To: Prof. DU Xuezeng

From: GONG Chuying

Course:

Date:

Examining the Cantonese Communities in Australia:

A Sociolinguistic Approach

Abstract: This paper explores the Cantonese communities

in Australia from a sociolinguistic approach by providing

an overview of the Cantonese dialect there. As an

important community language in Australia, Cantonese has

gone through several stages of development over the past

years. Aiming to reveal the close relationship between

language and such social conditions as politics and

economy, the author will recount waves of immigrants from

Cantonese speaking regions to Australia, the change in

the language policy adopted by the Australian government

as well as in the immigrants’ attitude towards their

identity and prospect in Australia. From a linguistic

point of view, how Cantonese and English in Australia

have impacted on each other will be discussed. Another

issue to be dealt with would be the influence exerted on

the Cantonese in Australia by the increasingly important

and widespread Putonghua. It is argued that Cantonese is

an important community language in Australia that has

enriched the linguistic landscape of the country yet is

now facing decline due to the encroachment of English and

more significantly, the expansion of Putonghua. The rise

and fall of the Cantonese dialect, in particular, is

intertwined with a series of societal factors.

Keyword: community language, Cantonese, Australia,

sociolinguistics

I. Introduction

It has been repeatedly recognized that Chinese is

becoming more and more important overseas, particularly

in countries with strong economic ties with China such as

Australia. However, the word “Chinese” itself is a

contested terminology as the Chinese language, to use the

word of Robert S. Bauer from the Department of

Linguistics of the University of Hong Kong, is a

“pluricentric language”1 and has different regional

varieties or even dialects just as many other languages

1 Chinese as a Pluricentric Language: the View from Hong Kong, source: http://www.linguistics.hku.hk/cou/adv/ling6023/Lect%201%20Chinese%20as%20Pluricentric%20Language15012011.pdf

do. Cantonese, the central topic to be elaborated on, is

among the most influential Chinese dialects2 with a

comparatively long history in Australia since the contact

between Australia and Guangdong, an important source of

Cantonese-speaking immigrants, dates back to the early

19th century, even before the gold rush in Victoria had

began.3 Currently, while Putonghua4 is expanding its

dominance rapidly and has become the second biggest

2 Some linguists refer to Cantonese as a language rather than dialect, since its speakers and those who speak Putonghua are mutually intelligible. For sure there are still debates about its linguistic status but that is hardly within the scope of this paper and difficult for the author to deal with at length. Thus for the sake of convenience and political correctiveness, the official rhetoric in Chinese mainland will be adopted, which regards Cantonese as a dialectic variant of the Chinese language. 3 It is generally held by scholars on overseas Chinese that systematic labor export from China to Australia, a big proportion of which were of Cantonese heritage (some others were from the Fujian province), started in the 1840s. But before that there already existed sporadic immigration. According to materials provided by National Museum Australia, Mak Sai Ying (also known asJohn Shying) was the first officially recorded Chinese migrant. Born and raised in Guangzhou (then Canton), he arrived at Australia in 1818, just as the museum’s website indicates:http://www.nma.gov.au/collections/collection_interactives/endurance_scroll/harvest_of_endurance_html_version/explore_the_scroll/before_the_gold_rush4 In some research, Putonghua and Mandarin are used interchangeably but thereare differences between these two terms. “In fact, Mandarin refers to a broad category of northern varieties of Chinese, whereas Putonghua is the standardized variety that does not have a specific geographical affinity.” That being said, “Putonghua’s pronunciation and grammar are very similar to those of Mandarin”. For the sake of accuracy, this paper refer to the mainstream Chinese language as Putonghua, not Mandarin. Teaching and Learning Chinese in Global Contexts: CFL Worldwide, pp. 13

language only next to English in Australia according to

the 2011 census, there are still considerable Cantonese

communities in the antipodes.5 Either recent immigrants or

Cantonese descendants, they have gradually established

themselves both economically and politically. Considering

the number and influence of Cantonese speakers in

Australia, it is believed that this group of people

merits further research and examination.

In China, most of the Cantonese speakers live in

Guangdong, Guangxi, Hong Kong and Macao. There is also an

extremely large overseas Cantonese population in the

United States, Canada, and Australia etc. since a large

5 The most commonly spoken languages other than English include Mandarin (1.6per cent), Italian (1.4 per cent), Arabic (1.3 per cent), Cantonese (1.2 percent) and Greek (1.2 per cent).http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/mandarin-overtakes-italian-in-homes-2011-census-shows/story-fn59niix-1226404108725#

proportion of earlier Chinese immigrants to these

countries came from Hong Kong and Guangdong.6 Since the

1840s, a period when the Qing government was troubled by

internal upheaval and famine, Guangdong experienced a

tide of immigration which “became a flood and beyond the

power of the government to control”.7Among the early

Chinese immigrants to Melbourne, for example, most were

from Guangdong’s densely populated Siyi region, which

includes Taishan, Xinhui, Kaiping and Enping.8 They spoke

a regional variant of the Cantonese dialect. According

the research of Valeria Denisova, Cantonese speakers in

Australia roughly fall into four categories: (1) those

who come from Guangzhou, Macao and Hong Kong. What they

6 Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania, pp. 1467 Colour, Confusion and Concessions: The History of the Chinese in South Africa, pp. 318 The word “Yi” (邑) means “county” in Chinese. In the current administrative division of the Guangdong province, the four counties mentioned above all belong to the prefecture-level city of Jiangmen.

speak is considered as the standard form of Cantonese

because of the regions’ economic and political influence;

(2) those who come from Nanhai, Panyu9 and Shunde. Because

of the proximity to the provincial city, they speak in a

way very similar to the standard form of Cantonese; (3)

those who come from the Siyi region in the Guangdong

province, namely Taishan, Xinhui, Kaiping and Enping

County; (4) those who come from the Zhongshan city. They

also speak not much differently from the standard

Cantonese.10

In the above categorization, Denisova largely draws the

9 Panyu (邑邑) used to be the name for Guangdong’s provincial capital at least till the late Qing dynasty, which is to say, what we refer to as Guangzhou was known as Panyu in ancient times. Currently Panyu is a district of the Guangzhou city so that geographically the area that “Panyu” covers has changed over the past centuries. As it was allocated to the capital city in 2000 and had been a separate city before that, there are linguistic difference between Panyu locals and those from Guangzhou’s older districts. Variants of Hakka are spoken there as well, though not predominantly. 10 邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑《》

line geographically. That, however, is not free of

problem. For example, immigrants from Dongguan, a city

located to the south of Guangzhou, speak a variant of

Cantonese that deviates from the standard form and, on

some occasions, would find it difficult to communicate

with those from the capital city. As the number of

immigrants to Australia from Dongguan is quite

considerable, they might deserve to be added to

Denisova’s categorization as a separate item. Michael

Clyne and Sandra Kipp, on the other hand, gave a

different grouping according to the birth place of

Australia’s Cantonese speakers. Those who grow up in

Southeast Asia, in fact, would speak Cantonese in a

different way from immigrants from China. However, as the

research was conducted in 1996, the statistics surely

would be outdated. Still it serves to give us an idea

about the composition of those who speak Cantonese in

Australia.

