who’s gonna tell “Chinese” langblr that it’s called Mandarin and the idea that Mandarin is the one and only Chinese is contributing to genocide and language loss across Asia/the Asian diaspora
speaking as (1) a non-han chinese person (2) having members of my family being Personally Affected by 汉化 / han sinicization + native dialect/language loss/forced cultural assimilation, and (3) Literally Majoring In This Stuff ….it would prob have been more productive to boost posts by/for speakers + learners of overlooked chinese language families or y’know, boost actual information on movements looking to preserve 方言/regional dialects + combat han sinicization rather than making this post and half-heartedly throwing it in the langblr tags
moreover, most langblr posts are targeted towards acquiring characters + teaching very basic grammatical structures, both of which are shared by most chinese languages, whether or not it’s the most common colloquial usage in ur lang/dialect of choice: whether you’re speaking mandarin, cantonese, or hakka, the kinds of posts at the level of chinese langblr (and by that, let’s be real, mandarin + like a handful of HK cantonese posts) are often applicable to more than one lang family… and if you’re gonna split hairs, “mandarin” in itself is only the name for a collection of northern/central cn language groups (北京话 and, say, 陕西话 are both “mandarin”), without even getting into the Yikes™ territory of how all the cn terms to mean “standard mandarin” are also in themselves problematic (国语，普通话，汉语…)
but all of that aside, without vomiting an entire thesis on this post: it just seems a little ridiculous that you’re placing part of the blame of 汉化 and language loss esp in asia on like, langblr ignorance, and not, y’know, (1) the aggressive policies of the PRC over the past decade that have pushed mandarin-only education in predominantly southern provinces of china as well as taxing (and often shutting down entirely) publications, broadcasts, and tv channels in non-standard mandarin languages (2) the complex political/cultural relationships both in china’s own provinces (esp. north-south re: beijing, hell, just look at how mainlanders treat ppl from 新疆) as well as with china and the rest of asia as a whole that has led to standardization of beijing mandarin as the prestige dialect as well as the resurgence of (han!) chinese ethnonationalism w/recent politics… just look at xi jinping’s “中华民族伟大复兴” lmfao. (3) this is all not even mentioning the Complex race relations re: overseas chinese + sino diaspora in south asia
tl;dr should langblr tag their posts better? probably. but if you’re going to throw around words like genocide, i wouldn’t do it so lightly. where deliberate cultural and linguistic erasure — not simple “language loss” — is occurring most is in mainland china itself, for historical and political reasons well beyond the reach of a hobbyist tumblr language learner’s control. this isn’t a language problem so much as it is a race problem — not a problem of “mandarin,” but of the idea of “汉语” itself
anyway, for followers who aren’t in the loop: some info on forced han sinicization (1) (2) (3), chinese language families (1), recent han ethnonationalism (1 2 opinion articles). this is also a good book that one of my profs contributed to, while i’m tossing out worthwhile research sources. for reading that’s even less cheery and yet very relevant @ the present moment, look into the current state of 新疆 xinjiang + tibet, not to mention the recent hk extradition laws + hk umbrella movements. bonus: chinese ethnic minorities, plus a list
