What does "native language" mean to you?

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Guest Fri Oct 17, 2008 11:07 am GMT
在西藏，漢族有8百萬人，藏族也只有5百萬人。
因此，按照民主原則，占多數的漢族西藏當地人可不想要獨立呢。
至於，海外那些藏族想要獨立，就去他們的印度那裡建立一個西藏自由邦，也許你們崇拜的民主印度還會同意呢，可是要在西藏，先問問占多數的漢族吧！他們可能會給你一句話：門都沒有！
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数据有误哈，西藏总人口还不到300万
一小撮受西方反华势力操纵的藏人想要西藏变天，只能是蚍蜉撼树，自不量力

> "Cantonese as a dialect of Chinese is of coz a language of Sinitic Group, as Chinese belongs to the Sinitic(-Tibetan) Group."

The Cantonese and Mandarin are the Sister Language of Sinitic Group, the Sinitic Group is a member of Sino-Tibetan Family. The "Chinese" is mean the Literary Chinese (Wunyenwun; Written Language), not to mean the Mandarin.

> "Are the writing systems of English, Spanish or Polish exactly the same as Cantonese and Mandarin Chinese?"

The English, Spanish and Polish adopt the Alphabetic Writing System. In history, Cantonese and Mandarin were adopt :
1. Logo-syllabic Writing System. (Chinese character script)
2. Alphabetic Writing System. (Roman script)

If English, Spanish or Polish want to adopt Logo-syllabic Writing System, they can do it well, as well as the cases of Japanese, Korean and Vietnam that all can write in Chinese character script. There are no any body said the Japanese, Korean and Vietnam are the dialects of Chinese. You must know the "language" is the subject, and the "writing system" is just only a tool for record the "language".

<<The Cantonese and Mandarin are the Sister Language of Sinitic Group, the Sinitic Group is a member of Sino-Tibetan Family. The "Chinese" is mean the Literary Chinese (Wunyenwun; Written Language), not to mean the Mandarin. >>
Who said The Cantonese and Mandarin are the Sister Language of Sinitic Group, the Sinitic Group is a member of Sino-Tibetan Family?
who said The "Chinese" is mean the Literary Chinese (Wunyenwun; Written Language), not to mean the Mandarin.?

<<The English, Spanish and Polish adopt the Alphabetic Writing System. In history, Cantonese and Mandarin were adopt :
1. Logo-syllabic Writing System. (Chinese character script)
2. Alphabetic Writing System. (Roman script)
If English, Spanish or Polish want to adopt Logo-syllabic Writing System, they can do it well, as well as the cases of Japanese, Korean and Vietnam that all can write in Chinese character script. There are no any body said the Japanese, Korean and Vietnam are the dialects of Chinese. You must know the "language" is the subject, and the "writing system" is just only a tool for record the "language". >>
Seems as if a language had a life of its own will, which could do whatever it wanted to do and wished to do!
If Shakespeare wanted to write a novel like A Dream of Red Mansions, rather than A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM, he surely could!
If English wished to be Chinesenized, it surely could!
Oh, pigs might fly!

to Guest Fri Oct 17, 2008 2:20 pm GMT

Who ever claimed Japanese, Korean and Vietnam as the dialects of Chinese?
That is a piece of un-heard-of news! Well, you might well say in neighboring country of China, Chinese, whether Mandarin Chinese or Shanghainese Chinese or Cantonese Chinese might well be considered as dialects of Korean. LOL
True, "writing system" is just only a tool for record the "language", to use your crappy English, which I should say, "tongue" is a better word.
Thus American English is a tongue, British English is a tongue, south African English is also a tongue, so are Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese Chinese and Shangainese Chinese! They are all languages, and they are all tongues!

Xie Fri Oct 17, 2008 8:34 am GMT

<<I think Shuimo may be very interested to see the complications of translating 方言, language, dialect, variety... from English/Chinese to Chinese/English. Very often such matters are politicize >>
Actually I am less interested to see the complications of translating 方言, language, dialect, variety... from English/Chinese to Chinese/English than the various resaons that lead to such complications, an issue that is definitely worthy of note and thorough investigation.

That is for sure --- Very often such matters are politicized! No doubt about that! The so-called (or oft-acclaimed?) linguistics as a discipline studied by pedant professors and research fellows, after all, is not a strictly scientific discipline in a sense mathematics and physics are, is it?

