Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Kultur-, Sozial- und Bildungswissenschaftliche Fakultät - Institut für Asien- und Afrikawissenschaften

The island of Timor, whose eastern half is occupied by independent Timor-Leste while its western half belongs to Indonesia, is home to one of the most remote and hardly known Chinese-descended minorities in Southeast Asia. This talk will discuss the historical origins and current situation of this community before focussing on the Hakka variety traditionally spoken by a majority of Chinese-descended Timorese. Like all Sinitic varieties spoken by entrenched and localised Chinese-descended communities, it has been shaped by the particular mix of Hakka dialects brought to Timor from China by the original immigrants, and through contact with local and colonial languages. In Timor, the island's political division is leading to a gradual divergence between East and West Timorese Hakka through the consolidation of forms from different Hakka dialects on the one hand, and the influence of different dominant languages on the other.

Bio

Juliette Huber is a linguist affiliated with Humboldt University of Berlin. Her expertise is on the Papuan / non-Austronesian languages of Timor's eastern tip. Most recently, she has started researching the linguistic properties of Timorese Hakka in both East and West Timor.
 

This talk is part of the seminar "Chinese Diaspora in a Global Context" (53655), Seminar für Ostasienstudien, Institut für Asien- und Afrikawissenschaften, HU Berlin.