Early ‘mixing’ practices in China

‘Mixing’ is nothing new in China's linguistic contact with English over a history of four hundred years. The earliest case of ‘mixing’ is evidenced in the origins of Chinese English that dates back to ‘Canton English’, also called ‘broken English’ or ‘Canton jargon’, and was later called Chinese Pidgin English. From around 1750 until 1842, early Chinese English flourished in southern Chinese ports such as Canton (Guangzhou), Hong Kong, Xiamen, and Fuzhou for the purposes of trade with the British (Bolton, Reference Bolton2003: 22–3). The grammar of Chinese Pidgin English derives primarily from Cantonese and the vocabulary is overwhelmingly English-derived. Chinese Pidgin English was regarded by the western missionaries at the time as a ‘barbarous jargon’ deliberately ‘set up by the Mandarin officials against the evangelization and enlightenment of China’ (Bolton, Reference Bolton2003: 153). In the early twentieth century, as thousands of Chinese people became English-literate through hundreds of mission schools as well as overseas education, Chinese Pidgin English gradually declined. In the late 1920s and 1930s, the practice of ‘mixing’ reemerged as a popular bilingual intragroup practice among the social elites in Shanghai. Many examples can be found in the literary works authored by Qian Zhongshu, Fu Lei, Lu Xun and Guo Moruo before 1949 (Jiang Jinyun, Reference Jiang2000). In Qian Zhongshu's 围城 [Fortress Besieged], a popular novel that describes the life of Chinese intellectuals in the 1930s and 1940s, ‘mixing’ between Baihua,Footnote ⁷ English and even French codes in the conversations of his characters, from bankers to professors, was considered a badge of modernity and social status. For example, when Fang Hongjian, the hero of the novel, first moved into his father-in-law's residence in Shanghai, the banker frequently inserted English words and expressions in his little speech about his porcelain collection to impress his returnee son-in-law:

Since China reopened to the outside world in the 1980s and produced a large English-literate population through mass English education over three decades, ‘mixing’ practices have reemerged in the newspapers, magazines, and television in mainland China (Kang Jianxiu, Reference Kang1999). With the development of digital communication technologies in recent years, the practice of ‘mixing’ has now spread to a much broader range of domains. In China's social networking spaces, ‘mixing’ between Chinese languages and dialects with English, along a hierarchy from the simple insertion of lexical items to the insertion of idioms, collocations and sentences (see Kachru, Reference Kachru1983: 201), has become a common practice among the urbanites such as college students and white-collars and even among some Tibetan monks from remote areas of China. Following a deductive digital ethnographic approach, which has the strength of situating ‘mixing’ practices in a richer social and technological context, I will, in the following sections, describe the ‘mixing’ practices in China's social networking spaces with a focus on three domains – social interaction, government administration, and pop culture creativity.

Social interaction: ‘I mix, therefore I live’

Douban, a core social networking site in China that mainly attracts college students, art critics, and general netizens who prefer to identify themselves as 文艺青年 [literary youth], provides an ideal site for observing trendy linguistic practices in the domain of social interaction. On August 27, 2010, a Douban group named ‘说话不夹杂 english 就会 die’ [Speaking without english ‘mixing’ will die] was set up for, in the group leader's words, ‘双语小神童’ [‘bilingual whiz kids’] and has attracted 2,337 members in less than two years. The rule of the group interaction is simple: Every sentence should be mixed with English.

In Example (2), ‘I mix, therefore I live ~ ’ by Orchid, a self-identified participant from Tianjin (a metropolitan city near Beijing),Footnote ⁸ her post reflects the status of ‘mixing’ practice in the everyday life of the group members:

By replacing the verbs from the Chinese translation of René Descartes's famous quote 我思故我在 [I think, therefore I am], Orchid foregrounded ‘mix’ and ‘live’ in this post. Such ‘skillful mixing’ requires creative playing of the two languages and ‘constant practice’, as noted by two other participants:

While some participants took a cautious approach in practicing the art of ‘mixing’, others chose a more liberating approach. Yibulaximoweiqi wrote:

