![Sample our Area Studies journals, sign in here to start your access, latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5922/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Area-Studies.jpg"})
Abstract
This article reviews debates over the nature of fangyan (local language or dialect) vis-à-vis a unified national language and explores the discourse of the local in China's quest for modernity in the early twentieth century. It examines four major literary movements and intellectual debates: the romanized script reform and the national language movement that began in the late Qing period; the vernacular movement, including the folk song collection movement in the May Fourth era; the discussion on mass language and the Latinized New Writing movement in the 1930s; and the debate on “national forms” in the late 1930s and early 1940s during the Second Sino-Japanese War. This paper explores how Chinese intellectuals conceived the role of fangyan in the construction of national language, national literature, and the modern nation-state. It demonstrates that Chinese intellectuals’ primary concern in language debates and movements, for all their differences, lay in building a unified modern national language.
Acknowledgments
This shortened article is based on a chapter of my book Signifying the Local: Media Productions Rendered in Local Languages in Mainland China in the New Millennium, pp. 19–57. It is presented here with the permission of the publisher, Brill. I thank the two anonymous Twentieth-Century China reviewers for their valuable suggestions for revisions.
Notes
1 John DeFrancis, The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1984), 57–64; Victor Mair, “What is a Chinese ‘Dialect/Topolect’? Reflections on Some Key Sino-English Linguistic Terms,” Sino-Platonic Papers 29 (1991), 1–31; Shu-mei Shih, “Introduction,” in Shu-mei Shih, Chien-Hsin Tsai, and Brian Bernards, eds., Sinophone Studies: A Critical Reader (New York: Columbia University Press, 2013), 7–11.
2 For example, Donald Snow, Cantonese as Written Language: The Growth of a Written Chinese Vernacular (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2004), 105.
3 Elisabeth Kaske, The Politics of Language in Chinese Education, 1895–1919 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 152–8.
4 Kaske, Politics of Language, 133.
5 Li Jinxi, Guoyu yundong shigang (History of the national language movement) (1934; repr. Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan, 2011), 92; Ni Haishu, Qingmo hanyu pinyin yundong biannianshi (A chronological history of the late Qing movement for a phonographic script) (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1959), 25.
6 Ni Haishu, Qingmo hanyu pinyin yundong, 57–8.
7 Lao Naixuan, Jianzi pulu (Complete volume of the simplified scripts) (Beijing: Wenzi gaige chubanshe, 1957), 275.
8 Lao Naixuan, Jianzi pulu, 8.
9 John DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform in China (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1950), 53–4.
10 Li Jinxi, Guoyu yundong shigang, 45.
11 Jing Tsu, Sound and Script in Chinese Diaspora (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010), 45.
12 Kaske, Politics of Language, 384.
13 According to Zhang, besides Han language and writing, the other two features of national essence were the legal and bureaucratic systems and the loyal deeds of ancient heroes. See Lydia Liu, Translingual Practice: Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity—China, 1900–1937 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995), 241.
14 Zhang explicitly used guoyu (national language) when he declared the importance and urgency of this project in the preface to his New Dialect. Zhang Taiyan, Xin fangyan (New dialect), vol. 11 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2002), 178.
15 Kaske, Politics of Language, 366.
16 Zhang Taiyan, “Lun hanzi tongyihui” (Debate with the Association for the Unification of the Chinese Characters), in Zhang Taiyan quanji (Complete collection of Zhang Taiyan), vol. 4 (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1982), 320. The English translation is based on Kaske's book, with some revisions; Kaske, Politics of Language, 377.
17 Lydia Liu, Translingual Practice, 244.
18 Lydia Liu, Translingual Practice, 251.
19 Hu Shi [Hu Shih], The Chinese Renaissance: The Haskell Lectures, 1933, 2nd ed. (New York: Paragon, 1963), 49.
20 Wang Hui, “Local Forms, Vernacular Dialects, and the War of Resistance against Japan: The ‘National Forms’ Debate,” trans. Chris Berry, in Wang Hui, in Theodore Hunters, ed., The Politics of Imagining Asia (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), 117.
