April 20 – Chinese Language Day

21 April 2025

Chinese Language Day, celebrated on April 20, was established in 2010 and is dedicated to the memory of Cang Jie, the founder of Chinese writing.

Cang Jie's name was first mentioned in the philosophical treatise of the 3rd century BC "Xun Tzu". It says: "There were numerous experiments in creating writing, but only the signs created by Cang Jie were accepted and exist to this day."

Written Chinese is considered one of the most complex in the world. About 80 thousand hieroglyphs are used to express all its richness. However, 3-5 thousand symbols are enough for everyday use. In addition, it is one of the most ancient languages existing on the planet.

Chinese is the official language of the PRC, Taiwan and Singapore. In total, over 1.3 billion people speak it in the world. The huge number of native speakers led to the inclusion of Chinese among the six official and working languages of the UN.

Since 2022, Petrozavodsk State University has been training students in the program "Russian as a Foreign Language, Chinese Language". Among the students, there are those who have already been on an internship in China.

Eva Radetskaya, a student at the Institute of Philology, said:

“The internship program provided for an in-depth study of the Chinese language and Chinese culture (calligraphy, painting, wushu, tai chi, etc.). The learning process was unusual for me, because the language classes were conducted exclusively in Chinese using authentic resources (videos, films, books). At first, it was unusual to perceive a huge flow of information exclusively in the original language (without an intermediary language), but I soon managed to adapt. After successfully mastering the training courses, I received a Certificate of Completion.

The Chinese language is taught by professional philologist Wang Shichu, a native Chinese speaker. She came to Petrozavodsk not only to teach the students Chinese, but also to introduce them to Chinese culture and the life of modern China.

Also in 2024, PetrSU opened a bachelor's degree program "International Relations with Chinese as a Second Foreign Language".

In 2025, admission to the bachelor's degree program "Linguistics. Russian as a Foreign Language, Chinese Language" has already been announced.

Whoever wants to study Chinese is welcome to PetrSU!