Qapqal News
Encyclopedia
The Qapqal News is the world's only newspaper in the Xibe language
, a Tungusic language
spoken in northwest China. It is one of roughly fifty minority-language
newspapers in the Xinjiang
autonomous region
of the People's Republic of China
.
in 1956. It was forced to stop publication in June 1966, during the Cultural Revolution
, but was revived under its present name in October 1974, and has been in continuous operation since then.
in places as varied as Shenyang
, Beijing
, Hubei
, Guizhou
, Sichuan
, and a dozen other provinces, and the remainder are local Xibe
people, mostly those in rural areas. It is sold at retail for ¥
0.09, or at a full-year subscription price of ¥9. Their full-year revenue
is thus only around ¥10,000; the county government gives them a subsidy to cover roughly ¥30,000 of annual paper
and printing costs and ¥3,000 of salaries paid to reporters.
and other wire services
, with the remaining 20% written by the paper's own staff. Even the paper's own staff do not always write their articles in Xibe; sometimes they write in Chinese, Uyghur, or Kazakh, and then translate it into Xibe later. The paper does not accept advertisements.
The Qapqal News plays an important role in Xibe language planning
and standardisation. The editors are highly conscious of their role as the modern caretakers not just of their own language but of the Manchu language which few besides Xibe people can read and write anymore; Manchu proper is nearly extinct
, with the last native speakers
believed to be 18 octogenerian residents of the village of Sanjiazi
near Qiqihar
in northern Heilongjiang
. The problem is that the Xibe language exhibits increasing diglossia
, with the old Manchu terminology in the standard
written language
being replaced by a large body of Mandarin Chinese loanword
s in the spoken language; many younger readers lack familiarity with the older Manchu words. The editors of the Qapqal News thus worry that their desire to reach the widest audience possible conflicts with their role as a guardian of the standard language and of Manchu culture in general.
, Uyghur
, Kazakh
, and Russian
. He began working for the Ice Banjin in 1958, and took over as editor-in-chief of the Qapqal News in 1985. The paper has a total staff of 25 people; however, all but two lack a formal journalism education
background, and 20 only have a middle-school or lower educational background.
it using movable lead type
, a practise which continued up until 2007. The editors had long hoped to move to digital typesetting and printing, but were delayed by lack of both software and hardware. Researcher Tongjia Qingfu spent over ten years starting in 1994 to do research on the Xibe and Manchu languages and develop further fonts, input methods, and related software, as well as write and submit standards documents, with the aid of a grant from the National Natural Science Foundation of China
. Initial versions of the software were unsatisfactory because they only supported three typefaces, and so the editors continued to wait for further development.
The government of the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture
contributed ¥150,000 in 2002 to upgrade the newspaper's printing facilities. A further contribution of ¥800,000 in 2007 enabled the newspaper to upgrade its aging equipment; new equipment they purchased included a hectograph
y machine, a scanner
, industrial staplers and paper cutting machines, a blade sharpener, three digital camera
s, two digital video camera
s, nine computers, two multifunction printer
s, a laser printer
, and two fax machines.
Xibe language
The Xibe language is the most widely spoken of the Tungusic languages spoken by members of the Xibe ethnic group in Xinjiang, in the northwest of the People's Republic of China.-Phonology:...
, a Tungusic language
Tungusic languages
The Tungusic languages form a language family spoken in Eastern Siberia and Manchuria by Tungusic peoples. Many Tungusic languages are endangered, and the long-term future of the family is uncertain...
spoken in northwest China. It is one of roughly fifty minority-language
Languages of China
China's many different ethnic groups speak many different languages, collectively called Zhōngguó Yǔwén , literally, "speech and writing of China", which span eight primary language families. Most of them are dissimilar morphologically and phonetically. Even within each family, most are mutually...
newspapers in the Xinjiang
Xinjiang
Xinjiang is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. It is the largest Chinese administrative division and spans over 1.6 million km2...
autonomous region
Autonomous regions of China
An autonomous region is a first-level administrative subdivision of People's Republic of China. Like Chinese provinces, an autonomous region has its own local government, but an autonomous region theoretically has more legislative rights. An Autonomous Region is a minority entity which has a...
of the People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
.
History
The predecessor of the Qapqal News, the Sulfan Jilgan ("Voice of Freedom"), was founded in July 1946 in Ghulja. In 1954, it changed its name to Ice Banjin ("New Life News"). The paper moved its offices to its present location in the Qapqal Xibe Autonomous CountyQapqal Xibe Autonomous County
Qapqal Xibe Autonomous County in Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture in northern Xinjiang is the only Xibe autonomous county of the People's Republic of China. It has an area of 4,430 square kilometers and a population 160,000...
in 1956. It was forced to stop publication in June 1966, during the Cultural Revolution
Cultural Revolution
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, commonly known as the Cultural Revolution , was a socio-political movement that took place in the People's Republic of China from 1966 through 1976...
