ChineseChinese or the Sinitic language is a language family consisting of languages mutually unintelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the two branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
forms part of the
Sino-TibetanThe Sino-Tibetan languages form a language family composed of, at least, the Chinese and the Tibeto-Burman languages, including some 250 languages of East Asia, Southeast Asia and parts of South Asia...
family of languagesA language family is a group of languages related by descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family.As with biological families, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics...
. About one-fifth of the people in the world speak some
varietyIn sociolinguistics a variety, also called a lect, is a form of a language used by speakers of that language. This may include dialects, accents, registers, styles or other sociolinguistic variation, as well as the standard language variety itself...
of Chinese as their native language. Internal diversity in Chinese, with respect to grammar, vocabulary, and syntax, is comparable to the
Romance languagesThe Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family comprising all the languages that descend from Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
, and it is greater than the
GermanicThe Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all the languages in this branch is Proto-Germanic, spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
and
Slavic languagesThe Slavic languages , a group of closely related languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages, have speakers in most of Eastern Europe, in much of the Balkans, in parts of Central Europe, and in the northern part of Asia.-Branches:Scholars traditionally divide Slavic...
. However, owing to
ChinaChina is a cultural region, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
's sociopolitical and cultural situation, whether these variants should be known as
languages or
dialects is a subject of ongoing debate. Some people call Chinese a
languageA language is a system for encoding and decoding information. In its most common use, the term refers to so-called "natural languages" — the forms of communication considered peculiar to humankind. In linguistics the term is extended to refer to the human cognitive facility of creating and using...
and its subdivisions
dialectThe term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by scholars of language. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other...
s, while others call Chinese a
language familyA language family is a group of languages related by descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family.As with biological families, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics...
and its subdivisions languages. If the definition of "dialect" includes mutual intelligibility, this confusion would resolve into a paradigm of mutually incomprehensible languages, such as Cantonese and Mandarin, broken down into groups of mutually intelligible dialects, such as Beijing and Sichuan speech as rather easily mutually intelligible dialects of Mandarin .
From a purely
descriptiveIn linguistics, prescription can refer both to the codification and the enforcement of rules governing how a language ought to be used. These rules can cover such topics as standards for spelling and grammar or syntax, or rules for what is deemed socially or politically correct or proper...
point of view, "languages" and "dialects" are simply arbitrary groups of similar
idiolectIn linguistics, an idiolect is a variety of a language unique to an individual. It is manifested by patterns of vocabulary or idiom selection , grammar, or pronunciations that are unique to the individual. Every individual's language production is in some sense unique...
s. However, the language/dialect distinction has far-reaching implications in socio-political issues, such as the national identity of China, regional identities within China, and the very nature of the
Han ChineseHan Chinese are an ethnic group native to China and, by most modern definitions, the largest single ethnic group in the world.Han Chinese constitute about 92 percent of the population of the People's Republic of China , 98 percent of the population of the Republic of China , 75 percent of the...
"nation" or "race". As a result, it has become a subject of contention.
Origins
The modern spoken varieties of Chinese originated from
Old ChineseOld Chinese , or Archaic Chinese as used by linguist Bernhard Karlgren, refers to the Chinese spoken from the Shang Dynasty , well into the Former Han Dynasty . There are several distinct sub-periods within that long period of time...
and
Middle ChineseMiddle Chinese , or Ancient Chinese as used by linguist Bernhard Karlgren, refers to the Chinese language spoken during Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Sui, Tang, and Song dynasties...
. Classical Chinese is a literary language, and not any form of current Spoken Chinese, including in previous times.
Confusion in terminology
The Chinese word for these varieties,
fāngyán (方言, literally "place speech"), is commonly translated as "dialect". The words have subtly different meanings, however:
fāngyán, as suggested by its characters, focuses on region rather than mutual intelligibility. For example, a native from Beijing would use it to describe both the dialects of
Tianjin' is the sixth largest city of the People's Republic of China in terms of urban population. Administratively it is one of the four municipalities that have provincial-level status, reporting directly to the central government...
