| There are around 292 living languages in China. Many others exist but are extinct today. You’ve probably heard of languages related to China such as: Chinese, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien, Wu dialect, Fujianese etc. To set the record straight, the term CHINESE encompass many languages. We might think of “Chinese” as one unique language, but we couldn’t be further away from the truth! Chinese is a group of languages, which we will discover in more detail later on.  Chinese varieties and Chinese dialects Definition of dialect: “A dialect is a form of the language that is spoken in a particular part of the country or by a particular group of people.” Definition of variety: “Linguists commonly use language variety (or simply variety) as a cover term for any of the overlapping subcategories of a language, including dialects, jargon, register […]” That’s a bit confusing, isn’t it? John McWhorter shares in his essay What’s a Language, Anyway? a very useful explanation that might help make things more understandable: “Dialect-language distinction [is] based on “intelligibility”: If you can understand it without training, it’s a dialect of your own language; if you can’t, it’s a different language.” In the world of Chinese language studies, the term dialect is often used to talk about the varieties of languages spoken in China, even though they are most of the time mutually unintelligible. |
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