The Passion of Cantonese

[Amdir_Flassion]

As a Cantonese speaker, I don't know about you, but I feel a sense of fun and passion when I speak it. As much as other people say Canto sounds like a dialect for arguing and swearing, I really have to say it's colourfulness is what makes it a really 'addictive' way to speak Chinese.

Like, I try to practice my Mandarin with friends at uni (I'm in Australia). They're from Malaysia, Vietnam and Guangzhou, and fluent in both Mando and Canto. Our conversations always begin in Mandarain (by my choice and initiation of course!), but after a minute or so, one of us would accidently pronounce a word in Cantonese and then it 'degenerates' into a full-blown conversation in Canto. I've noticed this so many times and it's prob coz of our uncontrollable urge to speak Cantonese. And btw, my Guangzhou friend is from Fujian province, who speaks Canto fluently.

But when I see my friends from Shanghai talk to each other, they always converse in Mandarin when I know they're both fluent in Shanghainese. It's the same for my Hokkien-speaking friends from Malaysia, who speak to each other mainly in Canto rather than Hokkien.

Is there some sort of colourfulness about Cantonese that makes it a survivor in the new age of Mandarin?

[pazu]

I don't know if it's the urge of speaking Cantonese or not, but whenever I talk to my friends if I found that they could speak Cantonese, I prefer to talk to them in Cantonese as this is my first tongue. And I think most Cantonese speakers I've met used Cantonese as their first language at home too. It's indeed not very common *FOR ME* to see a Mandarin speaker (I mean those whose first language is Mandarin) who is fluent in Cantonese.

[pazu]

I don't know if it's the urge of speaking Cantonese or not, but whenever I talk to my friends if I found that they could speak Cantonese, I prefer to talk to them in Cantonese as this is my first tongue. And I think most Cantonese speakers I've met used Cantonese as their first language at home too. It's indeed not very common *FOR ME* to see a Mandarin speaker (I mean those whose first language is Mandarin) who is fluent in Cantonese.

And indeed I've met a man from Thailand who could speak very fluent Cantonese (and Mandarin), but whenever he talked to me he insisted to talk to me in Mandarin Chinese only, so I talked to him in English.

[skylee]

I think Cantonese-speaking people are quite proud of the dialect.

[TSkillet]

Even though I'm a "native" English speaker (cantonese was actually my first language - even though I was born in the US) when I'm amongst Cantonese speakers who speak english well - I prefer speaking Cantonese.

[geek_frappa]

like i said before, cantonese is God's language.

there is no better way to make fun of your friends. ... or haggle over a price... or sing to a girlfriend...

also, easy to pun in cantonese...

[geek_frappa]

Is there some sort of colourfulness about Cantonese that makes it a survivor in the new age of Mandarin?

cantonese is an innovative language. cantonese speakers are often very clever people, regardless of education. maybe the lack of conformity in cantonese results in higher productivity and talent in places where cantonese is spoken??

[pazu]

SKylee, I do think many people are proud of their own languages. It's that sense of pride that kept many languages survive.

[geek_frappa]

SKylee, I do think many people are proud of their own languages. It's that sense of pride that kept many languages survive.

PAzUuu.., pride often comes before a fall.

as you can see with President Tung...

[ala]

http://www.hvk.org/articles/0202/130.html

AP/New York Times

See link about language endangerment. It mentions China a little bit, although I'm sure Cantonese will not face extinction for a long long time as it has more speakers than Italian.

[Ian_Lee]

See link about language endangerment. It mentions China a little bit, although I'm sure Cantonese will not face extinction for a long long time as it has more speakers than Italian.

But Shanghaiese looks very vulnerable if what you depict about it, i.e. high exclusivity, is true.

[geek_frappa]

wu dialect thrives because of economic security.

[ala]

But Shanghaiese looks very vulnerable if what you depict about it, i.e. high exclusivity, is true.

But there are still 14 million speakers of Shanghainese. And the Wu dialects have 81 million speakers in total, more than native French and Korean speakers. It isn't really worried about acquiring new speakers. The only vulnerability is that there isn't a very strong sense of standard, and as result it is susceptible to heavy Mandarin influence by individual speakers, and eventually becoming a Mandarin subdialect. So, yes, less regional exclusivity among the Wu dialects will help to create a more unified stance.

[geek_frappa]

you mean wu, hakka, hokkien will eventally blend into mandarin through necessity?

[ala]

No, I'm saying Wu is most at risk to blending into Mandarin because of its geographic proximity and the lack of internal unity. There is no necessity to blend with Mandarin. 2 major cities within the Wu speaking Yangtze Delta region are Mandarin speaking: Nanjing and Hangzhou (Hangzhou people can also do a pidgin Wu though, since they used to speak Wu). The exclusiveness of Wu dialects doesn't help matters since it prevents a unified Wu standard to form (though not because it prevents non-Wu speakers from learning it, to me the amount of people learning Wu would be negligible anyway to the existing population of Wu speakers). Without an agreed upon Wu standard, each Wu variant is pitching against 880 million native Mandarin speakers by itself, and you see dramatic phonological changes because of Mandarin influence. If there were a standard (at least something heard on TV, in music, etc), then this merging with Mandarin would slow down considerably.

From what I know of Cantonese and Minnan, I can't see the two dialects merging with Mandarin. These two dialects also have a satellite state and city to help proliferate the dialect: Taiwan and Hong Kong. Lien Chan spoke in Minnan-hua at least a 1/3 of the time. I don't know anything about Hakka, but I know there are plenty of websites and radio stations relating to it (Wu, which is much larger and geographically united, hardly has any).

[pazu]

geek_frappa, no matter how bad Tung is, he's just a Chief Exec of Hong Kong. China would be in another dark age if Tung's the president.

[ala]

What's so bad about Tung?

[Ian_Lee]

Tung is actually a good, honest and clean guy. Even his political opponents agree. Per many countries' standard, Tung is an integral politician.

The problem is that he doesn't have the capacity to handle the delicate job in managing the sophisticated metropolis.

Look at his own shipping empire. In 1960s, his father was one of the world's 10 shipping tycoons and ranked in par with Onassis. But now it isn't even counted as Blue Chip in HK bourse.

If Tung could not be a competent CEO of his family business, how can he be a successful CEO of HK Inc.?

Moreover, he is severely handicapped by the political constraint. Unlike other political leaders, HK's CE cannot be affiliated with any political party. Nor did he have his own team when he got the job. In 1997, Tung practically parachuted into the position on himself alone.

But nobody can do this job satisfactorily in my opinion since he has to acquiescence consent from Beijing, gain assent from largely suspicious population and the approval of international community.