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The 2010 Tibetan language protest was an assembly in Tongren County, Qinghai, People's Republic of China by ethnic Tibetan students on October 19, 2010.
Contents
Cause
Assembly
Inspired by Guangzhou July 25, 2010 mass assembly, which returns a positive result, Tibetan students from six schools protested in Tongren from 7am to 2pm. The protest was against alleged proposals for the Chinese language to become the language of instruction in most subjects, excepting Tibetan and English studies in the local Tibetan dialect. The students waved banners saying, "Expand the Use of the Tibetan Language".
A range of reports from hundreds to 9000 people were alleged to have been involved in the protest. According to a local Tibetan blogger, the head of the county’s education department drove out and assured the protestors that "their grievances would be addressed by senior authorities". An education-related protest in Dawu in neighboring Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture was apparently inspired by the Tongren protest. 400 Tibetan students at the Minzu University of China in Beijing staged a supportive demonstration on October 22.
Official response
On Oct. 29，Government of Qinghai says these incidents reflect some misunderstanding of the "bilingual" education policy by Tibetan people and reinsist that “strengthen and improve the ‘bilingual’ education工作的指导思想和基本原则是完全正确的” and that “as the state is promoting Standard Mandarin and Commonly Used Characters, the rights of using local minority languages by minority peoples is fully respected and guaranteed”.