Using Chinese as the base language, Yibulaximoweiqi inserted English lexical items such as nouns (e.g. heart, sea back) and adjectives (e.g. stiff, big) to highlight his key message: Liberate ourselves from the ‘norm’ of the English learned from classrooms! And he practices what he preaches. The expression ‘sea back’, a direct translation of 海归, ‘returnees’ in formal Chinese English for those who obtained their degrees from abroad, signals a ‘liberated’ variety of Chinese English only intelligible by bilingual insiders. One email shared by a group member can further illustrate how far this ‘liberated’ variety goes:

Text 6 above has incorporated two layers of ‘mixing’: a story narrated in a mixed-code variety by Lu Maomao about her interactions with a colleague at workplace; and the mixed-code interactions, both written and oral, with the colleague. In the story by Lu Maomao, the English lexical insertions, such as ‘fashion’, ‘company’, foregrounded the context of the story and the verb ‘joking’ in the end emphasized the dramatic effect of her story. As for the interaction with her colleague, which involved email and voice messaging, the English ‘mixing’ extends from lexical insertions (e.g. convenient, red) to the direct English translation of a Chinese clause (e.g. give me use use). The seamless mixture of English and Chinese resembles Chinese Pidgin English – the origins of Chinese English, once popular in southern China three hundred years ago.

The group members expressed their love of ‘mixing’ in various posts. For some, ‘mixing’ brings them ‘excitement’ as they play with languages; for others, ‘mixing’, as they have observed from friends and colleagues, is the ‘fashion’ among professionals and carries a ‘high-end feel’ [高端的 feel], as in Examples 7 and 8 below:

In collaborative spirit, Bai (a self-identified participant from Beijing) contributed a hybridized word ‘mar 克’, which can be interpreted either as the verb ‘mark’, marking the above post, or the male name ‘Mark’, preserving its English origin and its Chinese flavor, and vividly captured the multicultural identities the bilingual white-collars identify with. It is worth noting that the participants’ attitudes towards ‘mixing’ are not fixed. In Example 9 below, Linlinsansan admits that she used to regard English ‘mixing’ as a kind of ‘show-off’, but now, the ‘feel’ of Chinese does not exist without English insertions:

As the participants practice the art of ‘mixing’ together through sharing their ‘mixed-code’ posts, their ‘mixing’ strategies, and their experiences and opinions about ‘mixing’ practices, they are slowly evolving into an online community of practice with a common goal of enjoying the ‘high-end feel’ of English ‘mixing’, a state of living for the bilingual urbanites.

The government Weibo where ‘Hundred groups happy-go’

The practice of ‘mixing’, popular in the online interactions among college students and white-collars, is gradually spreading to the domain of government, as various branches and levels of Chinese governments start to use new social networking technologies to communicate with the general public.Footnote ¹¹ On December 9, 2011, the Tiannin Branch of Changzhou Police Department started a fugitive hunt campaign with a TaobaoFootnote ¹² style tweet at their official Sina Weibo site, which has more than 110,000 followers.

Instead of describing the fugitive hunt campaign as a traditional legal action with the official legal term 通缉令 [‘wanted notice’], the Tiannin Police chose to use a hybridized noun phrase as the rubric 百团乐 go [‘Hundred groups happy-go’]. The English verb ‘go’, which has the same pronunciation of 购 [‘buy’] in Chinese, carrying both the sense of the action in ‘go’ as well as the sense of ‘group buy’ in 购 [‘buy’], creates a bilingual pun. Of course, an online ‘group buy’Footnote ¹³ event is much more appealing to the netizens than a fugitive hunt. Meanwhile, the replacement of ‘buy’ with go distinguishes the wanted notice from a real ‘group buy’ advertisement. Before detailing the cash reward for each fugitive and the information about the fugitives, the Tiannin Police appropriate the hot mixed-code expression 你还 hold 住吗？[‘Can you resist the temptation?’] to signal a trendy new identity for the police force and their solidarity with the netizens who share similarly trendy practices of interaction.

