get along.'
A few Americans have managed to become friends with the Chinese students. One of them is Frank Kehl, an adjunct professor of anthropology at Queens College, who speaks Cantonese and Mandarin. Mr. Kehl frequently invites groups of students to the beach or to his home for Chinese New Year or Thanksgiving dinners. Although he likes his invariably polite, appreciative guests, he finds there is still a chasm between him and the Chinese. 'Friendship between ordinary Americans and ordinary Chinese has a long way to go before inhibitions and barriers break down,' he says. 'Right now, we're each in the outer orbit of the other's atoms.'
Like most students, the Chinese students revolve their lives around school. Few know anyone outside the university except for Americans who have a special interest in China and seek them out. They rarely attend cultural events, because of both language and budgetary restrictions. And though their propaganda has always exhorted them to 'unite with the proletariat,' most have virtually no contact with workers.
For the Chinese, one unpleasant volt of off-campus culture shock is the ever-present danger on the streets of America's big cities. Conspicuous in their baggy clothes and short-cropped hair, and accustomed to carrying cash rather than checks or credit cards -two items that don't exist in China -the students make easy marks.
Gao Zongze, an urbane, articulate lawyer on an exchange with a New York law firm, was waiting for a subway train in a semideserted station. A young man sat down next to him. Suddenly, his arm was around Mr. Gao, his knife at the lawyer's throat. To the few bystanders not far away, it looked as though the two were old friends. Mr. Gao quickly handed over his wallet.
Despite such encounters, many of the Chinese feel their experience here is worthwhile because the education they are receiving is better than the one they would get in China. 'Independent thinking and flexibility are encouraged at the graduate level,' says Xu Yixie, a brilliant young physics student in a doctoral program at Columbia University, who placed third in the national competition to study here. 'This is decisive for future research work. In China, methods are stricter and there is a great deal of emphasis on memorization.'
Miss Xu thinks Chinese undergraduate programs, however, are better. 'Our professors are stricter,' she says. 'They give more lectures and homework. Standards are tougher.' In fact, only 4 percent of Chinese youths can attend college, compared with 45 percent in the United States.
'There's no question that Americans are more advanced in the sciences,' said Tang Zhisong, 56, a senior researcher at the Institute of Computing Technology in Peking, who arrived in September 1979 to do two years of research in computer science at Stanford University. Reflecting on this experience, he said that while Chinese were just as strong as Americans in theoretical work, they lagged behind in technology. 'We just don't have the conditions back home,' he said, noting that while every Stanford scientist had his own terminal, his institute colleagues must work at one main computer.
Mr. Tang had enjoyed his research at Stanford. 'I was very free,' he said. 'No one interfered with me. One of our problems in China is that research institutes and schools are administered just like factories.' Mr. Tang said that back home he had had no voice in policy decisions, which were in the hands of nonprofessionals. 'That makes me very angry,' he said. Later, he insisted, 'This has nothing to do with politics.'
'One good thing about the U.S. is that I haven't gotten mad since I've been here,' he said. But Mr. Tang was not interested in staying permanently, even though he probably could have a good research job here if he wanted it. His reason was simple, profound and typical of many of the Chinese students. 'I love China,' he said quietly, after a half-hour diatribe against the drawbacks of doing research back home. 'It's my country. I have no roots here.'
Yang Shude, a visiting scholar at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, expressed similar sentiments in a poem entitled 'I Came to Go Back,' which was published last spring in The People's Daily in Peking. A swirl of people of many kinds and colors, from every country in the world, but my heart, at all moments, is beating loyally in time with that of my homeland, - in this noisy crowd, in this blizzard that blinds, and in the quiet laboratory while I'm studying through the long night ... I am not a wandering vagabond, I am not a leaf searching for the roots of its tree, I am a citizen of the great China, I came - to go back! - I once said this in parting with my homeland. My heart was not full of the sorrow of parting, but of the pride of the descendants of the Chinese people, and deep love for my homeland!
For most of the students, family and cultural ties are strong, and permanent residence in the United States is out of the question. Some students fear unemployment if they stayed and, eventually, a lonely old age in a society they feel cares little about the elderly. When directly questioned, only a few of the Chinese students will say frankly that they would like to remain.
Upon their return, the students expect to work in their chosen fields. It will be the first sign of the program's failure if they do not. Huang Bing, the Harvard sophomore, wants to put his economic expertise to work for the State Planning Commission. Deng Zhifang, the son of Deng Xiaoping, expects to teach or do research when he returns to China.
Some believe that the Chinese, especially those in their 40's, would not be successful here if they chose to stay. 'They couldn't function here,' says John K. Tien, a Chinese-American metallurgist at Columbia University who had four Chinese studying with him this past year. 'They like to stay with the crowd. They're afraid to stick out, to be above average. That way they can always keep up, but they can never go forward.'
No one knows for sure how many students will choose not to return to China. For Taiwan, the brain drain has been a serious problem in the past, with as many as 90 percent of its overseas students refusing to return.
In some fields, there would indeed be a crisis if many mainland students chose to stay. For instance, about 90 percent of the first class of the Peking Institute of Theoretical Physics is now studying in the United States.
The State Department unofficially estimates that perhaps 10 percent of the privately sponsored students will opt to stay. If the Government-sponsored students request political asylum, a State Department official says, it most likely will be denied by the Immigration Department. The Chinese leader, Deng Xiaoping, has been quoted in Peking, and by exchange students here, as saying that the program will still be worthwhile even if 10 percent don't return.
Yet a more serious problem might be caused by those who do return. The most profound experience the Chinese students here are having, many of them say, is their brush with American freedom and democracy. The students themselves predict that at least some who return will stray from the path of Communist orthodoxy. 'Of course, there will be some dissidents,' says one young Chinese physicist. 'Many of us studying in America will have had our eyes opened. We will think more independently when we go back.'
American officials are hoping that the current exchange will produce a generation of influential Chinese sympathetic to the United States, much as the program of 1872 did. 'We're encouraging the Chinese to send over as many as are accepted by American universities,' says Conrad L. Bellamy of the China desk of the State Department. 'We are helping the Chinese catch up technologically from the disastrous Cultural Revolution.'
China's current experiment in modernization is unprecedented in scale, and the thousands of Chinese studying science and engineering here are expected to improve the country's standard of living by the end of the century. But because the welfare of a billion people is involved, 20 years may be too short a time in which to see more than minimal improvements. The first group of students may return to become not so much researchers as the middle-management link between the old guard and future groups of American-trained scientists.
Perhaps more important than acquiring expertise, these students have touched life here. They will constitute a corps of highly trained individuals who will temper Communist China's decades-old suspicion of the United States and provide a better understanding of this country's strengths and weaknesses. Certainly, China will find it harder, if not impossible, to return to its previous era of isolation.
A version of this article appears in print on Nov. 15, 1981, Section 6, Page 82 of the National edition with the headline: CHINA'S LEAP TO AMERICAN CAMPUSES. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe |
