Conclusion

Abstract

This chapter presents a summary of the changing ecology of Hokkien in four places that have been examined in this book, namely: Burma , Singapore , Taiwan and southern Fujian . Its functional status in four major cities in these areas is compared, with attention paid particularly to natural transmission of Hokkien to children . It shows that the functional status of Hokkien has gone through the whole range of the scale, from vernacular language in China to lingua franca in Singapore more than a century ago, to ethnic language throughout most of the 20th century and to inner language this century. This downgrading has taken place faster in the small Hokkien community in Burma, where the status of inner language was reached in the mid-1980s and currently it may stand at private language , the lowest level on the scale. Finally, the Youngest Child Model and its application to language shift in Singapore, Taiwan and southern Fujian are reviewed and discussed. It is noted that among members of a set, the chronological order of the members correlates with the language shift from Hokkien to Mandarin : the youngest one is the first to complete the change, whereas the oldest one shows more resistance to this change, resulting in a slower pace.