Sophisticated tweeters at SinaWeibo often add visuals to enhance the linguistic content of the tweet. The incorporated image of the notice of the wanted people resembles the structure of the webpage for merchandise to be sold at Taobao. Below the introduction of the campaign, which repeats the key information in the tweet, are the photos of the three fugitives, displayed as items for sale. The purchase button, which is often located on the right side of a Taobao page, has been moved to the left side, foregrounding the new information on the right side: photos of the three fugitives. Mixing and blending the legal genre with the genre of advertising, the Tiannin Police successfully transformed a traditional, straight-faced fugitive hunt campaign into a happy ‘group-hunting’ event.

The innovative wanted notice proved to be quite effective. One day later, Cui Hongbing, one of the three fugitives, turned himself over to the police after reading the tweet. In a follow-up tweet, the Tiannin Police ended the tweet with ‘百团乐go….ing’ [‘Hundred groups happy-go…ing’]. The English morpheme ‘ing’, inserted after the ellipsis dots in English and Chinese style, suggested the continuation of the fugitive hunt campaign and invited the netizens’ continued participation. Five days later, a second fugitive was captured.

The four related tweets by the Tiannin Police on the fugitive hunt were then retweeted and commented on over a hundred times by the general public, journalists, as well as other government agencies from various parts of China. In general, netizens reacted positively to this innovative use of the Internet by the police. Xiamen Anti-theft Online, a branch of the Xiamen police, wrote:

Probably encouraged by the playful spirit of the Tiannin Police, several netizens addressed the police officers in their comments as 阿 Sir [Ah Sir], a friendly mixed-code address term, originating from Hong Kong, but rarely used in offline encounters with policemen in mainland China. Through these joint mixing and blending activities mediated with the new social networking technologies, the netizens and the Tiannin Police have not only transformed the traditional fugitive hunt campaign but also established a closer and more equal social relationship.

Pop culture creativity: ‘Welcome to China!’

The national carnival of ‘mixing’ practices reached a new high point at the appearance of an English-based one-man show in China's social networking spaces. In February 2011, a nearly seven-minute video ‘Introducing nine countries in nine Englishes by Northeast English Brother’, first uploaded by Nick张旭 (screen name) at YouKu (the Chinese equivalent of YouTube), has been played at YouKu over 3 million times, retweeted over 60,000 times, and commented on over 10,000 times at Sina Weibo (Figure 1). Even Yao Chen, a popular Chinese actress and Weibo Queen, praised the creativity of the video. An analysis of the ‘mixing’ practices in and around the show, participated in by Nick张旭 as well as his fans, illustrates the status of English in mainland China and reveals the attitudes of the general public towards a new variety within the variety of Chinese English.

Figure 1.

Screenshot of the Weibo-nested one-man show

Nick张旭, the producer, screenwriter, and actor of this one-man show, is an employee of an international company located in Dalian, a harbor city in China's northeast Liaoning Province. Born in 1983, Nick张旭 graduated from the English Department at Dalian University. He passed TEM 8, a higher-level English proficiency test for English majors, and is now working as an auditor of international orders at the company. He said in an interview that he often consulted his colleagues, whose work requires communication with clients all over the world, about the characteristics of the Englishes in different countries (Hu Tingting & Li Yi, February 17, Reference Hu and Li2012).

In the nearly seven-minute video, which took him three months to shoot, Nick 张旭 introduced Japan, South Korea, Britain, India, France, Italy, the United States, Russia and China, using eight varieties of English with distinctive local features in phonology, lexicon, nonverbal cues such as gestures and facial expressions, and even in background music.Footnote ¹⁴ In addition to the English audio which is occasionally mixed with the keywords that represent the local culture of each country in its local language, Nick张旭 also prepared Chinese subtitles throughout. The analysis below will focus on the English ‘mixing’ in his Chinese-based subtitles as well as the Chinese ‘mixing’ in his English-based script in the part on China (Example 13).

