Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg recently surprised Chinese students when he spoke to them in Chinese. In a talk at Tsinghua University in Beijing, Zuckerberg spoke Chinese for about 30 minutes. Although his Mandarin was far from perfect, students and faculty cheered his effort.
Facebok创始人马克·扎克伯格最近用中文同中国学生交流，把他们都惊呆了。在清华大学的一次演讲中，扎克伯格说了大约30分钟的中文。虽然他的普通话远不够标准，清华师生们都为他的努力喝彩。
Clayton Dube is the head of the U.S.-China Institute at the University of Southern California. He praises Zuckerberg's effort and thinks more American CEOs should learn foreign languages.
克莱顿·杜贝（Clayton Dube）是南加州大学美中学院负责人。他称赞了扎克伯格的努力，并认为更多美国的CEO们应该学习外语。
"To speak Chinese means you begin to think as Chinese people do. You begin to understand how Chinese speakers have the world organized, how they perceive things. And that is a vital step if you're going to be culturally competent."
杜贝说，“说中文意味着你开始按中国人的方式思考。你开始了解中文人士如何让社会组织起来，你开始了解他们如何看待事物。如果你希望具备文化竞争力，这是必不可少的一步。”
Zuckerberg's talk raises a larger question: is Chinese the language of the future? Could it replace English as the world's international language? Mandarin Chinese already has the most native speakers of any language. And, China may soon pass the United States as the world's largest economy.
扎克伯格的演讲引出了一个更大的问题：中文是未来的语言吗？它是否会取代英语成为国际通用语言？以普通话为母语的人数已经超过了任何语言。而且，中国可能很快超过美国成为全球最大的经济体。
The study of the Chinese language is increasing in the United States and around the world. In 2009, about 60,000 American college students were studying Chinese. That is three times as many as in 1990.
学中文在美国和世界各地不断升温。2009年大约有6千名美国大学生在学中文，是1990年的三倍。
A small but growing number of American parents are even sending their children to bilingual Chinese immersion schools. Leianne Clements has no cultural connection to China, but her children are learning Chinese at the Yu Ying Public Charter School in Washington D.C. Every other day, classes at this school are 100 percent in Chinese. Ms. Clements thinks knowing Chinese could give her children a competitive advantage.
甚至有为数不多但数量却不断增长的美国父母把孩子送到双语的中文浸入式教学学校。莱昂尼·克莱门茨（Leianne Clements）和中国并无文化关联，但她的孩子们正在华盛顿特区的育婴公立特许学校学习中文。这个学校每隔一天全部用中文上课。克莱门茨女士认为，懂中文会给她的孩子提供一种竞争优势。
"So far, English has kind of been the universal language, but more and more, with Chinese businesses and just the amount of industry that they have there it seems that that would be, you know, logical thing that could be happening or it seems like it would make you a valuable employee if you also spoke Chinese."
她说，“截至目前英语一直是全球通用语言。但中国的企业越来越多，你光看看中国拥有的行业数量，看上去顺理成章的事情可能会发生，如果会说中文，你就会成为更有价值的员工。”
Clayton Dube thinks Chinese will grow in importance, especially for people who want to work and do business in China. But he does not think Chinese will overtake English any time soon.
杜贝认为，中文将变得越来越重要，对那些想在中国工作或做生意的人来说尤其如此。但他并不认为中文能很快超过英文。
"As China rises you can anticipate that more people will adopt the language. But is China(Chinese) going to replace English? I don't think so--certainly not in my lifetime, probably not in the next two, three, four generations."
杜贝说，“随着中国的崛起，你可以预见更多人会采用中文。但是中文是否将会取代英文呢？我不这么认为。这一幕肯定不会在我的有生之年发生，也可能不会在未来三四十年就发生。”
English rose to prominence through the British Empire in the nineteenth century. American dominance in the twentieth century spread the language even further. Dube says American pop culture is one reason for English's popularity as a foreign language.