44

Cantonese speakers by birth place, 199611

The immigration of Cantonese speakers to Australia has

gone through several stages. From 1840s to early 1900s,

especially during the frenzy of gold rush, most of them

went to Australia as indentured labor, lured by the hope

of making a fortune by gold digging. The amount then

declined after the Immigration Restriction Act was issued at the

time of federation and rose again at the end of World War

11 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 218

II. Part of this group of Cantonese speakers came from

Chinese mainland, as they were not certain about the

political future of their country. Others, however, were

from Southeast Asia, who had migrated earlier from China

to countries like Malaysia. To understand the complexity

of Cantonese speakers as a social group it is important

to note that not all of them have left directly from

Cantonese speaking regions in China to Australia.12 After

the immigration restriction gradually loosened, more

Cantonese speaking immigrants were attracted to Australia

since the 1970s. Many of them came from Hong Kong, either

to make money or seek education. Towards the handover in

1997, business migration from Hong Kong became common as

12 Another example would be that in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, with anti-Chinese sentiment on the rise, there were many Cantonese speakers of Chinese ancestry among the refugees fleeing from Saigon to Australia. Considering this situation, Denisova’s categorization of Cantonese speakers might again require revision, to which “immigrants from Southeast Asia of Cantonese origin” could probably be added.

well.13 At the same time, with the policy of reform and

opening up in Chinese mainland being implemented since

1978, immigrants from Cantonese-speaking regions in China

also increased.14

Efforts have been made to examine the Cantonese

communities in Australia, but not many are done from a

linguistic perspective. Among the few research dedicated

to the Cantonese dialect in Australia, Au-Yeung and Kai

Yin Gigi have examined how Cantonese is maintained among

Cantonese immigrants in Brisbane with their MPhil thesis.

The paper Language maintenance among Cantonese migrants in

Brisbane, investigates the factors that may affect the ways

13 They did it mostly due to the uncertainty about Hong Kong’s future after 1997 and a lack of confidence in the PRC government. However, many of them chose to return to Hong Kong afterwards since the situation was not as bad as, or was even much better than they imagined. 邑邑邑14 Zhang Qiusheng

Cantonese immigrants use their dialect, their attitudes

towards Cantonese and what is happening to it in

Australia.15 Although their work takes a specific look at

Brisbane, not generalizing the Cantonese dialect in

Australia, it is highly enlightening and useful for the

current exploration. Most of the relevant researches stem

from a broader concern and thus center on the Chinese

community as a whole yet do touch upon the situation of

the Cantonese dialect in Australia,16 such as Valeria

Denisova’s work to examine Chinese dialects popularly

used in Australia’s Chinese communities. Regretfully

there is a lack of first-hand information and empirical

studies, so that materials related to the topic will be15 The word used by Au-Yeung and Kai Yin Gigi is “language”, not dialect. As has been explained in footnote 2, this paper sticks to the rhetoric of Cantonese as dialect rather than language so that the word has been revised accordingly. 16 Some of the earlier research, though referring to “Chinese communities”, actually ended up examining the Cantonese speaking people in Australia, which is largely due to the conspicuously large number of this group of people.

selected and juxtaposed in this paper to present a

clearer overview of the Cantonese dialect in Australia.

This paper sets out to examine the Cantonese communities

in Australia from a sociolinguistic approach, by tracing

its history, status quo, development and the linguistic

environment, just to name a few. The further purpose is

two-fold. Firstly, the situations experienced by

Putonghua and other Chinese dialects also spoken in

Australia such as Cantonese, Hakka, Hokkien and Teochiu

are quite different. By presenting the circumstances

faced by the Cantonese dialect and therefore not focusing

only on Putonghua, the current research aims to provide a

more specific picture of community languages17 in

Australia, as well as encourage the perception of

Australian Chinese as a pluralistic rather than

monolithic group of people. Secondly, as the use of

language is closely related to identity formation,

directly impacting on what one would identify with,18 a

better understanding of the Cantonese dialect in

Australia would go beyond the realm of linguistics and

ultimately help us to interpret the Chineseness of

Chinese diaspora and the development of their identity.

II. The Language Ecology: the Environment for the

17 The term “community language”, which usually excludes indigenous languages, is employed to denote the so-called “immigrant” languages used within the Australian community to emphasize the legitimacy of their continuing existence. Language in Australia, pp. 216 Also, “Within education, community languages are often subsumed under ‘languages other than English (LOTE)’ which is a key learning area in most parts of Australia.” Community Language Learning in Australia, pp. 118 The Chinese Face in Australia: Multi-generational Ethnicity among Australian

Maintenance of Cantonese

Edward Sapir has discussed the role of environment in

studying languages in his 1912 paper Language and

Environment, which includes both physical and social

factors. “Under physical environment are comprised

geographical characters... and what may be called the

economic basis of human life” (such as fauna and flora),

whereas “under social environment are comprised the

various forces of society that mold the life and though

of each individual.”19 Decades later, Einar Haugen created

the paradigm of “the ecology of language” in 1970 by

emphasizing the interrelations between languages in both

the human mind and in multilingual communities.20 Haugen

19 Language and Environment, pp. 220 Ecolinguistics Reader: Language, Ecology and Environment, pp. 1

has made the following statement to define the term:

“Language ecology may be defined as the study of interactions

between any given language and its environment…The true

environment of a language is the society that uses it as one of its

codes. Language exists only in the minds of its users, and it only

functions in relating these users to one another and to nature, i.e.

their social and natural environment. Part of its ecology is therefore

psychological: its interaction with other languages in the minds of bi-

and multilingual speakers. Another part of its ecology is sociological:

its interaction with the society in which it functions as a medium of

communication. The ecology of a language is determined primarily by

the people who learn it, use it, and transmit it to others.”21

The language ecology encompasses a wide range of factors,

21 The Ecology of Language, pp. 325

be it natural, economic, political, or cultural etc.

