Sun, Jul 14, 2024 page8

• [ LETTER ]

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  Cantonese language loss

  On Wednesday, Hong Kong’s Legislative Council passed the “2024 Statutes and Laws (Miscellaneous Provisions)” bill. The legislation amends 73 existing laws to change about 300 phrases, wordings or titles that appeared in the British colonial period, such as replacing zungduk (總督, governor general in Cantonese) with the bland title “administrative official.”

  During the bill’s second reading, many councilors said the city government must accelerate legal “decolonization,” adding that words such as “governor general” would be used to brainwash young Hong Kongers.

  Contrary to their histrionics, zungduk originates from the Ming Dynasty’s administrative system. Governor generals were in charge of managing the political, civil and military affairs for entire provinces. For example, Li Hongzhang (李鴻章), an imperial viceroy and the founder of the late Qing Dynasty and Beiyang Government’s naval forces, directly administered Shandong and Henan provinces. In Hong Kong, the chief secretary for the administration (政務司司長) during British rule was referred to by the abbreviated title, “chief secretary” or “colonial secretary” (布政司). The title comes from the full term, “heads of the provincial administration commission” (承宣布政使司), the person responsible for managing the civil affairs and taxation of a province. The British clearly referenced China’s ancient imperial administrative systems with detailed consideration by using contemporary Qing titles for their Hong Kong administrators.

  Compared with China, the British were much more tolerant of Chinese political exiles that came to Hong Kong, such as academics Qian Mu (錢穆) and Tang Chun-i (唐君毅), who jointly founded the New Asia College (新亞書院) — Chinese University of Hong Kong’s predecessor.

  The British administration was also intent on preserving traditional Chinese culture. Today, Hong Kong officials slick their hair back with oil, slip on tennis shoes and enshroud themselves in traditional Han clothing, or hanfu, while promoting the lofty culture of an imagined grand China. They also view traditional Chinese characters as a remnant of colonialism and want to replace Hong Kong’s writing system with China’s simplified characters. It is as though China’s Red Guards have been resurrected, with the same incompetence and destructive nature that wrought the Cultural Revolution. Even if a chimp is bathed, clothed and dons a little hat, it is hard to change its innate nature. The only thing unique about it is that it wears clothes.

  The CCP’s “unification” is not just a territorial unification, but cultural and linguistic unification as well. Immigration data show that 150 Chinese per day immigrated to Hong Kong from 2017 to 2019. Hong Kong’s declining birthrate and a majority of its elementary and high-school students being from China, mean the Cantonese speakers have dwindled to a minority in their own backyard.

  Hong Kong-style Cantonese language and culture could go extinct if this continues. Taiwanese must learn from this and strive harder to promote and safeguard their linguistic diversity to avoid a repeat of this loss and Chinese cultural homogenization.

  Lee Kuang-chih

  Taipei
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