Hong Kong should put Putonghua as the first language. Language Policies in Hong Kong
1.012 Words / ~6 pages Hong Kong Polytechnic University - PolyU HK
Class: ELC1012 S14 Sem003 Assessment number:2 Word Count: 825 Topic area: Language Policies in Hong Kong Narrowed topic: “Hong Kong should put Putonghua as the first language.” With reference to Hong Kong, to what extent do you agree with this view? After the handover of Hong Kong in 1997, whether the first language should be ged from Cantonese to Mandarin has been thoroughly debated. Since Mandarin (also known as Putonghua), is “the national spoken standard variety on the Chinese mainland” (Gao, Leung, & Trent, 2010), some citizens support Putonghua replace Cantonese as the mother tongue in Hong Kong, while some do not. This paper will discuss both sides of the argument. The reason for ging mother tongue from Cantonese to Putonghua is that the latter is the official language of China. After 1997, the frequency of using Putonghua…[show more]