<<I don't think there's a problem with translation and linguistics intertwined with culture. >>
I have to disagree with you there! There are just too many problems, and very complicated ones, out there when translation and linguistics are intertwined with culture, given that CULTURE itself is highly controvercial and defies any easy definition.

<<I believe I speak three languages, namely Cantonese (the best), Mandarin (the second best), and English (the only foreign, and third best).>>
I surely believe you speak three TONGUES，but only two languages ---Chinese and English. There is no mistaking that your mother tongue is Cantonese, which you speak most fluently. In Chinese, this is immedately clear: 香港是个通“两文三语”的地方。 Isn't that the language policy of Hong Kong SAR?

to Xie Fri Oct 17, 2008 8:34 am GMT

The follwoing issue illustrates a problem with translation and linguistics intertwined with culture in a perfect way (BTW, I seldom described sth as "perfect", a rare case here indeed)!

<<On what grounds do you say Tibet is Chinese? From the perspective of the PRC government? Or who else? If you do read history books of the past carefully... now, just as some sort of reminder, I'm not discussing politics here... >>

You are half right! I say Tibetans are Chinese indeed not only from the perspective of the PRC government, but also from the standpoint of the majority ordinary Chinese people you meet on the street, if you believe me. 西藏是中国的一部分，西藏人自然是中国人！(Tibet is part of China, therefore Tibetans are Chinese) I think this is where translation problems come in and most Westerners take issue with us Chinese.

Somehow, let us be frank, stop reminding and pretending we are are not discussing politics, OK? Your sort of reminder, to me, is nothing but 此地无银三百两 (I think I'd better provide an English translation of this vivid and concise Chinese idiom in case other non-Chinese-speaking Antimooners spot this thread: A guilty person gives himself away by conspicuously protesting his innocence. Well, What a dumb transltion !:-( ). Forgive my bluntness!

<<In *some* interpretations, Tibet didn't use to be part of the Ming Dynasty; instead, they did have some connections with the Ming government. But in the Qing Dynasty, in *some* interpretations again, it became Qing (Chinese) territory. Before 1950, Tibet was de facto (in international legal terms) independent when ROC couldn't integrate its country very well, and as you might know, it might have been the results of a British plot (and so was the MacMahon line...) >>

Good! You are not without an awareness of the "some" modyfier in the interpretations you provided! But I hope you could be more specific about where these interpretations came from. The British masterminded a lot of plots around the world in these old LAWLESS days,the MacMahon line being one of them, didn't they? The destiny of Tibet, I must confess, has been a winding and twisted one, full of ups and downs, but one of which that had never happened in the past 700 years was this: Tibet never gained independence from China, as Mongolia once did and probably for keeps, by all accounts of Chinese historical records. I must say to read and understand them is no easy task, as they are all in Classical Chinese.

<<And after 1950, yes, the PRC had the final say in asserting that Tibet really was and is now Chinese (PRC). If you support this, you may also be supporting the government perspective. It doesn't really matter if someone disagrees with your stance, period. >>
You are so right! I should just add that before 1950, Tibet really was Chinese as well.
I understand well that what matters here on the Tibetan issue is not really whether someone disagrees with me (or us Chinese) or not, but rather whether we have both the confidence and resources to ensure the saying: Tibet is part of China, and Tibetans are Chinese, period. O(∩_∩)O

>>You are half right! I say Tibetans are Chinese indeed not only from the perspective of the PRC government, but also from the standpoint of the majority ordinary Chinese people you meet on the street, if you believe me. 西藏是中国的一部分，西藏人自然是中国人！(Tibet is part of China, therefore Tibetans are Chinese) I think this is where translation problems come in and most Westerners take issue with us Chinese.<<

Well, they are definitely not ethnically Han Chinese, to say the very least - which is different matter from whether they are Chinese citizens or not. If they were actually ethnically Han Chinese or really identified with the Chinese state, why would the Chinese government be trying to dilute them with more, well, loyal Han Chinese in Tibet itself?

