This monograph provides an overview of the language situation in Hong Kong from a historical perspective. Hong Kong has evolved in the past 167 years from a small fishing port to an international financial centre which forms part of a financial network hailed by Time Magazine as Ny.Lon.Kong (i.e. New York-London-Hong Kong). Hong Kong has gone through changes of sovereignty twice, once in 1842 as a Chinese territory ceded to Britain after the first Opium War, and a second time in 1997 as a British colony returned to China. It is a micro polity with no natural resources except its deep harbour. Economically, Hong Kong has gradually developed from a fishing port when British settlement began in 1841, to an entrepocirct during 1945-1950s, to a manufacturing hub during 1960-1970s, to an international financial centre since the 1980s. The historical, political and economic development has had a great impact on the language situation in Hong Kong. Its language community started with two separate monolingual groups: one consisting of local Chinese speaking Cantonese and other Chinese dialects, and the other composed of British colonists speaking English. Because of language spread and language shift as a result of political, economic and social changes, the monolingual group of Chinese speakers has become trilingual, speaking Cantonese, English and Putonghua, whereas the monolingual group of English speakers has expanded to include native speakers of such other English varieties as American English, Australian English, Canadian English, Indian English and Singaporean English. In addition, there is a large group of minorities composed of bilingual speakers of English and a south Asian language. Although the development of language use is a natural process, it can be influenced by the government's language policy and planning. In 1997 there was a major political change, and Hong Kong, a capitalist city that practised a free economy for 155 years, was handed back to a socialist

The Education Department of Hong Kong issued the Medium of Instruction Guidance for Secondary Schools in October 1997. The policy stipulates that the use of Chinese as the medium of instruction in all but English language and literature subjects in secondary schools will be enforced with effect from September 1998. This signals a change in language policy in post-1997 Hong Kong, from bilingual to monolingual education. Traditionally English medium instruction has been more popular than Chinese medium instruction in Hong Kong secondary schools. Despite the Hong Kong government's recent efforts to promote Chinese medium education, the number of Chinese-medium schools was small before the handover. This is a documentary study investigating changes in Hong Kong government's medium of instruction policy amid political, economic and sociolinguistic changes in the last three decades. The study also explores some possible impact of the Chinese medium instruction policy proposed in the wake of change of sovereignty on English language learning. I will critique this new policy and make recommendations pertaining to the direction of Hong Kong's language education. The theoretical underpinning of the study is bilingualism and bilingual education. The model I propose will provide new insights for language teachers, language planners and policy makers.
[Copyright of International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13670059908667684]

It is argued that language learning ought to be interactive. The traditional language classroom provides a favourable interactive situation for language learners. By contrast, the distance education mode is limited in some ways regarding language learning. Necessarily, distance education involves, primarily, self-learning. Face-to-face learning opportunities are scant compared with traditional classroom-based learning. It is, therefore, a challenge for language professionals to explore new ways of teaching language, the speaking skills in particular, within the constraints of the distance education mode. Being able to master English -- an increasingly important international language -- provides a key to information and learning societies in the 21[&SUP] stcentury. In this paper, I will suggest some ways of maximizing the amount of interactive activities in English language distance learning, based on my work-based experience as a course developer of a new English enhancement course offered by the Open University of Hong Kong. I will focus on the development of listening and speaking skills, which are in fact the most problematic areas -- the speaking skill, in particular, involves two-way communication. I will consider the issue from the perspectives of learners' motivation, peer support and technological support. Finally, I will present findings of a survey on the learners and tutors' feedback on the teaching materials of this new English language enhancement course.
[Copyright of Open Learning is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02680510307413 ]