Read on Twitter
I was working on an article on this that never came together in the summer, but I’d like to turn some of the ideas into a thread.
For people in the China-related field, being a fluent speaker is a flex, and clumsy use of Chinese in public becomes an easy target for ridicule. 1/
For people in the China-related field, being a fluent speaker is a flex, and clumsy use of Chinese in public becomes an easy target for ridicule. 1/
Laughing at Buttigeg or Zuckerburg for their unnatural cadence hardly feels like punching down, but the truth is few manage to attain Chinese mastery at a well-educated native speaker’s level.
As I’ve written last year, investment required to master Chinese is extremely steep 2/
As I’ve written last year, investment required to master Chinese is extremely steep 2/
I would argue that the amount of time & effort required to learn to speak and write Chinese (and it’s probably Putonghua) so that ppl can’t poke fun at you greatly exceeds time & effort it might require for someone become knowledgeable in a China issue in a meaningful way. 3/
My point is that at some point the jokes about whether a China person’s Chinese is up to par can 1) become linguistic gatekeeping and 2) creates a false impression that Chinese language mastery, because it’s so difficult to attain, indicates a parallel “China mastery” 4/
I know people don’t tend to just examining the way a China-related field person commands Chinese but also the content of their words, but I continuously find there to be too much emphasis on how fluent someone might be when the issue is often about their knowledge about China.
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It could be that China Twitter has skewed my perspective but the people I spoke to indicated it’s not just a Twitter thing.
It’s not exclusive to the China field, but bc it’s such a hard language to learn, being really fluent seems to lend an outsized amount of credibility. 6/
It’s not exclusive to the China field, but bc it’s such a hard language to learn, being really fluent seems to lend an outsized amount of credibility. 6/
It’s not that we shouldn’t have expectations for non-native speakers to learn the language, but I think what we really should be more explicit about is how we expect people in the China-related field to understand China deeply and stop peddling stereotypes and misinformation. 7/
Otherwise, the jokes about how strangely someone speaks Chinese in a TV interview lands not on the public figures in question but regular folks who are learning the language and overwhelmed by how hard it is.
I chatted with @KevinSlaten about this, who expressed 8/
I chatted with @KevinSlaten about this, who expressed 8/
frustration at how often disagreements on Twitter devolves into people picking apart his Chinese language tweets as if a faulty sentence structure undercuts the credibility of the content.
I feel sensitive about this too because my Chinese is only OK. 9/
I feel sensitive about this too because my Chinese is only OK. 9/
A lot of diaspora folks also may not speak or write great Chinese, but know a lot. Ppl should feel comfortable using Chinese publicly without getting ripped apart.
Not everyone had the opportunity & resources to become a fluent Chinese user and shouldn’t be punished for it. 10/
Not everyone had the opportunity & resources to become a fluent Chinese user and shouldn’t be punished for it. 10/
The point of this thread is to serve as a gentle request for people to think of those in the splash zone of what I’ve dubbed linguistic gatekeeping, and also to remember someone can learn to speak Chinese perfectly and still have nothing of substance to say. 11/
This is not a call for us to stop dragging irresponsible “China experts” btw
I didn’t get into the double standard about diaspora people https://twitter.com/pixelvoidmother/status/1336692148436131841