>>Good! You are not without an awareness of the "some" modyfier in the interpretations you provided! But I hope you could be more specific about where these interpretations came from. The British masterminded a lot of plots around the world in these old LAWLESS days,the MacMahon line being one of them, didn't they? The destiny of Tibet, I must confess, has been a winding and twisted one, full of ups and downs, but one of which that had never happened in the past 700 years was this: Tibet never gained independence from China, as Mongolia once did and probably for keeps, by all accounts of Chinese historical records. I must say to read and understand them is no easy task, as they are all in Classical Chinese.<<

>>You are so right! I should just add that before 1950, Tibet really was Chinese as well.
I understand well that what matters here on the Tibetan issue is not really whether someone disagrees with me (or us Chinese) or not, but rather whether we have both the confidence and resources to ensure the saying: Tibet is part of China, and Tibetans are Chinese, period. O(∩_∩)O<<

Actually, things are not nearly this simple in reality. Tibet only actually came under direct *Chinese* rule during the Qing dynasty. Yes, it had been under shared Mongol rule around the same time that the Mongols conquered southern China, but this was not really Chinese rule per se as much as Mongol rule despite being classified as part of the foreign Yuan dynasty of China. Under the Ming, Tibet in reality was independent, as its relationship with the Ming was one of being a tributary of China, just like Korea and Vietnam, and which was mostly symbolic, as opposed to actually being under Ming rule per se; Tibet had no Ming military forces on its territory to replace those of the Mongols, engaged in its own foreign policy, and for that matter had its own civil wars. Only later in the early 1700s under the Qing did Tibet actually come under Chinese rule, but even then it very often more took the manner of repeated Qing interventions in Tibet rather than consistent direct Qing rule. Clearly Qing rule in Tibet was not strong enough to firmly make Tibet part of China, such that it would not become independent once again.

Also note that modern notions of succession of states and whatnot as often used by PRC China to justify their rule of Tibet, cannot really be applied to international relations before at least the 19th century. As a result. arguments to the effect that because Tibet was part of the Yuan dynasty, and because modern PRC China is considered a successor state to such, that Tibet is automatically to be legally considered part of China ring rather hollow in such a regard. Also, such ignores the nature of the pre-modern tributary system of Imperial China, under which being a tributary of China was a different from actually being under Chinese rule; hence even if one could say that under Yuan rule Tibet was under Chinese rule, one cannot necessarily justify the statement that Tibet actually came under Ming rule. If Tibet were not actually under Ming rule per se, how could Tibet actually be considered to have been under Chinese rule for most of the last 700 years?

>>I surely believe you speak three TONGUES，but only two languages ---Chinese and English. There is no mistaking that your mother tongue is Cantonese, which you speak most fluently. In Chinese, this is immedately clear: 香港是个通“两文三语”的地方。 Isn't that the language policy of Hong Kong SAR?

My impression that HKSAR (you know, its being a part of PRC) tries to play down the importance of written Cantonese (the lower register), like in popular literature, internet usage, etc, is thinly veiled. This is a term that they claims, not mine. I don't have to agree with it, and in fact I don't. Even by the simplest criterion (or, to be more precise, yardstick), no matter how the PRC/HKSAR thinks, there's no doubt that, even in terms of mutual intelligibility...loads of Hong Kong folks (I mean, older ones, and a lot of my own senior relatives elsewhere in Guangdong) can't even understand a single phrase of Mandarin, so they are pretty much separate languages. If you say they aren't, then probably you are citing the government stance, or you only agree with the government, perhaps. To put it simply, Guangdong in general just doesn't have the power to claim a nationality, and so, literally, no matter how they slice it, their languages (the others being Hakka, for example) are all considered DIALECTS, in the general definition in English (now, I typing English now), which mean something slightly different from generic Chinese, so that everyone within our country can understand it.

This is a big scam. My Mandarin might not too very good yet with very limited self-study, but I believe a lot of folks in other provinces sound almost unintelligible to me.

>>but also from the standpoint of the majority ordinary Chinese people you meet on the street, if you believe me

I do believe, why not? The problem is just that... now, let us also think about: Shuimo, what's the nationality of your ancestors? Were they first citizens of a country called Ming if they lived in the period 1368-1644, and Qing (a Manchu-run country, when "China" could be said to be being conquered) in the period 1644-1911?

Nationality, while, yes, a very convenient label for traveling, it'd be the worse fools to believe it and become obsessed with it, so that they'd want to kill some nationals of some other nationalities, just because those nations had tried to attack and conquer their own.

