Chinese Language Learning and Mobile Technologies

China's global influence has increased with its spectacular economic development. With the growing trade and cultural exchange between China and other countries, there is a rapid rising need for Chinese language learning. Although Chinese language is challenging to learn due to its different intonations, complicated shapes, and considerable significance, it still attracts more individuals, organizations, and companies. Advances in mobile technologies provide new opportunities for language learning anytime and anywhere. To meet the diverse demands of students of language learning, many scholars have studied Chinese mobile language learning and developed many mobile applications to improve language learners' skills in listening, speaking, reading, and writing by leveraging the emerging mobile technologies. This chapter reviews earlier studies on mobile technologies employed in Chinese language learning and provides recommendations for future research.

Development of antimicrobial resistance due to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a new coronavirus identified in 2019. This disease, which may cause a serious respiratory infection, has been designated an international public health emergency and is being treated with several types of antivirals, antibiotics, and antifungals. While society works hard to combat the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, it is equally vital to be prepared for the outbreak’s notorious effects on the development of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Antibiotic misuse and overuse are predicted to have serious ramifications for antibiotic stewardship programs and AMR management worldwide. Importantly, the global influence on the creation of novel antimicrobial resistance is uncertain due to a paucity of data on antimicrobial usage during the COVID-19 pandemic. The current pandemic might be a useful tool for depicting the spread of antimicrobial resistance and underlining the difficulties in managing the issue once it has emerged. This review aims to assess available data on bacterial infections in coronavirus-infected patients and to offer insight into the development of AMR in the face of the current public health issue.

The Use of English in SKAM. Exploring Authentic Resources in Learning Norwegian at BA Level at Babe?-Bolyai University

The goal of this paper is to explore how the use of the popular Norwegian web-based TV series SKAM (SHAME) can enhance cultural awareness by exposure to authentic language and to diverse discourse practices that have both a multilingual and a multicultural dimension. English, through the use of anglicisms and code-switching in SKAM, acts as a cohesive factor that reflects the changes within the Norwegian society while building bridges between different cultures because of its global influence, particularly upon the younger generations. These generations no longer perceive English as a foreign language, but rather as an essential part of their personal and collective identity, and this is reflected in their discourse practices. The analysis of the teenage informal discourse in the series SKAM provides insights into the benefits of using authentic resources to acquaint BA students with the Norwegian contemporary culture.

Human Rights and Structural Inequality in the Shadow of COVID-19—A New Chapter in the Culture Wars?

This article takes as its starting point the convergence of two rights-related grassroots movements given momentum by the pandemic’s manifestly discriminatory impact: the push to recognise and address racism as a public health crisis, and the global influence of the Black Lives Matter (‘BLM’) movement. It considers the relevance of this moment to international human rights law, the adequacy of the response from its key institutions, and the conservative backlash, framed within the rhetoric of rights, that is challenging the very idea of structural racism. In doing so, it argues that we are witnessing a new stage of the culture wars around the language, method and assumptions of human rights law with which the discipline must engage pragmatically and strategically.

Canon Studies in China: Traditions, Modernization, and Revisions in the Global Context

Though particular texts have long held culturally foundational authority, debates over the idea of a canon and the texts that are to compose it are a much more recent phenomenon, one that originated in the United States and quickly spread to other countries. The present article situates China in the international trend of canon studies by tracing how the Chinese conceptualization of the canon was modernized in the 1990s by Western ideas when canon studies were introduced to China by Dutch scholar Douwe W. Fokkema. While embracing the Western notion of the canon as always in a dynamic process of change that involves aesthetic qualities as well as a power mechanism, Chinese scholars, under the influence of culturally specific practices of literary criticism, the Confucian principle of the golden mean, and the more recent Marxist teaching of dialectical thinking, refuse to replicate Western discourses, instead adhering to a more dialectical treatment of the mutually antagonistic positions. Moreover, China's rising international status and its pursuit of wider global influence have led Chinese scholars to approach literary (re)historiography as an opportunity to showcase Chinese scholarship and to enhance China's national image.

Transcultural Communication for a Polycentric World

In the era of digitized and globalized 24/7 communication, the one-way vertical flow of media and mediated culture from the West to the East has given way to multiple and horizontal flows, in which Asian countries are playing an increasingly significant role. This is having a profound impact on transcultural communication in a polycentric world. Although the United States and some other western countries still maintain their leading position in the field of global media and communication hardware and software. This article suggests that new actors, harnessing the potential of digital globalization, have emerged in the past decade and provide new avenues for transnational communication. Such changes, it argues, warrant a re-evaluation of how we define the global in terms of media and communication. Focusing on the growing global influence and digital presence of China and other Asian countries, the article suggests that the ascent of Asia contributes to further internationalizing of media and its study.

Saving EU digital constitutionalism through the proportionality principle and a transatlantic digital accord

The article explains the importance of the emerging movement for EU digital constitutionalism (EUDC), which reflects a Union-wide effort to address through regulation the challenges posed by digitalisation. The article outlines the core legislative acts that have been introduced by proponents of EUDC. It describes why EUDC is important for fundamental rights protection and European foreign policy, and how the ‘Brussels effect’ extends the impact of EUDC. It enquires into whether EUDC is sustainable, taking into consideration waning EU global influence and the need for economic growth. The EU needs to strike a balance between fundamental rights protection and economic growth. The proportionality principle is the right tool for this. A proportional approach should be followed in establishing a transatlantic digital accord with the US—an agreement on the basic principles governing the digital space. A more proportional approach will pave the way to such an agreement—giving EUDC a global scope.

Nederlands, een grote taal? Een kwestie van meten

In this article we want to explore the status of the Dutch language. Is Dutch an important language, a ‘major’ one? How do we measure the importance of a language? Is this about the number of native speakers? Or are there other parameters that have to be taken into account? We can check the global influence of a language, the number of translations made, and the presence on the internet, amongst other elements. Ethnologue and UNESCO have developed a classification system to measure the importance and vitality of a language. Whether languages continue to be dynamic is also related to their digital power. In this article we will expand on the status of Dutch and the power of the Dutch digital language infrastructure.