老外看上海：如何拯救沪语

Shanghai’s local dialect has been back in the news these last few weeks, rekindling the debate about whether the city should make special efforts to save a colorful language that is quickly being overtaken by Mandarin. I’ve previously said that the disappearance of local dialects is inevitable throughout China as the nation modernizes, even though there’s nothing wrong with local governments and individuals trying to preserve such languages. But I’ll also add my view that those same preservationists should change their approach to target a younger, more modern audience if they really want to succeed.

过去几周，上海当地方言重新成为新闻热点，并引发了一场辩论，即上海是否应该付出特别的努力使丰富的方言保存下来，这一方言正迅速被普通话取代。

我之前说过，随着中国现代化发展，全国范围内各地方言的消失或许在所难免，不过地方政府和个人试图保留这些语言是没有错的。但我也将补充我的观点，如果这些保护主义者真想成功的话，他们应该改变方式， 将目标集中于更年轻和更现代的人身上。

I first wrote about the effort to resuscitate Shanghainese last year, when I looked at an innovative Internet-based drama program created by some local young speakers hoping to revive interest in the dialect. Since then, city officials have joined the campaign by reintroducing announcements in Shanghai dialect onto several local bus routes.

我第一次写关于努力复苏上海话的文章是在去年，当时我看了一个基于互联网的创新节目，节目由几个上海当地年轻人创办，希望人们恢复对上海话的兴趣。从那以后，上海政府官员加入这一行动，重新声明在当地的几条公交路线上播放上海方言报站。

In the latest move of the growing campaign, the city has launched a pilot program at 20 elementary schools where kindergarteners will be encouraged to speak and learn in Shanghainese. The move came as city officials declared that protecting the local dialect will be one of their big tasks for the future, as they seek to reverse a rapid decline in use of the language.

这项行动不断发展，最新举措是，上海已经在20所小学推出试点项目，鼓励学生学习和说上海话。如今，上海政府官员宣布保护当地方言将是未来重大任务之一，他们试图扭转使用上海话人数快速下滑的情况。

A separate new survey detailed just how much the dialect has declined over the last decade. It revealed that more Shanghai residents can now speak Mandarin than the local dialect, with 97 percent able to speak the former and only 81 percent proficient in the latter. The survey also found that younger people were less proficient in the dialect than older ones, not a good sign for its long-term suvival.

一项独立的调查表明，过去十年已经减少的很多方言。调查还揭示出，上海居民中讲普通话的多于讲上海话的，97%的人会讲普通话，只有81%的人精通后者。调查也发现，年轻人不如年长者精通上海话，这对于该方言的长期生存并非好的迹象。

Those results shouldn’t surprise anyone, since Shanghai has welcomed millions of immigrants from other parts of China over the last decade, most of whom don’t speak the local dialect. But in my view, the deeper issue fueling the rapid decline is an image problem.

这些结论并不令人惊讶，因为过去十年，上海接纳了数百万中国其他地方来的移民，大多数人不讲上海话。但在我看来，快速下降的深层次原因是一个形象问题。

Put simply, many increasingly see Shanghai dialect as a language that is spoken mostly by a group of older residents who come from an earlier era in the city’s history. I certainly don’t want to disrespect that group, but I think that most people would agree that their collective image is the exact opposite of the “cool” and trendy style that most attracts the kinds of young people needed to sustain any language.

简单来说，许多人逐渐将上海话视为主要由一群老居民讲的语言，他们来自上海较早的时期。当然我并不是不尊重这个群体，但我认为大多数人会同意这个群体的集体形象与“酷”和新潮风格完全相反，而后者最吸引年轻人。

The issue certainly isn’t unique to Shanghai. The local language in Taiwan, called Taiwanese or Minnan dialect, is often shunned by young people in Taipei, who often prefer to speak Mandarin. Many of them can speak Taiwanese, and often use it to communicate with their parents and others from the older generation. But the language has a definite connotation of life in small towns and villages where it’s widely spoken, compared with a more cosmopolitan and modern image for Mandarin.

这个问题肯定不是上海独有的。台湾的当地语言台湾话或叫闽南语，台北的年轻人通常也都回避，他们往往更喜欢讲普通话。他们中的许多人也会讲台湾话，通常是和他们的父母和老一辈其他人讲话时用。但在小城镇和农村，方言有一定的生活内涵，与更国际化和现代化的普通话相比，方言被广泛使用。

If Shanghai city officials really want to improve the local dialect’s chances of survival, I would suggest they hire some image consultants to find ways to make the language more trendy and attractive to the younger speakers who will be key to its survival. For example, they could pay some young and trendy local celebrities to become Shanghainese ambassadors, similar to those who endorse consumer products. It could also launch campaigns to introduce colorful Shanghainese words into spoken Mandarin, much the way that many people think it’s cool to drop English and other foreign words into their Mandarin today.

如果上海官员真的想提升当地方言存活率的话，我建议他们聘请一些形象顾问，找到使上海话更加时尚和对年轻人更具吸引力的方式，年轻人对上海话的生存至关重要。

比如，他们可以花钱聘请一些年轻人和时尚名人成为上海话的形象大使，也可以推出活动将丰富的上海话词汇引入普通话中。现在许多人认为讲普通话时蹦出一些英语和其他外语词汇是件很酷的事情。

When all is said and done, efforts like the ones in elementary schools and on public buses could help to revive Shanghainese to some extent by making it more publicly accessible. But such efforts are all coercive, using old-style tactics that could ultimately backfire if people associate the campaign with forceful government tactics from a previous era. Instead, city authorities should try a new, more persuasive approach aimed at convincing people at how fun and inclusive it can be to speak Shanghainese, and how the language helps to define the city’s unique character as a meeting place between east and west.

总之，在小学和公交车等方面的努力有助于在某种程度上重振上海话，使其更公开更易接近。但这些努力都是强制性的，如果人们将这些行为与之前强劲的政府策略联系起来的话，这些老套的做法可能最终会适得其反。

相反，城市应该尝试一种新的、更有说服力的方法，旨在说服人们讲上海话多么有趣和包容，上海作为东西方交汇的地方，上海话有助于定义该城市的独特性。

（本文仅代表作者个人观点。本文编辑：洪俊杰 编辑邮箱：shguancha@sina.com）