Waves of Cantonese speaking immigrant reviewed in the

first part are also embedded in the language ecology for

Cantonese in Australia. In this part, the author will

focus on development of Australia’s language policy for a

better understanding of the topic. The discussion upon

the ecology for the Cantonese dialect, however, is by no

means limited to this part. Part three and four also

touch upon the issue, though not systematically since the

orientation is different. It is hoped that in combination

the following paragraphs can provide a general view of

the language ecology for the development of Cantonese in

Australia.

A. Development in Australia’s language policy

With frequently quoted literature on the development of

language policy in Australia, famous linguistics such as

Michael Clyne and Joseph Lo Bianco certainly take the

lead in this research area. As this paper is not going to

discuss the history of Australia’s language policy at

great length, a relatively simplified version of its

historical development, proposed by Wang Hui based on the

studies of previous scholars and a combination of their

views, is adopted for the current discussion. Wang argues

that the history of Australia’s language policy can be

divided into the following sessions:22

(1) Before 20th century: the period of nonintervention;

(2) From early 20th century to the end of 1960s: the period of

22 A Study on Language Policy in Australia, pp. 39

assimilation;

(3) From 1970s to the end of 1980s: the period of multiculturalism;

(4) From 1990s to now: the period of prioritization.

In the first stage, there were not any language policies

in Australia, with little political attention given to

the development of language, especially those outside

English. In an age of colonialism, authorities in

different colonies, which had not yet been federated,

were loose and separate in their control and regulation.

On the other hand, as most of those arriving at the

Australian continent were English-speaking, English was

the common language and it was also during this period of

time that the Australian English gradually came into

being.23

The start of the second period is marked by the Immigration

Restrict Act, which tried to exclude what the government

regarded as “undesirable immigrants” with a dictation

test. In the earlier stage of this period, in particular,

“extensive controls over the institutionalization of

community languages evolved not only from general social

antipathy towards alienness, but also more specific

worries over alien languages and populations in wartime.”

Thus there were pre-World War II restrictions on “foreign

languages” in school systems, school curriculum, and

publishing of newspapers. Libraries stocked almost

23 Although English was the common language, it is important to note that bilingualism or multilingualism had been a reality for Australia even in theearly stage. For example, there were considerable immigrants of German origin in South Australia who regarded those who later arrived and spoke English as “new immigrants”.

exclusively English language publications, and

interpreting services were non-existent. Following in the

spirits of these policies, restrictions on the use of

foreign languages in broadcasting were introduced in

1952.24

After World War II, non-English-speaking European

immigrants were taken in since Australia was pressured by

“populate or perish”, yet the tone of racial

discrimination still carried on since their languages

were not recognized. Community language teaching was

scarce and limited, with radio broadcast in languages

other than English constrained by law to no more than

2.5% of all the programs. It was expected that children

24 Language in Australia, pp. 330

of non-English-speaking immigrants would soon acquire

English and adapt themselves easily to the new

environment, as can be observed in the rhetoric of the

document First Report on the Progress and Assimilation of Migrant Children

in Australia, which was submitted to Commonwealth Immigration

Advisory Council by Judge Dovey in 1960.25

In the late 1960s, problems experienced by immigrants in

Australia began to come to light, urging the government

to take different strategies. The reformist Whitlam Labor

government embraced the Grassby Report, which recommended

education and services in community languages for

immigrants, thus unveiling a brand new era of

multiculturalism. In the following years, the

25 A Study on Language Policy in Australia, pp. 40-61

government’s stance was consolidated by Towards a National

Language Policy (1981) and Australian National Policy on Languages

(1987),26 which demonstrated a multicultural approach for

language policy.

Some of the policies introduced in this period are: the

gradual introduction of community languages into primary

schools, the provision of Saturday classes within State

Education Departments in languages not widely taught in

day schools, the recognition of all (or most) community

languages as matriculation subjects, government subsidies

for part-time ethnic schools, a nationwide Telephone

Interpreter Service, ethnic and multilingual radio

stations, multicultural television, and a reflection of

26 A Study on Language Policy in Australia, pp. 62-106

the reading public in local library holdings, as well as

some public and company notices in appropriate languages

other than English.27

Next comes the period of prioritization. The federal

government issued a green paper titled The Language of

Australia: Discussion Paper on an Australian Literacy and Language Policy for

the 1990s in 1990, which proposed three national goals for

an Australian literacy and language policy: literacy in

English, learning languages other than English and

aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages whereas

“language service”, an additional goal in the previous

stage is dropped. Based on this document, 1991 witnessed

the release of Australia’s Language: the Australian Language and

27 Language in Australia, pp. 218

Literacy Policy.28

Pragmatism is the principle of language policies in this

period, which is to say, language is largely regarded as

a tool or a kind of human resources. For example,

different languages are ranked according to the level of

their importance in foreign trade, so that the education

of certain Asian languages, namely Japanese, Putonghua29

and Korean. Therefore, some linguists question the

attitude towards language learning expressed in the

documents, criticizing the over-emphasis on economic

importance.30

28 A Study on Language Policy in Australia, pp. 107-139

29 The document uses the term “Mandarin” yet for the sake of consistence it is changed into “Putonghua” in this paper.30From Language Policy to Language Planning: An Overview of Languages Other Than English in Australian Education, pp. 26-27

B. Analysis of the linguistic ecology for the Cantonese

dialect in Australia

Generally speaking, the development of Cantonese in

Australia is in accordance with the change in the

government’s language policy as well as the different

waves of immigrants reviewed in the first part of this

paper. In the first period, Cantonese was quite popular

among the early Chinese immigrants. Despite the prejudice

they received from other social groups, there was no

official ban or regulation on its use as we can see in

the second period. Then because of the introduction of

the White Australia policy, the number of Chinese

immigrants decreased, so that the Cantonese speaking

population started aging, with the use of the dialect

being limited as well. The maintenance of Cantonese was

then boosted by the multicultural policies issued in the

third period as has been stated above. In the 1970s,

“Special Broadcasting Service” (SBS) was launched,

catering to the needs of those who speak community

languages in Australia. The webpage of SBS Cantonese

service is presented below. 2CR China Radio Network and

2AC National Australian Chinese Radio are also broadcast

in Cantonese.31 Translation and interpreting services

targeted at Cantonese speakers are also provided by the

Australian government. For example, on the website of

Australian Electoral Commission, Cantonese is included

under the item of “translated information and telephone

interpreter service” as demonstrated below.

