New Media as Channels for Linguistic Diversity —A Case Study of Chinese

Hongyuan Dong

Overview

• Linguistic situation in China• New media research in other disciplines• Linguistic Landscape and “Virtual Linguistic

Community (VLC)” • Case study of Chinese Wiki• Discussions of the pros and cons of VLC

Linguistic Diversity In LPP

• Linguistic Imperialism (e.g. Phillipson 1992, 2003 on English in the EU)

• National Language and Minority Rights (e.g. Steven May 2006, esp. on African and Native American languages)

• Linguistic Landscape (e.g. Ivkovic and Lotherington 2009)

Dominant languages cause the shift and eventual loss of minority languages.

Linguistic Situation in China

• The Monolithic view: Han Chinese and minority languages such as Tibetan, Mongolian and Uyghur

• Leading to research on LPP on minority languages in China, e.g. Zhou 2003

Majority Minorities

The Han Chinese The non-Han minorities

The “Chinese” Language The minority languages

Linguistic Situation in China

• The Pluralistic view: Sinitic Languages vs. Non-Sinitic languages (e.g. Mair 1991)

• Leading to research on regional cultures and identities of Chinese (e.g. Liu 2013) and Sinophone studies (e.g. Shih 2013)

Majority Minorities

The Han Chinese The non-Han minorities

The Sinitic Languages The minority languages

Linguistic Situation in China

• Source/Credits: Wikipedia article on languages of China

The Sinitic Languages• Mandarin (northern and southwestern China)• Cantonese (Guangdong, Guangxi, Hong Kong)• Min (Fujian, Taiwan, Hainan)• Wu (Shanghai, Zhejiang, southern Jiangsu)• Hakka (Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Taiwan)• Gan (Jiangxi)• Xiang (Hunan)

“Mandarin, Fuchow, Cantonese, Shanghai, Suchow, and the other major fangyan…Certainly they are no closer to each other than Dutch is to English or Italian to Spanish” (Mair 1991)

The National Language• Putonghua (“common speech”) is the national

language in China.• Putonghua is a standardized language with

Beijing Mandarin as its base of pronunciation. • National Commission on Language and Script

Work, within the Ministry of Education is in charge of the standardization of Putonghua.

• There are many other varieties of Mandarin in northern China. They are mostly mutually intelligible with Beijing Mandarin.

Putonghua vs. regional speeches

• Law of the People‘s Republic of China on the Standard Spoken and Written Chinese Language

• Adopted at the 18th Meeting of Standing Committee of the Ninth National People’s Congress on October 31, 2000.

Putonghua vs. regional speeches

Chapter 1 Article 8

– All the nationalities shall have the freedom to use and develop their own spoken and written languages.

– The spoken and written languages of the ethnic peoples shall be used in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Constitution, the Law on Regional National Autonomy and other laws.

• All the Han people are regarded as one nationality. Therefore the article above does not grant each different region their freedom to use their own regional variety of Chinese.

• Compare: if English is imposed on all EU countries?

Redefining “minority language” in China

• “Minority language” is usually taken to be the language spoken by an ethnic minority, e.g. Tibetan, Mongolian and Uyghur.

• But in LPP, a “minority” is “not based on numerical size, but on clearly observable differences among groups in relation to power, status, and entitlement.” (May 2006: 255)

• Thus in this sense, the various Sinitic languages that are different from the National Language can be considered minority languages, especially those non-Mandarin dialects.

Three Stages of Language Shift

• Stage I: increasing pressure on minority-language speakers to speak the majority language, particularly in formal language domains.

• Stage II: Bilingualism characterized by a decreasing number of minority-language speakers, esp. among the younger generation, and decrease of fluency

• Stage III: replacement of minority language by majority language

• (Baker & Prys Jones, 1998; Stephen May 2006)

Three Stages of Language Shift

• Most varieties of Chinese. Especially those in the south, are in the second stage of language shift as described above.

• Local efforts to resist the dominance of the national language have sprung up in various places.

In July 2010, a government proposal to increase Putonghua programming on Guangzhou Television's main and news channels sparked widespread protests in Guangzhou, and to a lesser extent in Hong Kong. The proposal was rejected eventually.

Photo source: http://chinamusictech.blogspot.com

• Oriental Morning Post, May 9, 2011: “Some elementary schools offer Shanghainese classes to students”

• Zhou Libo, a Shanghainese stand-up comedian who debuted in 2006, is an advocate and practitioner of the Shanghainese language and culture

New Media Promoting Social Change

• In political science and international affairs, scholars have long been debating the role of new media in social change (e.g. Atton 2003, Kraidy 2002, Shirky 2011, Joseph 2012, Gladwell 2010).

New Media as Soft Channels for Linguistic Diversity

• The same characteristics of new media, especially social media, that have enabled the kind of social changes (e.g. Joseph 2012) can also be used to the advantage of minority language users.

The Internet Promoting “dialects”

• Liu (2012: 59-78) lists many ways the Internet has been used by Chinese “dialect” speakers to promote linguistic diversity.– Xue Cun’s internet song in Northeastern Mandarin– Dialect versions of a famous monolog from Steven Chow’s

(1995) movie A Chinese Odyssey circulating on the internet– Writing in dialects, pinyin, English on line.– Mock “standard tests” on dialect competence– Dialect rap songs on web communities– Regional online communities such as Shanghaining.com

Virtual Linguistic Community (VLC)

• Any online community that shares a common primary language can be called a virtual linguistic community, an instance of Linguistic Landscape.

• A VLC does not necessarily have focus on language, and in many cases, they focus on production of content.

