A small group of scholars, students and local residents of Shanghai are standing up to save their dialect, which traces its roots to one of China's oldest spoken languages, from extinction. Shanghainese, like many of the estimated 80 other local dialects spoken in China, is endangered by the government's pro-Mandarin policy.
上海本地的一小批学者、学生以及本地市民都挺身而出加入了保护上海话的行列，害怕这个中国最古老的方言之一会随岁月消亡。与中国不同地区其他八十种的方言一样，上海话也受到国家普通话推广政策的威胁。
"I guess the younger generation is much more familiar with English than their mother tongue," said Roman Xu, a 33-year-old who heads an non-profit organisation that promotes the use of the Shanghai dialect.
33岁的许罗曼(音译)说：“我认为年青一代对英语的熟悉度甚至超过其母语。”他是一个推广上海话的非营利组织的负责人。
"I've read in history books about how a language gradually dies out. Hope my mother tongue won't become one."
“我看了些历史书，知道语言是如何缓慢消亡的。希望上海话不会这样。”
Qian Nairong, a professor at Shanghai University who specialises in language research, says it's not yet too late to save the dialect – but the clocking is ticking.
上海大学语言研究方向的教授钱乃荣，说拯救方言应立即开始--但时间十分有限。
"Shanghainese will come to an end within a generation or two," said Qian, who has written textbooks as well as a dictionary on Shanghainese.
他说“上海话的消亡也就是一两代人的事情”，他曾撰写过上海话的教科书和字典。
Shanghainese, a branch of the Wu dialect which was spoken in regions around Shanghai over 2,200 years ago, has its own grammar and vocabulary, with limited correlation with Mandarin.
作为吴语的一个分支，上海话已经在上海及周边地区有了超过2200年的历史，有着自己的语法和词汇，和普通话差别较大。
For example, a commonly-used phrase "have you eaten?" would be "ni fan chi guo le ma?" in Mandarin but would be pronounced "nong che gu la va?" in Shanghainese.
例如一个经常会用到的短语：“你吃了没?” 普通话我们会说：“你饭吃过了吗?”但上海话的发音为“侬切估了伐?”。
Advocates, consisting mainly of scholars like Qian and non-governmental organisations, have started to move to protect Shanghainese, and their efforts seem to be bearing some fruit.
像钱乃荣以及一些非政府组织形成的倡导者已经开始行动起来保护上海话，他们的努力也开始略见成效。