31 Their programs are proportionally divided between Putonghua and Cantonese.邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑《》

Webpage of SBS Chinese – Cantonese Radio32

Cantonese services provided by Australian Electoral Commission33

Paper media is also an important area where the

32 Source: http://www.sbs.com.au/chinese/program/cantonese-radio/33 Source: http://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Translated_information/

development of Cantonese in Australia can be observed.34

According to An Australian Guide to Chinese Language Publishing &

Translating released by Australia-China Council, “it was not

until the 1980s that the first of a new generation of

Chinese newspapers appeared”. To locate the current

discussion within the linguistic ecology outlined

previously, it occurred after new waves of Cantonese

immigrants arrived and the policy of multiculturalism was

adopted. “In March 1982, the Hong Kong Sing Tao Daily 邑邑邑邑邑《 》

launched an Australian edition in Sydney, publishing six

34 As Chinese is a pluricentric langauge, the discussion of its written form can cause debate. The paper media presented here mostly derives from Hong Kong or is started by Hong Kong immigrants. While not all Cantonese people speakers use traditinal Chinese as it is the case in Hong Kong, since those from Chinese mainland are largely accustomed to simplified Chinese, and alsoamong those who obtain news in traditional Chinese there are people who do not speak Cantonese, such as some immigrants from Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia, still the author regard it reasonable to demonstrate the development of Cantonese in Australia with the above examples. This is because firstly, even both are written in the traditional form of Chinese, Cantonese speakers from Hong Kong use different vocabulary from Taiwan immigrants, some of which are based on Cantonese pronunciation; secondly, while those of Cantonese origin who immigrate to Australia from Chinese mainland use a different written, a lot of them have been heavily influencedby the Hong Kong media either when they are in China or Australia. Therefore, it is believed that the rise of the media mentioned above is representative of the development of Cantonese in Australia.

days a week. Employing satellite communications to

transmit news swiftly from Hong Kong, it rapidly

established a market for itself in Australia, New Zealand

and countries of the South Pacific.” Until now, a large

proportion of Chinese newspapers are of Hong Kong

background.35

Whereas language policies proposed and carried out by the

government constitute a large part of the external

environment for the development of the Cantonese dialect,

the language ecology also contains other factors which

also influence its maintenance. Comparisons between the

language shift rates of different ethnolinguistic groups

suggest clear-cut factors that can lead to either

35 In fact, most of them are of either Hong Kong or Taiwan background, which is why some more recent Chinese immigrants to Australia from Chinese mainland have to spend some time to adjust themselves to the Chinese media there.

language maintenance or language shift (depending on

their combination with other factors). Here are some of

them that apply to the Australian experience: exogamy,

pre-migration language maintenance experience, cultural

similarity to the dominant group, and the role of

language as a core value in the group’s cultural values

systems.36

In the case of Cantonese in Australia, we can see the

factors of exogamy and pre-migration language maintenance

experience37 in play, which have their roots in how the

immigrants perceive their identity. While on the policy

level, Australia’s Cantonese speakers are no longer

36 There are also ambivalent factors but this paper can afford to devote longparagraphs to this particular topic. For more detailed information please refer to Language in Australia, pp. 21837 Other factors mentioned in the previous paragraph most probably have exerted their influence as well, but since related literature is not abundant, the author has to select only what can be confirmed based on the research.

prejudiced against with the implementation of

multiculturalism, it does not necessarily mean that the

Chinese dialect would be better maintained. This,

however, is not to say that multicultural policies are a

failure but the situation experienced by a particular

language or dialect is more complicated than it can be

theoretically imagined. Multiculturalism did help

Cantonese to thrive, yet it has not always remained that

way, as there are other more crucial factors, especially

the economic concern. It will be more specifically

discussed in part four

Variety exists in the maintenance of Cantonese when it

comes to different generations. Early Chinese immigrants

to Australia, such as indentured laborers from China’s

Cantonese speaking regions, tended to regard themselves

as “passengers”, which is to say, they would not

permanently stay in Australia. These Cantonese went there

simply to make money so that when they eventually

returned home a better life would lie ahead. The impetus

for them to better English skills was not that strong.

Such a mentality resulted in a high rate of maintenance

of their mother tongue. For the early immigrants who did

continue to live in Australia, most of them would still

consider themselves as Chinese and not Australians.

Exogamy and pre-migration language maintenance experience

thus were important factors that help to maintain the use

of Cantonese. Intermarriage with non-Chinese was quite

rare. Finding a bride back in China and then sending her

to Australia would be much preferred, who, in most

circumstances, could not speak English so that the tie to

the mother tongue was again strengthened. For the next

generations, those would could afford it would send their

sons back to China to receive education (and to find a

bride during the course). Before they went to Australia,

their Cantonese skills would be consolidated.38

Such is the case for the older generations. The

“passengers” mentality, however, is not dominant among

new immigrants of Cantonese origin, which means that they

would try harder to adapt themselves to the Australian

society, including the improvement of English language

skills even at the expense of their mother tongue (this

point will be further discussed in part three). For the

38

second and later generations of immigrants, how they view

their identity has also changed. For example, Reg Mu

Sung, a descendant of early Cantonese immigrants to

Australia, has made the following remark:39

“My children, the sixth generation, are thoroughly westernized... They

consider themselves to be Australian and not Chinese.”

Generally, the practice of going back to China for

education is no longer common among the Cantonese

descendants in Australia. The rate of exogamy rises as

well, although some Cantonese family, especially those

who immigrate more recently, still prefer not to have

intermarriage. The education level is also an important

39 The Chinese face in Australia : multi-generational ethnicity among Australian-born Chinese, pp. 115

variant when we compare different generations of

Cantonese immigrants to Australia. While the early ones

were mostly poorly educated, according to Zhang Qiusheng,

a scholar specialized in the studies of overseas Chinese,

Cantonese-speaking immigrants from Hong Kong ever since

the 1970s mostly belonged to the category of “skilled

workers and professionals”,40 which means that this group

of people were already bilingual before immigration. Such

factors indeed pave the way for a transition from the use

of Cantonese to English, the dominant language spoken by

Australians. Therefore, compared with their predecessors,

the more recent Cantonese-speaking immigrants to

Australia would not stick to the maintenance of the

dialect that strictly.