英语在十九世纪通过大英帝国得以崛起。到了二十世纪，美国的优势使其传播更广。杜贝表示，美国流行文化是英语作为一门外语得到普及的原因之一。
"American movies, music, television, video games have wide audiences...So far China's success in this realm has been very limited. Chinese films, Chinese television shows, Chinese music doesn't have a huge following outside of China."
“美国电影、音乐、电视和视频游戏有着广泛的受众。到目前为止中国在这一领域的成功非常有限。中国电影、电视节目和音乐在海外没有庞大的追随者。”
Andres Martinez is the editorial director at Zocalo Public Square and a professor of journalism at Arizona State University. He says that he respects Chinese culture and expects the language to grow. But he says English, with its association with freedom, will remain the global language.
安德烈斯·马丁内斯（Andres Martinez）是Zocalo Public Square网站的编辑部主任，也是亚利桑那州立大学的新闻学教授。他说，他尊重中国文化，并预计中文会增长。但他表示，英语与自由的关联使得它仍将是全球通用语言。
"You don't have anybody on the Internet stifling speech in English, censoring speech in English. And most of the dominant English-language countries internally also have a tradition of freedom of speech."
马丁内斯说，“没人在网上压制、审查英文演讲。而且大多数以英语为主的国家内部都具有言论自由的传统。”
Martinez says that English is seen as a more neutral language than Chinese. Unlike Chinese, it is not associated with one country. He says even the ideas of equality are built into English grammar.
马丁内斯说英语被视为是一种比中文更具中立性的语言。英语和中文不同，和英语相关联的不只是一个国家。他说，平等观念甚至扎根于英语语法中。
"If you study German, if you study Spanish, if you study Russian, there are many languages where the "you" form and how you conjugate verbs is very different depending on whether you're talking to a grandparent or a boss versus one of your children or an employee or a close friend...If I'm talking to President Obama or if I'm talking to my closest friend or my son, its ‘you.'"
“如果你学德语、西班牙语、俄语，还有很多语言，第二人称‘你’以及动词如何变形有很大不同，这完全取决于你交谈的是祖父母、是老板、是孩子、是雇员还是密友。（而在英语中，）我同奥巴马、同密友或我儿子，我都用的‘你’。”
Chinese is also a more difficult language to learn. The U.S. Foreign Service Institute estimates it would take a native English speaker 2,200 hours to reach professional fluency in Chinese. That is four times longer than it would take to reach the same level in Dutch, French, or Spanish. While Chinese grammar is much simpler, Chinese has a tone and writing system that is more difficult for adult learners to master.
中文还是一种比较难学的语言。美国外交事务所估计，让英语母语者达到中文专业流利水平需要2200小时。与荷兰语、法语、西班牙语达到同等水平相比，中文所花费的时间要长4倍。然而中文语法要简单得多，中文的声调和书写体系对成人学习者来说更难掌握。
A recent survey by Gallup showed that only one in four Americans is multilingual, or able to speak more than one language. And most multilingual Americans are immigrants or the children of immigrants. For most Americans, Brits, and Australians, learning a foreign language is a choice, not a necessity. China Daily estimates that 400 million Chinese are studying English. That means China has more English learners than the U.S. has English speakers.
盖洛普最近的一项调查显示，只有1/4的美国人会说多个语种。而且大多数懂多种语言的美国人是移民或移民子弟。对于大多数美国人、英国人和澳大利亚人来说，学习外语是一种选择而不是必要。中国日报估计有4亿中国人在学英语。这意味着中国学英语的人比美国讲英语的人还多。
Last month, China hosted the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in the capital city of Beijing. But the meeting was not in Chinese – or any Asian language. The official language of APEC is English.
上个月，中国在首都北京举办了亚太经合组织会议。但会议并未采用中文或任何一种亚洲语言。亚太经济合作组织（APEC）的官方语言是英语。
I'm Adam Brock.
我是亚当·布洛克（Adam Brock)。(51VOA.COM对本文翻译保留全部权利，未经授权请勿转载，违者必究！)