[lg policy] Lost in Translation

Tue Mar 12 16:02:05 UTC 2019

Lost In Translation: How Language Is Used to Obfuscate Taiwan’s RealityFrom
“reunification” to “mainland” to “renegade province”, the way we talk about
Taiwan affects the world’s perceptions of Asia’s most vibrant democracy
  2274
By Jenna Lynn Cody
<https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/search?keyword=Jenna%20Lynn%20Cody>
2019/03/11 16:40
[image: (Credit: Jenna Lynn Cody)]

(Credit: Jenna Lynn Cody)

Consume any mainstream English-language media about Taiwan, and you’ll come
across an abundant lexicon of terms that sound as though they help define
the Taiwan-China situation: “renegade province”, “split in 1949”,
“dialect”, “Mainland”, “reunification”, Chinese”, “One China Policy” and
“status quo” are probably the most common. More recently, there’s also the
term “one family”
<https://laorencha.blogspot.com/2018/09/yes-ko-is-using-xis-language-on-one.html>,
though that doesn’t seem to have made the leap to English quite yet, and
there’s the perennial “tensions”, a term which has already been covered
extensively
<https://laorencha.blogspot.com/2018/10/this-week-in-china-tensions.html> for
its problematic usage.

These terms are readily employed by writers wanting to appear knowledgeable
about the region — especially non-specialist journalists, though some
specialists do it too.

The problem?

Many of these words and phrases don’t translate well into English, and the
ambiguity created by imperfect translations appears to be used
intentionally to imprint an inaccurate narrative of Taiwan in the
international media.

In other cases, the meanings of the terms are clear, but the most common
translation is simply wrong, yet encouraged by China because it promotes
the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) preferred perspective.

In still others, the implications of the terms call to mind a state of
affairs that simply does not exist.

All of these are invisible hurdles that Taiwan advocates must vault in
order to make Taiwan’s case to the world. Every minute we spend arguing
over the meaning or use of a term, we waste the attention of others. We are
literally held back by language. This is not an accident.

There doesn’t seem to be a comprehensive breakdown of this strategic use of
language anywhere else and why it’s a problem for Taiwan, so I’ve created
one here. Let’s have a look — starting with the biggest headache of them
all.
*“Reunification”*

The Mandarin term for Taiwan and China (ostensibly peacefully) uniting is
統(tǒng yī). It means “unify” or “unification”. If you wanted to add the
meaning of the “re-” prefix in English to that, it would be something like
再統 (zài tǒng yī). There’s also the term “回歸” (huí guī), as well as 光復
(guāng fù), which means ‘retrocession’ or ‘recovery’, but is rarely used
outside of formal speech.

So here’s the thing: *nobody actually says these in Mandarin. *They always
use “tǒng yī”. The Mandarin term for this concept is “unification”. It
doesn’t mean — and has never meant — “reunification”.

This is not a natural perspective arising from history. Before the Qing
Dynasty, the sea was considered to be the natural border of “China”. The
Qing era, which was an imperial era, and the brief interlude between
1945–1949 are the only times in the history of both China and Taiwan that
one could argue that the two were united. Both are open to interpretation,
however. The Qing Dynasty was an empire run by Manchus, who were not
considered Chinese at the time. Arguably, Qing Dynasty China was a Manchu
colonial holding, as was Taiwan. Moreover, the Qing only controlled the
western part of the island, which for most of the Manchu period was not
considered a ‘province’ in its own right.

Was there one China under the Qing Empire or were there two colonial
holdings, Taiwan and China? That’s a discussion worth having for a clear
historical perspective. The government which accepted Japan’s surrender on
behalf of the allies was *not the same government* that ceded Taiwan to
Japan. Likewise, the People’s Republic of China and the Republic of China
were never united.

