The Descriptive Ethnographic Study On Chinese Cultural Events Organized By One Of The Confucius Institutes In The United States

With the rapid development of economy,China's international standing has risen notably in recently and foreign exchange has become more and more frequently.The craze for Chinese language has certainly grown due to the improvement of China's international influence.In 2004,America's first Confucius Institute established at the university of Maryland,and in the following years Confucius Institutes have sprung up throughout the United States.Up till December 2017,the United States has launched 110 Confucius Institutes and 501 Confucius Classrooms.Confucius Institutes are carrying out Chinese teaching and cultural events throughout the world,dedicating to promote Chinese language,culture and facilitate cultural exchanges.As a key window for the world to understand China,the importance of its research is selfevident.Through one-year ethnographic fieldwork in one of the Confucius Institutes,the author collected the first-hand information for the research of cultural events.By the points of static and dynamic,the author gave a thick description of the general outline of the Confucius Institute and its cultural events through participant observation and interview.From static point of view,the paper described the background and development of the Confucius Institute,the general outline of cultural events,including distribution and types of these events.Meanwhile,it also described one of representative cultural events “Chinese food club” and its process,and analyzed features of it by using symbolic interactionism theory.From dynamic point of view,it described daily communication of all related people,revealing the process,features and problems of these cultural events,combined with symbolic interactionism and definition of situation theory.By analyzing features and weaknesses of these cultural events,it provided some specific recommendations and experience for the organization of cultural events,promoting sustainable development of Confucius Institutes.