Framework Radio covers Growing Up with Shanghai this week. You can listen on the site or download as an mp3.

Here’s the direct link.

Shanghaiist posted an article a couple days back called “That ain’t Shanghainese you’re speaking“. It’s short so I’ll just reproduce it here:

For anyone who has mastered a few basic Chinese commands and been stumped when your local street vendor doesn’t know what you’re saying since he speaks ‘Shanghainese’, you may be able to call his bluff next time! It seems that there are very few ‘pure’ Shanghai dialect speakers; whatever ‘pure’ means. The Shanghai government has had to rethink a recent recruitment drive to recruit Shanghainese speakers as they failed to find even a few qualified candidates. Of the 13 recruitment sites, only 2 found suitable candidates despite it being reported that there are over 14 million speakers of the dialect. The government are now turning to the media for help in preserving and researching the dialect. If you’re looking to brush up on your Shanghainese then visit Shanghai City’s very own ‘how to guide’ – complete with sound clips!

Click here to go to the original which has the proper hyperlinks.

Hey. How’s it been? It’s been a long summer-into-autumn, and it’s going to continue to be so for me. Things at school picked up, and before that I was busy traveling the Great Lakes and finishing papers, including one on Shanghainese that will hopefully be in printed form by the end of the year. When that happens I’ll figure out how to make it available, even if only the (quite long) abstract.

In the mean time things will stay slow here for a little while. I’m finding some time to post on the main Sinoglot blog, so head over there for some Sinitic linguistics discussion.

In the mean time, We’re open to guest posts here at the Annals as well as over at Sinoglot. If you’re interested and have something to say about language in China or Jiangnan, shoot me an email or leave your email address in the comments and I’ll get back to you shortly.

再会！

The Global Times (环球时报) has a nice write up on Terence Lloren, the man behind Growing Up With Shanghai. It provides the story behind the recorder.

A snippet:

In one recording, Lloren captures the hum of the city and the snippets of conversations from people walking by. Jackhammers ring in the distance. The sounds of bicycle gears pierce the layers of sound. Buses come screaming to a halt in a wave of horns. There is something strangely intimate about focusing on these sounds up close, as if one can really feel the pulse of Shanghai. Lloren’s has used these recordings to create soundwalks of Shanghai that focus on authenticity, offering listeners a way to experience Shanghai that they wouldn’t get by simply taking a tour.

Take a look.