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Conference Poster

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K. K. Luke is Senior Lecturer in Linguistics at the University of Hong Kong. He has done research on a variety of topics, including Chinese and English grammar, tone and intonation, the syntax-conversation interface, and biligual language processing. His publications include: Utterance Particles in Cantonese Conversation, Papers on Language and Education in Hong Kong, Language and Society in Hong Kong, and Telephone Calls: Unity and Diversity in Conversational Structure across Languages and Cultures. He was Visiting Scholar at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore in 2006-07.

Presentation

Language Awareness in Hong Kong and Singapore

Much has been written on language and society in Hong Kong and Singapore. This paper aims to add to this fascinating literature by focusing on language awareness in these two cities. A comparative and contrastive perspective is adopted in order to facilitate the identification of salient similarities and differences and the postulation of possible explanations for them.

The similarities between Hong Kong and Singapore are readily discernible. Both have a long tradition of language and cultural contact between Chinese and English; both have successfully transformed themselves from a humble entrepot to a sophisticated financial centre in the course of the last 50 years; both are now cosmopolitan, multilingual and multicultural societies. However, below the surface of these similarities it is possible to detect fundamental differences in how people perceive and understand their community's linguistic resources and how they position themselves relative to these resources. There are significant differences in terms of people's language awareness (i.e. awareness of the history and structure of one's own languages), as well as sociolinguistic awareness (i.e. understanding of the status and functions of the community's languages). There are also deep differences between the two communities' understanding of what it means to be 'bilingua' or 'multilingual' in their respective social and cultural settings.

Through this comparison I hope to show how important language awareness is for a community's 'linguistic self-esteem' and for a better understanding of its own position in the wider world. A keener awareness of one's own languages and what it means to use them accurately and effectively should be regarded as part and parcel of the knowledge and skills that children and students are supposed to acquire and develop in language learning.

Dr K. K. Luke
Department of Linguistics University of Hong Kong China

 
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