English in Beijing
China has long had a love-hate relationship with the English language. Since the late 19th century up till the mid-20th century, things were mostly peachy-creamy. Then China fell under the tutelage of the Soviet Union and Russian linguistic influence, and English was largely shunned. After the Sino-American love-fest initiated by Richard Nixon and Deng Xiaoping, English flourished once again as long as Deng was around and his successor Jiang Zemin, who actually knew some English, maintained a benign policy toward the language of Shakespeare. But as increasingly hardline communist leaders rose to power, English came under attack until now, with the puritanical Marxist-Maoist Xi Jinping assuming full-blown dictatorial status, English is under the gun.
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