Debate over Cantonese and the handover highlight Hongkongers’ feeling of political helplessness

At last week’s chief executive question-and-answer session at the Legislative Council, some of our legislators made sure that Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor got an earful over “Cantonese being a dialect and not a mother tongue”. In the news are also the unresolved “inaccuracy” of the phrase “taking back Hong Kong” and the very (un)timely elimination of the use of “handover” by the official protocol office. As I’m no historian or linguist, I won’t argue over semantics.  

But these are not just matters of semantics. And when they are raised against the backdrop of strained Beijing-Hong Kong relations, they become downright cruel and counterproductive – that is, if one does not want to further strain the delicate relationship. 

Why has the “Cantonese is not a mother-tongue” spectre been raised at this time? The view was expressed in a 2013 article by Song Xinqiao, a professional consultant at the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Centre for Research and Development of Putonghua Education. The article was part of a set of 25 on Mandarin teaching experiences.

Since 1997, the Education Bureau has sent 11 sets of these articles to primary schools. The strong emotions that this has sparked is what our government officials must take note of. 

Cantonese, though not unique to Hong Kong, is an unalienable part of Hongkongers’ identity. Actions that are seen as attacking or downgrading it elicit emotionally charged responses. Some of these reactions are indeed over the top and uncalled for, such as the Baptist University students’ rowdy and obscenity-laced protest at the university’s language centre at the beginning of the year demanding that a mandatory Mandarin language requirement be scrapped.