CRCLE Hosts Symposium on Language Variation and Change in Multilingual China

From 27 to 28 February 2025, the Centre for Research on Chinese Language and Education (CRCLE) at The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK) hosted the ‘Symposium on Language Variation and Change in Multilingual Communities of China’ at its Tai Po Campus. Co-organised with Peking University’s Centre for Chinese Linguistics and EdUHK’s Department of Chinese Language Studies, the event drew leading scholars: Dr Kuang Jianjing from the University of Pennsylvania, Prof Wang Feng and Dr Li Zihe from Peking University, Prof Bao Zhiming from National University of Singapore, Prof Kwok Bit-Chee from The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Prof Weera Ostapirat from Mahidol University, Prof Hou Xingquan from Jinan University, Dr Li Xuan from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and Dr Liang Yuan, Dr Cai Mingjia, and Dr Ding Hongdi from EdUHK. The symposium explored language contact and evolution, focusing on Chinese and minority languages in the Greater Bay Area and southwest China.

In two days, ten presentations and follow-up discussions covered key topics in linguistics, including phonetic and grammatical variations in multilingual speakers, lexical borrowing in Bai-Chinese communities, contact-induced changes in Singapore English and Min languages, historical linguistic interactions among Yi, Chinese, Tai, and Miao-Yao, and linguistic convergence in hybrid dialects.

The event was funded by EdUHK’s CRAC project (No. 04A41), the 2024/25 Dean’s International Research Collaboration Award, and the Faculty Multi Development Fund (0402R).

 

 

 

 

Poster of the Symposium

 

 

 

 

Prof Weera Ostapirat is presenting at the Symposium

 

 

 

 

Group photo of Symposium participants