Teochew dialect in Southern China

Question

The singular Naomi Wu mentions that many of the traders in the Huaqiangbei (electronics) area of Shenzhen are "from the city of Chaozhou and so speak a common dialect".

Chaozhou is a considerable distance from Shenzhen- way up in the north-eastern corner of Guangdong province. I was of the impression that the majority (non-Mandarin) dialect in Shenzhen's part the province was Yue (Cantonese). I can think of analogous Western situations, and they usually come with an interesting back story.

Is there some reason why this particular trade or profession shares this particular dialect? Are there other examples in China of such linguistic clusters segregated by occupation rather than geography?

Answer 1

I think this may just be a matter of changing frame of reference. If you want to say chaozhou and shenzhen are far away its not wrong. If you want to say they are quite close, its not wrong either, here is a map for easy visual ((courtesy wikipedia)). I chose one with basic language mapping for also convenient reference, although not directly relevant to the answer:

Its about 180 miles//290km between these cities, thats a few hours by car-- or there are almost one hundred high speed trains every day between them, each ride only 2 something hours. It wouldn't be recommended at all, but theoretically you could even do it as a daily commute!

Thats distance addressed, now why would people flow from chaozhou to shenzhen? also a bit straight forward with right frame of mind; shenzhen has been an economic hot spot for a long time, and in fact was specifically created and developed to be one, it is one of the fastest growing cities in china ((and the world)). So people from all over flow into shenzhen, not just chaozhou.

Now, why people from chaozhou seem to have so many in one career path in shenzhen? you guessed it, lets lay out a few perspectives-- I don't know exactly which one applies here, but can show a few examples of how this can logically happen.

example one, lets say there is a very good tech school in chaozhou, that specializes in hardware mechanics. lots of people graduate, many people flow to bigger cities, and many of them go to companies in shenzhen.

example two, lets say there is no college involved, but a few people from chaozhou start that business in shenzhen. well, they invite their friends or family to come too, work for or with them, teach them the business. Some stranger or friend of a friend hears about their success, decides to go there too, or maybe even their enemy decides to go there and be better than them-- thats silly dramatic, but you get the idea.

example three, lets say one super successful business is in shenzhen in that category, anyone in that same line of business could decide yo go and try it for themselves, get a slice of the pie. its not actually required to have a direct connection at all "if they can do it, I can do it too" is a very powerful mentality.

again emphasis is that shenzhen might lack anything else you need, the one thing it won't lack is potential and opportunity. just like other mega business scapes like new york city, hongkong, tokyo, wherever, there is no shortage of people or job openings at any given time in any field. While it may not be those specific examples I gave in this instance, hopefully they help show how easy it is for a field in a city to have a high saturation of one group of individuals ((real life is probably a mix of all three examples and more)) （╹◡╹）

Answer 2

The question is quite complicated as it is not as much a question of language as it is of history. Basically, Teochew people flocked to Huaqiangbei, a fact that naturally made their dialect dominant there. The reason why they flocked to Huaqiangbei? I think it comes down to the following:

• Teochew people are known to be natural good traders in Guangdong province. They are said to have a nose for economic opportunities.
• Per China's reform and opening up policy in the 1980s, Shenzhen was designated as a Special Economic Zone, which made it a hive of economic activity at the time (and it still is to date).
• As a result, a lot of Teochew people migrated to Shenzhen at that time in pursuit of wealth.
• China was in need of industrial upgrading, which meant it needed to focus on manufacturing more complicated products, of which high-tech products like electronic components were an option.
• Shenzhen took on the challenge and planned out several things as the future mainstay of the city's economy. High-tech industry was one of them.
• The Teochew people may have learned of Shenzhen's plan and made the decision to ride the tide of history.