Do You Hear the Hong Kong People Sing?
Do You Hear the Hong Kong People Sing?
Thank you for joining me for this Sunday Special commentary.
As with most everything, there are many ways to interpret things, especially with something as controversial as today’s topic. Comments and questions are welcome. Please be respectful of others’ opinions if they should differ from yours.
For Japanese students, vocabulary words in bold are provided in Japanese below.
Commentary
(628 words)
An article in yesterday’s Japan Times caught my eye: “Hong Kong court says protest song is matter of national security.”
A song? A song carries so much power that it threatens national security?
The song is Glory to Hong Kong. It has become an anthem for the Democracy Movement in Hong Kong.
In 1997, British rule in Hong Kong ended and was transferred to China. The “One country, two systems” promises China made about keeping Hong Kong’s system of government and economy have slowly been replaced by its increasing control over the previous British colony. The National Security Law enacted in 2020 has taken away many civil rights and basic freedoms. The people can still vote, but the list of candidates has been pre-approved. Many protesters have been arrested, and since the outbreak of COVID, protests for democracy have ended under severe restrictions.
Yet a song keeps hope alive.
Serge Denisoff (1972, 1983) often pointed out that more than 2000 years ago, Plato knew about the power of music. In The Republic, Plato said, more or less, that changes in musical style are a mirror of society. When people change the music, it signals that they want changes in society, and, we assume, they will fight to get those changes.
Social movements throughout history have used songs to call people to join their cause. People within the movements have sung songs in solidarity, either for an issue (such as supporting the Spanish Republic during its Civil War, 1936-1939) or against (such as union employees on strike against the abuses of their employers in coal mines and factories).
The songs themselves are just notes and words. However, when they are sung by the people, they take on power: the emotions that flow through a group singing the same words for the same reasons.
Folk singer Pete Seeger talked about this in his recording of Jarama Valley (video below). After Franco (Spain’s dictator for 35 years) died in 1975, Seeger went to give concerts in Spain. The audience sang his songs exactly the way he did.
He asked them, “‘How come you sing these songs in the same versions that I sing them?’ and they said, ‘Oh, we learned them off your record. We made tapes of them and brought them across the border and played them for each other. Of course, if we played them very loud, we might have gotten arrested.’”
Risking arrest just to listen to songs.
But those songs gave the listeners the feeling of not being alone, the feeling that others might be listening to the same songs and that one day they would break free of the yoke of the dictatorship.
And so it is with Glory to Hong Kong. The lyrics are no more or less threatening than the Marseillaise or the Star Spangled Banner. It is the emotions of the people that are powerful and can create the change that they are demanding.
Final thought…
The film Joshua: Teenager vs. Superpower (Sundance 2017 winner, available on Netflix), is about the Democracy Movement in 2014 and one of its leaders, Joshua Wong. In the film, there is a scene of a demonstration. It’s only about a second of the film, but it shows a banner that someone has put above the crowd of people below. It says, “Do you hear the people sing?” This one phrase from the world-famous musical Les Miserables refers to the struggle of the people of France during the French Revolution (1789-1790s).
Do you hear the people sing, singing a song of angry men?
It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again
When the beating of your heart echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start when tomorrow comes
VOCABULARY
national security 国家安全保障
threaten 脅かす
democracy 民主主義
been replaced すり替えられた
candidate 候補者
pre-approve 事前承認
arrest 逮捕
outbreak 流行
severe restrictions 厳しい制限
Plato プラトン
abuse 虐待
coal mine 炭鉱
dictator 独裁者
How come? どうして？
yoke 首枷
struggle 戦い
slave 奴隷
Glory to Hong Kong (the CC subtitles in English are correct)
Glory to Hong Kong (Japanese subtitles)
Jarama Valley (Pete Seeger asking about the audience knowing the same version: 3:27)
SOURCES
Denisoff, R. S., & Peterson, R. A. (1972). The sounds of social change: Studies in popular culture, p. 153. Rand McNally.
Denisoff, R. S. (1983). Sing a song of Social Significance, p. 19. Bowling Green State University Popular Press.
Lyrics to Do You Hear the People Sing? by Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel (French), Herbert Kretzmer (English), music by Claude-Michel Schönberg, 1980.