长春光华学院二十周年校庆 徐航博士演讲

 

Dear Chairman, Principal, Distinguished Guests, Fellows at Guanghua University, All the Students and Alumni, good afternoon. I am Dr Frank Hang Xu, graduated from the School of Foreign Languages at Changchun Guanghua University in 2010. I am greeting to all of you 

from Edinburgh, the United Kingdom. Considering the time difference between China and the UK, I recorded speech in advance.

 

尊敬的董事长、校长、各位贵宾、光华学院的教职同仁、同学以及校友朋友们，大家下午好！我是徐航博士，长春光华学院外国语学院 2010 届毕业生，从英国爱丁堡向各位问好。我考虑到中英两国的时差问题，特意提前录制了这个演讲。

 

Due to the worldwide outbreak of the pandemic, Covid-19, I am unable to fly back to Changchun in person. That is a shame. Nevertheless, via the Internet, I still feel so privileged and delighted to be invited to this historical occasion held at my alma mater. This speech serves as a token of my blessings to the 20th Anniversary Celebration of Changchun Guanghua University. 

 

十分遗憾，因为全球新冠疫情的影响，我无法亲临光华学院来做这个演讲。但我依旧感到十分的荣幸和喜悦能通过网络的形式受邀参加这个具有历史意义的活动：我的母校，光华学院 20周年华诞。我以此视频演讲作为对长春光华学院20周年校庆的献礼。

 

First and foremost, I would like to take this particular opportunity to express my gratitude to both current and former Chairmen of Guanghua University. Without your wholehearted devotion to education, to the founding of Changchun Guanghua University, I would not have had the learning opportunity to complete my undergraduate studies. If that had not happened, all the successive pursuits would not be possible. Every time when I am thinking of this, I am deeply respectful to the chairmen in Guanghua. My true appreciation might not be properly shown in words. 

 

首先，我想借这个特别的机会对现任和前任两位光华学院董事长表达衷心的感谢。如果没有你们对教育事业的全身心投入，没有你们创办的长春光华学院，我不可能有机会完成四年的本科教育，那么我接下去十年的成绩都无从谈起。每每想到这里，我对光华学院的两任董事长满怀敬意，内心最真挚的感激之情非言语可以表达。

 

Apart from that, I feel obliged to the lecturers at Guanghua for your English-teaching with well-trained professionalism. It was none other than you who led me to explore the field of English studies and strongly convinced me that there is a fabulous world behind it. 

 

其次，我想借这个特别的机会对曾经在光华学院教授我英语技能的各位老师表达感谢。正是你们在教学过程中展现的专业素养带领我探索了英语这个学科，并成功地让我见识到英语背后那个充满魅力的世界。

 

Your 4 years’ dedication took me to the doorsteps of English literature. From then on, I am obsessed with a number of literati, including Shelley, Byron, Keats and Wilde. Again, it is your careful guidance that made me fall in love with morphology, syntax, and sociolinguistics. Undoubtedly, in terms of language skills, English literature and western linguistics had prepared me very well, which, later on, initiated a possibility for me to pursue a sort of self&O5534;actualisation and fulfilment in the field of social sciences.

 

是你们四年的敬业奉献，让我开始接触英国文学，从此迷上了一批英国的文人墨客，比如雪莱、拜伦、济慈和瓦尔德。也正是有你们的认真领引，我才会爱上词汇形态学、句法学、社会语言学。毫无疑问，英语文学和西方语言学帮我打下了很好的语言基础，也正是这样的语言基础，后来才给予了我一个可能性，让我可以去追求在社会科学领域中的某种自我价值和自我满足。

 

I am now enamoured with intercultural communication. At present, I am fully involved in intercultural teaching and researching. This field has accompanied me for the last decade from a postgraduate to a doctorate and then a post-doctoral researcher. In addition, it enabled me to travel from China to the UK, from Europe to the United States. Indeed, my engagement with intercultural communication has brought me life enrichment, splendid glories and also  insightful failures. 