The problem with “reunification”, then, is not just that it is an erroneous
translation of the Chinese. It also assumes a particular historical
interpretation under which Taiwan and China were once clearly “unified” and
that the change in government from ‘empire’ to ‘republic’ does not matter.
“Unification” is a less politically marked word. Regardless of one’s
interpretation of history, it provides the linguistic room for the
conversation to happen. For that reason alone, it is the more appropriate
term when discussing peaceful integration (violent integration would be
“annexation”).

Thus, what to make of news outlets using “reunification” as though it is
the correct term? I can only assume the editors don’t know what they’re
talking about. Reuters, especially, has just put out some word salad on
this point
<https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-taiwan/china-says-taiwan-talks-must-benefit-reunification-idUSKCN1QG0CJ?fbclid=IwAR2JNCvq-eF1taErBCfrbHqKLB1tfFcOHOWdDOEa0hnXMG5to_D-ZXLFB9w>
:

China translates the word “tong yi” as “reunification”, but it can also be
translated as “unification”, a term in English preferred by supporters of
Taiwan independence who point out that Beijing’s Communist government has
never ruled Taiwan and so it cannot be “reunified”.

The CCP does promote the use of “reunification” over “unification” to
describe 統一(tǒng yī), but the rest of this is laughable. It subtly gives
credence to the CCP’s preferred term by referring to it as “China’s” choice
of translation, not that of a political party with a particular objective
regarding Taiwan, and marks the *less*problematic and *more* accurate/directly
translated term as political by saying that it is used by “supporters of
Taiwan independence” — as though to use it is to make a political
statement. When, in fact, the opposite is true: “reunification” is an
inherently more politicized word, as it is promoted by a particular
political group (pro-China/CCP supporters) and is not a direct translation
of the Mandarin term.
*“Renegade Province”*

This one is interesting, because it does not seem to appear in
Mandarin-language media regarding Taiwan. Although the term has been used
by China to discuss northern Vietnam, and appeared in English-language
media as early as 1982
<https://michaelturton.blogspot.com/2018/04/renegade-province-grail.html?fbclid=IwAR36m4yZv9T6lYI1myG2Mq_qF0-fTUzsZqgcbKFo1e3u6dNEAAOhcHpbBhY>,
media from China discussing Taiwan never use “renegade province”, because
that would imply that the majority of the people in that province wanted to
be “renegades”, and that they’d elected a government that represented that
wish. China can never admit to its own people that this is in fact the
case. Instead, it refers to those who support Taiwanese independence as
“splittists” and make them seem like a loud minority.

This view that Taiwanese national identity is a minority separatist
movement is underlined by the recent comments of a Chinese general
<https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/chinese-general-issues-war-criminal-warning-to-taiwan>,
who warned that “Taiwanese independence supporters” would be considered
“war criminals” if China “were forced” to invade. That would only be
possible to carry out if it were a minority of Taiwanese. Otherwise, the
implication of that statement is that the majority of Taiwanese (so,
somewhere between 11 and 23 million people) would be war criminals. This
general, along with the Chinese government, cannot admit openly that the
majority of Taiwanese favor independence (more on that under “status quo”).

“Renegade province” in Mandarin would — to the best of my knowledge — be
叛變的省份 (pànbiàn de shěngfèn). That phrase pops up in Internet searches, but
does not seem to appear in any major Chinese-language media.

The phrase gives the international media an easy way to avoid clarifying
that China calls pro-independence support in Taiwan the work of a
“splittist” minority, but that in fact, such a category would include most
Taiwanese.

I do not believe the international media are intentionally trying to
distort the narrative. They just do not know better. The CCP, on the other
hand, tacitly encourages this usage, as it keeps Taiwan’s perspective from
being fully included. It frames the Taiwan issue as being similar to
‘separatist movements’ that Westerners, at least, seem to think of as
destabilizing, overly ethno-nationalist, or not their business (how many
Westerners do you know who actively support a Kurdish state?), rather than
accurately portraying the desire of most Taiwanese to merely maintain the
sovereignty they already enjoy.
*“Chinese”*

In Mandarin, there are two ways to refer to a person as “Chinese”. The
hypernym for this is “華人” (huá rén), and it means a person of Chinese
ethnic heritage. Not everyone from China is similar genetically — the
Uighurs and Tibetans certainly are not — and plenty of people who are
certainly not from China are Chinese, and not all Chinese speak the same
language or are Han. Hence, like any ethnic identity, it is a fuzzy
sociopolitical construct rather than a clearly definable thing.

