English
and Cantonese are co-official languages. English is
spoken by around 38% of the population, of whom some 3.1%
regard English as their 'usual' language. 34.9% claim to speak
English as 'another' language (Hong Kong Government
by-census 1996). Since 1995, the official language policy has
been to educate a 'trilingual' (Cantonese, Putonghua, English)
and 'biliterate' (Cantonese, English) population. Population:
c.6.7m.
Reading Bolton, K. (ed.) (2000) Special
issue of World Englishes, on 'Hong Kong English:
Autonomy and Creativity'. WorldEnglishes 19:3. Pennington, M.C. (ed.) (1998) Language in
Hong Kong at Century's End. Hong Kong: Hong Kong
University Press.
