I was somewhat confused when I read the headline: "Hakkas unite against Hokkein" in the Taipei Times on Sept. 27. My confusion was replaced by shock after I carefully read it again to make sure it was true.
The Hoklo language, better known as Taiwanese, is facing a disaster, as it may be extinct after a generation or two. The Hakka language -- the second most prominent language, spoken by one-fifth of the population -- is facing an even greater disaster. Since they are under the same circumstances, these fellow sufferers should have sympathy for one another.
Theoretically, the Hakka people should take this opportunity to promote respect for each and every ethnic group's own language and demand that public servants be proficient in the languages of all ethnic groups. Unfortunately, many Hakka politicians only rebuked the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) for "promoting Taiwanese chauvinism" or "oppressing Hakka people."
Today, many Hakka politicians from both the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the People First Party (PFP) have claimed that "Taiwanese chauvinism is oppres-sing Hakka people" in order to attack the DPP. This makes me feel that history appears to be repeating itself.
The serious decline of Taiwan-ese is a result of the KMT's long-term favoring of Mandarin. For example, in response to the calls for direct elections of local government heads, the then Taiwan Provincial Governor Chen Yi (陳儀) pointed out that "in order to build a `Chinese Taiwan,' the government has to make the Taiwan-ese people learn Mandarin first."
Due to the fear that the Taiwanese people might not be Sinicized, the education authorities at that time ordered a complete ban on Taiwanese on school campuses. Taiwan's existing languages then started to shrink.
In the long-term democratic movement against the KMT's autocracy, using dialects to resist Mandarin became one way of fighting oppression. During protests and election campaigns, many Taiwanese deliberately spoke in their own language only.
Looking back, if Hakka politicians think that Taiwanese are chauvinistic, or trying to crowd them out, why don't they ask themselves this question: Why didn't Hakka people risk their lives to air their views, so as to save their own language from the stranglehold of Mandarin?
Has the Taiwanese-dominated DPP really ignored the rights of Hakka people since coming to power? Has it favored Taiwanese and oppressed the Hakka language while promoting native-language education? Weren't the Council for Hakka Affairs and the Hakka television station established after the DPP came to power?
The impassioned remarks of those who have stood up to "safeguard" the Hakka language were absolutely stunning. Many of them have joined the KMT and have held important government posts for years. They enjoyed high positions and status inside the system which oppressed the Hakka language. But I have no impression of them ever fighting for the Hakka language before.
I wish I could turn back time, so that they could speak only in Hakka in front of the late president Chiang Ching-kuo (
If most Hakka people also dance to these politicians' tunes, they will truly hurt the feelings of the Taiwanese. The use of Tai-wanese in national exams did violate the principle of fairness. However, what we should do is save the endangered languages of all ethnic groups here, instead of boycotting the use of Taiwanese in national exams and letting the languages of all ethnic groups die together in a grave of hatred dug by some Hakka politicians.
Chen Ro-jinn is a freelance writer.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
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