40

So far a series of societal factors such as waves of

Cantonese speaking immigrants, policies proposed and

implemented by the authorities, exogamy, pre-migration

language maintenance experience and attitude held by

immigrants themselves have been briefly examined, which

are believed to have a impact on the development of

Cantonese as a community language in Australia. The

following paragraphs will discuss how the situation of

the Cantonese dialect has changed in respond to the

prominent influence of English in Australia and the

rising dominance of Putonghua in the Chinese community

respectively in part three and four.

III. The Changing Cantonese: Interaction with English in

Australia

In a linguistic ecology, languages not only develop in

accordance with social development but also interact with

other languages in the same society. The Cantonese

dialect in Australia is no exception. In this part, the

author would try to demonstrate how Cantonese and English

interact with each other through the linguistic

phenomenon of loanword, code-mixing and language shift.

A. “Eating in Guangzhou”: Loanwords from Cantonese used by

Australians

There is a famous Chinese saying, “Eating in Guangzhou”,

which means that the capital city of South China’s

Guangdong Province is a paradise for gourmets. Similarly,

loanwords from Cantonese popular in Australia are highly

concentrated in food. This, however, is not unique since

dining is one of the most important areas where the

culture of a nation or a particular social group is

directly demonstrated, so that terms from the original

languages, which are difficult to translate, would more

than often remain. Australians frequently encounter

loanwords from foreign languages when it comes to food

and dining, such as “pho” in Vietnamese, “paella” in

Spanish and “souvlaki” in Greek. It echoes a point made

by B. Taylor in 1989 that the influence of post-

immigrants on Australian English is mainly reflected

through loanwords, with a high concentration in those

about food and drinks.41 A remark from the Australian Language

also attests to this point: “The influence of New

Australians in improving the eating habits of this

community has been considerable although, to be quite

fair, this is by no means new… Modern migrants have done

much to refine this influence, in restaurants espresso

coffee bars and delicatessens, at least in the main

cities. One result has been the absorption of many new

eating terms into Australian use.”42

When Cantonese migrants interact with others social

groups, loanwords from the Chinese dialect are introduced

into Australia, revealing the rich food culture of the

Cantonese people. Some of them are further stabilized

41 Du Xuezeng 邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑 《》 pp. 149-15042 The Australian Language, pp. 408

through efforts made by the authorities or scholars. With

new waves of Cantonese immigrants going to Australia

since the 1970s, as has been aforementioned in the first

part of this paper, it was observed in Australian English: the

Language of a New Society published in 1989 that “From

Chinese43 has come in the last ten years yum cha,

Cantonese ‘drink tea’, originally a kind of morning tea

where customers select items of food brought around at

intervals on trays and trolleys… it has developed into a

full lunch selected in this way, that is, a kind of

Chinese smorgasbord44 (itself “sandwich table”).45 Along

with many others, the word has found its way into the

Macquarie Dictionary, and not just the more specialized

43 Again we can sense from the use of the word “Chinese” that different regional varieties of the Chinese language were not clearly distinguished atthat time. 44 A post-war transfer from Swedish Smörgåsbord45 Australian English: the Language of a New Society, pp. 253

dictionaries like the Grolier International Dictionary of World

English in an Asian Context.46

The entry of “yum cha” in the Macquarie Dictionary and Thesaurus

Online47

As has been discussed, the practice of “yum cha”

generally involves various kinds of food for diners to

choose from, hence resulting in more loanwords from

Cantonese. Collectively the different food items are

46 English in Southeast Asia: Features, Policy and Language in Use, pp. 12547 Without access to the latest edition of Macquarie Dictionary in hard copy, thee-version is referred to instead. Source: http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/anonymous@9c90A98690551/-/p/dict/index.html For the sake of clarity, the author has added the words’ meaning in Chinese.

referred to as “dim sum”. Below is the word’s entry.48

The entry of “dim sum” in the Macquarie Dictionary and ThesaurusOnline49

With the introduction of various kinds of Cantonese food,

terms transliterated from the Cantonese dialect become

well known on the Australian continent. Here are some

examples of Cantonese loanwords. Again they are all

collected in the Macquarie Dictionary.

48 It is important to point out that there is another word “dim sim”, also popularly used in the Australian context. However, “dim sim” and “dim sum” are not simply different forms of spelling that refer to the same kind of food. “Derived from the Chinese dim sum, the Aussie Dim Sim is about twice as large as its oriental heritage equivalent… The Australian Dim Sim is soldat the local Fish and Chips shop and usually eaten as a snack and served in a double lined plain paper bag.”Source: http://www.upfromaustralia.com/aussiedimsim.html49 Source: http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/anonymous@9c90A98690551/-/p/dict/index.html

The entry of “chow mein” in the Macquarie Dictionary andThesaurus Online50

The entry of “chow mein” in the Macquarie Dictionary andThesaurus Online51

The entry of “won ton” in the Macquarie Dictionary and ThesaurusOnline52

50 Ibid.51 Ibid.52 Ibid.

The entry of “chop suey” in the Macquarie Dictionary andThesaurus Online53

Some other loanwords from Cantonese do not refer to food

but are also closely related to dining and cooking, such

as wok, which is a Chinese style cooker, and hoisin

sauce, a kind of seasoning that Cantonese are keen to

use. Hoisin sauce, in particular, is introduced into

English in Australia through the combination of

transliteration and literal translation, which is a bit

different from the examples given above.

53 Ibid.

The entry of “wok” in the Macquarie Dictionary and ThesaurusOnline54

The entry of “hoisin sauce” in the Macquarie Dictionary andThesaurus Online55

Asides from delicacy, there are also Cantonese

loanwords for the names of fruit that have entered the

Australians’ vocabulary. This, of course, has a lot to do

with the local flora of South China where Cantonese is

frequently used and the introduction of fruits grown

54 Ibid.55 Ibid.

there to the Antipodes through the early immigration and

communication between the two countries. It also echoes

Sapir’s point mentioned in the second part, which

maintains that the physical environment, such as the

flora and fauna, would exert influence on languages.

Examples include lychee, loquat and cumquat.

