Tong King-sing’s Chinese-English Instructor

Tong King-sing’s Chinese-English Instructor produced in Canton 1862.

Graeme Lau Gooey

This is one of a number of phrasebooks and Chinese/English dictionaries produced and used in Australia and other places around the world where Cantonese speakers found they needed to communicate in English. Rather than a stampede of impoverished peasants fleeing rebellions that largely took place in other provinces (the Taiping is a favourite due the a co-incidence of dates with the main mid-19thcentury gold rushes), such works demonstrate the organisation and support this migration of people’s engendered. 

Entitled "Ying U Tsap Ts'un" or "The Chinese and English Instructor" by T'ong Ting-Ku, it consists of six individually bound volumes held together between two wooden covers, and was published in 1862. This copy addressed to "Yin Bun Low" in Melbourne, a business that ran around the 1900s until the 1920s. The Wong Loys lived in Celestial Avenue in Melbourne's Chinatown before moving out to North Caulfield in the mid-30s. William Wong Loy is inscribed in the book as final owner. When the last of the Wong Loys (Ronald Wong Loy) died in 1994, the Wong Loy chattels passed to the Lau Gooey family who donated it to the SLV on behalf of the Wong Loys.   Personal communication, Graeme Lau Gooey, July 2024.  

"Tong King-sing’s Chinese-English Instructor (1862) was an ambitious attempt by an exceptional Chinese linguist to make the complete English language available to Chinese learners."

Li, MKL, Matthews, SJ, Smith, GPS, "Pidgin English texts from the Chinese English Instructor", Hong Kong Journal of Applied Linguistics, 2005, v. 10 n.1 , p. 79-167.

"Tong King Sing(1832-1892) (also known as Tang Tingshu), born in Xiangshan County, Guangdong Province (now Tangjia Town, Zhuhai City, Guangdong), was a renowned Chinese industrialist, philanthropist, and a key figure in the Westernization Movement, who made significant contributions to the advancement of English teaching in China. Tong received a solid bilingual education during his early years, and later worked as a translator in government agencies and as a comprador in foreign trading firms, regularly engaging with foreigners and foreign businesses using the English language. Tong King Sing held a strong emphasis on English teaching, gradually developing his unique perspective on the subject through personal English language acquisition and practical experiences. He compiled and published The Chinese and English Instructor (yingyujiquan), a book that served as both a textbook and a Chinese-English dictionary, actively supporting the cause of English teaching in China." (p.28) "The Chinese and English Instructor, partially addressed the practical needs of English teaching in business activities, making significant contributions to the advancement of English teaching in China at that time." (p.33)

Ming Xu, Rongliang Niu, "Research on Tong King Sing's Views of English Teaching—Taking the Chinese and English Instructor as an Exemplar", Transactions on Comparative Education (2023) Vol. 5: 28-33.

See also:

Language, A Key to Survival: Cantonese-English Phrasebooks in Australia

State Library of Victoria

Full digitalised copy here