2016 Asia Culture Center
ACC network platform
Asia Kula Kula-ring, Kula-Bazaar
Asia Culture Center, Gwangju
1st September - 20 October 2016
At Wit’s End
Curated by Andre Chan
Ocean Leung Yu Tung
Andrew Luk
Nicole Wong
Alex Yiu
At Wit’s End
Cantonese is a language spoken by 80 million people in the world. It is said to be a ‘dialect’ of Chinese and not protected by any official status. Yet, it is the basis of identity of Hong Kong people and Hong Kong diaspora around the world. Facing the instability of recent influx of immigrants from Southern China in the millions, the colonial government lost its grip in the governance of the local Chinese population in the 1960s. It is became apparent for the English speaking government to implement a form of Chinese policy. Chinese became one of the two official languages in Hong Kong in 1970 and also became the de facto teaching language in the city. Popular music, film and television in the cantonese language has become a major industry in the 1960s that not only catered to the local market, but exporting to markets in all Chinese-speaking markets around the world. In recent years, localism has gained traction among the younger generations after the numerous protests against the local government, especially the Umbrella Revolution in 2014. This form localism shaped the identity of Hong Konger based largely upon the local popular culture industry in Cantonese language.
“At Wit’s End” will mount an abstract discussion on the relationship between language and identity of Hong Kong, especially the breakdown and the stalemate we see in the current political and social situation.
粵語是全球約八千萬人所使用的語言。雖然它常被視為漢語的一種「方言」（dialect），且缺乏官方地位的明文保障，然而，它卻是香港人及遍佈全球的香港流散族群（diaspora）建立身分認同的基石。
面對 1960 年代數以百萬計來自華南地區的移民湧入所帶來的不穩定局勢，殖民地政府意識到其對本地華人社群的管治逐漸失效。對於以英語為主的政府而言，推行某種形式的中文政策顯得勢在必行。中文遂於 1970 年代成為香港的法定語文之一，並成為市內實質上的教學語言。與此同時，以粵語為載體的流行音樂、電影及電視產業於 1960 年代蓬勃發展，成為主要產業，不僅滿足本地市場需求，更外銷至全球各地的華語市場。
近年，經歷多次針對特區政府的抗爭運動，尤以 2014 年的「雨傘革命」為甚，「本土主義」（localism）在年輕一代中蔚然成風。這種本土主義思潮，很大程度上建基於以粵語為主軸的本地流行文化產業，藉此重塑了「香港人」的身分認同。
作品《At Wit’s End》將展開一場關於香港語言與身分關係的抽象探討，特別著眼於當下政治與社會局勢中所顯見的崩壞與僵局。
