‘Huge shift': why learning Mandarin is losing its appeal in the West
Mandarin classes in sixth grade in Syracuse, New York, he was studying alongside 20 of his peers. By his final year of high school, only two other students remained, and the school had fewer than 25 Mandarin learners in total.
Soon after he graduated in 2020, the programme was shut down entirely due to dwindling enrolments and budget cuts during the
Covid-19 pandemic
The situation at Porter's school is not unusual in the United States and other countries in the Global North. While data is scarce, the available figures suggest that interest in learning Mandarin – once globally hailed as the language of the future – is waning after years of rapid growth.
In the US, Mandarin language enrolments in universities were down by 25 per cent in 2021 from their 2013 peak, according to the Modern Language Association's most recent report.
Across New Zealand, official data shows a decline in the number of Mandarin learners at secondary school level since 2020.
Meanwhile, university students in Britain pursuing Chinese language studies saw a 35 per cent drop in 2023 compared to their 2016 high, according to data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency.
And even in some European countries like Germany and France where Mandarin learning continues to grow, its expansion is modest compared to other more popular languages.
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‘Huge shift': why learning Mandarin is losing its appeal in the West
When Colby Porter began Mandarin classes in sixth grade in Syracuse, New York, he was studying alongside 20 of his peers. By his final year of high school, only two other students remained, and the school had fewer than 25 Mandarin learners in total. Soon after he graduated in 2020, the programme was shut down entirely due to dwindling enrolments and budget cuts during the Covid-19 pandemic The situation at Porter's school is not unusual in the United States and other countries in the Global North. While data is scarce, the available figures suggest that interest in learning Mandarin – once globally hailed as the language of the future – is waning after years of rapid growth. In the US, Mandarin language enrolments in universities were down by 25 per cent in 2021 from their 2013 peak, according to the Modern Language Association's most recent report. Across New Zealand, official data shows a decline in the number of Mandarin learners at secondary school level since 2020. Meanwhile, university students in Britain pursuing Chinese language studies saw a 35 per cent drop in 2023 compared to their 2016 high, according to data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency. And even in some European countries like Germany and France where Mandarin learning continues to grow, its expansion is modest compared to other more popular languages.