 

现在的我痴迷于跨文化交际学，目前我生活的绝大部分时间都被跨文化教学和科研占据。这一晃就是 10 年光阴，跨文化交际学陪伴着我从硕士、博士到后来的博士后研究。 也恰恰是跨文化交际学让我有实力从中国走到英国，从欧洲走到北美。这一路走来，我的专业让我体会到了人生的充实，感受到了绚烂的高光瞬间，但也让我经历过值得反思的失败。

 

In this sense, the 4-year higher education I received at Guanghua did lay a solid foundation for my further studies both at home and abroad. Therefore, I owe you all a BIG THANK YOU. 

 

从这个角度，光华学院四年本科教育无疑为我后来国内外的深造和提升奠定了坚实的基础。为此, 我要再次向光华学院外国语学院表达我最深的谢意。

 

Following my sincere appreciation for the teachers and the school, I intend to offer some personal reflections to the existing students at Guanghua, my fellow students, if you are willing to listen to them. 

 

我表达完对老师和光华外院的真诚感谢之后，很想和学弟学妹们分享一些我的人生感悟，希望你们愿意聆听。

 

The Philosopher Soren Kierkegaard said: “life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards”. The 20th Anniversary Celebration of Guanghua draws me back to the time 

when I was an undergraduate just like what you are now. All that happened more than 10 years ago seems to be a déjà vu, but, with some sort of sophisticated life experience and accumulated 

reflections during the years of learning and working overseas, I hope that I am entitled to make some suggestions for you.

 

哲学家基尔凯格尔说过“人生唯有反思才能被理解，但人生必须不断前行才能被体验”。光华学院 20 周年校庆一下子把我拉回到当年的时光，十多年前那个还在读本科的我，那时的我，就是你们现在的样子。这一切恍如昨日。和你们相比，10 年海外旅居、学习和工作所积攒的些许人生阅历和反思，或许让我有资格以一个学长的身份给你们一些建议。

 

In the first place, please take life in your own hands, life is nothing else but a self-construction.Do not follow suit or do what others demand you to do. Taking the authorship of life, you tell your mates, your teachers, your parents, and even the whole world, what impassion you and what you want to do. Emerson, the American essayist, once said “do not go where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail”.

 

第一点：人生需要自己掌握，它完全是一个自我构建的过程。请不要随波逐流，由别人告诉你要怎么做。让自己成为人生的主人，告诉你的同伴，你的老师，你的父母，甚至整个世界，你所热爱的是什么，你想成为怎么的一个人。美国散文家艾默生说过“不要走别人的路，请开辟一条新路，并留下自己的足迹”。

 

Next, more importantly, when you know what you are doing, please spare no efforts to excel at it. For sure, this pathway would never be smooth, you probably cannot imagine what price you have to pay until you confront the difficulties and obstacles. Facing up with them, you then muster up the courage to undertake this arduous journey with uncompromised determination and impregnable ambition. 

 

第二点，也是更重要的一点, 当你知道要做什么之后，请把你热爱的事业不遗余力地做到极致。当然，道路从来都不平坦，只有当你遇到困难和阻碍的时候，才会意识到你要付出何等的代价。直面这些困难和阻碍，你鼓足勇气，以毫不妥协的决心和坚不可摧的雄心壮志去完成这个艰苦的旅程。

 

It is always easy for us to admire those who have already succeeded and, subconsciously, we attempt to find seemingly justifiable reasons for their achievements, such as a gifted person, a brilliant mind, or having privileged resources. More often than not, we cannot accept such a crystal fact that they are common individuals like us but, differently, they have worked day and night with perseverance. 

我们总是会去羡慕别人的成功，然后帮他们找能够成功地理由，比如他是个天才，他很聪明，他拥有别人没有的资源等等。可是很多时候，我们就是不愿承认这样一个铁一般的事实，他们也和我们一样都是普通人，但是又和我们不一样，他们多了日以继夜的奋斗和坚持不懈。

 

The third, also the last point, before touching the light at the end of the tunnel, you should disregard all forms of criticism, distrust or doubt that are likely surrounding you all the time. Believe in yourself! Eventually, time will prove it as long as you keep on going. Your long&O5534;anticipated success might be delayed, but it would never be absent.

