Support Section 5831 H.R. 7900 (NDAA 2023)

Liu Xiaobo Fund for the Study of the Chinese Language

  • Countering PRC’s malign influence, i.e., state-funded “Confucius Institutes”

  • Supporting Hong Kongers, Tibetans, and Uyghurs movements

  • Providing $10 million to support language education programs locally

Section 5831, offered by Rep. Tom Malinowski (NJ), authorizes $10 million to establish the “Liu Xiaobo Fund for the Study of the Chinese Language.” It would support Cantonese language education, in addition to Tibetan, Uyghur, Mongolian, and other contemporary spoken languages of China in the United States.

The program is named after the late Nobel peace laureate and political prisoner Liu Xiaobo, who was imprisoned by China until shortly before his death in 2017.

Today, Chinese language programs around the world almost exclusively focus on Mandarin Chinese, the national languages of the People’s Republic of China and Taiwan. But Mandarin is by no means the only Chinese language worth learning.

As the Chinese government aggressively erases and replaces the cultural, religious, and political identities and languages of Hong Kongers, Tibetans, and Uyghurs and seeks to extend its influence via state-sponsored “Confucius Institutes” on American campuses, the US government must invest in alternative programs and institutions that ensure there remains a robust pipeline of Americans learning China’s many languages while preserving the unique identities and cultures of those targeted by the Chinese Communist Party.

Why Cantonese?

  • Cantonese is unique.

  • Cantonese is spoken by an estimated 84.9 million people worldwide, yet less than 20 universities, including Cornell, New York University, Ohio State, the University of Hawaii, and Williams College, offer Cantonese classes.

  • Cantonese is a language with great historical and socio-cultural impact and value, and it is at the core of the Hong Kongers’ cultural and political identity.

  • Supporting Cantonese is supporting Hong Kongers and their fight for freedom.

  • The PRC is aggressively pushing to replace Cantonese in the mainland and Hong Kong.

  • The Cantonese language also plays an important role in research on Hong Kong, Southern China, and US-China relations and strengthens US competitiveness.