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Nihao. Hello.

An exchange of greetings across languages should be a simple matter. But when spoken in different cultural contexts, nihao and hello have different meanings.

One language cannot be seamlessly translated into another because culture is entwined with every syllable, and “culture is invisible,” said Guangyan Chen, assistant professor of Chinese.

Chen was teaching American students in China in the 1990s when she realized her students were perceiving a different kind of society than she was. Her teaching style wasn’t resolving the issue, either. Traditional language instruction, which centers on grammar and vocabulary, could not bridge the gap between the cultures.

Nowadays, Chen advocates for a performed-culture approach to language instruction, where context is key to every interaction. She is writing a book about the pedagogical paradigm shift in which she explains how to approach the nuances lacking in the traditional language instruction.

Guangyan Chen was teaching Chinese as a foreign language in her native China when she noticed her American students didn’t have a basic understanding of Chinese culture. Photo by Jeffrey McWhorter

To illustrate: In Chinese, nihao would be used only to request a stranger’s attention, such as when asking for help, Chen said. Saying nihao to an unfamiliar person as a simple greeting would make a speaker fall in the category of “weird.”

China is a far different country from the U.S., Chen said. A large part of the reason is a divergent emphasis on “collectivist culture versus individualist culture.”

In China, the group is everything. “You have to perform according to the group goal,” Chen said. “Keep the harmony within the group — that is the goal. And [it’s] more important than your personal goal.”

Hence, Americans who are used to pushing their individual opinions and ways of doing business would be better served using language to fit into Chinese culture.

Cultural competence will gain more importance as China is poised to take America’s position as the world’s largest economy in terms of gross domestic product within 15 years, according to Bloomberg’s projections.

“The more difference between the two cultures,” Chen said, “the more important culture is in teaching the foreign language.” This philosophy is at the core of her teaching method, wherein she instructs students in conversational Chinese that meets what people in her native culture would expect.

For example, Chen teaches the word for please but explains that it can be used only in a hierarchical, respectful sense. When spoken to a spouse, the word can sound like an insult. “The polite form indicates that the psychological distance is large,” she said, and distance is not a good indicator of the health of a relationship.

Chen also inserts her students into everyday situations, starting with the core of communication: the speaker’s intention. In the business-minded American way, getting the deal done is often the reason for the conversation. But in China, personal relationships, especially as they fit into a group hierarchy, come first. Chinese people, she said, want to get to know their business partners before, well, doing business.

The performed-culture approach, Chen said, is a more sensible way to learn a foreign language. In the traditional language instruction, an average student might gain conversational skills but never learn to communicate with cultural sensitivity.

“Foreign-language teachers play a unique [role in] building global citizens with cultural competence,” Chen said.

An ongoing research study Chen is conducting links mission statements of American universities — which usually include verbiage about global and intercultural competence — to the benefits of a culture-based language-teaching approach.

Chen’s pedagogy fits TCU’s mission to prepare global citizens, said Peter Worthing, professor of history and associate dean in the AddRan College of Liberal Arts. Students, he said, “leave [her] class with a kind of real appreciation for the need to try to understand somebody, not just the words they’re saying but where they come from, their cultural background.”

Guangyan Chen said foreign-language teachers play a unique role in building global citizens with cultural competence. Photo by Jeffrey McWhorter

With foreign-language enrollment plummeting at universities across the country and more people turning to apps to learn translations, the intricacies of language, including cultural components, might be falling by the wayside.

With or without the assistance of software, most people with conversational Chinese skills can accomplish the basics, such as asking for directions or ordering food. But without the underlying cultural understanding of the language, non-native speakers will never become part of any group of Chinese people, Chen said.

If Westerners can learn culturally sensitive language skills, they can operate on an intercultural common ground, Chen said. The long-term benefits could be great for everyone involved, she said. “You could maybe avoid a trade war.”