21 Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 116.
22 Tsu, Sound and Script, 33.
23 Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 133.
24 Li Jinxi, Guoyu yundong shigang, 136.
25 Hu Shi, preface to Wuge jiaji (Collection of 100 Wu folk songs), Gu Jiegang, ed. (1926; repr. Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, 1990), 1–2. Hu expressed a similar opinion earlier in 1918: “The more the dialect literature [is drawn upon], the more useful materials can be channeled into national-language literature, and the richer the content and livelier the spirit will become.” Hu Shi, “Da Huang Jueseng jun ‘zhezhong de wenxue gexin lun,’” (A reply to Mr. Huang Jueseng about “a compromised theory on the literary revolution”), originally published in Xin qingnian (New youth) 5.3 (15 September 1918), reprinted in Hu Shi wenji (Collected essays of Hu Shi), vol. 2 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 1998), 91.
26 Hu Shi, Chinese Renaissance, 59.
27 Hu Shi, Chinese Renaissance, 57.
28 D. L. Holm, “Local Color and Popularization in the Literature of the Wartime Border Regions,” Modern Chinese Literature 2, no. 1 (1986): 7. Snow, Cantonese as Written Language, 104.
29 Liu Fu, “Du Haishanghua liezhuan” (Preface to Lives of Shanghai Flowers), 1925, in Han Bangqing, Haishanghua liezhuan (Lives of Shanghai flowers) (Taipei: Tianyi chubanshe, 1974), 25–7.
30 Liu Fu, “Wa fu ji xu” (Preface to Collection of an unworthy man's work), originally published in Yu si 75 (1926), cited from Yan Tonglin, Fangyan yu zhongguo xiandai xinshi (Dialect and the Chinese modern new poetry) (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2008), 107.
31 Yu Pingbo, preface to Gu, Wuge jiaji, 2. For the term “linguistic nativity” and its resistance to national-language writing, see Tsu, Sound and Script, 3–8.
32 Qian Xuantong, preface to Gu, Wuge jiaji, 11.
33 Hu Shi, “Haishanghua liezhuan xu,” (Preface to Lives of Shanghai Flowers) 1926, in Han, Haishanghua liezhuan, 29.
34 Hu Shi, “Haishanghua liezhuan xu,” 29. Similarly, Des Forges finds in Lives of Shanghai Flowers and other early Shanghai fiction “an abstracted Wu regional identity centered on Suzhou that is always already counterposed against a northern, ‘national’ mode of speech and writing.” Alexander Des Forges, Mediasphere Shanghai: The Aesthetics of Cultural Production (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2007), 36.
35 Chang-tai Hung, Going to the People: Chinese Intellectuals and Folk Literature 1918–1937 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), 17.
36 Yueh-yu Yeh, “Historiography and Sinification: Music in Chinese Cinema of the 1930s,” Cinema Journal 41, no. 3 (2002): 78–97.
37 Hu Shi, “Guoyu yundong yu wenxue” (The national language movement and literature), originally given as a lecture on 31 December 1921, in Hu Shi xueshu wenji: yuyan wenzi yanjiu (Hu Shi scholarly collection: on language and writing) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1993), 311.
38 Zhou Zuoren, “Geyao yu fangyan diaocha” (Folk songs and dialect investigation), Geyao (Folk songs) 31 (1923): 1.
39 For the complicated issues of dialect sounds and the pronunciation standard for the national language in this movement, see S. Robert Ramsey, The Languages of China (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987), 3–18.
40 DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 89.
41 DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 232.
42 Qu Qiubai, “The Question of Popular Literature and Art” (Dazhong wenyi de wenti), trans. Paul Pickowicz, in John Berninghausen and Ted Huters, eds., Revolutionary Literature in China: An Anthology (White Plains, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1976), 48.
