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Language Policy in the People’s Republic of China
Language matters in China. It is about power, identity, opportunities, and, above all, passion and nationalism. During the past five decades China’s language engineering projects transformed its linguistic landscape, affecting over one billion people’s lives, including both the majority and minority populations. The Han majority have been juggling between their home vernaculars and the official speech, Putonghua – a speech of no native speakers – and reading their way through a labyrinth of the traditional, simplified, and Pinyin (Roman) scripts. Moreover, the various minority groups have been struggling between their native languages and Chinese, maintaining the former for their heritages and identities and learning the latter for quality education and socioeconomic advancement. The contributors of this volume provide the first comprehensive scrutiny of this sweeping linguistic revolution from three unique perspectives. First, outside scholars critically question the parities between constitutional rights and actual practices and between policies and outcomes. Second, inside policy practitioners review their own project involvements and inside politics, pondering over missteps, undergoing soul-searching, and theorizing their personal experiences. Third, scholars of minority origin give inside views of policy implementations and challenges in their home communities. The volume sheds light on the complexity of language policy making and implementing as well as on the politics and ideology of language in contemporary China.
Introduction: The Context of the Theory and Practice of China’s Language Policy -- Introduction: The Context of the Theory and Practice of China’s Language Policy -- Theory and Practice in the Center -- Fifty Years of Script and Written Language Reform in the P.R.C. -- The Relationship between Putonghua and Chinese Dialects -- The Creation of Writing Systems and Nation Establishment -- Minority Language Policy in China -- The Center Versus The Periphery in Practice -- Language Spread Versus Language Maintenance: Policy Making and Implementation Process -- Good to Hear -- Putonghua Education and Language Policy in Postcolonial Hong Kong -- On the Promotion of Putonghua in China: How a Standard Language Becomes a Vernacular -- Theorizing Personal Experiences from the Practice -- Theorizing Over 40 Years Personal Experiences with the Creation and Development of Minority Writing Systems of China -- The Use and Development of Dai and its Vernacular Writing Systems -- Theory and Practice Viewed from Minority Communities -- The Use and Development of Tibetan in China -- The Introduction and Development of the Zhuang Writing System -- Policies on the Planning and Use of the Yi Language and Writing Systems -- Language Policy for Bai -- The Use and Development of Mongol and its Writing Systems in China -- Language Policy and Standardization of Korean in China -- Foreign Language Education Policy and Modernization -- Foreign Language Education in the PRC -- Postscript -- Language Matters in China: An Anthropological Postscript.