The Phasing out of Chinese "Dialects"
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Earlier today, Mark Liberman discussed the abortive attempt by Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to phase in Tunisian Arabic.
Now, in a report circulated by China Daily / ANN and carried in The Straits Times, we learn: "Dialects to be phased out of China's prime time TV"
CHINA – TV PROGRAMS with local dialects will be gradually phased out of prime time, Huang Sheng, vice governor of East China's Shandong province, said on Thursday at a provincial meeting to promote putonghua, or mandarin – the main spoken language in China – Shandong Commercial Times reported.
Ten years ago, China enacted the Law on Standard Spoken and Written Chinese Language.
Mr Huang said media plays a leading role in promoting Putonghua; TV programs with local dialects need to be moved out of prime time. 'It may take time to finally achieve that goal,' said Mr Huang.
But some linguistic experts are worried the rapid development of putonghua will lead to the disappearance of some dialects. Some have suggested setting up dialect TV channels and holding dialect speech competitions among primary and middle school students.
'We should promote a multi-lingual environment for a more harmonious society,' said Li Lunxin, a researcher. 'Promoting putonghua does not mean we have to forbid using dialects. The two can co-exist and co-develop.'
Various dialects in China, mainly from the south, have been on the decline as people become more educated and are communicating more in mandarin, which is based on northern China's dialects. — CHINA DAILY/ANN
Vice Governor Huang Sheng may proclaim the determination of the Chinese government to do away with prime time shows in local languages, but the disappearance of such programming is highly unlikely to be realized. Note that it was ten years ago that China enacted the Law on Standard Spoken and Written Chinese Language, and they still have a "problem" with so-called dialects. Mr. Sheng admits that "It may take time to finally achieve that goal" of removing TV programs in local "dialects" from prime time. With this open admission that the government cannot succeed immediately, or even quickly, in phasing out prime time programming in "dialects" other than Mandarin, the article then shifts gears.
Quoting "some linguistic experts" who "are worried the rapid development of putonghua will lead to the disappearance of some dialects," the article goes on to suggest the setting up of "dialect" TV channels and the holding of "dialect" speech competitions for primary and middle school students, which would seem to run exactly counter to the thrust of the first part of the article.
Then, with the obligatory invocation of a "harmonious society" promoted by President Hu Jintao, researcher Li Lunxin extols the peaceful coexistence of "dialects" and the national standard. The article ends on an abysmally sour note when it correlates higher degrees of education with speaking Mandarin. This surely will not please speakers of Cantonese and many other Sinitic topolects, some of whom are very highly educated. Conversely, not all speakers of Mandarin are educated; indeed, many of them are illiterate and unlearned.
[A tip of the hat to June Teufel Dreyer]
GF said,
January 14, 2011 @ 10:00 pm
More protests by Cantonese speakers ahoy! (Ref: http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/26982-pro-cantonese-protest-in-guangzhou/)
David Deterding said,
January 14, 2011 @ 11:37 pm
It is interesting that this attempt to discourage the use of regional dialects on TV in Mainland China contrasts quite sharply with what is happening in Taiwan, where Taiwanese is nowadays heard quite widely on TV and there is also a concerted attempt to support Hakka. Of course, this was not always the case, as just 20 years ago Taiwanese was almost never heard on TV, and nearly all programs were in Mandarin.
J. Goard said,
January 15, 2011 @ 12:25 am
The article ends on an abysmally sour note when it correlates higher degrees of education with speaking Mandarin. This surely will not please speakers of Cantonese and many other Sinitic topolects, some of whom are very highly educated. Conversely, not all speakers of Mandarin are educated
I think that you and I are very much in agreement on this issue, Victor, but are you really denying that there's a correlation between higher education and speaking the prestige language of the country one's in? Or are you merely opposed to pointing it out in such contexts?
GeorgeW said,
January 15, 2011 @ 6:35 am
Is the objective to develop a stronger national identity over the regional or ethnic identities?
oliverio said,
January 15, 2011 @ 6:39 am
The education part reminds me of the Vicky Pollard controversy.
It is more a problem of culture than of level of education.
And the change with dialect reminds me of what happened in France where less and less people speak the regional languages.
Though It's mainly because it was mandatory to school pupil to speak French on the school grounds for a long time and these languages were looked with scorn.
Though there has had in the last two decades some changes toward them with a renewed interest and their teaching in the school system.
Alex said,
January 15, 2011 @ 9:48 am
@ J Goard:
"I think that you and I are very much in agreement on this issue, Victor, but are you really denying that there's a correlation between higher education and speaking the prestige language of the country one's in? Or are you merely opposed to pointing it out in such contexts?"