Let’s say you had ancestors from China whom most people would consider
“Chinese”. It is quite possible in Mandarin to call oneself *huá rén* the
same way I call myself “Armenian” even though I’m a US citizen: without
making any statement about one’s nationality. You can be Singaporean,
Malaysian, Taiwanese, American, Australian or whatever and also *huá rén.*

The other term is more of a hyponym: 中國人(Zhōng guó rén), and it
specifically means “from China, the country” — as in, a citizen of the
People’s Republic of China.

Taiwanese who also claim Chinese ethnic identity overwhelmingly refer to
themselves as *huá rén. *Only a unificationist or someone actually born in
China would call themselves *Zhōngguórén.*

Yet, in English, both terms are translated as “Chinese”. It is very
confusing, and the Chinese government benefits from the ambiguity and wants
to keep it that way. It treats all Chinese regardless of citizenship as
primarily Chinese
<https://warontherocks.com/2018/03/beijings-influence-operations-target-chinese-diaspora/>
.

This bleeds over into another confusing term: “overseas Chinese”. “Overseas
Chinese” can be citizens of China who happen to live abroad, or citizens of
other countries who emigrated from China, or from other countries with
ancestral heritage from China. The Chinese government also benefits from
this ambiguity because it makes it easier to defend not only their harassment
of Chinese citizens abroad
<https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/06/opinion/beijing-chinese-australians-censorship.html>
, but their interference in the actions of citizens of other countries
<https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/06/in-the-debate-around-foreign-interference-chinese-australians-suffer>
(many
members of the Chinese Australian community referenced in the pieces linked
above are citizens of Australia, not China).

Thus, when some know-it-all Dunning-Kruger
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect> type says
“but the Taiwanese *are*Chinese!” as though that is a good argument for
Taiwan being part of China, he’s confusing *huá rén *(a person of Chinese
ancestry, the same way most Americans have ancestry outside the US) and
*Zhōngguórén *(a person from China). Or he’s deliberately equivocating
<https://michaelturton.blogspot.com/2017/04/mediafail-taiwanese-are-not-ethnic.html>:
deliberately using the *huá rén *meaning of “Chinese” to convince listeners
that Taiwanese are the *Zhōngguórén* kind of Chinese.

If you’re wondering whether this quirk of English translation is
intentionally exploited by the Chinese government, well, they equivocate in
the exact same way
<http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-01/02/c_137714303.htm>. Yes, it is.

Bring this up, and you might well get some version of “yeah but to be
*Chinese*is a different notion, because of…uh, cultural differences, so the
two terms connote more closeness than when Westerners talk about their
ethnic backgrounds!”

Except it is not and never has been. First, if it were, there would not be
two clearly separate terms for it. Second, ask any Taiwanese what they
think of the term *huá rén *and you won’t hear that it is similar in
meaning to *Zhōng guó rén. *If anything, they will tell you the opposite.
For this “but they are the same” nonsense to have any purchase, the
Taiwanese would have to agree with it, yet most do not. When people say
“Taiwanese are Chinese” they are telling others what they should think of
their own language and identity. Don’t be that person.

This makes it difficult not only to talk about the parts of Taiwan’s
cultural heritage which come from China, but for Taiwanese to talk about
their ancestry without it being politicized. I’m sympathetic to Taiwanese
who do not want to cut off their connection to their Chinese ancestral
heritage, and how difficult it is to express that clearly in English
without implying that one wants to be a citizen of China, when the two
words are the same in English.

