Sometimes I find myself pulling my hair out when I have to force myself to finish reading a piece of work that does not make me want to engage, question or get lost in its deep and intellectually stimulating messages. Sometimes I just want to simply enjoy the art of writing and the act of reading themselves, but this seemingly humble aspiration could be too much of a luxury to ask for. I do not want to pretend that I am a good writer or an interested reader, either. This is precisely the point. How could academic writing engage someone with not much patience nor a gift for writing and reading, like me, to have ‘ah hah’ and ‘wow’ moments? I have kept wondering about this for a long time.

Despite my research interests in academic writing and my long-time love for language, culture and identity, I have continued to be surprised by how, once in a while, a piece of academic work invokes so much emotion, thinking, wondering and self-reflection. This experience does not come often, particularly when there is always so much material to choose from these days. Don’t get me wrong here. I have no intention of sensationalising this book by Wei Ye, Taking Chinese to the World: Language, Culture and Identity in Confucius Institute Teachers. Rather, I would like to offer some thoughts stimulated by a book that has made a deep impression. These thoughts are random.

Like the English language and its global expansion, Chinese and its increasing worldwide spread have been the target of linguistic, socio-cultural, economic, political and geopolitical examination, investigations, analyses, discussions and debates that have, to a large extent, been centred on questions of power, identity, culture, dominance, discourse, ownership and representation. In many ways, so-called controversies and politicised agendas associated with the Confucius Institutes established in numerous countries and educational institutions and supported by China in one or another way are similar to the alleged agendas attributed to the UK’s British Council, for instance.