(where the locals speak with essentially a different accent) and of
GuangzhouGuangzhou , in English formerly known as Canton and also known as Kwangchow, is a sub-provincial city and the capital of Guangdong Province in the southern part of the People's Republic of China.It is a port on the Pearl River,...
(where the locals speak Cantonese, which a Mandarin speaker would find incomprehensible without study).
There is no Chinese word that is precisely equivalent to the word "dialect", and, similarly, no English word in common use that is precisely equivalent to
fāngyán. As such, the misunderstanding persists, with Chinese speakers of English using "dialect" the way they would use
fāngyán. The terms
topolect and
regiolect have been coined by linguists to better translate
fāngyán, but they are not in widespread use outside of linguistic scholars.
Self-descriptions of speakers of regional variants
Although linguists have made great progress in describing and classifying the regional varieties of Chinese over the course of the last century, their classification does not necessarily correspond to how these regional variants have traditionally been viewed and categorized. Thus, although the first-level divisions of Chinese are often referred to as "languages", they do not always correspond to linguistic divisions or cultural self-identity.
It is customary in China to refer to people's speech in terms of cities and provinces, even though these provincial boundaries have little in common with linguistic ones. For example, the various dialects within
AnhuiAnhui is a province of the People's Republic of China. Located in eastern China across the basins of the Yangtze River and the Huaihe River, it borders Jiangsu to the east, Zhejiang to the southeast, Jiangxi to the south, Hubei to the southwest, Henan to the northwest, and Shandong for a tiny...
Province are often referred to as the "Anhui dialect", even though this "Anhui dialect" comprises four of the the "Chinese languages" recognized by linguists — Mandarin, Wu, Huizhou, and Gan. Likewise, what linguists consider to be dialects of the Wu are spoken throughout
ZhejiangZhejiang is an eastern coastal province of the People's Republic of China. The word Zhejiang was the old name of the Qiantang River, which passes through Hangzhou, the provincial capital...
Province,
Jiangsu' is a province of the People's Republic of China, located along the east coast of the country. The name comes from jiang, short for the city of Jiangning , and su, for the city of Suzhou...
Province, Anhui Province, and
ShanghaiShanghai is the largest city in China, and one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world, with over 20 million people. Located on China's central eastern coast at the mouth of the Yangtze River, the city is administered as a municipality of the People's Republic of China with province-level...
Municipality, and are therefore often be described as "Zhejiang dialect", "Jiangsu dialect", "Anhui dialect", and "
ShanghaineseShanghainese , or the Shanghai dialect , is a dialect of Wu Chinese spoken in the city of Shanghai and the surrounding region. It is classified as part of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. Shanghainese, like other Wu dialects, is largely not mutually intelligible with other Chinese dialects...
". By the same token, although the Sichuan dialect is considered to be distinct from the Beijing dialect, linguists consider the Sichuan dialect and the
Beijing dialectBeijing dialect is the dialect of Mandarin spoken in the urban area of Beijing, China. The Beijing dialect is the basis of Standard Mandarin, which the standard official Chinese spoken language that is used by the People's Republic of China , the Republic of China , and Singapore.Although the...
to be part of the Mandarin group. If the definition of "dialect" includes mutual intelligibility, then Sichuan and Beijing speech clearly become dialects of Mandarin. Given the rift that exists between these systems of geographical and linguistic classification, sociolinguistic self-identity in China is also a complex phenomenon.
There is a tendency to regard dialects as "variations" of a single written Chinese language. This is partly because speakers of different varieties of Chinese have historically had a single written form. Before the 20th century,
Classical ChineseClassical Chinese or Literary Chinese is a traditional style of written Chinese based on the grammar and vocabulary of ancient Chinese, making it different from any modern spoken form of Chinese...
, a logographic language that could be pronounced according to the phonology of any Chinese language, enjoyed exclusive use for writing.; thus, it was possible to regard the common written language as detached and "above" all of the spoken languages. However, the 20th century saw the replacement of Classical Chinese with "
Vernacular ChineseVernacular Chinese is a style or register of the written Chinese language essentially modeled after the spoken language and associated with Standard Mandarin. This term is not to be confused with the various present-day vernacular spoken varieties of Chinese...
