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Cantonese Shui-sheung-yan who have joined, and not the Hoklo, who have been "resistant to the Gospel message." When I asked Philip Chan about the use of the term "Tanka”, he answered, as did most Shui-sheung-yan, that the term was no longer used as it was offensive, because of the way ordinary Cantonese used it to oppress them. Nevertheless, in the sermon he preached the next day, referring to the knowledge of the sea his audience possessed, which land people could not understand, he spoke of "We Tanka... or so to speak, Shui-sheung-yan." The whole sermon, over an hour and a quarter long, held his audience spell-bound with illustrations from storms at sea, fishing disasters and marine life, salting his speech with fisherman's talk (Shui-sheung-wa) so deep that the Malaysian student who had been put by my side and knew only standard Cantonese, was often completely baffled and unable to give me any interpretation. (Later, Philip Chan referred to Shui-sheung-wa as “a separate dialect”.)
Of course, the content of this sermon can hardly have been completely unaffected by the knowledge that there was a sociologist in the congregation interested in the life of boat-people. Nonetheless, it is indicative of the way in which an ethnic and cultural solidarity has been maintained, an assertion of pride of origin, which provides a way of avoiding the schizophrenic need to assimilate wholly to ordinary Cantonese society and suppress one's own identity.
Adaptation and Education
As Barbara Ward and other sociologists have indicated, the majority of boat people are able to assimilate into land-based Cantonese society, and do so fairly often. Members of the Fishermen's Recreation Clubs, the True Jesus Church, and perhaps to some extent the Hong Kong and Kowloon Fishermen's Association Ltd., find a middle way of adaptation that relieves them from the stark dilemma between the self-obliteration and the stasis of isolation. Nonetheless, one cannot speak of any general emergence of Shui-sheung-yan ethnic consciousness; the leaders of the three movements mentioned above, geographically separated at the three opposite corners of the territory, appeared absolutely unaware of each others' activities. When one asks Shui-sheung-yan the conventional Cantonese question about what kind of Chinese they are, (“Nei hai matye yan a ?"), the most common answer remains a reference to their home village, or, at any rate, to that of their grandparents — “Ngo hai Tunglowaan-yan" or "Yeung Kong yan”, or “Ap Chau yan”,
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136
T.A ACTON
Cantonese Shui-sheung-yan who have joined, and not the Hoklo, who have been "resistant to the Gospel message." When I asked Philip Chan about the use of the term "Tanka”, he answered, as did most Shui- sheung-yan, that the term was no longer used as it was offensive, because of the way ordinary Cantonese used it to oppress them. Never theless, in the sermon he preached the next day, referring to the know- ledge of the sea his audience possessed, which land people could not understand, he spoke of "We Tanka.
... or so to speak, Shui-sheung- yan." The whole sermon, over an hour and a quarter long, held his audience spell-bound with illustrations from storms at sea, fishing disasters and marine life, salting his speech with fisherman's talk (Shui- sheung-wa) so deep that the Malaysian student who had been put by my side and knew 'only standard Cantonese, was often completely baffled and unable to give me any interpretation. (Later, Philip Chan referred to Shui-sheung-wa as “a separate dialect”.)
Of course, the content of this sermon can hardly have been comp letely unaffected by the knowledge that there was a sociologist in the congregation interested in the life of boat-people. Nonetheless, it is indicative of the way in which an ethnic and cultural solidarity has been maintained, an assertion of pride of origin, which provides a way of avoiding the schizophrenic need to assimilate wholly to ordinary Cantonese society and suppress one's own identity.
Adaptation and Education
As Barbara Ward and other sociologists have indicated, the majority of boat people are able to assimilate into land-based Cantonese society, and do so fairly often. Members of the Fishermen's Recreation Clubs, the True Jesus Church, and perhaps to some extent the Hong Kong and Kowloon Fishermen's Association Ltd., find a middle way of adaptation that relieves them from the stark dilemma between the self-obliteration and the stasis of isolation. Nonetheless, one cannot speak of any general emergence of Shui-sheung-yan ethnic consciousness; the leaders of the three movements mentioned above, geographically separated at the three opposite corners of the territory, appeared absolutely unaware of each others' activities. When one asks Shui-sheung-yan the conventional Cantonese question about what kind of Chinese they are, (“Nei hai matye yan a ?"), the most common answer remains a reference to their home village, or, at any rate, to that of their grandparents — “Ngo hai Tunglowaan-yan" or "Yeung Kong yan”, or “Ap Chau yan”,
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