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Sign up with Google Sign up with FacebookQ: Are dialects in China dying?
Shanghai hua, hakka, all these dialects...will they disappear soon?
It depends on how much they are willing to keep it alive by teaching this. Some of the writing techniques already died out because it was getting hard for people to learn it. We don't use old english anymore such as the writing style from shakespeare because it is too difficult to understand for many people. I think once it becomes too difficult and nobody wants to learn it it can eventually die down but not entirely out!
Jnusb416:
People didn't speak the way they did in Shakespeare's plays in real life. The "Old English" that you're speaking of wasn't so different from how we speak now. Try speaking English 1,000 years ago. Now that would be impossible to understand.
They are disappearing yes. This is because the schools here only want Mandarin to be taught and used in class. Dialects are now only spoken at home, that's if both parents speak the same dialect.
Children have told me they don't speak the dialect because they want to have better Mandarin and don't think their dialects are important. It's sad to see children not keen no learning dialects because they think it's not important ...
jyao87:
But recently, I have heard in some school in SH, they are having classes where it's taught in Shanghainese because they realise that they are losing the dialect with the youngsters.