In her speech entitled “Where is globalized me?”, Long Yintai,a noted Chinese writer described her growth and the things that have stricken her with “vigilance” against “globalization”.
    “When I was in university, an American teacher taught us English and demanded every student to choose an English name, because she could not remember scores of Chinese names. So the whole class became Dick, Tom, Harry. I chose "Shirley". Later on, I went to the United States where I taught American students English writing. There were 20-30 students in the class and it was very difficult to memorize all these names. I spent a whole afternoon matching the names with their faces. This made me recall why my English teacher did not spend some time committing our Chinese names to memory but, instead, asked 50 of us to change our names to her convenience?”
    "Isn't it cultural arrogance?" asked Long Yintai.
    This happened in 1975. At that time, the word "globalization" was not widely known, even in the academic world. But, what happened to her made her feel suspicious of the so-called cultural "exchange", which, in fact, means "one-way flow" only.
    Of course, there were many things cropping up later on made this writer experience the cultural "exchange", which, in fact, is "one-way flow" only. At an international writers' forum, a gathering for writers from all countries to discuss international peace and cultural equality, a Chinese writer who is well-versed in Western culture may exchange views with others on Shakespeare, Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe and Ernest Hemingway, but not on Cao Xueqin, Zhuang Zi, Han Feizi or Zhang Ailing, because cultural commodities are mostly one-way export. One day, she wanted to buy a German edition of "Dao De Jing" (Classics on the Ways and Virtues) by Lao Zi. She went to the biggest bookstore in Frankfurt. She searched the section on philosophical works, but failed; she searched the section on literature, she did not find it either. Then she went to the section on books of political sciences, she met the same fate. Where did she find it? In the section of Esoterics. The books by great Chinese philosophers Lao Zi, Zhuang Zi and Confucius were all classified together with books on geomantic omen, birth symbols, Qi Gong and Tai Ji Quan.Can a Chinese bookstore put the works by Plato in the same category of Western astrology?
    Globalization is something that makes people both pleased and uneasy. Pleased, because people have suddenly found more choices, no matter in terms of the brands of detergents or the forms of government; uneasy, because the choices are often forced upon - although people might not feel the coercive force; in fact, the products force-sold to us by developed countries are not necessarily all the best and also because the choices often disrupt the original order at home.
    It is, therefore, of necessity that many people have conflicts of feelings toward globalization. The key to the problem is, in a nutshell, how we should look at our own culture in the torrential waves of globalization and how to cope with this irresistible tide.
    If we compare globalization to a railway that reaches all parts of the world, the best choice is, perhaps, to lay our own rail well and identify the joints. But this does not necessarily mean to ship the goods of others into our own home only. What is more important is to get our own goods ready for shipping out. Please remember: the gauge of the rail should be identical with the rails of other countries. However, the freight in the train should bear the features of our nation and country. Otherwise, who will want such goods that are imitations of others without any unique style, values and particularities.
    This means that we must know how to sell our cultural products worldwide. If you know that your own nation and country have unique aesthetics full of values, what remains to be done is to know how to preserve such aesthetics and carry it forward against the tide of globalization to attract the eye-balls of the people all over the world and even further, put our own culture on the international market.
    In a word, we cannot hollow ourselves out in the course of globalization. Even less should we substitute our own contents with those of others. Just as in the case when Paris wants to compete with New York, will it pull down all its old buildings and streets to build high-rises just like New York? That would become a laughing stock. Why people defy the fatigue of traveling thousands of miles to Ancient Rome? Why people defy the fatigue of traveling thousands of miles to Beijing? Do they want to see the super-modern high-rises in Beijing or the Wangfujing designed by French on the model of Champs Elysees Avenue of Paris?