• Building VLC’s by minority-language users (not necessarily native speakers) can be an effective way of promoting linguistic diversity.

• Cf. Virtual Speech community (Paolillo 1999)

Two types of linguistic diversity

• Diversity in using Putonghua – Use of non-standard language; – creating non-standard words; – mixing in elements (e.g. Pinyin, English, etc.);

• Diversity in using local languages (e.g. online)– making and distributing artistic productions such as songs created in

a local language on line; – creating cyberspace for publication in their local languages, e.g.

Wikipedia pages in local languages. – Youtube videos as non-written productions. – Creating dedicated local websites (e.g. Shanghaining.com)

Chinese Wiki

• The wikipedia content community can be viewed as a virtual linguistic community, especially when they focus on creating contents in a non-standard variety of Chinese.

• Thus a statistical analysis of such communities can help us understand the nature of such VLCs.

• Data on the following pages are retrieved from http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wikipedias as of March 9, 2015

Chinese Wiki-Ling Communities

Wiki Rank Chinese variety Articles Registered Users Operating Status

15 Mandarin 814,324 2,007,603 In use

79 Cantonese 35,280 100,829 In use

119 Southern Min 12,798 21,324 In use

143 Gan 6,305 21,862 In use

161 Hakka 4,512 13,473 In use

175 Wu 3,536 31,800 In use

195 Eastern Min 2,507 8,907 In use

N/A Northern Min 89 N/A Being incubated

N/A Pu-Xian Min 56 N/A Being incubated

N/A Xiang 50 N/A Being incubated

Wiki Content Size

Wiki Content Size

• All major Chinese dialects are represented.• Mandarin content dominates.• Cantonese and Southern Min contents are the

largest regional varieties.• Surprisingly, content written in the Gan variety

(a much smaller and less known variety of Chinese) surpasses that of Hakka and Wu.

Wiki Community Size

Wiki Community Size

• The relative sizes of these content communities generally correspond to those of the content.

• The only exception is that Wu ranks below Cantonese but above all the other regional varieties.

Real Community Size(all Chinese speaking communities in all countries)

Chinese varieties Proportions of First-Language Speakers

Mandarin 74.7%

Cantonese 5.0%

Min (all varieties) 6.0%

Gan 1.7%

Hakka 2.5%

Wu 6.5%

Xiang 3.0%

Other (Pinghua, Huizhou) 0.6% (Pinghua 0.2%; Huizhou 0.4%)

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varieties_of_Chinese and it is also based on Lewis, M. Paul; Simons, Gary F.; Fennig, Charles D., eds. (2013), Ethnologue: Languages of the World (Seventeenth ed.), Dallas, Texas: SIL International.

Real community size

Real Community Size

• The proportion of the real community of Mandarin is smaller than the virtual community.

• Therefore it suggests that Mandarin is even more dominant online than in other spheres.

Wiki Community Livelihood

Wiki Rank

Chinese variety

Articles Registered Users

Active Users Participation Rate

15 Mandarin 814,324 2,007,603 7949 0.40%79 Cantonese 35,280 100,829 167 0.17%119 Southern Min 12,798 21,324 38 0.18%143 Gan 6,305 21,862 24 0.11%161 Hakka 4,512 13,473 16 0.12%175 Wu 3,536 31,800 22 0.07%195 Eastern Min 2,507 8,907 11 0.12%

Participation

Participation

Participation

• Participation rate is generally very low. It is not surprising because of the general weak nature of virtual connections and the lack of motivation

• Mandarin participation is much higher than all the others.

Participation depth

The "Depth" column (Edits/Articles × Non-Articles/Articles × [1−Stub-ratio]) is a rough indicator of a Wikipedia’s quality, showing how frequently its articles are updated. It does not refer to academic quality.

Wiki Rank

Chinese variety

Articles Registered Users

Active Users Depth

15 Mandarin 814,324 2,007,603 7949 13479 Cantonese 35,280 100,829 167 32119 Southern Min 12,798 21,324 38 31143 Gan 6,305 21,862 24 219161 Hakka 4,512 13,473 16 9175 Wu 3,536 31,800 22 95195 Eastern Min 2,507 8,907 11 16

Participation depth

• Mandarin has high participation• Most other varieties have low participation• But Gan has extremely high participation,

showing that active user dedication is high.

Virtual Linguistic Community

Pros: • Unregulated (legislation of online activitities is

usually slower. Censorship normally does not interfere non-political content, e.g. the purely linguistic)

• low coast (the hegemonic power of the national language command resources, while the minority languages lack resources)

• Cross-boundaries and connected-ness (brings “everyone” together)

Virtual Linguistic Community

Cons: • Weak connections

– It is easy to get a huge number of participants, but they are not strongly motivated, as shown above.

– “slacktivism” instead of activism (Joseph 2012) – “the revolution will not be tweeted” (Gladwell 2010)

• Lack of organizational structure and hierarchy • Being “virtual” (it does not replace the real linguistic

community. )• Censorship (blocking of wikipedia in China, although not

for linguistic reasons)

Virtual Linguistic Community

• Specifically for the Chinese wiki space– Largely a “written” community– Many Chinese “dialects” don’t have a writing

system.– Even with those that do, lack of literacy education

in these “dialects” will make it hard for readers to read the content.

SummaryTYPES OF LANGUAGES

Standardized dominant languageMinority languages

TYPES OF DIVERSITYUse of non-standard elements

Use of minority languages

TYPES OF COMMUNITYVirtual linguistic communityReal Linguistic community