Specifically, loquat, which usually means “ 邑 邑 ” in

Chinese, does not originate from the Cantonese

pronunciation of this Chinese word. Instead, it derives

from “邑邑” and gets transliterated from Cantonese.

The entry of “lychee” in the Macquarie Dictionary and Thesaurus

Online56

The entry of “loquat” in the Macquarie Dictionary and ThesaurusOnline57

The entry of “cumquat” in the Macquarie Dictionary and ThesaurusOnline58

The most drastic move to integrate Cantonese loanwords

into the linguistic landscape in Australia might be the

56 Ibid.57 Ibid.58 Ibid.

standardization of vegetable names in 2005. In that year,

the New South Wales Department of Primary Industries

issued standard names to the 14 most common Asian

vegetables, which were finalized according to the

Cantonese version and pronunciation. The authorities did

it largely due to previous research revealing that the

wide variation in what the greens were called was

“foiling home cooks”. Afterwards major supermarkets

agreed to adopt the naming system nationally. Such a

measure was commented by then Primary Industries Minister

Ian Macdonald as a "world first".59

English names of the vegetables involved in the project

are results of transliteration, in combination with

59 Source:http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/now-were-cooking-asian-vegies-become-userfriendly/2005/11/07/1131212008740.html

literal translation (though on rare occasions) from the

Cantonese dialect. On explaining why Cantonese names were

adopted, David Chung, president of the Chinese Vegetable

Growers Association, said that it was because almost all

Sydney's growers speak an old dialect from the city of Ko

Yun in China's southern Guangdong province, also a

regional variety of Cantonese. The families immigrated to

Australia more than 100 years ago and have been active in

the growing and selling of vegetables, which was quite

usual for early Chinese immigrants in Australia. Here are

some of the Cantonese loanwords used by Australians for

vegetables.

Chinese English

邑邑邑(邑邑邑) Wombok(Chinese

Cabbage)

邑邑邑 Baby Buk Choy

邑邑邑 Baby TongChoy

邑邑 Gai Choy

邑邑邑 Baby Choy Sum

邑邑 En Choy

邑邑 Chi Qua

邑邑 Sin Qua

邑邑 Tung ChoyTranslation of Vegetable Names Standardized By the NSW Government According to Cantonese

In examining Cantonese loanwords that have found their

way into languages used by Australians, the following

points deserve special attention. Firstly, although terms

adopted from Cantonese are largely about food, dining and

cooking, it is not limited to this particular area.

Cheongsam, for example, is a famous word of Chinese

origin that has been introduced into English according to

the Cantonese pronunciation of “ 邑 邑 ” , literally meaning

“long gown”. Secondly, though many loanwords from Chinese

languages are transliteration of the Cantonese dialect,

what they refer to are by no means unique to Cantonese

speaking regions. Again Cheongsam might serve as an

example for this point. Cantonese names are adopted

largely due to the early contact between Cantonese and

foreigners and the strong influence the dialect used to

(or maybe still) exert. Lastly, loanwords from Cantonese

used in Australia coexist with others of Mandarin,

Hokkien and Teochiu origin. It is especially important

not to mistake words rendered from other Chinese dialects

or those converted into English through the Wade-

Giles system. Famous examples are Chiang Kai Shek and

Pecking University.

The entry of “cheongsam” in the Macquarie Dictionary andThesaurus Online60

B. Hybridity and Dynamicism: How English Impacts on

Cantonese

Since the interaction between Cantonese and English in

Australia is not one-direction, how English has impacted

on the Chinese dialect also merits attention. The issue

will be approached from two linguistic phenomena: code-

mixing and language shift. The influence, of course, is

related to the development of language policy reviewed in

60 Source: http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/anonymous@9c90A98690551/-/p/dict/index.html

the second part. For example, “the period of

assimilationist policies and attitudes is reflected in

high language shift between ethnolinguistic groups.”61 The

situation is also shaped by how immigrants view their

identity. For example, as has been discussed in the last

part, new generations who no longer perceive themselves

as “passengers” but citizens to permanently live in

Australia would readily adapt to themselves to the use of

English.

To put it simply, code-mixing, which is sometimes used

more or less interchangeably with code-switching,62 refers

to the mixing of two or more language or language

varieties in speech. When observing community language,

61 Language in Australia, pp. 21762 For difference between code-switching and code-mixing, please refer to Code-switching and Code-mixing, pp. 3

Michael Clyne remarks that “there are particular

sociolinguistic, communicative and stylistic functions of

‘mixed varieties’ which are characteristic of the speech

situation in Australia as opposed to the country of

origin, for example, citing key-words that had been used

in English in bilingual interaction; as a more informal

or familiar way of expressing oneself; within specific

networks of which ‘mixed variety’ is a symbol; to

emphasize the Australian context; for humorous reasons;

to facilitate the use of synonyms.”63

The phenomenon is quite common among Cantonese speakers

in Australia. To take an example, Rebecca, an adult

immigrant to Australia, speaks Cantonese as her first

63 Language in Australia, pp. 222

language. She is also fluent in English and Putonghua.

When asked which language was dominantly used in her

family, Rebecca made the following remarks:

“…my children both speak English a lot of the time at home, and then

if I want to get things done quickly it’s English. Not that they’re

naughty, but they do find it harder to grasp if I speak Cantonese to

them, so they’ll take a minute to work out what I want them to do. But

if I speak English they immediately know what I want. And at home is

half half. My husband speaks Cantonese with me, but then we do

throw in English words every now and then, for convenience, like there

are some terms in English and maybe we are talking about work and

so on, so we do mix a lot of English even into our Cantonese

conversation, but with the children mainly English. So I’d say English is

dominant.”64

For the above statement we can see the choice of language

serves certain purpose. English is used in Rebecca’s

family for compliance from the children or convenience

when it comes to topics that are work-related. Even when

the mother tongue is used, it is not purely in Cantonese.

