Cantonese is a Chinese dialect spoken by the majority of the population of Guangdong, Hong Kong, Macao, eastern Guangxi, and some neighboring areas. It is used in Hong Kong and Macao as the de facto official spoken language of government and instruction in schools. It is spoken by overseas Chinese communities in Canada, the United States and Australia, as well as throughout Europe and Southeast Asia. There are slight differences between the pronunciation used in Hong Kong Cantonese and that of the Cantonese spoken in other areas. Over the years, Hong Kong Cantonese has absorbed foreign vocabularies and developed a large set of Hong Kong-specific vocabularies. These differences from Standard Cantonese are the result of British rule between 1841 and 1997.

China Daily

(HK Edition 06/26/2010 page2)