From Rags to Riches in One Easy English Lesson

Slumdog Millionaire is a rags to riches story. But not just in the way you think. The Chinese have taken note of the part where the slum kids are at slum school reading ‘The Three Musketeers’ in English. That strikes a very strong chord in China, where recently billboards have appeared in remote and poor villages that proclaim (in English) “Success in English means Success in Life.”
I was asked by a Chinese academic recently, do poor children in India really know English? He was impressed to hear that you can indeed find slum children in Mumbai or Delhi who can prattle away (albeit with a limited vocabulary) in English. It made him very, very thoughtful.
Why does it matter what slum kids speak? No one in Europe would consider Indian slum kids much competition in the world jobs market.
But China wants to be ahead. And it wants to be ahead of India. In a globalised world countries who can manufacture cheaply AND speak English, so can provide cheap services, will be a global economic superpower all the way up and down the production pyramid.
Currently China “outsources” much of its internationally-oriented management, and services to Hong Kong, with its English-proficient population. But China is looking into the future. And services rather than production will become bigger in the future.
You would think that China already regards itself as being ahead of India economically, so why regard it as a rival in this regard? However, at a recent International Symposium on cross border investment organised by the Judge Business School in Cambridge, Chinese delegates became quite prickly about the number of Indian businessmen invited to share the same platform. They wanted ‘Asia’ to themselves. That was not what you would expect from a nation that is confident about being ahead. Or perhaps they did not want to be shown up for speaking poor English.
Chinese children now learn English in primary school, and that tells you a lot about the priorities of the Chinese government. If you could stop the clock and wait for these children to grow into adulthood, any one of them could take on an Indian slum kid at reading ‘The Three Musketeers’. That is the thinking in Beijing, which specialises in the long view. But of course India is expanding its education generally, and has a younger population, so the number of India’s English speakers will always overtake China’s. Right?
Not everyone would agree, including applied linguist David Graddol. In a new British Council study “English Next India”, to be published early next year Graddol says India is not learning English “fast enough.”
“Much of the world is catching up (on India) in terms of the English proficiency of their populations,” he said at the British Council’s palatial building tucked between the big international banks in the centre of New Delhi. In fact, China may soon have more people who speak English than India, he predicted.
Now that could be frightening if it wasn’t absurd.
Graddol has gathered an impressive array of statistics for his report even delving into India’s census statistics, where few academics dare to tread. But he is unable to say how many Indians speak English. Others put the figure at anything between 15 million people and 35 million people.
But even those who are not officially proficient in English – many slum kids would be among them – will hear people speak English around them. They see the big advertising hoardings in English and they hear English on the Radio and TV, even if they tune into Hindi channels. It may be a mish-mash of Hindi and English but they will understand those English words.
That is not the case in China. Anyone who has been in a Chinese classroom will know that the way English is taught is far, far from the living, breathing way it is experienced in India.
China’s universities do not teach in English as many of India’s do. Its legal system (if it can be said to have one at all) does not operate in English as India’s does, it barely has any English language newspapers, and no English TV channels compared to India’s vibrant media landscape.
There are very good reasons that some prefer to do business in India rather than China, and the culture and rule of law are part of it.
That is not to say that there are not Chinese people who speak very good English. Many do. What appears to interest China more, though is India’s emergence as an outsourcing magnet and as a general service industry backroom processing centre, due in large measure to the level of English. Of course India’s real export earner, as a software-IT hub does not merely depend on English language skills.
Graddol said: “India will need many more people speaking English to sustain its economic growth.” That may be so. But if it looses business that requires English to other countries, it is hardly likely to be China. If it were just about English, and only English, it might loose business to The Philippines, but never to China.
The British Council has every reason to be pushing English (and textbooks and courses) overseas. It is big business for British publishers. But it is guilty of overstating the case for English.
To suggest that any country an internal market size of India or for that matter China, Russia or Brazil’s will “fall behind” without English is patently absurd. Japan became an economic power without English.
English is an important economic skill. But it is not enough to get slum kids out of the slum. And equally, a nation’s economic fortunes does not dependent on it.