Credit: Corinne Davidson / EdSource
My mom always talks about Cantonese being my first language, but it’s hard to believe now that I can barely understand it.
When she was 2 years old, my mom and her family immigrated to the United States. Like many other first-generation kids, she grew up speaking her native language, Cantonese, at home and English at school. I remember my mom speaking to me in Cantonese and my grandma quizzing me on everyone’s Chinese names when I was younger. As I grew up, though, I started to push Cantonese away; maybe it was me just being a brat or a subconscious effort to fit in with the white kids at school.
In high school and college, I began to long for a greater connection to my Chinese heritage. I wanted to learn Cantonese again, but it was difficult to even find a class to take. My high school only started offering Mandarin my sophomore year. At the college level, only seven California colleges offer Cantonese. Of those seven colleges, three are community, three are four-year public and one is private.
Mandarin is the official language of China, and with the Chinese government’s push to uphold that, many fear Cantonese will decline. Cantonese is spoken by about 85 million people worldwide. However, it is still difficult to find resources to learn the language. Many parents — my mom included — fear that their familial Cantonese will end with their generation.
Since most schools only offer Mandarin as a Chinese language course, many parents turn to private classes or tutors in hopes of carrying on the Cantonese legacy. Growing up, I often heard about my friends going to Cantonese school on the weekends in order to build their fluency in the language. I never attended Cantonese school, and I have friends who, despite going to Cantonese school for years, are still not fluent.
The lack of Cantonese education is bigger than just families, though. The lack of Cantonese-speaking essential workers puts Cantonese-speaking citizens at a disadvantage, especially when they are seeking help. In a recent article, San Francisco Chronicle journalist Katherine Li follows Mei-wa Yeung, a 71-year-old resident of San Francisco’s Chinatown who encountered obstacles in receiving health care as a Cantonese speaker. When Yeung needed to go to the hospital for a burn, the language barrier between her and the hospital staff prevented her from receiving treatment.
The need for Cantonese speakers has long gone overlooked. As the lack of new-generation Cantonese speakers becomes more apparent, the demand for language classes grows. Stephanie Wong, a recent graduate of UC Berkeley, has been a strong advocate for Cantonese on Berkeley’s campus. Wong was originally drawn to Cantonese advocacy on campus when a colleague of hers was searching for translators at the campus’s food pantry. Wong was intrigued, and because her major had a language requirement, she decided to see if her fluency would fulfill it. Her adviser recommended she try Korean or Mandarin since the university didn’t recognize Cantonese as fulfilling the requirement.
Aside from seeing the lack of Cantonese education on campus, Wong was also strongly impacted by her cultural background. Wong has spoken Cantonese her entire life, and having parents from Hong Kong meant she often communicated with people whose primary language was not English.
A student-led advocacy group at UC Berkeley, Cal4Canto, pushes for Cantonese education on the campus. Wong, a founding member, said that this past year the group circulated a petition to get the university to recognize Cantonese education. “It caught the eye of administration, and we are very happy to announce that our first demand — out of five — to make Cantonese fulfill general foreign language requirements, was met by the administration, and they updated their website to reflect that,” Wong said.
There are other advocacy groups in addition to Cal4Canto, including Save Cantonese CCSF, Save Cantonese at Stanford, and the larger organization Save Cantonese.
Cantonese does not deserve to slowly die away, especially with the number of people who use it every day. Hopefully, with continued advocacy, Cantonese will become more easily accessible in education, and the past generations will no longer have to worry about their kids losing a part of their heritage.
I often wish I had easier access to Cantonese classes and education as my maternal grandparents are fluent in the language. They both speak English, but it’s broken, and I worry that my connection to them isn’t as strong as it could be because of my lack of Cantonese fluency. I don’t want Cantonese to be lost to my generation, and I hope that I and others will get more opportunities to learn the language.
•••
Corinne Davidson is a journalism student at San Diego State University and a member of EdSource’s California Student Journalism Corps.
The opinions expressed in this commentary represent those of the author. EdSource welcomes commentaries representing diverse points of view. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.