Oh God, did you pay attention, like, *at all* during the Oakland, CA controversy over AAVE and SAE and everything that has ever come after it regarding education and prestige dialects?
As someone who is currently learning Cantonese and currently has no interest in learning Mandarin, this is one of those issues that infuriates me, along with countless people telling me that Mandarin is "more useful" than Cantonese, yet not not one of them are able to give me a reason why.
Lazar said,
January 15, 2011 @ 11:24 am
Alex: Maybe I'm wading out beyond my depth here, but isn't Mandarin more useful than Cantonese because it's the national language and has far more speakers?
John Cowan said,
January 15, 2011 @ 5:13 pm
"Useful" begs many questions: "where?", "for whom?" and "to do what?" In my New York City neighborhood, neither Mandarin nor Cantonese is particularly useful for talking to people on the street. A mile or two south in Chinatown, Cantonese is very important, Mandarin much less so. Uptown a few miles to the U.N., and Mandarin is much more important than Cantonese.
Ray Dillinger said,
January 15, 2011 @ 5:29 pm
It seems to me that either journalism or translation to English has somehow failed when people talk about Chinese "Dialects" instead of Chinese "Languages." I mean, please; these languages are certainly related, and have influenced each other for a long time, but they are mutually incomprehensible, with different idioms, different vocabulary, and different sentence structures. I can understand Chinese state-controlled media wanting to downplay the distinctions given their goal of stamping the other languages out, but why do non-Chinese English-language newspapers ignore the distinction between "Dialect" and "Language" here?
the other Mark P said,
January 15, 2011 @ 5:32 pm
And the change with dialect reminds me of what happened in France where less and less people speak the regional languages.
Most French dialects are variants on French. It is a simple matter for people growing up with both to switch between the two.
Thus for the French allowing dialects to grow poses no threat to the ideal of everyone speaking a common language.
Chinese dialects don't work like that, so if the Chinese rulers wish to have everyone speak a common language first, then the use of dialects is a much bigger deal.
For Chinese the use of a common script however removes the horrible issue of needing to translate everything into multiple languages.
Jongseong Park said,
January 15, 2011 @ 8:20 pm
Most French dialects are variants on French. It is a simple matter for people growing up with both to switch between the two.
OK, the langues d'oïl like Ch'ti or Walloon can be thought of as variants of French, but these aren't even 'most' French regional languages. I wonder if you'd consider, say, Savoyard or Catalan to be variations on French. Breton, Alsatian, or Basque certainly are not.
France is not unlike a China where the rulers have been successful in getting everyone to speak the official language to the exclusion of regional languages. On a recent short visit to Strasbourg, I heard no Alsatian; it's mostly spoken only by the elderly and the younger generation understands it a bit but can't really speak it. But if you went back to the 19th century, the linguistic situation in France would probably be comparable to that of China today.
Lazar said,
January 15, 2011 @ 9:13 pm
@Jongseong Park: Indeed, I've read in a number of sources that only a small minority of the population of pre-Revolutionary France was fluent in the standard language. The revolutionaries were adamant about suppressing the regional languages, and the French state has never lost that hostility.
Legion said,
January 16, 2011 @ 7:50 am
Native French speaker here;
It is true that in France, virtually everyone speaks standard French (sometimes with a a regional accent, but even that tends to go away); in that optic, France has long since accomplished what China is trying to do here; you can spend years in the south of France without hearing a single word of Occitan; in fact, in cities, you are more likely to hear Arabic or Chinese! The problem here has reversed: it's no longer about imposing French, it's about preventing what's left of the regional languages from dying completly.
However, describing the regional languages as "variants" of French is highly counter intuitive. Even excluding non-Romance languages like Basque or Breton, and even excluding Occitan, which is undoublty a fully distinct language, considering the tongues of Oïl as "variants" of French is not representative of the truth: as a native French speaker, I don't understand *a single word* of spoken Walloon, and large parts of written Walloon are undecypherable without a dictionary; in fact, I find written Occitan *easier* to understand than written Walloon, and yet the latter is supposed to be closer to French.
That most people are now either bilingual or (in most cases actually) monolingual in French doesn't affect this.
Catanea said,
January 16, 2011 @ 4:45 pm
Thank-you, Jongseong Park.
