Three Stories of People Becoming Bilinguals in the Tibetan Areas of China from 1966

Abstract

This chapter presents the stories of four Tibetan individuals from three different generations in various Tibetan areas as they developed bilingualism. A Ji’s story, which took place from 1968 to 1981, details her experiences of not learning written Tibetan until university, showing that the development of bilingualism illustrates the relationship between the development of a person and a society. Manlatso and Dawa belong to the same generation, but their stories depict tremendously different journeys towards bilingualism, indicating that developing bilingualism in Tibetan areas may be complex and vary widely from place to place. Chamba’s story taking place in Lhasa further shows how context affects bilingual development in Tibetan areas of China. All of these stories show how layers of experience at home and school might heavily influence bilingual development, further indicating how social, cultural, and political changes happening in the wider layers of society fundamentally affect individual learning.

I praised the Amazon which sings the greatness of the native Americans.

I gasp in admiration when the Nile accumulates the splendour of the “Thousand and One Nights.”

But I do not therefore blame at all my mother,

Because the Yellow River and the Yangtse River gave Gesar to a world of Twinkling stars!

The Cultural history of each nationality is not bestowed by heaven!

My responsibility is not to dress up my mother with things from faraway places, But to transform my mother’s milk into wisdom that inspires epics!

Tibetan poet Yidan Cairang (cited in Dhondup 2008, pp. 46–47)