43 Holm, “Local Color,” 8.
44 Qu, “Question of Popular Literature and Art,” 49.
45 Edward Gunn, Rewriting Chinese: Style and Innovation in Twentieth-Century Chinese Prose (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1991), 47.
46 DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 112.
47 Li Helin, Jin ershinian Zhongguo wenyi sichaolun (1917–1937) (On the trend of thought in literature and art in the recent twenty years) (Shanxi: Shanxi renmin chubanshe, 1981), 288.
48 Wei Mengke, “Putonghua yu ‘dazhongyu’” (The common language and the “mass language”), in Wen Yi, Yuwen lunzhan de xian jieduan (Present stage of the debates on language and writing) (Shanghai: Tianma shudian, 1934), 201–4.
49 Fo Lang, “Zai tichu dian yijian: guanyu tuhua fangyan wenti” (More comments on local patois and dialects), in Wen Yi, Yuwen lunzhan, 246–53.
50 Ni Lu, “Dazhongyu wenti pipan” (Criticism on the issue of the mass language), Da wan bao (Great evening newspaper), 6 July 1934. In the same article, Ni promoted the use of drama and film to teach the masses the proper use of Mandarin and thus initiated the dialect-cinema debate, largely within the left-wing film circle, in July and August 1934. According to Pang, most leftist filmmakers and critics at the time repudiated dialect cinemas and ambiguously promoted the official state language, guoyu, in their films. Laikwan Pang, Building a New China in Cinema: The Chinese Left-Wing Cinema Movement, 1932–1937 (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), 179–87.
51 Er Ye, “Dazhongyu gen tuhua” (Mass language and local patois), in Wen Yi, Yuwen lunzhan, 83–4.
52 Hu Feng [Gao Huang, pseud.], “You fandui wenyanwen dao jianshe dazhongyu” (From opposing the classical language to building the mass language), 1934, Hu Feng quanji (Complete collection of Hu Feng), vol. 2 (Wuhan: Hubei renmin chubanshe, 1999), 63.
53 Hu Feng, “You fandui wenyanwen dao jianshe dazhongyu.”
54 Gunn, Rewriting Chinese, 47.
55 Lu Xun, Lu Xun lun wenzi gaige (Lu Xun on writing reform) (Jinan: Shandong renmin chubanshe, 1979), 66.
56 Lu, Lu Xun lun wenzi gaige, 6–14.
57 Lu, Lu Xun lun wenzi gaige, 63–6.
58 Lu, Lu Xun lun wenzi gaige, 15–9.
59 Lu, Lu Xun lun wenzi gaige, 20–4.
60 Lu, Lu Xun lun wenzi gaige, 39.
61 Gunn, Rewriting Chinese, 103.
62 Gunn, Rewriting Chinese, 104.
63 DeFrancis summarizes the agreements and disagreements of the two sides in a broader discussion between the integralist and federalist nationalists on the relationship between writing systems and national unity. DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 221–36.
64 DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 118.
65 DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 232.
66 Wang Yuchuan, “Dao xieshou zhilu: yu Pan Gugan xiansheng zai lun ladinghua zhi quedian” (Further discussion with Mr. Pan Gugan on the shortcomings of Latinxua), in Ni Haishu, Zhongguo yuwen de xinsheng: Ladinghua Zhongguozi yundong ershinian lunwenji (Rebirth of the Chinese language: a collection of papers on the latinization movement in China in the past twenty years) (Shanghai: Shidai chubanshe, 1949), 164.
67 Li Jinxi, “Su E de ‘Zhongguozi ladinghua’ yu guiding de ‘guoyu luomazi’ zhi bijiao” (Comparison between the Soviet Union's “Chinese latinization” and the Chinese “national language romanization”), 1936, in Ni Haishu, Zhongguo yuwen de xinsheng, 131–2.
