When educational reforms meets with Confucian cultural practices: A case study of Hong Kong’s English and liberal studies teachers

Educational reform as a global movement in the 1990s was enacted differently in the local. Hong Kong, often called a place where ‘East meets West’, is a good case to study the enmeshment of the Chinese Confucian cultural heritage and Western traditions in education. This paper discusses the teaching and learning in English and Liberal studies that has taken place as part and parcel of educational reforms in secondary schools in Hong Kong. The interplay of the global with the local has created both difference and sameness, plus a third way – what Bhabha called hybridity which creates both tensions and possibilities for teachers. Drawing from in-depth interviews of secondary school English and Liberal Studies teachers in Hong Kong, this paper compare and contrast the different kinds of hybridities that English and Liberal Studies teachers experienced. The paper concludes not only by acknowledging the need to start with East-West hybridities in Hong Kong for policy making but also calls for continuous dialogue and integration of East and West traditions in the implementation as well as the evaluation of education reforms.