New Immigrants in Hong Kong
LCOM3001
New Immigrants as a Community in Hong Kong
Since the 1980s, there have been migrants moving from Mainland China to Hong Kong. In 2011, these new immigrants who have resided in Hong Kong for less than 7 years constitute 2.5% of the Hong Kong population, totalling 171,322 people. (Census and Statistics Department, 2011)
They are of the same ethnicity as Hong Kong people, yet they indeed constitute a linguistic minority in Hong Kong. Though they also speak Chinese, i.e. Putonghua, they have to adopt major changes in their linguistic practice according to the linguistic environment in Hong Kong.
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Use of Traditional characters
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Use of Cantonese, especially Hong Kong Cantonese
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Use of English in some school studies
(Tang, 2002)
Living in such a different linguistic environment dominated by Cantonese and English, these new immigrants position themselves with a different identity in Hong Kong.
Who comprise this community?
The term "new immigrants" technically refers to those migrants who have resided in Hong Kong for less than 7 years. (Once they have lived in Hong Kong for 7 years, they are permanent residents in Hong Kong and no longer "new" to society.)
People in different age groups constitute the new immigrants community. As some people migrated to Hong Kong according to family unification policy, some are investment migration, while some applied for one-way permit to live in Hong Kong.
There are people from mainland China moved to Hong Kong to seek better living environment, hence more than half of these immigrants are in their 20s to 50s. Some parents also moved to Hong Kong with their children for better and guruanteed education, e.g. pre-school classes, playgroups, EMI schools, which constitute another ~40% of school aged immigrants. While there are also some immigrants come to Hong Kong after retirement.
Among those who moved to Hong Kong with one-way permit, a large proportion (42%) joined the labour force in Hong Kong working in different professions. Non-working individuals include 7.7% students, 35% homemakers and 1.7% retired persons.
(Home Affairs Department and Immigration Department, 2013)
New immigrants used to live in Mainland China where social norms, economic conditions and living environment are very different from Hong Kong. Once they move to Hong Kong, they need to adapt to the way of living here. Do they face any difficulties living in Hong Kong?
(Census and Statistics Department, 2011)
(Home Affairs Department and Immigration Department, 2013)
One can see that indeed these new immigrants face difficulties in various aspects of life in Hong Kong. It is mainly due to the cultural difference between Mainland China and Hong Kong. New immigrants report that they do have difficulties in adapting to Hong Kong's dominant languages as they are very different from the Putonghua dominant environment in mainland.