68 DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform, 230.
69 Guo Moruo, “Lun fangyan ladinghua zhi qieyao” (On the importance of dialect latinization), in Ni Haishu, Zhongguo yuwen de xinsheng, 119.
70 Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 100.
71 Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 101–7; Gunn, Rewriting Chinese, 48.
72 Xiang Linbing, “Lun ‘minzu xingshi’ de zhongxin yuanquan” (On the core source of the “national forms”), 1940, in Xu Naixiang, ed., Wenxue de “minzu xingshi” taolun ziliao (Documents from the discussion on “national forms” in literature) (Beijing: Zhishi chanquan chubanshe, 2010), 156–9.
73 Chang Hong, “Minjian yuyan, minzu xingshi de zhenzheng de zhongxin yuanquan” (Folk language, the real core source of national forms), 1940, in Xu, “Minzu xingshi” taolun, 340–1.
74 For Hu Feng's reevaluation of the May Fourth movement, see Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 130–5. For Wang's analysis of “linguistic modernity” in Pan Zinian and Huang Sheng's papers, see Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 124–30.
75 Du Ai, “Minzu xingshi chuangzao zhu wenti” (Issues surrounding the creation of national forms), 1939, in Xu, “Minzu xingshi” taolun, 93.
76 Du, “Minzu xingshi chuangzao zhu wenti,” 91.
77 Huang Sheng, “Minzu xingshi yu yuyan wenti” (National forms and the issue of language), 1939, in Xu, “Minzu xingshi” taolun, 106.
78 Holm, “Local Color,” 7.
79 Ma Jianling, Cha lutiao (Inspecting road passes) (n.p.: Xinhua shudian, 1944).
80 Holm mistakenly thought the spoken dialect was that of Hebei. See Holm, “Local Color,” 11.
81 Holm, “Local Color.”
82 Ke Zhongping, “Jieshao Cha lutiao bing lun chuangzao xin de minzu geju” (Introduction to Cha lutiao and some views on creating the new national opera), 1939, in Xu, “Minzu xingshi” taolun, 33.
83 The English translation is largely from Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 107, but with some revisions based on his original Chinese version in Wang Hui zixuanji (Self-selected work of Wang Hui) (Guilin: Guangxi shifan daxue chubanshe, 1997), 351.
84 Holm, “Local Color,” 13.
85 Gunn, Rewriting Chinese, 136.
86 Hu Feng, “Tongguo yuyan wenti: wenzi gaizao he dazhong de renmin wenyi de fazhan” (On the problem of language: writing reform and the development of the mass people's literature and art), 1940, in Hu Feng quanji, 778.
87 Hu Feng, “Tongguo yuyan,” 779.
88 For a detailed summary of the history of the DLM, see Snow, Cantonese as Written Language, 101–23.
89 Snow, Cantonese as Written Language, 101.
90 Snow, Cantonese as Written Language, 115.
91 Snow, Cantonese as Written Language, 115.
92 Huang Sheng, “Fangyan wenyi yundong jige lundian de huigu” (Retrospective on several arguments concerning the Dialect Literature movement), in Fangyan wenxue (Dialect literature) (Hong Kong: Xin minzhu chubanshe, 1949), 25.
93 Huang, “Fangyan wenyi,” 26.
94 Wang Hui, “Local Forms,” 99.
95 Snow, Cantonese as Written Language, 116.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Jin Liu
Jin Liu (PhD, Cornell) is associate professor of Chinese language and culture at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Her primary research area is contemporary Chinese popular culture from the perspective of language, writing, music, voice, and sound. She is the author of the book Signifying the Local: Media Productions Rendered in Local Languages in Mainland China in the New Millennium (2013) and coeditor of Chinese Under Globalization: Emerging Trends in Language Use in China (2012). She has published articles in journals including positions: Asia Critique, Modern Chinese Literature and Culture, and Journal of Modern Literature in Chinese.