If you’re wondering why Singaporeans, Malaysians, Americans and others of
Chinese heritage refer to themselves as “Chinese” without hesitation, it is
because China is not trying to take over Singapore, Malaysia, or the US.
They *are* trying to take over Taiwan. The political implications are
simply more dire, and that is not an accident.
*“Dialect”*

As someone who studies Applied Linguistics, this one has me clawing at the
air with rage.

First, forget the stupid adage that a language is a dialect with an army
and a navy, or however it goes. That was an off-the-cuff joke by a
non-linguist. It explains the political reasons why we have separate
“language” names for dialects like Hindi and Urdu, but linguistically it
means nothing.

The labels “language” and “dialect” can only be applied in relation to
other languages/dialects. In relation to Urdu, Hindi is a dialect, but in
relation to Tamil (which is entirely unrelated), it is a language. American
English and Australian English are dialects in relation to each other. In
relation to German, each is a language.

Languages are mutually unintelligible. Dialects may sound different and
have some different features, but are mutually intelligible.

By that rubric, Minnan (Southern Fujianese) and Taiwanese are dialects of
each other. In relation to Mandarin, they are languages. Cantonese is a
language in relation to Mandarin. Taiwanese, Mandarin, and Cantonese are
not mutually intelligible.

But oh look, here comes Dunning-Kruger Guy again, and he took Chinese 101
as an elective in college. “*But the Chinese *[he means Mandarin] *word for
them translates to ‘dialect’! Hah! I explained it!”*

That’s true. In Mandarin, the word 方言 (fāng yán) — as in 地方的語言 or “language
of a place” — is translated as “dialect”, but the underlying implication is
more like ‘tongue spoken by people of a nearby [in China] place’. This is
entirely a sociopolitical construct: in defining what “is” and “is not”
China, the tongues spoken “in” China are more conveniently referred to as
“dialects” to promote a sense of political unity that helps the leaders of
China to maintain control and discourages the formation of unique cultural
and national identities within China.

It is very convenient for the Chinese government to refer to Taiwanese,
which is intelligible by people from southern Fujian, but nowhere else in
China, as a “dialect”. It implies that Mandarin speakers can understand
Taiwanese, though they cannot. It promotes a sense of unity where there is
otherwise none. It makes it more difficult to talk about this aspect of
Taiwanese identity in English, especially as Mandarin was essentially
forced on Taiwan by the KMT’s language policies
<https://laorencha.blogspot.com/2018/09/speaking-in-brutal-tongues.html>,
so that the vast majority of Taiwanese now speak it.

Dunning-Kruger Guy: *“But they can understand each other through writing
because the writing systems are the same! Nyah!”*

Sort of, but no. Since Taiwanese does not have its own standardized writing
system, Chinese ideographs were adopted to write it. Someone who can read
Mandarin can puzzle out some Taiwanese writing, but that does not mean they
are mutually intelligible, any more than Japanese and Mandarin (two
different language families) are mutually intelligible just because one can
write Japanese in Chinese ideographs. Further, with meaningful differences
in how the characters are used and how the grammar works, it is not as
intelligible as many think.

Don’t believe me? Ask a Mandarin-speaking/reading friend who is not from
Taiwan and does not speak Taiwanese or Minnan what this says:

哩講三小！ 恁祖媽係大員郎。

Go ahead, I’ll wait.
*“…split in 1949”*

This is not completely wrong, but it leaves out key details that change the
entire story.

First, the Republic of China (ROC) fought a civil war with the Communists,
who won, drove out the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and their ROC
government, and formed the People’s Republic of China (PRC). To split, two
sides must have once been united, and the ROC and PRC were never united.

It also implies, through omitting the history immediately prior to 1949,
that before that date Taiwan and China had been united. For how long? Who
knows? The media never says!

It is true that from 1945–1949 the ROC “controlled” both Taiwan and China.
Yet China was torn asunder by civil war, and ROC “control” of Taiwan
was a postwar
occupation conducted at the behest of the wartime allies as their
representative
<https://medium.com/american-citizens-for-taiwan/what-is-behind-the-current-international-status-of-taiwan-75d19b954c29>
.