, but was revived under its present name in October 1974, and has been in continuous operation since then.
Circulation
From about 300 copies in the 1970s when it was revived, the circulation of the Qapqal News grew to about 1,300 by 2007. It now comes out twice a week. Of the subscribers, about 500 are government organisations, twenty are enthusiasts of the closely related Manchu languageManchu language
Manchu is a Tungusic endangered language spoken in Northeast China; it used to be the language of the Manchu, though now most Manchus speak Mandarin Chinese and there are fewer than 70 native speakers of Manchu out of a total of nearly 10 million ethnic Manchus...
in places as varied as Shenyang
Shenyang
Shenyang , or Mukden , is the capital and largest city of Liaoning Province in Northeast China. Currently holding sub-provincial administrative status, the city was once known as Shengjing or Fengtianfu...
, Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
, Hubei
Hubei
' Hupeh) is a province in Central China. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Lake Dongting...
, Guizhou
Guizhou
' is a province of the People's Republic of China located in the southwestern part of the country. Its provincial capital city is Guiyang.- History :...
, Sichuan
Sichuan
' , known formerly in the West by its postal map spellings of Szechwan or Szechuan is a province in Southwest China with its capital in Chengdu...
, and a dozen other provinces, and the remainder are local Xibe
Xibe
The Xibe or Sibo are a Tungusic ethnic group living mostly in northeast China and Xinjiang. They form one of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognized by the People's Republic of China.- History :...
people, mostly those in rural areas. It is sold at retail for ¥
Renminbi
The Renminbi is the official currency of the People's Republic of China . Renminbi is legal tender in mainland China, but not in Hong Kong or Macau. It is issued by the People's Bank of China, the monetary authority of the PRC...
0.09, or at a full-year subscription price of ¥9. Their full-year revenue
Revenue
In business, revenue is income that a company receives from its normal business activities, usually from the sale of goods and services to customers. In many countries, such as the United Kingdom, revenue is referred to as turnover....
is thus only around ¥10,000; the county government gives them a subsidy to cover roughly ¥30,000 of annual paper
Newsprint
Newsprint is a low-cost, non-archival paper most commonly used to print newspapers, and other publications and advertising material. It usually has an off-white cast and distinctive feel. It is designed for use in printing presses that employ a long web of paper rather than individual sheets of...
and printing costs and ¥3,000 of salaries paid to reporters.
Content
The newspaper's name is printed in four languages on its front page: Xibe, Chinese (察布查尔报/Chábùcháěr Bào), Uyghur (چاپچال گېزىت/Qapqal Gezit), and Kazakh (چاپچال گازەت/Çapçal Gazet). About 80% of its content consists of translated reports from China's official Xinhua News AgencyXinhua News Agency
The Xinhua News Agency is the official press agency of the government of the People's Republic of China and the biggest center for collecting information and press conferences in the PRC. It is the largest news agency in the PRC, ahead of the China News Service...
and other wire services
News agency
A news agency is an organization of journalists established to supply news reports to news organizations: newspapers, magazines, and radio and television broadcasters. Such an agency may also be referred to as a wire service, newswire or news service.-History:The oldest news agency is Agence...
, with the remaining 20% written by the paper's own staff. Even the paper's own staff do not always write their articles in Xibe; sometimes they write in Chinese, Uyghur, or Kazakh, and then translate it into Xibe later. The paper does not accept advertisements.
The Qapqal News plays an important role in Xibe language planning
Language planning
Language planning is a deliberate effort to influence the function, structure, or acquisition of languages or language variety within a speech community. It is often associated with government planning, but is also used by a variety of non-governmental organizations, such as grass-roots...
and standardisation. The editors are highly conscious of their role as the modern caretakers not just of their own language but of the Manchu language which few besides Xibe people can read and write anymore; Manchu proper is nearly extinct
Language death
In linguistics, language death is a process that affects speech communities where the level of linguistic competence that speakers possess of a given language variety is decreased, eventually resulting in no native and/or fluent speakers of the variety...
, with the last native speakers
First language
A first language is the language a person has learned from birth or within the critical period, or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for sociolinguistic identity...
believed to be 18 octogenerian residents of the village of Sanjiazi
Sanjiazi
Sanjiazi village or Ilanbotokso in Youyi Daur, Manchu and Kirghiz Ethnic Township , Fuyu County, Qiqihar Prefecture, Heilongjiang province...
near Qiqihar
Qiqihar
- Subdivisions :Qiqihar is divided into 16 divisions: 7 districts , 8 counties and 1 county-level city .-Economy:...
in northern Heilongjiang
Heilongjiang
For the river known in Mandarin as Heilong Jiang, see Amur River' is a province of the People's Republic of China located in the northeastern part of the country. "Heilongjiang" literally means Black Dragon River, which is the Chinese name for the Amur. The one-character abbreviation is 黑...