(13.) ‘Welcome to China!’ Script and Subtitles

By creatively deploying his bilingual and cultural repertoires, in particular, the cultural keywords about the China of our time, Nick 张旭 creates a humorous effect through ‘mixing’. In the Chinese-based subtitles, the insertion of the English adjective tough foregrounds the characteristics of the nation, the English verb do highlights the action of ‘killing’ in a Chinese idiomatic threat 做了你 [to kill you], and the acronym TMD as an euphemism for a direct Chinese curse expression. In the English-based script, mixing involves the use of nouns from Chinese in noun phrases such as Digou oil [‘hogwash oil’] and ‘thin pig meat jing’ [‘lean meat essence’] to highlight food safety problems and the direct use of the Chinese address term Xiao Zhang [‘Young Zhang’] and the acronym of the Chinese national curse expression ‘TMD’ to identify the national identity of the performer. Besides mixing at the lexical level, Nick张旭mixes English and Chinese grammar (together with direct translations) in sentences such as we have people mountain people sea and If you hai[even] look for more, I TMD really do you [‘I will kill you’], producing sentences that even resemble Chinese pidgin English in its early stage. And yet, unlike the early linguistic middlemen who used Chinese pidgin to negotiate with the British traders, Nick张旭, an advanced bilingual working for an international company today, deliberately chooses to use a code-mixed, pidginized variety of Chinese English to amuse and identify with his fellow netizens ‘without apology’ (see Butler, Reference Butler and Bautista1997: 106).

Other than a tool for material prosperity, a passport for social mobility or a ‘weapon’ of patriotism,Footnote ¹⁵ the primary function of English, for Nick张旭, appears simply to be having a good time together with his fellow Chinese netizens. A pursuit of ‘fun’ also sets the tone of his Weibo, primarily in Chinese but naturally mixed with English lexical items or idiomatic expressions here and there. Indeed, he has even tweeted that he started the video with the intention of entertaining everybody:

But for Nick, it is more than entertainment. In an interview on the story behind the show, he noted that 有些东西你不能直接说，可能被和谐，但是你可以转着弯儿说一下。可以调侃一下 [‘You cannot make direct comments, which are likely to be “harmonized”.Footnote ¹⁶ But you can express it in a roundabout way. You can be ironic’] (Xinqingnian we54, February 18, 2012). Skillfully blending his bilingual repertoire into a fashionable ‘post-pidgin’ variety of Chinese English, Nick takes a few accurate and gentle jabs at social problems in contemporary China.

The reactions of Chinese netizens to this video show an increasingly open attitude, not only towards Chinese English, but also to other varieties of English. Most Chinese netizens are impressed with Zhang Xu's outstanding command of a number of English varieties with local phonological and cultural features. Musuodaren (a self-identified high school student from Hubei Province) and Feifeizuozaocao made their comments at Nick张旭's tweet:

One netizen even suggested that he should use English varieties based on Chinese dialects in his next show:

The netizens’ open attitudes towards ‘Englishes’ in the plural are also revealed in their response to the norms of English grammar. While Nick张旭 might still be a bit concerned about the normative English grammar when sharing the English-based script with the netizens by adding 别有语法错误啊 [‘Hope there are no grammatical mistakes’], his fans are more carefree. Ying Xiaoya (a self-identified woman from Dalian) made a comment, using the trendy ‘mixed-code’ style thus:

Since Nick张旭's Weibo video was first posted, it has been shown on Beijing buses and Shanghai subway for entertainment and also used in college English classrooms for courses such as Oral Interpretation and English Reading by individual teachers in various parts of China, despite Nick 张旭's caution that the video was for 纯娱乐 [‘pure entertainment’] rather than for teaching (Figure 2).

Figure 2.

Nick's one-man show on a bus and in the classroom

A number of his followers, self-identified as college teachers, students and company employees, have also recommended that the National Bureau of Education include this video in English textbooks to help students understand English varieties from different parts of the world in an entertaining way:

The analysis of the mixing practices in the domain of pop culture creativity reveals that innovations in linguistic practices, as in many other social practices, often do not start in the classroom, but instead come into the classroom from the spaces of popular culture.