Multilingualism and Language Attitudes in Wuji Village, Hainan Province, PR China

Wuji Village (19°38'18.64"N and 109°31'54.17"E) is within the administration of Nada Town, Danzhou City, in northwestern Hainan Province, PR China. Subject to a tropical monsoon ocean climate, with an average annual temperature of 23.1℃ and rainfall of 1,823 mm, Wuji borders Zixi, Zhongjianxiang, and Dalandi villages. Wuji is linguistically diverse with Danzhounese/the Tan-Chou dialect, Modern Standard Mandarin (MSC), Hakka, Cantonese, Hainanese (MSC, Hainanhua), and the Lin'gao language/dialect commonly spoken. To profile the linguistic situation in Wuji Village and better describe villagers' language attitudes, I conducted a language study. This paper features a literature review of the linguistic situation and language attitudes in Hainan Province and Wuji Village's location, residents, villagers' livelihoods, village religion, and the local linguistic environment. The results of a survey of Wuji Villagers' language abilities and sentiments regarding Danzhounese, Hakka, and MSC profile languages spoken in Wuji Village and villagers' language attitudes. The survey explores the villagers' language competencies, ages and MSC fluency, language attitudes, and how they acquired these (vernacular) languages. Finally, findings and limitations are included, and suggestions are made regarding future research to advance studies of Danzhounese and other vernaculars spoken in the village.