In a way, I just think identity issues are often quite arbitrary (based on chance rather than being planned or based on reason AND using unlimited personal power without considering other people's wishes, by Cambridge's dictionary). Perhaps a good example might be what defined the Chinese language (and as your own native language now). What? Over 2000 years ago, a guy called Qin Shi Huang managed to conquered every single state of ancient China and then, you know, created the first Chinese Empire, and probably that's why foreign guys called us China (Qin) from those days onward. Who are you really? Why do you use the language of the Qin (you know, the scripts were codified by then, and used continuously until now), instead of the other Chineses of, say, Chu?

By the Weinreich saying, what I just mean is identity is often forged (again, it has multiple meanings in English) by force (no pun intended). Some of my relatives do question why I'm being so... kind of... "not understanding" what Chinese (as a nationality) is. As I wrote, there's some sort of identity I can't deny (how can you say you were Chu, without practically any kind of genealogical evidence?), but except that we AGREE to be fellow Chinese, in what ways am I related to you at all? It may be that my biological lineage is lightyears apart from yours, or actually our oldest ancestors were full-flood brothers. It may only be fortunate that we happen (not expected or obliged) to be fellow Chinese.

Apart from that, you know, everyone has his own definitions about identity. Since I'm not speaking for a government, so I can frankly say I, too, have no particular affiliations or even particular, overt affection to any particular nationality. The only limitation, perhaps, is that I understand the folks in my country far far far better than any others, so that I do empathize particularly well with really poor Chinese living under the worst circumstances, and that's very obvious according your "ordinary Chinese citizens" - I'm one of them.

So, yes, in a way, this is also related to my present understanding of political science, in terms of getting to know what ideology means, what international politics means (in terms of the ... especially, the accusations that governments have against others, such as "ours"), and some practically politically incorrect concepts in the strictest, non-political academic context of studying political science.

I'm not a major, I'm just learning critical thinking in this way.

Yeah, I do think it could be a very interesting subject at large. I do have my own ideology, and you should have already read what I...'m satirizing. As I wrote, a lot of Tianya folks do know the same stuff. Our country has offered me my native language, so I understand a lot of folks think quite similarly. They too know every kind of lies out there.

I expected the Tibetan issue to be popular! LOL
<<Well, they are definitely not ethnically Han Chinese, to say the very least - which is different matter from whether they are Chinese citizens or not. >>

Tibetans are definitely not Han Chinese, no big news at all for the world. That is just fine. China has various ethnical groups --- Uygurians in Xinjiang are definitely not ethnically Han Chinese, Mongolians in Inner Mongolia are definitely not ethnically Han Chinese, Dai in Yunnan are definitely not ethnically Han Chinese….In China, there are just many ethnical groups that are definitely not ethnical Chinese. All the people in China and the world know that. Fine enough. All of them being Chinese citizens? They all belong to the Chinese nation? Yes, in the sense that there are blacks from Africa and Asians from the east living in the US who are now American citizens and belong to the American nation, period. Does that make any one jealousy? I suspect. LOL

<<If they were actually ethnically Han Chinese or really identified with the Chinese state, why would the Chinese government be trying to dilute them with more, well, loyal Han Chinese in Tibet itself?>>

Your “if” supposition of them being actually ethnically Han Chinese is hence utterly pointless. The question of whether they are really identified with the Chinese state is irrelevant, to say the very least, and is unimportant, to say the very most. If they were born on the Chinese land, they are automatically Chinese. There are indeed Han Chinese living in Tibet, which is in yours eyes “governmental diluting”. You named it. Remind you, there are also the ethnically Hui Chinese and other ethnical minority groups living in Tibet. Whether that is true or not is a different matter. To sat the very least, because Tibet is part of China and also a bordering region of the country, I see no problem with all the legal moves and action taken by the Chinese government as it sees fitting to make the place a safer one. The recent Tibetan riots this year only testify the need for the Chinese government and the Chinese people to pay more attention to this area, which seems to be the object of modern Utopian visualization by the outside world. LOL

<<Actually, things are not nearly this simple in reality. >>

That is so true. Tibetan issues are way more complicated in reality than most idiot-like Westerners think they know. Pity that most Westerners have been so easily cheated by what their media fed them.