", a written standard based on the modern Mandarin group of dialects and used by all Chinese-speakers regardless of the group to which their native dialect belongs. This development has complicated the idea that all Chinese languages, Mandarin or not, share one single written language, as this unitary written language is now based on one particular group of spoken dialects. This "Standard Written Chinese" is essentially consistent in terms of grammar and vocabulary when written by speakers of different Chinese languages, and differs only in the pronunciation of characters, which varies regionally. However, the spoken Chinese languages are generally not mutually intelligible with Standard Written Chinese even when recited with the local language's pronunciation, since the written language, being based on Mandarin, may not use the same morphology, vocabulary and syntax. Proponents of Chinese as a single language with many dialects describe grammatical/lexical deviations of the local language from the single written language as "slang" , even if these differences persist at the acrolectic (formal) level.
At the same time, regions with a strong sense of regional cohesion have become more aware of regional groupings of dialects in recent times, and have formed self-identities connected to these linguistic categories. In some self-identified linguistic groups, such as Wu or Hakka, these groups correspond well to those devised by linguists. In other self-identified linguistic groups, such as Teochew and Taiwanese, the correspondences are not as exact.
Comparison with Europe
Differences in the socio-political context of Chinese and European languages gave rise to the difference in terms of linguistic perception between the two cultures. In Western Europe,
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
remained the written standard for centuries after the spoken language diverged and began shifting into distinct
Romance languagesThe Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family comprising all the languages that descend from Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
, like how
Old ChineseOld Chinese , or Archaic Chinese as used by linguist Bernhard Karlgren, refers to the Chinese spoken from the Shang Dynasty , well into the Former Han Dynasty . There are several distinct sub-periods within that long period of time...
and
Middle ChineseMiddle Chinese , or Ancient Chinese as used by linguist Bernhard Karlgren, refers to the Chinese language spoken during Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Sui, Tang, and Song dynasties...
diverged. It is important to note that Latin is actually a spoken language, in addition to being a literary language too. Classical Chinese is a literary language, and not a spoken one, and it was the written standard for Chinese. However, political fragmentation gave rise to independent states roughly the size of Chinese provinces. This eventually generated a political desire to create separate cultural and literary standards to differentiate nation-states and standardize the language within a nation-state. In China, a single cultural and literary standard (
Classical ChineseClassical Chinese or Literary Chinese is a traditional style of written Chinese based on the grammar and vocabulary of ancient Chinese, making it different from any modern spoken form of Chinese...
and later,
Vernacular ChineseVernacular Chinese is a style or register of the written Chinese language essentially modeled after the spoken language and associated with Standard Mandarin. This term is not to be confused with the various present-day vernacular spoken varieties of Chinese...
) continued to exist while the spoken language continued to diverge between different cities and counties, much as European languages diverged, due to the scale of the country, and the obstruction of communication by geography.
The diverse Chinese spoken forms and common written form comprise a very different linguistic situation from that in Europe. In Europe, linguistic differences sharpened as the language of each nation-state was standardized. The use of local speech became stigmatized. In China, standardization of spoken languages was weaker, and mostly due to cultural influence and the fact that
Classical ChineseClassical Chinese or Literary Chinese is a traditional style of written Chinese based on the grammar and vocabulary of ancient Chinese, making it different from any modern spoken form of Chinese...
was the main form of writing, because it is a literary language, it could be spoken in any tongue so they continued to speak the local tongues. Although, as with Europe, dialects of regional political or cultural capitals were still prestigious and widely used as the region's
lingua francaA lingua franca is a language systematically used to communicate between persons not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both persons' mother tongues.Lingua franca is a functionally defined term, independent of the linguistic history or...