. The problem is that the Xibe language exhibits increasing diglossia
Diglossia
In linguistics, diglossia refers to a situation in which two dialects or languages are used by a single language community. In addition to the community's everyday or vernacular language variety , a second, highly codified variety is used in certain situations such as literature, formal...
, with the old Manchu terminology in the standard
Standard language
A standard language is a language variety used by a group of people in their public discourse. Alternatively, varieties become standard by undergoing a process of standardization, during which it is organized for description in grammars and dictionaries and encoded in such reference works...
written language
Written language
A written language is the representation of a language by means of a writing system. Written language is an invention in that it must be taught to children, who will instinctively learn or create spoken or gestural languages....
being replaced by a large body of Mandarin Chinese loanword
Loanword
A loanword is a word borrowed from a donor language and incorporated into a recipient language. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept where the meaning or idiom is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself. The word loanword is itself a calque of the German Lehnwort,...
s in the spoken language; many younger readers lack familiarity with the older Manchu words. The editors of the Qapqal News thus worry that their desire to reach the widest audience possible conflicts with their role as a guardian of the standard language and of Manchu culture in general.
Staff
The current editor-in-chief, Yiketan, is a graduate of the Minzu University of China; aside from Xibe, he also speaks ChineseChinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
, Uyghur
Uyghur language
Uyghur , formerly known as Eastern Turk, is a Turkic language with 8 to 11 million speakers, spoken primarily by the Uyghur people in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of Western China. Significant communities of Uyghur-speakers are located in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, and various other...
, Kazakh
Kazakh language
Kazakh is a Turkic language which belongs to the Kipchak branch of the Turkic languages, closely related to Nogai and Karakalpak....
, and Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
. He began working for the Ice Banjin in 1958, and took over as editor-in-chief of the Qapqal News in 1985. The paper has a total staff of 25 people; however, all but two lack a formal journalism education
Journalism school
A journalism school is a school or department, usually part of an established university, where journalists are trained. An increasingly used term for a journalism department, school or college is 'J-School'...
background, and 20 only have a middle-school or lower educational background.
Equipment
From 1946 to 1954, the newspaper had to be written out by hand and mimeographed. In 1954, they began to manually typesetTypesetting
Typesetting is the composition of text by means of types.Typesetting requires the prior process of designing a font and storing it in some manner...
it using movable lead type
Movable type
Movable type is the system of printing and typography that uses movable components to reproduce the elements of a document ....
, a practise which continued up until 2007. The editors had long hoped to move to digital typesetting and printing, but were delayed by lack of both software and hardware. Researcher Tongjia Qingfu spent over ten years starting in 1994 to do research on the Xibe and Manchu languages and develop further fonts, input methods, and related software, as well as write and submit standards documents, with the aid of a grant from the National Natural Science Foundation of China
National Natural Science Foundation of China
The National Natural Science Foundation of China is an organization directly affiliated to the State Council for the management of the National Natural Science Fund.-History:NSFC was founded in February 1986 with the approval of the State Council...
. Initial versions of the software were unsatisfactory because they only supported three typefaces, and so the editors continued to wait for further development.
The government of the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture
Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture
Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture , in northernmost Xinjiang, is the only Kazakh autonomous prefecture of the People's Republic of China.-Geography and coordinates:The following figures excludes both Tacheng Prefecture and Altay Prefecture....
contributed ¥150,000 in 2002 to upgrade the newspaper's printing facilities. A further contribution of ¥800,000 in 2007 enabled the newspaper to upgrade its aging equipment; new equipment they purchased included a hectograph
Hectograph
The hectograph or gelatin duplicator or jellygraph is a printing process which involves transfer of an original, prepared with special inks, to a pan of gelatin or a gelatin pad pulled tight on a metal frame.-Process:...
y machine, a scanner
Image scanner
In computing, an image scanner—often abbreviated to just scanner—is a device that optically scans images, printed text, handwriting, or an object, and converts it to a digital image. Common examples found in offices are variations of the desktop scanner where the document is placed on a glass...
, industrial staplers and paper cutting machines, a blade sharpener, three digital camera
Digital camera
A digital camera is a camera that takes video or still photographs, or both, digitally by recording images via an electronic image sensor. It is the main device used in the field of digital photography...
s, two digital video camera
Video camera
A video camera is a camera used for electronic motion picture acquisition, initially developed by the television industry but now common in other applications as well. The earliest video cameras were those of John Logie Baird, based on the electromechanical Nipkow disk and used by the BBC in...
s, nine computers, two multifunction printer
Multifunction printer
An MFP , multifunctional, all-in-one , or Multifunction Device , is an office machine which incorporates the functionality of multiple devices in one, so as to have a smaller footprint in a home or small business setting , or to provide centralized document...
s, a laser printer
Laser printer
A laser printer is a common type of computer printer that rapidly produces high quality text and graphics on plain paper. As with digital photocopiers and multifunction printers , laser printers employ a xerographic printing process, but differ from analog photocopiers in that the image is produced...
, and two fax machines.