Dec 20
By the Numbers: Endangered Tongues in the People’s Republic
China Ethnic, Uncategorized Add commentsIn <四成少数民族语言临危,> Wang Bo at Chinanews.com reports that up to four of ten languages native to minorities in China are threatened with extinction.
Here are a few numbers that appear in the report:
- Non-han languages: 55 officially designated “peoples” (民族) speak an estimated 130 languages
- Scripts in use: 40, including Mongolian, Tibetan, Uighur, Kazakh, Kirghiz, Korean, Yi, Dai, Lahu, Jingpo and Xibe
- Populations: one-half of non-Han languages are spoken by groups that number under 10,000 members, of which 20+ have 1,000 speakers or less
- Endangered languages: Manchu, Tatar, She, Hezhen can no longer be used for conversation; another 20 percent, such as Nu, Yilao, Pumi and Jinuo are approaching that state; and a total of 40 percent are in danger of extinction in the mid-term.
- Manchu: 11 million ethnic Manchus, but only 100 or so can speak fluently and less than a dozen read and write well.
- Jing (京族): with a population of 20,000 in Guangxi, one-half can still speak their mother tongue.
Wang Bo notes that fluency in seven non-Han languages continues to be passed on to the next generation fairly well: Mongolian, Tibetan, Uighur, Kazakh, Korean, Zhuang and Yi. He attributes this partly to the fact that they have a written script, and interpreting services are often offered at official meetings.
What he doesn’t note—like many PRC-centric writers—is the fact that except for Zhuang and Yi, these other languages are spoken and written by large numbers of native speakers outside China.
December 20th, 2012 at 9:12 am
My organization did some work with the Minyak language, which is often erroneously identified as a dialect of Tibetan, to develop a writing system for it and to teach it in Minyak area primary schools. The language was being displaced by Tibetan but the textbook we published inspired new interest and pride among Minyak people in their local language.
December 23rd, 2012 at 1:55 am
What’s worse is that all the local languages, given the status of ‘local dialects’, are dying out too. People aged 40 for instance don’t use proper grammar or vocabulary and usually speak Mandarin.
December 29th, 2012 at 7:44 am
[...] recent report from Chinanews.com found that four out of ten languages native to minorities in China are [...]
December 29th, 2012 at 8:46 am
The Tu languages in Gansu and Qinghai are rapidly being overwhelmed by Chinese, which is acquired powerfully during the process of education. Although there were a few schools that taught Mongghul in Huzhu County (the only autonomous Tu county in China; there are other counties with /Tu/ in the name, e.g., Minhe Hui and Tu Autonomous County; Datong Hui and Tu Autonomous County), but that was stopped years ago. What is most disturbing is the use of Chinese by children to the exclusion of Tu, which suggests that these children’s children will not be able to speak Tu–a common situation for Tibetan and Mongolian in the Xining City areas. The government is doing very little about this.
December 31st, 2012 at 4:27 pm
I don’t know why people say that “the government is doing very little about this”. What most supporters of ‘minority’ ethnic groups and their languages seem to be blind to is the fact the government of the PRC has been doing its best to marginalise and destroy the ethnic cultures and languages of China ever since its inception. While it may not be proclaimed as official policy, that is effectively government policy. Why do people continue to believe those liars?