and influential language in southeastern China until the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949 and its promotion of Standard Mandarin Chinese as the sole official language of the nation throughout the last half of the 20th century, although its influence still remains strong within the region. While the Chinese government encourages the use of Standard Mandarin rather than local varieties of Chinese in broadcasts, Cantonese enjoys a relatively higher standing than other Chinese languages, with its own media and usage in public transportation in Guangdong province. Furthermore, it is also a medium of instruction in select academic curricula, including some university elective courses and Chinese as a foreign language programs. The permitted usage of Cantonese in mainland China is largely a countermeasure against Hong Kong's influence, as the autonomous territory has the right to freedom of the press and speech and its Cantonese-language media have a substantial exposure and following in Guangdong. Nevertheless, the place of local Cantonese language and culture remains contentious, as with other non-Mandarin Chinese languages. A 2010 proposal to switch some programming on Guangzhou television from Cantonese to Mandarin was abandoned following massive public protests, the largest since the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. As a major economic center of China, there have been recent concerns that the use of Cantonese in Guangzhou is diminishing in favour of Mandarin, both through the continual influx of Mandarin-speaking migrants from impoverished areas and strict government policies. As a result, Cantonese is being given a more important status by the natives than ever before as a common identity of the local people. Despite some decline in Cantonese usage in Guangdong province, its survival is still doing better than other Chinese dialects due to the local cultural prestige, pride, popularity, and especially with the wide availability and popularity of Cantonese entertainment and media from both Guangzhou and especially from Hong Kong, which is maintaining the encouragements of the local Cantonese speakers to want to continue to preserve their culture and language versus other Chinese dialectal speaking regions are much more limited with their encouragements to maintain their local dialects as they have very limited to no media or entertainment outlets to cater to their local dialects. Back in the 1980s-90s, migrants from many parts of China settling in Guangzhou or anywhere in Guangdong showed more interest to learning Cantonese and wanting to integrate into the local cultural