But before that, Taiwan was a colony of Japan, and before that, a colonial
holding of the Qing
<https://laorencha.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-rectification-of-colonial-names.html>.
To boil that complicated history down to “split in 1949” makes it easier to
write succinctly, but also implants in readers’ minds the idea that for a
significant period of time before 1949, Taiwan and China were part of the
same country. That is simply not the case. Many who consider themselves
well-versed in international affairs likely do not even know that Taiwan
was Japanese, not Chinese, before it became controlled by the ROC. Why?
Because the media rarely mentions it!

And why doesn’t the media mention it? In part because it takes up valuable
word count, but in part because the “China experts” that the media talk
with never bother to emphasize this point. And why would they? It helps
China’s case that Taiwan is Chinese if the rest of the world conveniently
forgets that Taiwan used to be Japanese.
*“Mainland”*

Let’s take a quick look at the first dictionary results for the term
“mainland”:

The clear connotation of “mainland” is that it is the main/continental part
of a territory and that outlying islands which are referred to in relation
to it are also part of said territory.

By that metric, the only reason to use the phrase “Mainland China” in
relation to Taiwan is if you want to imply that China and Taiwan have some
sort of territorial relationship, or that Taiwan is a part of China. If you
believe they are two sovereign or at least self-ruled entities, it makes no
sense at all. In that sense, Taiwan does not have a mainland, unless you
want to refer to “mainland Asia” (as Taiwan *is* a part of Asia, but not a
part of China).

Why then do people keep saying it? Partly it is force of habit. Pro-China
types insist on it, and the media often follows. It is unclear how people
came to believe the word was neutral or apolitical. It is not.

How political is “mainland”? It is required as a corresponding term to
“Taiwan” in Xinhua’s style guide
<https://international.thenewslens.com/article/68463>, a reflection of
Chinese government policy.

Yet, it has become so ingrained in English discussions about Taiwan that
people I know have asked for other options to refer to China (like, oh,
“China”), and then resist, saying that just calling it “China” is
political, but “Mainland” is not, when the opposite is true.

If you want to talk about Taiwan exactly the way the Chinese government
prefers, by all means use “mainland”. I, however, prefer not to be a useful
idiot.
*“Status Quo”*

The thing about the term “status quo” is that it is not wrong. It correctly
describes the situation of Taiwan being *de facto* independent but not *de *
*jure*independent.

The status quo as it exists today does allow Taiwan to rule itself. It has
sovereignty. From the Taiwanese perspective, it may be said that Taiwan is
already independent (if we leave aside the compelling argument that the ROC
is a colonial entity and true independence will come the day we formally
change to a government of Taiwan).

Yet, when people who do not know Taiwan that well refer to the “status
quo”, they seem to think it means that Taiwan is in a much more precarious
state of limbo. I’ve met people who genuinely think that Taiwan’s current
status is “a part of China but wanting independence” (like East Turkestan
<http://www.iuhrdf.org/uyghurs>, or what the CCP refers to as Xinjiang), or
that China has some official say in how things are run in Taiwan (it does
not), or that Taiwan simply does not have a government (how would that even
work on an island of 23.5 million people?). In any case they do not realize
that the ‘status quo’ effectively renders Taiwan as *de facto* sovereign.

Thus, if you are wondering why I would say that the Taiwanese favor
independence when polls show they favor the status quo, it is because the
status quo basically is independence
<https://medium.com/american-citizens-for-taiwan/the-status-quo-is-independence-a5aecd289436>.
Considered alongside the fact that there is almost no support for
unification
<http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2016/05/31/2003647521>, the
public will is clear.

I do believe this is somewhat purposeful: while the Chinese media refer to
Taiwan as a part of China in their own media, internationally they are
quite happy to encourage the misconception that “status quo” means Taiwan
does not currently have sovereignty in any form, when in fact it does.
*“One China Policy”*

Last but not least, we have the most misunderstood policy in… quite
possibly the history of modern international relations.

