Mandarin Mayhem III: The Cantonese Conundrum

Barbarians at the Gate

In this episode, Jeremiah and David talk with James Griffiths, Asia Correspondent for the Globe and Mail, about his new book Speak Not: Empire, Identity and the Politics of Language. This podcast can be considered the third installment of a trilogy of Barbarian at the Gate episodes that deal with the politics of language and dialects in China (see the links to the earlier podcasts below). Our previous guest Gina Anne Tam aptly sums up Griffiths’ research topic in her dustjacket review of the book:

“Speak Not is a beautifully narrated and intensely smart global history of how languages are destroyed. From Hong Kong to Wales, Hawaii to South Africa, Griffiths artfully guides us through intimate stories of people fighting over decades, often in vain, to protect their linguistic heritage and identities, stories that, when taken together, reveal an oft-unexplored aspect of the ‘disasters wrought’ by colonialism, nationalism, and global inequality.”

In addition to insights from the revitalization of Welsh, one of Griffiths’ native tongues, the podcast delves deeply into the recent plight of Cantonese in Hong Kong and the mainland minority languages of Tibet, Xinjiang, and Inner Mongolia.

Links to:

“Mandarin Mayhem” April 10, 2020

“Mandarin Mayhem, Part II: Dialect and Nationalism in China” June 02, 2020

The Great Firewall of China

“A residential school system in China is stripping Tibetan children of their languages and culture, report claims” The Globe and Mail December 7, 2021

David Moser, A Billion Voices: China’s Search for a Common Language (Penguin, 2016)