, their linguistic influence depended more on the capital's status and wealth than entirely on the political boundaries of the region.
| English English is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
|
Mandarin |
Wu |
Xiang |
Gan |
Hakka |
Cantonese |
Min |
FrenchFrench is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
|
ItalianItalian is a Romance language spoken by about 60 million people in Italy, and by a total of around 70 million in the world. In Switzerland, Italian is one of four official languages. It is also the official language of San Marino, as well as the primary language of Vatican City...
|
CatalanCatalan is a Romance language, the national and official language of Andorra, and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of the Balearic Islands, Catalonia and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencià , as well as in the city of Alghero on the Italian island of...
|
SpanishSpanish or Castilian is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that originated in northern Spain and gradually spread in the Kingdom of Castile, evolving into the principal language of government and trade in the Iberian peninsula...
|
PortuguesePortuguese is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia and northern Portugal. It is derived from the Latin spoken by the romanized Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula around 2000 years ago...
|
RomanianRomanian or Daco-Romanian is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova. It has official status in Romania, Republic of Moldova, and the Autonomous Province of Vojvodina in Serbia...
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| I |
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je |
io |
jo |
yo |
eu |
eu |
| You |
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tu |
tu |
tu |
tú |
tu |
tu |
| He |
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il |
egli/lui |
ell |
él |
ele |
el |
| This |
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ceci |
questo |
aquest |
este |
isto |
acesta |
| That |
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cela |
quello |
allò |
aquel |
aquele |
acela |
| Human |
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homme |
uomo |
home |
hombre |
homem |
om |
| Man |
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homme |
uomo |
home |
hombre |
homem |
om |
| Woman |
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femme |
donna |
dona |
mujer |
mulher |
femeie |
| Father |
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père |
padre |
pare |
padre |
pai |
tată |
| Mother |
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mère |
madre |
mare |
madre |
mãe |
mamă |
| Child |
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enfant |
bambino |
nen |
niño |
criança |
copil |
| Fish |
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poisson |
pesce |
peix |
pez |
peixe |
peşte |
| Snake |
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serpent |
serpente |
serp |
serpiente |
serpente |
şarpe |
| Meat |
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viande |
carne |
carn |
carne |
carne |
carne |
| Bone |
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os |
osso |
os |
hueso |
osso |
os |
| Eye |
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œil |
occhio |
ull |
ojo |
olho |
ochi |
| Ear |
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oreille |
orecchio |
orella |
oreja |
orelha |
ureche |
| Nose |
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nez |
naso |
nas |
nariz |
nariz |
nas |
| Eat |
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manger |
mangiare |
menjar |
comer |
comer |
mânca |
| Drink |
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boire |
bere |
beure |
beber |
beber |
bea |
| Say |
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dire |
dire |
dir |
decir |
dizer |
zice |
| Hear |
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entendre |
udire/sentire |
sentir |
oír |
ouvir |
auzi |
| See |
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voir |
vedere |
veure |
ver |
ver |
vedea |
| Smell |
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sentir |
odorare |
sentir |
oler |
cheirar |
mirosi |
| Sit |
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s'asseoir |
sedere |
assentar-se |
sentarse |
sentar-se |
şedea |
| Lie (verb) |
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s'étendre |
distendersi |
estirar-se |
tenderse |
deitar-se |
sta culcat |
| Stand |
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être debout |
stare in piedi |
estar de peu |
estar de pie |
pôr-se de pé |
sta în picioare |
| Sun |
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soleil |
sole |
sol |
sol |
sol |
soare |
| Moon |
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lune |
luna |
lluna |
luna |
lua |
lună |
| Mountain |
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montagne |
montagna |
muntanya |
montaña |
montanha |
munte |
| Water |
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eau |
acqua |
aigua |
agua |
água |
apă |
| Red |
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rouge |
rosso |
vermell |
rojo |
vermelho |
roşu |
| Green |
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vert |
verde |
verd |
verde |
verde |
verde |
| Yellow |
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jaune |
giallo |
groc |
amarillo |
amarelo |
galben |
| White |
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blanc |
bianco |
blanc |
blanco |
branco |
alb |
| Black |
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noir |
nero |
negre |
negro |
negro |
negru |
| Day |
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jour |
giorno |
dia |
día |
dia |
zi |
| Night |
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nuit |
notte |
nit |
noche |
noite |
noapte |
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Mandarin |
Wu |
Xiang |
Gan |
Hakka |
Cantonese |
Min |
FrenchFrench is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
|
ItalianItalian is a Romance language spoken by about 60 million people in Italy, and by a total of around 70 million in the world. In Switzerland, Italian is one of four official languages. It is also the official language of San Marino, as well as the primary language of Vatican City...
