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Outrage Over Restrictions on Use of Cantonese in Chinese Media

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Cantonese netizens reacted angrily to new regulations requiring that, starting on March 1, 2012, all television, radio and even Internet broadcasts in Guangdong province, one of China's most prosperous, must use Mandarin Chinese instead of Cantonese.  The two languages have much vocabulary in common but are nevertheless nearly mutually unintelligible due to extensive differences in pronounciation.

Cantonese-speaking netizens, joined by some of their Mandarin-speaking compatriots, are expressing anger at "government overreach," with some suggesting that the government focus its energy on more pressing issues like "pervasive corruption among officials."  Many feel that Cantonese preserves elements of traditional Chinese from thousands of years ago due to the relative isolation and stability of southern China during periods of invasion and upheaval in the north of the country. Some advise the regulators who do not speak Cantonese to "go back to the countryside" and cite Wikipedia's classification of Cantonese "as a language, not a dialect of Mandarin." One netizen even reminisces that "even the British permitted the use of Cantonese by Hong Kong media".   Even netizens who "support the use of Mandarin" feel that such a blanket legislation is "inconsiderate of local culture" and expresses concern for "senior citizens who do not understand any Mandarin."  Noting the plans of developing an English-only education center in a suburb of Beijing, one irate netizen sneers at the irony of "no Cantonese allowed in Canton, no Chinese allowed in Beijing."