THE MONG LANGUAGE & PEOPLE
The Hmong or Mong have a rich history going back thousands of years. I will use the term "Mong" here for its simplicity and to inform those who may not know it. Chinese historians said that the Mong were the first to settle in the Yellow River basin before the Chinese. They were also noted as China's first enemy. Mong people have existed in China for as long as 5,000 years. Around the 1850s, many Mong escaped China's persecution and migrated southward towards Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. Then in 1975 at the end of the Vietnam War and CIA's Secret War in Laos, the Mong once again became migrants and refugees. This time, though, they became part of the larger diaspora of the Southeast Asian people that scattered all over the globe. Today, Mong are found in most of the major nations. A quick search on Google will show about 2.7 million Mong with numerous groups and languages or dialects living in China. Additionally, it will show the dispersion of Mong from within these nations: Canada 805, Australia 2,190, France 2,000, Vietnam 1,393,547, Laos 595,028, and Thailand 250,070. In the United States, the 2010 census estimates that there are 260,000 Mong but the true figure may be around 300,000. The first Mong group arrived in the United States in 1976, with the last wave arriving in 1996 after the refugee camps closed. Those who chose not to come fled to the monk temple at Wat Tham Krabok until they were allowed to resettle in 2005. In the West and Southeast Asia, there are two major groups of Mong, known as Hmong Daw or Hmoob Dawb (aka White Hmong) and Mong Leng or Moob Leeg (aka Blue Mong, Green Mong, and/or Mong Njua). The differences in spellings reflect the dialect spoken by each group. For instance, "Hmong" (with the silent H) is spelled as pronounced in the White Hmong dialect, where as "Mong" is pronounced as spoken in Blue Mong. The "Hmong" spelling, however, has been in wide use publicly and by governments for more than four decades in the United Sates. Thus, Hmong has become the standard spelling. But within these two communities, each group still maintains its own identify as either Moob Leeg or Hmoob Dawb and each group still refers to itself as either Moob (Mong) or Hmoob (Hmong), respectively. In terms of spoken words and writing though, there isn't a major difference between the two dialects. In the Mong RPA writing system, which was invented by missionaries in early 1950s, there are 61 consonants combined. Of these, four are used by White Hmong only and another four by Blue Mong. There are also eight vowels but only two are different, one for each group. The majority of the spoken words are mutually intelligible, meaning one can understand the other without being previously exposed to it. However, this is mostly true only for the Mong in the west and Southeast Asia. Some Mong dialects spoken in China today are very different and most words are not intelligible to the Mong in the west and Southeast Asia at all. Despite the closeness between the two groups in the U.S., disputes between the two do conjure up, for example, the spelling of "Hmong," "Mong," or "HMong" as a compromise. Blue Mong's complaints include the lack of equity and support for them and their children. For example, school and government materials are often written or translated into White Hmong and none for Blue Mong. As educators and public servants, we should be sensitive to the needs of all children, both blue and white Mong students alike. Therefore, if a Mong language course is taught at a public school or university, both dialects should be taught and covered equitably. I am extremely proud to say that this dual representation is exactly what we have done here at Golden Valley for the last quarter century. |