Instead, English words are usually embedded in the

conversion.65

Language shift among immigrants of Cantonese origin is

also situational, depending on the age group as well as

domain. Research indicates a low language shift in the

64 Bilingualism among Teachers of English as a Second Language: A Study of Second Language Learning Experience as a Contributor to the Professional Knowledge and Beliefs of Teachers of ESL to Adults, pp. 23265 This is also a phenomenon common in Hong Kong as well as foreign-invested enterprises in Chinese mainland.

elderly and higher language shift in young adults.66 An

examination of Brisbane’s Cantonese communities also

attests to the finding, which demonstrates “a clear

generational language shift from Cantonese to English in

the second generation and among participants who migrated

to Australia as children”. Similarly, in Hong Kong Club

Inc, an association originally founded in 1965 as the

Overseas Hong Kong Student Association of Victoria,

“Cantonese is spoken at both formal and informal

meetings, although children usually speak English, unless

they are the children of new arrivals”.67 On one hand, it

is because children, after a period of time associating

with friends or classmates in Australia, would find the

transition to English easier, which is also facilitated

66 Community Languages: The Australian Experience, pp. 8367 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 231

by school education. On the other hand, it is observed

that “families often made a choice to concentrate on

English skills, in order to give the children the best

possible opportunity to excel at school in Australia and

be successful in the future”. 68

Domain or the specific occasion is another important

element to consider. According to previous research,

Cantonese is primarily used at home. In the case of

Brisbane’s Cantonese communities, “the generational

language shift was found to be more rapid outside the

family domain, i.e. the friendship domain, the church

domain and the media domain.”69 When the younger

generations do use Cantonese, it is mainly for speaking

68 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 23469 Language maintenance among Cantonese migrants in Brisbane

with their family and the dialect more or less serves as

an identity marker. “This was reflected in the high

number of participants who reported using and preferring

the use of Cantonese in the family, and the strong

support of ‘communicate with relatives’, ‘to retain one’s

identity’ and ‘to participate in the culture of the

country of origin” as reasons for language maintenance

among participants.”70 Here are some comments on the home

use of Cantonese made by Hong Kong immigrants to

Australia:

(A Cantonese-speaking parent) “It is important to teach children at

home when they’re still young, and before they are exposed to

70 Language maintenance among Cantonese migrants in Brisbane

Australian society or an Australian workplace.”

(A Cantonese-speaking young adult) “If I do not practice my

Cantonese at home, I will lose it, but I would also like to be able to use

English sometimes.” [not possible because her father gets very angry

if English is used]71

(A Cantonese-speaking parent) “I prefer to use Cantonese at home,

but the children’s Cantonese is poor, so we must use English in order

to communicate.”72

What the above paragraphs reveal, of course, is just a

general pattern. As the notion of language ecology

suggests, there are many other factors in play, such as

71 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 24372 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 244

economic concern. For example, “whereas in the earlier

days of settlement in Australia, parents were content for

their children to develop their English skills, often at

the expense of their Cantonese skills”, the economic

downturn and rising unemployment rate that Australia

experienced in the late 1980s and early 1990s motivated

“a stronger push for Cantonese language maintenance to

safeguard career opportunities for the younger

generations”,73 which caused a reverse in the language

shift towards English. It is reported during that period,

young people of Hong Kong background from Australia

experienced no difficulty in securing employment in Hong

Kong.

73 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 293

In this part, it can be observed that the impact of

Cantonese and English on each other is asymmetrical.

While Cantonese does have influence on English, it is

quite limited and almost exclusively lexical, hardly

going beyond the realm of vocabulary. The introduction of

Cantonese loanwords, on the other hand, also adheres to

the linguistic rule that “it is the vocabulary of a

language that most clearly reflects the physical and

social environment of its speakers”,74 which is to say,

vocabulary is the most dynamic linguistic arena in which

exchange of different language or language varieties

occurs.

English, however, exerts more profound influence on

74 Language and Environment, pp. 3

Cantonese. Not through the use of loanwords, English

words could directly enter Cantonese conversation and on

some occasion replace the Chinese dialect, resulting in

language shift. This asymmetrical relationship, again, is

consistent with the status of English and Cantonese in

Australia: one is the dominant and most common language

in use while the other is a community language.

IV. The Retreat of Cantonese: Rising Putonghua and Its

Implication

Aside from the influence exerted by English, the spread

of Cantonese in Australia, just as many other parts in

the world, is being encroached by the rising influence of

the standard form of Chinese language. Currently the

Cantonese dialect coexists with Putonghua, along with

some other dialects such as Hakka, Hokkien and Teochiu in

Australia’s Chinese communities, and is more than often

being replaced by it. The encroachment is manifested in

three aspects: firstly, those interested in learning

Chinese tend to choose Putonghua rather than Cantonese,

resulting in a decrease of Cantonese learners; secondly,

some Cantonese learners switch to Putonghua in the

process of learning Cantonese; thirdly, some of the

Cantonese speakers not fluent in Putonghua are facing the

pressure to better their Putonghua skills.

The rapid expansion of Putonghua globally is due to the

strong growth of the Chinese economy. When examining the

Australian experience specifically, it can be attributed

to the increase in trading between the two countries as

well as the large number of students going from Chinese

mainland to Australia for better education. On both

occasions, Putonghua claims dominance for the linguistic

expression of the Chinese side. Moreover, as scholars has

previously observed, the shift towards Putonghua “as the

prestigious and standard language of use and education”

is closely related to initiatives adopted by the Chinese

government such as the Confucius Institutes.75 Hanban’s

efforts to introduce Chinese culture and promote

Putonghua all over the world unavoidably threaten the

maintenance of dialectic variants of Chinese such as

Cantonese.

The growth of Putonghua speakers in Australia in the past

75 Teaching and Learning Chinese in Global Contexts: CFL Worldwide, pp. 3

decades is phenomenal. According to the 2006 census,

presented in the chart below, those who used Cantonese at

home in Australia still outnumbered Putonghua76 speakers

at this stage. Yet the growth rate of those who speak

Putonghua has been about six to seven times of that of

the Cantonese speakers in recent years, which is also the

highest among all the community languages. Therefore, it

is no wonder that the tide has turned within only five

years’ time. In 2011, the Australian government conducted

another survey. It indicated that Putonghua77 has bypassed

Cantonese and overtaken Italian as the most commonly

spoken language other than English. The ranking of

different languages’ percentage in terms of use at

76As has been clarified in footnote 4, this paper refers to the standard formof the Chinese language as Putonghua. The 2006 census, however, has used “Mandarin” and the meaning is more or less the same. For the sake of consistence, “Putonghua” instead of “Mandarin” is adopted in the paper whereas in the chart, which is directly copied from the census, the term “Mandarin” remains. 77 See footnote 49