Thom said,
January 16, 2011 @ 9:35 pm
@Alex & Lazar
I am very intrigued by the question of a language being "useful". I speak Mandarin as a Second Language, and while I would at first side to Mandarin being more useful a language, it does raise the question of what is useful. Consider some who takes time to research one of the numerous Native American languages–how useful is that? Well, it makes one a rare commodity by having first-hand knowledge of the language and culture. If I specifically wanted to wheel'n'deal in Hong Kong, I would learn Cantonese–it would absolutely be more useful. Dealing anywhere from Shanghai to Hainan along China's East/Southern Coast would require a language other than Mandarin if you wish to really impress the local population. The "usefulness" of a language is subject to the speaker's personal motivations.
I'm also curious if this language enforcement would also entail the diminishing of Mandarin-based accents, such as the "Northeast" accent. Many popular shows that are based on/around Harbin use this accent. It is stigmatized in a way comparable to the Southern or Appalachian accents in the US. However, the "Northeast" accent is still technically Mandarin. Would they prefer to limit broadcasting in the Beijing "-er" accent and, likely, the accent around Central China (which is reminiscent of the the Midwest accent in the US)? or would any variant of Mandarin be acceptable?
Alex said,
January 17, 2011 @ 2:37 am
""Useful" begs many questions: "where?", "for whom?" and "to do what?" In my New York City neighborhood, neither Mandarin nor Cantonese is particularly useful for talking to people on the street. A mile or two south in Chinatown, Cantonese is very important, Mandarin much less so. Uptown a few miles to the U.N., and Mandarin is much more important than Cantonese." (by John Cowan, above)
Exactly. All of my friends who are Chinese speak Cantonese as their native language, as does my girlfriend. All of them are from Hong Kong. With regards to my personal endeavors, how could Mandarin possibly be more useful than Cantonese? People like Lazar above always give me "there are more speakers of Mandarin" as a reason why it is more useful than Cantonese. OK, it's true, there are a few hundred million more. But Cantonese has about 60 million speakers! Fewer people speak Danish than that, or Dutch, or Swedish, or Norwegian, or Icelandic, or Finnish, or many other languages! Yet if that's the case, why are there language programs dedicated to learning one or all of those languages? Population-wise, they're much less "useful" than Cantonese!
J. Goard said,
January 17, 2011 @ 10:50 pm
Oh God, did you pay attention, like, *at all* during the Oakland, CA controversy over AAVE and SAE and everything that has ever come after it regarding education and prestige dialects?
Well, yes, as a matter of fact I did, since I was a linguistics undergrad in Northern California at the time.
You apparently seem to have read me as claiming that prestige dialects are inherently more "educated" forms of language. If so, I don't know whether to be more offended at the suggestion of bigotry, or of academic incompetence.
But let me spell it out for you. I think that, speaking in terms of statistical correlation, as a speaker of a minority dialect gets increasingly higher-level education, he or she tends to study in places with more prestige speakers, make friendships/date/marry prestige speakers, and tends to have less financial and psychological dependence upon people from his or her original dialect area. This should naturally lead to decreased non-prestige features.
Now, if this hypothesis has been disproven, then I sure don't recall that fact coming up in the Oakland AAVE controversy.
I didn't really intend my remarks to include Cantonese, which has a huge high- and middlebrow culture and encompasses the richest city "in China". I was thinking of the many smaller and largely rural languages/dialects.
ngukho said,
January 18, 2011 @ 12:35 am
It would be really interesting if someone could explain to me why a government trying to phase out Chinese dialects would engage in building a giant spoken corpus collection (中国语言资源有声数据库) that aims at covering (as described in http://www.china-language.gov.cn/14/2008_10_13/1_14_3837_0_1223884671947.html) major dialects and ethnic languages of all provinces.
Alex said,
January 19, 2011 @ 4:33 am
@ J. Goard
Ahh, I see now, thanks. It was a misreading on my part.
J. Goard said,
January 19, 2011 @ 6:34 am
@Alex:
No problem! Sorry, I think I was a little intoxicated when I wrote that overly snarky reply…
David Cowhig said,
February 4, 2011 @ 10:16 am
The PRC dialect policy is real intriguing, especially since I have been living in Chengdu and have come back to Taiwan to spend Spring Festival with my in-laws. This side of the straits, dialect is in, with lots of broadcasting in Taiwanese and a Hakka channel on cable. I asked someone from Guangdong yesterday about whether Guangdong TV had any Guangdong dialect broadcasting such as their own Spring Festival program, I was told no, they have to use the feed from Beijing.
A few weeks ago on a train ride from Chengdu to Xichang, I met a toothbrush saleslady with a nice pitch in Sichuanese. I put it on Youtube here —
http://www.youtube.com/user/GaoDawei2?feature=mhum#p/a/u/0/x-h_bhLXBJs