Post by: Casey Young
This is part 2 of a multi-part series that talks about cultural identity and cultural redemption within the Chinese American Church. This is something that is near and dear to me. I often speak with a dose of sarcasm that may sound like frustration, but I do so with a deep humble love for the Church. I know that there is no perfect church, but the Chinese American Church is where I have found myself in and where God has called me to. I write this as a product of the Chinese American Church and as an honest critic of her. I am by no means an expert, but I hope to offer some insight, opinion, critique, thoughts, and if nothing else, at least some laughs and some humor.
In this article, we will discuss the challenge of linguistic differences in the Chinese American Church (CAC). These are challenges within any ethnic and immigrant church, but as we will see, there are added complications and complexities for the CAC. As we advance in this multi-part series, an important thing to keep in mind is that the CAC is facing these challenges and opportunities at a very unique time in globalization, technology, social media, and other platforms of cyberspace. Also, the CAC is in some ways only now joining the Asian American discussion within and outside of the Church. Some of the predecessors and forerunners of the Asian American movement include the Japanese American and Korean American Church (JAC and KAC, respectively). This allows the CAC to have various models to inform these discussions and decisions in ministry.
Ni Hao! Nay Ho! Hello! Nee Hou! Lee Ho!
Dialects
Spoken Chinese is separated into five main dialectal groups: Mandarin (which includes Beijing dialects), Yue (which includes Cantonese), Min, Wu, and Hakka (which includes Taiwanese) make up the five, covering more than 200 individual dialects. The main groups in most CACs are Mandarin and Cantonese speaking or Taiwanese speaking. Geographically, Mandarin speakers are the Northern parts of China and the Cantonese speakers are the Southern parts of China. Mandarin, has four tonal sounds and inflections and is based on a pinyin system, which uses romanized letters (English alphabet) to capture the sounds and pronunciations. On the other hand, Cantonese has nine tonal sounds and inflections, which makes pronunciation very difficult. Many of the Cantonese words and sounds are captured in the throat and nose, which is why Cantonese has been deemed by linguists as one of the most difficult languages in the world. Generally speaking, most Cantonese speakers understand Mandarin, but can only attempt to speak it with a heavy accent. Mandarin speakers usually have a very hard time understanding Cantonese and don’t even think about learning to speak it. One of the main challenges here is that the group currently growing at the quickest rate in most of the CAC is the Mandarin-speaking group. This is largely due to immigration (which we will discuss in a following article). The more established group on the other hand, is the Cantonese-speaking group.
Spoken Chinese Language
One of the favorites of the CAC is to do combined worship services (typically for Christmas, Easter, Baptism, Church Anniversary, and some other holidays or events). Another challenge in the CAC is that on a typical Sunday, the announcements, prayers, sermons, songs, and everything in between have to be translated into Cantonese, Mandarin, and English. At the very least, services and events should be conducted in English and Mandarin. For most CACs, this means that the responsibility of translating each of these things falls on the shoulders of a single individual. In some CACs however, headpieces and devices are given out where an interpreter delivers a live translation of the sermon. This also means that a 45 minute sermon can take as long as an hour and a half, if the pastor doesn’t see the need to cut down the sermon. Of course, there will also be many cultural references and jokes that will fly right over some heads. One thing that I have learned by experience as a translator is that the Chinese language loves speaking in idioms, sayings, and couplets, which usually is impossible to translate into English without an additional history lecture per saying. And the singing time? This means we sing verse 1 in Cantonese, verse 2 in Mandarin, and the chorus in English, or some combination of that. So, this means we stick with hymns or some poorly translated songs from the English or vice versa. Usually led by a composite praise team with representation from all three language congregations.
Written Chinese Language
The written Chinese is a little less complex because the one thing that unifies Chinese people and all its dialects is that it shares a common written language. This means that the spoken form may vary, but ideas are communicable in writing. However, there are still complications with the written language, because of the distinction between the simplified characters and the traditional characters. Roughly speaking, Mainland China (the People’s Republic of China) uses the simplified characters which is a form that was adopted during the start of the Communist party and the modernization of China. The traditional characters are largely retained by Hong Kong and Taiwan and other Chinese speaking areas (sometimes for political reasons, which we will address in the next article). However, the longer established group in the USA is usually Cantonese speaking and use the traditional characters. This means that most worship slides, bibles, and flyers will be in the traditional character. Furthermore, the way the written form is utilized in the spoken form is also a bit complicated. Mandarin is for the most part the same whether it is written or spoken, while Cantonese is quite different in its spoken form than the written form. Cantonese utilizes more slang and contractions, and if you are from Hong Kong, there is a good amount of English thrown in.
Conclusion
Overall, the English language is usually the one that crosses all the congregations. Board meetings, minutes, and committees are usually hosted in English. As you can see, the very fundamental part of the CAC, as simple as language is quite complex. In most immigrant churches, the challenge is between an immigrant language group and English, but in the CAC there is usually at least three major language groups, and not to mention the smaller dialects and local languages. I personally grew up in a household that spoke four distinct languages (Cantonese, Mandarin, Taishanese- a localized dialect of Southern China that many early immigrants spoke even before the Gold Rush and Transcontinental Railroad days in the USA, and English). My parents have told me that I started speaking much later than most children and for a time, they even entertained the thought that I was a mute. But, they later figured out that I must have just been confused with so many languages surrounding me.
Next up, the geopolitical issues of the Chinese American Church!
Casey Young is currently a graduate student pursuing a Master of Divinity degree at the Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. Casey desires to help people understand how they can redeem and reconcile cultural identities and challenge their faith, through the gospel of Jesus Christ. He grew up in the Chinese American church and currently serves as a pastoral intern at First Chinese Baptist Church, San Gabriel Valley. With the passion of bringing theology and cultural relevance to the table, he has the wants to see the Asian American church grow and shift to better reach this generation and those to come.