This Element introduces Kongish as a translingual and multimodal urban dialect emerging in Hong Kong in recent years and still in the making. Through the lens of translanguaging and linguistic commodification, and using the popular Facebook page Kongish Daily as a case in point, the study outlines the semiotic profile of Kongish. It examines how Kongish communications draw on a full range of performative resources, thriving on social media affordances and a creative-critical ethos. The study then turns to look at how Kongish is commoditized in a marketing context in the form of playful epithets emplaced on locally designed products, demonstrating how the urban dialect is not merely a niche medium of communication on social media, but has become integral to commercial, profit-driven practices. The Element concludes by challenging the proposition that Kongish must be considered a 'variety' of English, arguing instead that it is an innominate term embodying translanguaging-in-action.
Author(s): Tong King Lee
Series: Elements in Applied Linguistics
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 90
City: Cambridge
Cover
Title page
Copyright page
Kongish: Translanguaging and the Commodification of an Urban Dialect
Contents
1 Kongish: A Multimodal Translingual Practice
1.1 Introducing Kongish
1.2 Kongish versus HKE
1.3 Languaging to Translanguaging
2 Translanguaging and Linguistic Commodification
2.1 Translanguaging As a Creative-Critical Practice
2.2 Commodifying Urban Dialects: From Social Media Writing to Text-Based Artefacts
2.3 The Commodity Situation and Enregisterment of Kongish
2.3.1 The Commodity Phase
2.3.2 Commodity Candidacy and Commodity Context
2.4 Interim Summary and Methodological Note
3 Kongish Daily: Translanguaging on Facebook
3.1 Kongish Daily As a Discourse Event
3.2 Case Examples
3.3 From Translanguaging to Commodification
4 Commoditizing Kongish: The Linguistic Business of Marketing
4.1 Gweilo: Kongish and Entrepreneurship
4.2 The Fok Hing Gin Controversy
4.3 Fetishizing Kongish
4.4 Kongish T-shirts and Other Merchandise
5 Implications of Study
References
Acknowledgements