 

第三点也是最后一点，在你触碰到黑暗尽头的光芒之前，请无视你周遭的任何批评、不信任或是质疑。相信你自己，只要你坚持不懈，最终时间会证明一切。你长久期盼的成功和荣耀可能会迟到，但永远不会缺席。

 

Thus, my dear fellow students, do not trivialise yourselves meanwhile do not fanaticise your future. When I started to learn French as the second foreign language, a proverb left me a deep impression. I share it with you here. Pas à pas, on va loin dans un jour. I have written this sentence on the cover of every French learning notebook in order to serve as a reminder: tomorrow’s honour, if any, must come from today’s hard work. Life is too short, so we need to leave all our time for what is worthwhile. To me, commitment to something I am passionate about is definitely meaningful. 

 

因此，亲爱的学弟学妹们，不要把自己看的过于渺小，同时也不要对未来抱有幻想。在这里我和你们分享一句法国谚语 Pas à pas, on va loin dans un jour 意思大概对应汉语中的“不积跬步，无以至千里”。这是当年我刚学习第二外语法语的时候，读到的句子，从那以后，我把它写在了自己每本法语笔记的封面上，用来提醒自己，如果明日有荣耀敲门，它必定始于今日之努力。人生何其短暂，正因为它的短暂，时间只能被有意义的事情所消耗。在我看来，用所有的时间全力以赴自己所热爱的事业便是一种值得。

Towards the final part of my speech today, I also take this chance to address to my alma mater, Guanghua University, for I have heard many inspiring stories in the preceding months. 

 

因为之前听说了许多关于光华发展方面鼓舞人心的故事，在我演讲的最后的这个部分，我也想借用这个机会，和母校光华学院说几句心里话。

 

Over the past two decades, Guanghua has always been striving to strengthen its professional and vocational courses, to enhance its profile of research, to ensure that its students are ready to take on the challenges bestowed by the real world. As one of the alumni from Guanghua University, I take pride in that name. 

 

过去 20 年，光华学院一直在拼搏和发展，一方面努力提升各种专业和职业课程内容，加强科研建设，另一方面也在不断完善学生培养体系，让每一位毕业生都能够自如应对现实世界的挑战。作为光华学院毕业生中的一员，我以拥有这样的母校而自豪。

 

In the meantime, as an academic in intercultural communication, I am more desperate than anyone else to hope that, one day in the near future, Guanghua could develop new modules and embark on research projects, both of which focus on developing students’ intercultural competence, on embedding intercultural education in foreign language learning, on adding intercultural communicative skills to optional courses for all. 

 

同时，作为从事跨文化交际的研究人员，我比任何人都渴望光华学院在不久的将来可以开设以培养学生跨文化交际能力为核心的课程，鼓励教师开展相关的科研项目，让跨文化教育融入外语教学之中，让跨文化教育体现在各专业的公选课之上。

 

Through the pedagogical practice and research activities, Guanghua is not simply expected to demonstrate western cultures in art, literature and drama, but aims to empower its students to contemplate, to analyse and to decipher the cultural differences. In contrast with pure admiration and imitation, we Chinese need to reinterpret and renovate our own culture and values through the lens of learning and understanding the West. Never ever should our own Chinese culture be substituted. From my point of view, this could be the message of a true meeting of the East and the West.

通过教学实践和科研活动，光华不单单只是向学生展示西方国家在艺术、文学、戏曲等方面的文化造诣，而是要着眼于培养学生思考、分析和解读不同文化的能力。我们中国人不应该只是单纯的崇拜和模仿西方文化，我们需要在学习和了解这些西方文化的基础之上，来重现解读，并且复兴自己的文化和价值。在我看来，这才算是东西方碰撞的真正含义。

 

Today, you are 20 years old, let me propose a toast, and wish you a very Happy Birthday. Last but not least, I do hope that Changchun Guanghua University has a much brighter future. Thank you for watching and all the best wishes!

 

今天光华学院 20 岁了，让我们举杯，祝光华 20 岁生日快乐。最后，我衷心祝愿长春光华学院的未来更加璀璨。谢谢各位聆听。