Infographics for the North America Chapter
History
I started to consider forming a Cantonese coalition after a student published a story in Stanford Daily in 2017 about how Stanford’s Language Center rejected her request to use Cantonese to fulfill the university’s foreign language requirement. That experience made me realize how little administrators understand the Cantonese language and its importance to the Cantonese Diaspora. In October 2020, the Language Center’s decision to cut the Cantonese program towards further strengthened my resolve to form the coalition. Under tremendous pressure from the Save Cantonese at Stanford compaign, Stanford restored half of the program and can only commit to half of the program in perpetuity even with a generous donation of 1M from S.J. Distributors. It's critical that we mobilize all concerned parties at the grassroots level to preserve and nourish the Cantonese language and culture for the generations to come. We'll work together to rebuild the structural support that has been gradually eroded here and overseas
Mission
Connect Cantonese instructors, content creators, learners, and organizations to nourish and pass down Cantonese culture and
language in the Cantonese Diaspora.
The need to maintain Cantonese has become very urgent as the structural support for Cantonese has been eroding. It's important to connect Cantonese learners, instructors, content creators, and organization so that we can work together to rebuild that structure in North America.
Goals
Create an organization that serve Cantonese learners, teachers, content creators, and other Cantonese enthusiasts:
- Design curricula and high-quality teaching materials that meet the needs of CHL speakers
- Develop innovative approaches to the teaching of CHL
- Hold workshops for instructors and tutors
- Offer courses for language learners that go beyond the basic level
- Provide fellowships for intensive studies of CHL
- Provide grants for community schools, content creators, advocacy groups, and CHL research
Plan
- Reach out to Cantonese teachers, content creators, community schools, and organizations
- Collaborate with teachers and content creators to create Cantonese learning materials, e.g., the CantoTalk Music Podcast.
- Sort out existing materials on the Internet and provide structure and guidance to learners, teachers, parents, and community schools
- Identify unmet needs and create materials to meet those needs. Examples:
- Form a core group of affiliated
organizations
- Create a website to showcase sample materials: Learn Cantonese
in a Relaxing Way
- Start hosting teacher training workshops in May
- Offer Culture Cafe and Movie Club in June and July, 2022
- Offer Canto Music Club in August and September, 2022
- Form the Cantonese Language Teachers Association and recurit members in Fall 2022
- Launch our fundraising effort in Fall 2022
Contact Information
- Sik Lee Dennig, PhD, cantonesealliance@gmail.com