Image via YouTube screenshot
While English tends to view the ‘Chinese language’ as a monolith, the phrase actually represents a large diversity of both written and spoken languages, many of which are not mutually understandable.
Linguistically, Chinese languages belong to the Sinitic branch of the larger Sino-Tibetan family of languages. When spoken, Chinese is divided into over 10 languages which each embody a continuum of dialects. The main spoken languages include Mandarin Chinese, Yue (also called Cantonese in English), Wu (sometimes called Shanghainese), Min (that includes Hokkien and Taiwanese), and others.
When written, Chinese also encompasses different scripts. What is called Traditional Chinese in English refers to 繁體字 and represents the form of Chinese characters unchanged for centuries, which is considered the official script in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao, and parts of the wider Sinophone diaspora. Specific Chinese languages, such as Cantonese or Taiwanese, also have specific characters unique to their language and absent in other languages.
The term Simplified Chinese is used in connection to a reform implemented in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in the 1960s that shortened the number of strokes in complicated characters. It is used as the official spelling in the PRC, Singapore and increasingly by the global Sinophone diaspora in media and social media, as well as the United Nations as one of its six official languages in its simplified version since 1971 after it expelled the Republic of China in Taiwan that used the traditional form. The PRC also introduced what is called pinyin — a transliteration of Mandarin Chinese pronunciation in Latin letters for the purposes of international standardization, including when transcribing personal or geographic names.
Taiwan developed its own systems, but today mixes that with pinyin. A form of Mandarin Chinese, spoken by the Hui Muslim Chinese ethnic group, called Dungan in the former Soviet space, also uses the Cyrillic alphabet to write its language, including in literature and in media. Chinese was also tentatively written in the 13th and 14th centuries in an alphabet based on Tibetan letters, a system called phags-pa.
Various Chinese languages are spoken by an estimated 16 percent of the world’s population (about 1.3 billion people) and have official status in a number of Asian countries, including the PRC, Taiwan and Singapore, but are also widely spoken across the wide Sinophone world diaspora estimated to number 50 million people.
The power relations amongst Chinese languages and in regard to other and Indigenous languages are an important part of the history of Chinese languages. In Taiwan, Chinese languages have been used to colonize Indigenous nations. In the PRC, where Mandarin Chinese is aggressively promoted as the official language, a similar policy is still in place against Uyghur, Tibetan, Mongolian and other languages, but also against Shanghainese and Cantonese.
Global Voices has been publishing in Traditional Chinese since our newroom was first created, and also maintains a site in Simplified Chinese. Here is an ongoing list of stories related to the many Chinese languages:
Stories about A plurality of Chinese languages
Explaining the politics behind Chinese language translation: The year of “Loong”
After mainland Chinese official media outlets started calling the 2024 Zodiac the Year of “Loong” instead of the Year of the Dragon to advance the State's political goals.
A starter guide to Chinese open source data for non-Chinese speakers
This mini guides offers practical tools for non-Chinese speaking researchers and journalists to make a professional use of official Chinese sources to map China's presence across the world.
A Sinophone podcast finds a loyal audience both in China and among the Chinese diaspora
One Sinophone podcast focusing on global as well as hyper-local issues is connecting China and its large overseas population thanks to a well-balanced selection of topics and guests.
‘Overseas Chinese writer is now a label’: Interview with youth author Xia Zhou
Overseas Sinophone writers tend to continue writing in Chinese no matter what, according to young Chinese author Xia Zhou who now lives in the US.
The reasons behind the myth of Cantonese as a more authentic Chinese language
Claims that local languages, including Sichuanese and Cantonese, only lost one vote to Mandarin to become China’s “national language” have kept popping up on the internet from time to time.
How do Mandarin Chinese-speakers reference their own language in Mandarin Chinese?
Mandarin Chinese-speakers have about a dozen terms to describe the different spoken and written forms of the language, offer alluding to various cultural or political affiliations.
State violence and the standardization of the Chinese language
After implementing compulsory education in 1986, Putonghua was promulgated as the primary language in schools, and recently it has replaced indigenous languages in autonomous regions, including Xinjiang, inner Mongolia and Tibet.
Chinese soft power in Kyrgyzstan grows through culture and language
Still looking to publicize its language and culture in Central Asia, China is using the instrument of Confucius Institutes to strengthen its soft power in Kyrgyzstan
Is Mandarin Chinese the language of East Africa’s future?
As China strengthens its already robust trade and infrastructural ties with Africa, Chinese-government funded Confucius Institutes to teach Chinese Mandarin are on the rise.
The Translation Detail Everyone Missed in the China Internet’s Incredibly Surreal Anthem
Below is an edited version of “The Translation Detail Everyone Missed in the China Internet's Incredibly Surreal Anthem“ by Jason Li, originally published on the blog 88 Bar and republished here as part of a...
