A citizen of Guilin in south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region
I strongly encourage children to learn indigenous dialects. I am from Gansu Province in northwest China and my husband is from Guilin. So I want my daughter, who is now one and a half years old, to learn both Guilin and Gansu dialects so that she knows the culture of her two hometowns.
In my opinion, dialect indicates a person’s affection to his or her hometown. However, nowadays, a large number of people from different places are flooding into big cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. To better integrate into the cities, they gradually pick up Mandarin and lose their dialects. It’s very sad.
It’s always pleasing to meet someone from your hometown. One will feel cordial when he or she hears local accent in a foreign land. Dialect is a reminder of who we are and where we are from.
Zeng Jin
A teacher in Guilin
As a primary school teacher, I think students should be encouraged to learn indigenous dialects. Nowadays many parents speak Mandarin with their children and they encourage their grandparents to speak Mandarin with their grandchildren at home. In school, students learn Mandarin and English. Though it is convenient for people to communicate in Mandarin, nothing can replace the vibe and beauty of indigenous dialects. Proverbs and slang are usually rich with local sound and interesting to speak. They all require dialects to express their full meaning. For instance, dialect in northeast China is concise, vivid, rich and dynamic, and identical to local people’s characters of boldness, straightness, and humor. Mastering indigenous dialects will help students better appreciate local cultures and traditions. That’s why we should study local dialects in our compulsory education, especially in Chinese textbooks.
Wang Zhenjun
Professor with Zhengzhou University
I am worried about the future of indigenous dialects. China’s vast territory has cultivated various dialects. Dialects, being the carriers of local culture, reflect the traditions deeply rooted in people’s hearts. It is worth mentioning that the degeneration of dialects has become evident in recent years. This phenomenon has become highly prevalent in cities than in rural areas. The frequency of indigenous dialect usage has reduced. Language is an intangible cultural heritage, as well as the carrier of other intangible cultural heritages. Each dialect represents a knowledge system and a variety of cultural traditions. If a dialect is dead, we would lose a corresponding culture system.
I suggest that primary and secondary schools set up dialect courses and more measures should be taken to cultivate a friendly environment for the use of local dialects.
Zhou Xiao
A Guilin resident
I am against children learning dialects. I grew up learning Guilin dialect and ended up with non-standard Mandarin. My major in the university required an extremely high level of Mandarin. I spent a lot of time correcting my pronunciation. It was at that time when I realized that my children should learn Mandarin in early childhood. Many parents I know share the same idea. Between each other as parents, we speak Guilin dialect, but with our children, we communicate in Mandarin.
My son has never visited my hometown in the rural area because we now live in Guilin. Local dialect would be of no use for him and speaking Mandarin is definitely easier. During class, on TV, and in academic literature, people are using Mandarin. When he begins to attend university in perhaps another city, he can communicate in Mandarin.
Chen Shaoling
A resident in Huizhou City, South China’s Guangdong Province
I have been working in the field of pre-school education for 25 years. According to my research and experience, there is more harm in cultivating a child’s language ability if there are different dialects within a family. The child will become overwhelmed by them and it would slow down their language development.
To avoid this, when teaching your child basic Chinese, it’s advisable to start with standard Mandarin. This is unlikely to compromise your child’s expression ability in the language learning process.
It’s easier for students to learn and speak Mandarin from TV and books, which helps build up their vocabulary. They become more sensitive to phrases and words. Indigenous dialect-speaking students, however, would find it more difficult to understand the linguistics of Mandarin.
Dong Jian
Professor with School of Chinese Language and Literature, Nanjing Normal University
It is inappropriate to promote the use of dialects at present. The death of language or dialect is a natural process. We cannot sympathize for the loss of certain dialects. For example, people in modern times do not feel frustrated when they fail to read inscriptions on bones or tortoise shells from the Shang Dynasty (16001100 B.C.).
For certain dialects, which will not disappear in short term, we can use them, but should not make special efforts to promote them. The disappearance of dialects is a loss indeed. But, as long as our society keeps moving forward, there is no ground to blame such phenomena.
I think they go toward the wrong direction when some people are promoting dialects. Indigenous dialects break the integrity of the Chinese culture. They do not cohere with the Chinese philosophy of “grand unity.”