My Take | Cantonese to stay on the tip of our tongues
Fighting against extending the teaching of Mandarin in Hong Kong schools makes as much sense as stopping the yuan from being used in the local economy
If Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor had been asked in the legislature what she thought was the official currency of Hong Kong, would she have dismissed the question as silly?
It all depends on the context. Suppose lawmakers are addressing a rumour that the yuan may be replacing the Hong Kong dollar. In that case the question would certainly not be out of place.
In light of an ongoing review of primary and secondary school curriculum by a government task force, a rumour – unfounded as it turns out – has been circulating that a plan is afoot to replace Cantonese with Mandarin as the main medium of instruction.
It was in this context that Lam was being asked by social welfare sector lawmaker Shiu Ka-chun what her mother tongue was.
The issue, of course, is that the post-1997 government has a policy of teaching in mother tongue in public and aided schools, and so far no one doubts that that means Cantonese. Shiu’s question, therefore, was not “silly”, though it was dismissed as such by Lam. For once, Secretary for Education Kevin Yeung Yun-hung did the smart thing and acknowledged mother tongue was Cantonese under current policy.