|
CatalanCatalan is a Romance language, the national and official language of Andorra, and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of the Balearic Islands, Catalonia and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencià , as well as in the city of Alghero on the Italian island of...
|
SpanishSpanish or Castilian is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that originated in northern Spain and gradually spread in the Kingdom of Castile, evolving into the principal language of government and trade in the Iberian peninsula...
|
PortuguesePortuguese is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia and northern Portugal. It is derived from the Latin spoken by the romanized Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula around 2000 years ago...
|
RomanianRomanian or Daco-Romanian is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova. It has official status in Romania, Republic of Moldova, and the Autonomous Province of Vojvodina in Serbia...
|
Note:
- Mandarin→Beijing dialect
Beijing dialect is the dialect of Mandarin spoken in the urban area of Beijing, China. The Beijing dialect is the basis of Standard Mandarin, which the standard official Chinese spoken language that is used by the People's Republic of China , the Republic of China , and Singapore.Although the...
;
- Wu→Shanghainese
Shanghainese , or the Shanghai dialect , is a dialect of Wu Chinese spoken in the city of Shanghai and the surrounding region. It is classified as part of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. Shanghainese, like other Wu dialects, is largely not mutually intelligible with other Chinese dialects...
;
- Xiang→Changsha dialect
Changsha dialect is a dialect of the Xiang language family, which in turn constitutes one of the Sinitic language families. It is spoken predominantly in Changsha, the capital of Hunan province...
;
- Gan→Nanchang dialect
Nanchang dialect is a dialect of the Gan language. It is spoken in Nanchang in the Jiangxi province.-Consonants:-Citation tones:-References:...
;
- Hakka→Meixian dialect;
- Yue→Guangzhou dialect;
- Min→Xiamen dialect
Comparison with Arab countries
The
diglossiaIn linguistics, diglossia is a situation where a given language community uses two languages or dialects: the first being the community's present day vernacular and the second being either an ancestral version of the same vernacular from centuries earlier , a distinct yet closely related present...
in China's provinces where dialects are spoken can be compared with that in the
Arab WorldThe Arab World refers to Arabic-speaking countries stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the east, and from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Horn of Africa and the Indian Ocean in the southeast...
, where Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or
Classical ArabicClassical Arabic , also known as Qur'anic or Koranic Arabic, is the form of the Arabic language used in literary texts from Umayyad and Abbasid times . It is based on the Medieval dialects of Arab tribes...
is the official language, language of the education and formal media but there are various
spoken dialectsThe Arabic language is a Semitic language with many varieties that diverge widely from one another—both from country to country and within a single country. A distinction is to be made between Classical/Standard Arabic and these "colloquial" variants...
, which are used on a daily basis. Usage/ratio of dialect vs MSA varies from one Arab country to another but in all Arab countries MSA is used in writing and dialects are used in the verbal communication. However, Modern Standard Arabic is nobody's native language and there is no single country/area where standard Arabic is spoken socially. The usage of Arabic dialects is much higher than that of Chinese dialects; movies and popular songs are all in dialects. Modern Standard Arabic is more comparable with Classical Chinese, a written
koineIn linguistics, a koiné language is a standard language or dialect, that has arisen as a result of contact between two mutually intelligible varieties of the same language. Since the speakers understand one another from before the advent of the koiné, the koineization process is not as rapid as...
that differed significantly from the spoken language upon which it was originally based. The Classical Chinese that is referred to in this context is the literary language, not the ancient spoken form.
See also
- The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy
The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy is a book written by John DeFrancis, published in 1984 by University of Hawaii Press. The book describes some of the concepts underlying the Chinese language and writing system, and gives the author's position on a number of ideas about the language.-Main...
- A language is a dialect with an army and navy
"A language is a dialect with an army and navy" is one of the most frequently used aphorisms in the discussion of the distinction between dialect and language. It points out the influence that political conditions can have over a community's perception of the status of a language or dialect...
- Spoken Chinese
Spoken Chinese comprises many regional varieties, the primary ones being Mandarin, Wu, Cantonese, and Min. These are not mutually intelligible, but for sociological and political reasons are considered a single Chinese language....
External links