China avoids dialects on film, TV

[antonkan]

Well, the use of non-Mandarin Chinese dialect will disappear on Chinese television. Here's the news:

Concerned over the increasing use of dialects, China's broadcasting watchdog has ordered film and TV productions to be performed in Mandarin.

In a statement released last week, the Chinese government has demanded that dialogue in TV dramas, children's shows and its screen portrayals of Chinese leaders must be performed in standard Mandarin dialect, according to Variety.

"This production trend is inconsistent with our country's spirit of promoting Putonghua [Mandarin]," said spokesman Zhu Hong from the State of Administration of Radio, Film, and Television.

"Under normal circumstances, non-standard Mandarin and dialects should not be used. Major revolutionary and historical-themed television dramas, children's TV series, as well as propaganda education TV series and so on must use Mandarin; leaders appearing in TV series also must use Mandarin," Hong said.

The provisions have already been in place but broadcasters have largely ignored them. In 2005, the Chinese government issued a notice to change the language of TV and film to Mandarin in an attempt to promote uniformity.

The ruling presents a challenge in regards to the accurate portrayals of political leaders. Former chairman Mao Zedong, who spoke Hunanese, and architect Deng Xiaoping from Sichuan, for example, both have strong regional accents.

China is home to dozens of different dialects. Recently, the government has tried to standardize the use of Mandarin, a dialect spoken largely in northern China and Beijing.

An exemption has been made for Cantonese operas that can only be performed in Cantonese.

Source: CBC News

EDIT: Sorry, Dialects are not just subtitles, but I think it's spoken. I forgot to remove "Dialects are just like subtitles." Sorry about that!

 

[FAST6191]

For giggles:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/broad...ip-1449238.html

Also see all the jokes about news anchormen anywhere in the world. Hell we even have the term "BBC accent" for a reason.

Were I more interested in typing right now I would ponder the significance of the similar things that befell Ip Man (excellent Chinese martial arts film) a few months back.

 

[Hop2089]

Very ridiculous at best, the Chinese government should embrace the dialects since it's part of Chinese culture.

 

[antonkan]

For giggles:
*link*

Also see all the jokes about news anchormen anywhere in the world. Hell we even have the term "BBC accent" for a reason.

Were I more interested in typing right now I would ponder the significance of the similar things that befell Ip Man (excellent Chinese martial arts film) a few months back.

Well, it's a quite off topic about broadcasting in the UK. We're discussing this topic about broadcasting in China, where the non-Mandarin dialects disappear in Chinese film and television, FAST6191. And your link is old news (in 1994).

QUOTE(Hop2089 @ Jul 20 2009, 07:10 PM) Very ridiculous at best, the Chinese government should embrace the dialects since it's part of Chinese culture.

True that. Mandarin Chinese is national spoken language of the People's Republic of China, while Simplified Chinese is the national written language in this country. There are other languages of China too, including the Mongolian language and the Tibetan language.

 

[Vidboy10]

Thankfully, this isnt going to happen with HK.
Because we can have our own rules.

But we still have films that are dubbed in English here, and that's all i care about.

 

[FAST6191]

I was fully aware of what I posted and when it was from; I was attempting to draw parallels.

Although it is nice to see China catching up with the rest of the world rather than the other way around (I find it endlessly amusing to see people rail against the great firewall and then welcome the same thing when their government introduces it).