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Honest question for someone who doesn't know the area well.. Macau and HK are both Cantonese speaking regions. Given that the Infrastructure updates in the are

Honest question for someone who doesn't know the area well.. Macau and HK are both Cantonese speaking regions. Given that the Infrastructure updates in the area make everything "closer" (in terms of travel time etc), what impact is this having on language? Is this a Montreal type thing where most people are bilingual enough where it doesn't matter? Is Cantonese a de-facto street language in these South Chinese cities even if Mandarin is the official language?

TeckMonkeyLOL 8y ago
why would you think that Mandarin and Cantonese are two language
jacobolus 8y ago
People originally from that region speak Cantonese, but from what I understand most people in Shenzhen are immigrants from elsewhere in China, and predominantly speak Mandarin.
L_Rahman 8y ago
We have an existing example to extrapolate from. Cantonese is the native dialect in Guangzhou and it's fading away in the current generation of children in no small part because of government pressure in schools. It's likely that something similar will happen in Macau and HK. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2136237/why-has-cantonese-fallen-out-favour-guangzhou-youngsters https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2136237/why-...
jhedwards 8y ago
I'm not terribly familiar with that area but I know a bit about Chinese languages. HK and Macau are adjacent to Guangdong which is a Cantonese speaking province. There are many dialects within Cantonese, so someone from Taishan will speak a dialect of Cantonese that will probably be mutually intelligible with HK Cantonese but probably also has lots of major differences. I found a cool map of them on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yue_Chinese#Distribution_and_variation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yue_Chinese#Distribution_and_v... From what I know, as education improves and movement of people across large areas increases Mandarin becomes more and more common. As for movement within a Cantonese speaking area, I would guess that it might result in the adoption of a more common "standard" Cantonese over regional dialects in parallel with the increasing prevalence of Mandarin.
Markoff 8y ago
watch Ten years (2015) anthology scifi (?) movie about Hong Kong, in one of the stories (Dialect) it's quite realistically foreshadowing what's gonna happen with languages in HK
forkLding 8y ago
The Cantonese dialect originally came from the Guangdong/Guangzhou area (Guangdong was originally pronounced Canton, hence the name Cantonese), Hong Kong was originally a fishing village of ~7000 people (so was Shenzhen 40 years ago) before becoming a colony so the language won't disappear. People from Shenzhen speak Cantonese as well and Shenzhen is already connected to Hong Kong by subway. This Greater Bay Area is really just making something that was more unofficial official. Shenzhen is part of Guangdong province while Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong is also about 45 minutes by train from Hong Kong. The Greater Bay Area is really more about making it more official that Hong Kong is related as a group with Guangdong.

TeckMonkeyLOL 8y ago

why would you think that Mandarin and Cantonese are two language

jacobolus 8y ago

People originally from that region speak Cantonese, but from what I understand most people in Shenzhen are immigrants from elsewhere in China, and predominantly speak Mandarin.

L_Rahman 8y ago

We have an existing example to extrapolate from. Cantonese is the native dialect in Guangzhou and it's fading away in the current generation of children in no small part because of government pressure in schools. It's likely that something similar will happen in Macau and HK. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2136237/why-has-cantonese-fallen-out-favour-guangzhou-youngsters https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2136237/why-...

jhedwards 8y ago

I'm not terribly familiar with that area but I know a bit about Chinese languages. HK and Macau are adjacent to Guangdong which is a Cantonese speaking province. There are many dialects within Cantonese, so someone from Taishan will speak a dialect of Cantonese that will probably be mutually intelligible with HK Cantonese but probably also has lots of major differences. I found a cool map of them on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yue_Chinese#Distribution_and_variation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yue_Chinese#Distribution_and_v... From what I know, as education improves and movement of people across large areas increases Mandarin becomes more and more common. As for movement within a Cantonese speaking area, I would guess that it might result in the adoption of a more common "standard" Cantonese over regional dialects in parallel with the increasing prevalence of Mandarin.

Markoff 8y ago

watch Ten years (2015) anthology scifi (?) movie about Hong Kong, in one of the stories (Dialect) it's quite realistically foreshadowing what's gonna happen with languages in HK

forkLding 8y ago

The Cantonese dialect originally came from the Guangdong/Guangzhou area (Guangdong was originally pronounced Canton, hence the name Cantonese), Hong Kong was originally a fishing village of ~7000 people (so was Shenzhen 40 years ago) before becoming a colony so the language won't disappear. People from Shenzhen speak Cantonese as well and Shenzhen is already connected to Hong Kong by subway. This Greater Bay Area is really just making something that was more unofficial official. Shenzhen is part of Guangdong province while Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong is also about 45 minutes by train from Hong Kong. The Greater Bay Area is really more about making it more official that Hong Kong is related as a group with Guangdong.