Australian homes goes like this: 1. English (76.8 per

cent), 2. Putonghua (1.6 per cent), 3. Italian (1.4 per

cent), 4. Arabic (1.3 per cent), 5. Cantonese (1.2 per

cent), 6. Greek (1.2 per cent). While Cantonese used to

be the predominant language in some capital cities for a

long time, this is no longer the case.78

Top 10 LOTEs spoken at Home in Australia in 200679

A further examination of Cantonese loanwords also reveals

78http://andrewhong.net/2012/11/19/mandarin-now-overtakes-cantonese-in- australia-2011/79LOTE: language other than English. A problem of this survey, however, is that it “understates the number using a LOTE as it is based entirely on self-reporting of home use and many people employ a community language in the homes of parents or other relatives or in community groups but not in their own homes”. Multiculturalism and Intergration: A Harmonious Relationship, pp. 55

the decline of the dialect. English transliteration of

Cantonese expressions presented above only take up a

small proportion of what has been historically introduced

from the dialect to English, since the author has

deliberately limited the selection to those that have

been collected in the Maquarie Dictionary. Other loanwords of

Cantonese include Lekin, Dotchin, Pakapu, Pakipai, Yen-

hok, just to name a few.80 As a matter of fact, these

words are very archaic, outdated and hardly used any

more. In recent decades, most of Chinese loanwords that

have been presented to English speakers come from

Putonghua, such as online buzzwords like “Dama”81 and

“Tuhao”82. 80 邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑邑《》, pp. 381 Chinese dama (“邑邑”) came under the spotlight after they rushed to buy goldas global prices plunged in the first half of 2013. It has even been mentioned in Wall Street Journal. 82 Tuhao (“邑邑”) refers to the new rich in China. The term has been introducedin a BBC program and will probably be added to the future edition of Oxford English dictionary. Source: http://www.ibtimes.com/oxford-english-dictionary-considers-adding-tuhao-chinese-slang-term-future-edition-1477460

Another observation made of the Maquarie Dictionary can

also demonstrate the marginalization of Cantonese as well

as the position of Putonghua as the standard and

therefore dominant version of the Chinese language. A new

tendency is to standardize the pluricentric Chinese

language with Putonghua’s pinyin system. For example, the

first president and founding father of the Republic of

China is generally referred to as Sun Yat-sen according

to the Cantonese pronunciation of his Chinese name “邑邑邑”

since Sun is of Cantonese origin. However, the Macquarie

Dictionary introduces “Sun Yat-sen” as the “former name of

Sun Zhong-shan”, which accords with Putonghua.83

83 It would be interesting to compare the entry of Sun Yat-sen in different dictionaries. The author has referred to the online edition of Merriam-Webster Dictionary (as a representative of American English) and that of the Oxford English Dictionary (as a representative of British English), and found that none of the two introduce Sun Yat-sen as a “former name” as the Macquarie Dictionary does. The definition given by Merriam Webster is “originally Sun Wen or Sun Chung-shan Chin. Statesman”. The Oxford English Dictionary, on the other hand, addsthe information “also Sun Yixian”. That only the Australian version has made

The entry of “Sun Yat-sen” in the Macquarie Dictionary andThesaurus Online84

To present the situation in a more systematic way, the

author has summarized the decline of the Cantonese

dialect in Australia with the following points:

(1) Age: The average age of Cantonese speakers in

Australia is older than that of the Putonghua

speakers. This is because, firstly, there are

more Cantonese than Putonghua speakers in earlier

immigration to Australia; and secondly, new

the effort to standardize the use of name with Putonghua pinyin might be because the country has prioritized the standard Chinese language even more than the U.K and the U.S., which, however, is just the author’s guess and not yet been confirmed. 84 Source: http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/anonymous@9c90A98690551/-/p/dict/index.html

generations of Chinese immigrants predominantly

speak Putonghua.85

(2) Domain: Most Chinese-language educational

provision is in Putonghua, with Cantonese

remaining a community and home language86. It has

been observed that Putonghua is the school

language of choice for many from Cantonese-

speaking backgrounds (hence the absence of

Cantonese from public examinations in Australia

as well as its near-absence from university

programs).87

(3) Number of speakers: most of the recent Chinese

immigrants to Australia speak Putonghua, not

Cantonese, whose number has been rapidly growing

85 Valeria Denisova, pp. 586 Pluricentric Languages in an Immigrant Context: Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, pp. 22687 Encyclopedia of Language and Education, pp. 174

as has been presented in the 2011 census result

given above.

(4) Loanwords: now there are more loanwords to

English from Putonghua than from Cantonese, and

many of the loanwords of Cantonese are quite

outdated

Sensitive to the rise of Putonghua, the Australian

government has stressed their emphasis on Chinese by

advocating the teaching of Putonghua, or Mandarin as the

standard Chinese is referred to in its rhetoric, which

has also resulted in the retreat of Cantonese. According

to Asian Languages and Australia's Economic Future, the importance

of different languages is ranked according to the

country’s economic ties with Australia. As we can see,

Chinese, which on this occasion means Putonghua, belongs

to tire one whereas Cantonese ranks tier three. The

strategy again adheres to the spirit in the fourth stage

of Australia’s language policy development, or the period

of prioritization as we have discussed in part two.

Tier One Tier Two Tier Three

Japanese,

Chinese,

Indonesian

Arabic,

French,

Korean,

Spanish, Thai

Bislama, Burmese,

Cantonese, Farsi, German,

Greek, Italian, Khmer, Lao,

Melanesian Pidgin, Malay,

Polish, Portuguese,

Russian, Tok Pisin and

Vietnamese

“Australia’s

major

priorities”

“international

application”

and “important

interests”

“significant interests”

Priority of Languages88

V. Conclusion

By looking at the language ecology, which includes waves

of immigrants, the development of language policy etc.,

the interaction between Cantonese and English, as well as

the decline of Cantonese when it is faced with the rise

of Putonghua, this paper has generally outlined the

situation of the Cantonese dialect in Australia. As an

important community language in Australia, Cantonese has

gone through ups and downs, whose maintenance is being

challenged due to a series of societal factors. As both

time and related literature are limited, there are surely

problems with this paper. For example, some of the

88 A Site for Debate, Negotiation and Contest of National Identity: Language Policy in Australia, pp. 25

statistics might not be the latest and there are points

that have not been fully elaborated on. Still, it is

hoped that the author has succeeded in giving a general

picture of the use of Cantonese in Australia, which can

help us not only to better understand the country’s

community languages but also to see more specifically the

situation of Chinese dialects overseas.

Reference