Personal Statement for Global Markets & Local Creativities
·You should outline your motivation for choosing the GLOCAL programme (i.e. how it complements and develops your previous studies; how it relates to your potential future career path; how it relates to your personal and academic interests).
·Explain why you think you are a good candidate for the programme given your previous studies and how they relate to the courses offered on the programme in both years.
·If you have significant post-graduation work experience, please explain how those activities relate to the courses offered in the programme and why you are re-entering the academic world.
·Briefly indicate what you might see as being the topic of your Masters thesis (this can change later).
·You should highlight your participation in conferences, internships, non-governmental organisations, summer schools, and other socially sensitive or political activity; as well as any prizes/awards received even if these activities are not specially connected to the area of Global Markets & Local Creativities.
I recently heard about this project and would like to have a try. But I have never written PS before, I am extremely confused. Hope that you can give me some advices, Thanks!
I had been lived in a small city, Chaozhou in China since I was born. It was the first time that I have the opportunity to get in touch with people from diversified regions when I came to Guangzhou for university, and I gradually realised my ignorance, especially by participating in various activities. At the beginning of my college life, I attended the alumni association in our school and participated in various alumni activities, among which, particularly in the industry alumni association activities, I learned a lot of things out of campus. I also took part in a volunteer association aming to preserve Cinese dialects, because I am a dialect user and I love my mother tongue. Since the Chinese central government have promoted the use of mandarin for decades, many dialects are endangered, and it is vital to protect these languages because they are the keys to cultures. Here, I helped with organizing the dialect film festival, made and edited video about different dialects to protect dialects. During this period, I had the honor to participate in the world heritage study and communicated with an UNESCO official, who is not prejudiced against cultures and genuinely appreciates and protects them, which convinced me of the significance of protecting dialects and cultures. What is more, influenced by her, I want to work for the UNESCO or ONG that devotes to preserve cultures in the future. During all these activities, I also made friends and felt good to cooperate with them. I hope that I can get in touch with various people in the following life.
I am majoring in Chinese（cross-cultural management）and I have learned about the deficiencies of China's creative industry, especially the aspect of artworks. There is no art brokerage system in China. Except for a few artists, many artists operate their own works by themselves, which brings them a lot of trouble and the sales effect is yet not very good. For example, I once visited several craftsmen in my hometown and they said that marketing was a big matter for them and they have no idea of brokers. Though trying hard, they could get little reward. I also hope to learn more about the art brokerage system and become a broker to help these artists since I am a lover of domestic culture.
On the other hand, in a globalized environment, it is easier for big brands to gain competitive advantages. For instance, when I helped a friend of my father to do some translate work in the Canton Fair, I heard that there are some big brand companies from other regions who choose ceramics from small factories in my hometown, label them with their own brands and sell them in the name of the brand. From another perspective, this shows that the quality of products produced by these factories can be comparable to that of large companies. However, by selling products in this way, they will not make their own reputation, and it is difficult for them to get better profits and development. Many other kinds of products are facing the same problem. In this situation, the economic growing in my hometown is slow. My parents all had been under great pressures of losing their jobs, which brought terrible memory for our family. In recent years, China has advanced relations with major countries and unveiled a series of major cooperation initiatives such as the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, which have boosted the development of China. But China also suffers from uneven development. Therefore, I hope to understand the global market better through this study and help the local enterprises to find appropriate paths for development.
And as we all know, the economy has a great impact on education and it is true that our city is facing the problem of low education levels. Take myself for example, I had never studied English phonetic symbols systematically and had P.E. class in a standard stadium until college. Despite these, I am dissatisfied with the education system in China. So my ultimate goal is to change this situation and I hope that our offspring can enjoy the same quality of education as children in big cities. What inspires me is the fact that many Chinese government officials had studied abord and then returned back for the domestic construction. And in deed, they have contributed a lot. I want to know what I can do for this goal, instead of waiting a super hero to do everything for me. Of course, this goal may be hard to achieve. But as the saying goes, to try and fail is better than not to try at all.
I do see a need of higher education to help me achieve my goals. Firstly, the module that GLOCAL offers is the best program suiting my passion and concern. GLOCAL offers the participants the opportunities to learn the fundamentals on making innovations to have an insight to local creativities. Actually, considering my academic background, I lack some professional knowledge in economics though I have learned some through reading and watching online classes. I am eager to gain new knowledge. Second, I have never been studied outside China. In my previous courses, in order to promote communication among people from different cultures, I had interacted with some overseas students in my college. But these students are who came to learn Chinese and have had some understanding of Chinese culture. Therefore, I am not sure that whether I can be a cross-cultural communicator and I hope I can strengthen my ability of intercultural communication. Finally, if I participate in this program I can communicate with people coming from different backgrounds and areas and I can have the opportunity to get command of historical and cultural perspectives on global economy, global marketing, mass consumption and other information from them and the courses. In return, they can get details about China from me as China is a mysterious country for many.
And my future dissertation would focus on cultural and creative products from museums. Today, these products have already gone viral in China, take the Palace museum for example, these products brought the museum 1.5 billion yuan in revenue last year. And in early July this year, British Museum launched an online shop for its products through Chinese e-commerce platform Tmall and it has proved to be a huge success with many items selling out within days. But China should not only be a recipient, but a promoter of Chinese culture through exporting these products. I want to figure out how to do this and how other small local museums develop their own products based on local cultures.
All in all, I am looking forward to sharing my experience of different cultures and characteristics to my peers in the future. After receiving the world-class education offered at this program, I know that I will be capable of attaining my goals and contributing to my society in the future.