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by inkyoto 1832 days ago
Yes, one can speak their own first Sinitic language on the mainland (and they do, and many even speak more than 2) and that is not banned.

But they can't buy a textbook on their first language because the official policy is that everything that is not Mandarin is a «dialect», and dialects can't be studied (as in «are impossible to study due to not deserving to be studied»), therefore there is no need for textbooks.

1 comments

Jingdong has a large selection of Cantonese textbooks: https://so.m.jd.com/ware/search.action?keyword=%E7%B2%A4%E8%...

Have you tried to buy one?

In or from mainland China? No. I converse with native Cantonese speakers from Gwong Dung on a regular basis, and they have told me that teaching materials were not available on the mainland. I am either misinformed, or the situation with textbooks has vastly improved in recent years.

I have had no problem buying Cantonese teaching materials, including the Robert Bauer's comprehensive Cantonese dictionary, Victoria Yip's Cantonese grammar book and a quite a few more obscure ones from Western online book sellers.

Why was this downvoted? It makes no sense. I am not an apologist for CCP but this is a terrific retort!