<<Tibet only actually came under direct *Chinese* rule during the Qing dynasty.>>

Hugely wrong!
Tibet actually came under effective *Chinese* rule during the Yuan dynasty (1206-1368 AD).

<<Yes, it had been under shared Mongol rule around the same time that the Mongols conquered southern China, but this was not really Chinese rule per se as much as Mongol rule despite being classified as part of the foreign Yuan dynasty of China. >>

Yuan dynasty was just one of the dozen-numbered dynasties of China in the history of the Chinese nation. Mongolians then were just one of the many ethnical groups that existed in the history of China too. We Chinese never consider the Yuan dynasty as the so-called Foreign dynasty of China, period. There is no such thing as FOREIGN Yuan dynasty of China.

<<Under the Ming, Tibet in reality was independent, as its relationship with the Ming was one of being a tributary of China, just like Korea and Vietnam, and which was mostly symbolic, as opposed to actually being under Ming rule per se; Tibet had no Ming military forces on its territory to replace those of the Mongols, engaged in its own foreign policy, and for that matter had its own civil wars. >>

Even under the Ming (1368-1644), which was a less powerful dynasty than the Yuan dynasty, Tibet was NOT FULLY independent! The highest ruler in Tibet was subject to the control of the Ming dynasty, which had the power to appoint local officials. There are abundant historical files recording how the Ming dynasty controlled Tibet. Just go to《萨迦世系史》,《宗喀巴大师传佛法庄严》,《大慈法王释迦也失传》,《法王热丹贡桑帕巴传》……

<<Only later in the early 1700s under the Qing did Tibet actually come under Chinese rule >>

Definitely not. In the Qing dynasty (1616-1911), Tibet also came under the Chinese rule, yet in a stronger and more comprehensive way. Even the spiritual Dalai Lamas had to be appointed by the emperors of the Qing Dynasty, which sent ministers to take charge of local Tibetan affairs in cooperation with local officials.

<<Also note that modern notions of succession of states and whatnot as often used by PRC China to justify their rule of Tibet, cannot really be applied to international relations before at least the 19th century. As a result. arguments to the effect that because Tibet was part of the Yuan dynasty, and because modern PRC China is considered a successor state to such, that Tibet is automatically to be legally considered part of China ring rather hollow in such a regard. Also, such ignores the nature of the pre-modern tributary system of Imperial China, under which being a tributary of China was a different from actually being under Chinese rule; hence even if one could say that under Yuan rule Tibet was under Chinese rule, one cannot necessarily justify the statement that Tibet actually came under Ming rule. If Tibet were not actually under Ming rule per se, how could Tibet actually be considered to have been under Chinese rule for most of the last 700 years?>>

Very Good! Glad to see the emergence of popular expressions like “modern notions of states”, “international relations”. Why not go further to bring “sovereignty”, “Vienna Conventions” into the picture? Pitifully, what you said, to informed and enlightened audiences, is only proving hypocritical and misleadingly deceiving. Where did such seemingly objective discourse originate and come from? Unmistakably Western discourse invented by Westerners in modern times of the West, as if that fact alone is sufficient to authorize and legitimize Westerners to proudly proclaim they, as the original author and inventor of such discourse, automatically have the final say in terms of its usefulness and validity anywhere around the globe.

So who applied these notions to Tibet of the People’s Republic of China? It is nobody else but those so-called “enlightened” Western politicians and intellectuals. For that matter, the idiot-like “unenlightened” Western masses are not wholly immune to blame either. As I, a proud PRC citizen, see it, the PRC and “modern” Chinese people never regard the Yuan dynasty, the Ming Dynasty, and the Qing Dynasty or any other dynasty in the Chinese history, as states beyond what they actually were --- feudal dynasties, no better, no worse, but merely dynasties. The PRC emerged out of the old feudal China, which nevertheless we modern Chinese still heartedly regard as our HOME, no matter it being poor or glorious in history. That Tibet is automatically to be legally considered part of China rings rather significant and substantial in a Chinese regard, as opposed to what it appears to be in a Western regard. Now that when China today has Tibet as part of its territory in a full sense Hawaii is part of the US, some Westerners are having jitters in their stomachs. LOL

To Xie
No comment on your identity, whatever you define it.
BTW, I also happen to be a registered member of Tianya too, which is one of the many virtual communities and online forums I often surf through. We may have encountered once before. LOL

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