A Chinese tutor from the University's Confucius Institute shares her knowledge of Wales and Welsh with her compatriots at home in China.
21.11.2022
A member of the Advanced Working Welsh scheme class at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, who also works as a member of staff with the University’s Confucius Institute has been busy sharing her knowledge with hundreds of others.
Yuqi Tang – or Morwenna as she is known – has been learning Welsh since 2019 and is very keen to share her knowledge of Wales and the language with her compatriots at home in China.
Morwenna is originally from Shanghai. There she met her husband who is originally from Cardiff, and the two decided to move to Wales permanently three years ago. When Morwenna settled in Wales, she was aware of the existence of the Welsh language, and after hearing Welsh spoken in public, she decided to go ahead and learn it.
Morwenna said: "I moved to Wales with my husband three years ago. At the start of the lockdown, I started learning Welsh with my husband's great-aunt and learning Gwent Welsh. After realising that there was a shortage of Welsh language material on Bilili, a Chinese version of YouTube, I decided to go ahead and fill the gap by teaching a little Welsh and sharing Welsh culture with my followers. "
As well as teaching the Welsh language on her channel, Morwenna has presented its audience with a wide range of cultural topics such as the history of Hedd Wyn, Y Fari Lwyd, Patagonia, the Wales Coastal Path, and the Mabinogi. Currently, nearly 500 people follow her channel, and the videos have been viewed thousands of times.
Morwenna is passionate about learning and teaching Welsh since she joined the University’s Confucius Institute in September 2021 as a Chinese tutor, at the forefront of teaching Chinese to the people of Wales as well as teaching Welsh to the people of China. She has recently been busy developing and delivering two innovative courses – the first is a Welsh-medium Chinese course for adults, and the second is a training and resource course for Key Stage 2 and 3 teachers which uses a multilingual methodology to enable students to identify similarities between Welsh, English and Chinese.
Some University staff have been fortunate enough to receive Chinese sessions from Morwenna, as she teaches short courses through the medium of English and Welsh.
Her Welsh tutor, Catrin Evans-Thomas from the Welsh Service Centre, said: "Morwenna's passion for Welsh is evident in our online sessions. Although she has only been learning Welsh for a few years, her progress has been tremendous, and it is very gratifying to see so many others benefitting from her language skills as well. It's great that she's been able to use her Welsh to stimulate others in the workplace and beyond, and it's a pleasure to have her as a member of the University's Senior class. I enjoyed having her as a Chinese tutor as she taught me her language, as I have been teaching her Welsh. "
Further Information
Lowri Thomas, Principal Communications and PR Officer
07449 998476
