Speak Not: Empire, Identity and the Politics of Language

by James Griffiths

Language is extremely political and this book traces what that means for the history, present, and future of three languages: Welsh, Cantonese, and Hawaiian. This is a book in which you’ll learn a lot, also on the history of the communities speaking these languages, who have been sidelined by the political dominance of English and/or Putonghua, the ‘common spoken language’ of China (often referred to in English as Mandarin).