Chinese gov are trying to get rid of Cantonese?

[Ken Cheng]

On second thought, maybe I just misinterpretted it. Somehow, I thought the writer was trying to imply that the name of the city actually got changed recently (rather than 100 years ago)

As recently as thirty years ago, more people in the West knew the city as "Canton" than as "Guangzhou." The actual Chinese name has actually only become better known internationally since the mid-1980s.

[pemberly]

it wasn't 100 yrs ago. it was still canton in the 80s. and canton is guangdong, not guangzhou.

[Ken Cheng]

it wasn't 100 yrs ago. it was still canton in the 80s. and canton is guangdong, not guangzhou.

The Westerners didn't make that distinction back then. For them, Canton was both the city and the province.

Chinese folks, however, referred to it as Poon Yu for a long time (some still do, I guess). I think it was even called Ling Nam farther back in history, and referred to as "Yeut Chou" by some (which is where the designation "yeut yu," Cantonese, comes from).

[Candide]

Cantonese sounds like a hilarious drunk & hysterical Vietnamese. I'd love it to survive just for the lolz.

[Ian Liew]

it wasn't 100 yrs ago. it was still canton in the 80s. and canton is guangdong, not guangzhou.

I thought Canton was Guangzhou (the city) and not Guangdong (the province). The zhou is misleading because it sounds like it's bigger, but it's actually the city. The Province is Guangdong, which like so many other Provinces has a pair in Guangxi.

Unless Canton was the province, but I always thought it was the city.

[Ken Cheng]

I thought Canton was Guangzhou (the city) and not Guangdong (the province). The zhou is misleading because it sounds like it's bigger, but it's actually the city. The Province is Guangdong, which like so many other Provinces has a pair in Guangxi.

Unless Canton was the province, but I always thought it was the city.

The anglicization "Canton" referred to both and all of it...city and province. As I said previously, the Westerners didn't make the distinction, at least not in their language. If they needed to make the distinction at all, they simply tacked on the word "province" to distinguish that from Canton (the city). They didn't have separate names for the city and province as the Chinese do.