Governor opens British Council Centre
Published on: Saturday, August 05, 1961
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The following article explains the function of the Council.
Twenty-five years ago an influential group of British people decided that the time had come to supplement and reinforce our diplomatic and commercial relations with other countries by extending the area of contacts to include the educational, scientific, professional and cultural fields.
With the active support of British Government, they founded the British Council whose principal purposes are defined in its Royal, Charter as the promotion of a wider knowledge of the United Kingdom and the English language abroad and the development of closer cultural relations with other countries.
It is perhaps typical of British institutions that Parliament should provide most of the funds — at present more than £5,000,000 a year — to enable an independent body such as the Council to be the main agent for British educational and cultural work overseas.
The Council’s Executive Committee of 30 members is broadly representative of many elements in the life of Britain — the House of Commons, the universities, the arts, the sciences, the trade unions and industry amongst them — and it includes nine members appointed by Ministers, thus ensuring close contact with the relevant Departments of State.
We are fortunate also in having available to us on our 15 advisory committees and panels the best possible academic and, professional advice, and assistance in the many subject with which we deal.
Over the years some principles, governing our work have developed from practical experience.
One is that in all our work we should seek a mutual advantage — both to the United Kingdom and to the other country concerned.
Thus, wherever we work, the nature of the demand determines the nature of the work: we do not seek to force our wares on unwilling customers.
Another principle is that it is best, when possible, for the overseas visitor or student to come to the United Kingdom and see for himself.
This principle underlies the large part of our effort which is devoted to fostering contacts between opposite numbers in the professions, education, science (including medicine) and the arts.
At present some 5,000 such visitors come to the United Kingdom every year. A few of the visits the Council pays for, but the great majority of the visitors come at their own expense or at the United Nations Agencies or the Colombo Plan.
In general it is our task to perform the duties of host, and to see that both the visitor and those whom he meets in the United Kingdom derive as much benefit as possible from the visit.
We are also responsible for organising a much smaller outward flow of British specialists and lecturers, whose object is not only to convey or exchange knowledge and information in many subjects, but also to promote personal contacts between people of like interests in Britain and overseas – and so strengthen mutual understanding and respect.
Many of these visits take place as part of two schemes for university interchange, for the administration of which the Council is responsible.
Another major task of the Council is the reception and welfare of a large proportion of the 40,000 overseas students in the United Kingdom.
Nearly 10,000 are members of the 20 centres which we run for them, mainly in university towns throughout the country, and each year more than 7,000 new arrivals are met by the Council and helped in various ways.
Many of the students will eventually be leaders in their own countries, and we aim to give them the broadest possible view of Britain during their stay, so that their visit is as profitable to them, and their country, on the human side as well as on the academic and technical, as it is to the United Kingdom.
Since its foundation one of the Council’s main tasks overseas has been the teaching of the English language, and at present there are more than 50,000 students of English under the Council’s auspices.
Sometimes we do it through British Institutes which we set up for the primary purpose of giving English classes. Sometimes we do it in collaboration with new or existing an anglophile societies — this is especially the method in Latin America.
Sometimes we do it — and in recent years this method has been strikingly developed in response to requests from many parts of the world where English is the key to higher education — by co-operating with the educational institutions of the countries concerned.
We help in the training of local teachers of English, we advise when invited to do so about syllabuses and text-books, we are beginning to take a part in the teaching of English by television.
We help in the recruitment of suitably qualified British teachers for service overseas, who not only teach their subject (whether English or some other subject) but also do much through extra-curricular activities to demonstrate the British conception of education as something not confined to the class room.
In a short article, it is difficult to do justice to the great variety of the Council’s work in some 7o countries, both inside and outside the Commonwealth.
Another of our main tasks is the running of 100 lending and reference libraries, from which about 1,5oo,000 books are borrowed every year.
Recently we have been much pre-occupied with plans for making more British books and periodicals available overseas, primarily to meet the demand, of students and others who require them for their studies.
Finally, there is the work we do in helping to display abroad the best of British drama, music and the visual, arts.
Here there are geographical and financial difficulties to be overcome, but we seek nevertheless to give some recognition, so far as our means permit, to this element in the life of Britain, both in its traditional and its contemporary forms. With the support of the British Government, we have recently entered upon a period of fairly rapid expansion.
Our aims will remain the same. We seek to do work that is welcome to the overseas country and which will also in the long run benefit the United Kingdom; and to promote and strengthen mutual understanding and friendship between the reader and his author, between the visitor and his host, between Britain and the rest of the world.
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