A frightening number of laypeople and writers confuse the US’s “One China
Policy” with China’s “One China Principle”.

The American “One China Policy” — which is not so much a single, formal
policy as a set of confusing and ambiguous policy decisions, acts,
communiques, and official documents — stipulates that there is one
government of China. Somewhere in this dizzying array of papers, there is
an “acknowledgement” that “Chinese people” on “both sides” agree that there
is “one China” and Taiwan is a part of it (wording that was penned back
when the ROC government felt that way, but was a one-party military
dictatorship and therefore not representative of the will of the people).

These documents, however, are more of an acknowledgement of the situation
rather than a formal statement about what the US believes vis-à-vis China.
That is to say, the US government acknowledges China’s position that their
territory includes Taiwan, but does not say that the US necessarily agrees
(or disagrees). The US affirms that issue should be settled bilaterally.

Leaving aside the fact that a bilateral solution is not possible
<https://laorencha.blogspot.com/2019/02/where-richard-bush-is-right-and-where.html>,
the clearest interpretation of the “One China Policy” is that the US takes
no formal stance other than that there should be no unilateral moves. That
means Taiwan cannot unilaterally declare independence, but also that China
cannot take Taiwan by force.

Why then do so many people seem to think it means “the US believes Taiwan
is a part of China”?

First, because China’s own “One China Principle” (which *does* say that
Taiwan is Chinese) sounds so similar to the “One China Policy” — and there
is no way that is unintentional. Of course they want it to be confusing.

Second, because every time someone points out that Taiwan is already
self-ruled, and that the US maintains close (unofficial) ties with Taiwan
which include arms sales and trade as well as unofficial consulates, a
bunch of yahoos butt into the conversation with “but *One China Policy! The
US says Taiwan is Chinese!*”

Some of these are surely Dunning-Kruger Guys, but I suspect a fair number
of them are PRC trolls who deliberately muddy the issue and crap all over
these conversations, forcing Taiwan advocates to spend time fighting with
them rather than getting our message out to people who might listen.

Let me repeat: China wants you to think that the US agrees that Taiwan is a
part of China, and so it (probably) deliberately gave its own policy a
similar name in the hope of confusing you, and is all too happy to let
Internet trolls (who may be on its payroll
<https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/politics/2012/10/china%E2%80%99s-paid-trolls-meet-50-cent-party>)
further obfuscate the truth.
------------------------------

I hope that one day the international media will wise up and start
reporting on Taiwan and China with more accurate terminology and clearer
explanations. But the sad truth is that most folks writing for said media
do not know Taiwan and the region well enough, and I’m not holding my
breath.

In the meantime, everyone reading this should take a long look at the
language they use to talk about these issues, and start using accurate
terms that make Taiwan’s case to the world, rather than holding Taiwan back
with terminology deliberately crafted to make it more difficult for us to
do so.

*(This article originally appeared on Medium
<https://medium.com/american-citizens-for-taiwan/lost-in-translation-how-language-is-used-to-obfuscate-taiwans-reality-5b0d11a1a844?fbclid=IwAR1fco3fjJdx2X6wsM0tvoWeFneq1aGN1vhyFJ2dBG9cVweZ0Um9QeqhtT8>)*

*Jenna Lynn Cody is a Taipei-based writer, teacher trainer and graduate
student. She is a regular contributor to **Ketagalan Media
<http://www.ketagalanmedia.com/>, Medium <https://medium.com/>** and **Taiwan
Scene* <https://taiwan-scene.com/>*and blogs at **Lao Ren Cha*
<https://laorencha.blogspot.com/>*.*

-- 
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+

 Harold F. Schiffman

Professor Emeritus of
 Dravidian Linguistics and Culture
Dept. of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305

Phone:  (215) 898-7475
Fax:  (215) 573-2138

Email:  haroldfs at gmail.com
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/

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