Talk:Standard Chinese

No such thing as "Standard Chinese"

The title should be "Standard Mandarin", not "Standard Chinese" There's no such language as "Chinese", just like there's no such language as "Indian". Unlike Japan or Korea, within the border of China exists multiple ethnicities, cultures and languages, not just a single people called "Chinese" or a single language called "Chinese" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.244.23.236 (talk) 15:37, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

I agree that the most appropriate title is "Standard Mandarin", as it is a more common term than "Standard Chinese", and Wikiepdia should reflect common usage.

If you search in Google books results from 2014 onwards, you will find 0 mentions in books to "standard Chinese":

https://www.google.es/search?biw=1366&bih=638&tbs=cdr%3A1%2Ccd_min%3A2014&tbm=bks&sxsrf=ALeKk004__w06AKEuP52QSESnK1-oQx8RA%3A1593784705290&ei=gTn_XtGiEbnkgweC37jAAg&q=standard+Chinese&oq=standard+Chinese&gs_l=psy-ab.3...1423.2820.0.2905.9.8.0.1.1.0.150.587.1j4.5.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..3.4.354...0j0i19k1.0.GRUUFtzf5WE

If you seach in google books results from 2014 onwards of "standard Mandarin" you will find several results:

https://www.google.es/search?biw=1366&bih=638&tbs=cdr%3A1%2Ccd_min%3A2014&tbm=bks&sxsrf=ALeKk00qqSSKTemeMNyL0gauAyAINlp_pg%3A1593784709130&ei=hTn_XtG2B_zIgweMy7-IAg&q=standard+Mandarin&oq=standard+Mandarin&gs_l=psy-ab.3...33076.34855.0.35063.10.9.0.1.1.0.169.1004.4j5.9.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..0.3.206...0.0.QfmiwkuA3x4

If you search on Google scholar results form 2016 onwards, there are hundreds of papers mentioning "standard Mandarin": ::https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=es&as_sdt=0%2C5&as_ylo=2016&q=standard+Mandarin&btnG=

If you search on Google scholar results from 2016 onwards, there are only two mere papers mentioning "standard Chinese" language:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2016&q=standard+Chinese&hl=es&as_sdt=0,5

Despite the current consensus in changing the title, it is impossible to do so. James343e (talk) 13:56, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

How do you mean "Since there is consensus"? Read this lengthy discussion: Talk:Standard Chinese/Archive 3#Requested move. Love —LiliCharlie (talk) 14:11, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

That is a very old discussion that occured over a decade ago. That doesn't necessarily reflect the current viewpoint of editors.James343e (talk) 14:13, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

If you wish to test the current consensus, the appropriate way is to open another move request. In the meantime, you might consider this ngram. Kanguole 14:15, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

That is an unreliable, outdated and old search engine (pre-2013) that also includes results for "Chinese" (as an adjective for its people and society, rather than its language). A dated (from 2014-onwards) search in Google Scholar or Google books is more reliable, as you can clearly see virtually no reasearch paper (from 2016 onwards) or current book (from 2014 onwards) employs the term "standard Chinese" for the language. James343e (talk) 14:21, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

research papers since 2016, books since 2014. Also, there's no such thing as "standard Chinese" people or society. Kanguole 14:26, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

Moving the page to Standard Mandarin was discussed and formally rejected, however long ago. You will have to open another move request. Love —LiliCharlie (talk) 14:26, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

There is such thing as standard Chinese culture and technology. There are many articles that use the term "standard Chinese" to refer to Chinese cultural and technological products rather than its language. A few examples include but are not limited to:

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1008981520920

https://arxiv.org/abs/1806.00920

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/8656953/James343e (talk) 14:36, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

The second one is about the language. You've also ignored the recent links I posted. Best of luck with your requested move. Kanguole 14:41, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

I have not ignored them, but rather pointed out that while "standard Mandarin" is exclusively used to denote the language, "standard Chinese" is also commonly used to denote non-linguistic aspects. So a brute comparison between "standard Mandarin" and "standard Chinese" on Google scholar is problematic due to the aforementioned reason. I have not created a requested move, nor am I convinced of the necessity to do so after this discussion. James343e (talk) 14:53, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

Well perhaps that's some progress. I've tried to help you out with some searches, but I will save any further discussion of this issue for a requested move discussion. Kanguole 15:25, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

But the page is not a general page about "standard Chinese" it is a page about Standard Mandarin, asserting that Mandarin is just Chinese is a political argument by the CCP to strengthen their One-China policy. Linguists do not call this language "Standard Chinese." 159.121.206.13 (talk) 17:05, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

This is simply not true. "Standard Chinese" is in use by linguists to an extent comparable to other terms for the variety. If anything, I see "Modern Standard Chinese" more often than "Standard Mandarin",

Even if this were true, we generally use the most common name for a topic in English-language sources, not necessarily the preferred name by scholars. Remsense ‥ 论 18:56, 6 December 2024 (UTC)

The standard usage among native English speakers is "Mandarin." When native English speakers want to be specific, they typically have used the term, "Beijing Standard Mandarin." Standard Chinese is most typically used by non-native English speakers, especially Chinese government's spokespersons, and initiatives paid for by the Chinese government. They are trying to further entrench a perception of common usage to further the One-China policy. The language is called Mandarin. 159.121.206.13 (talk) 20:35, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

The most common name in English for this language (Pǔtōnghuà/Guóyǔ) is simply "Chinese", as may be verified by visiting the foreign language section of any English-language bookstore. Of course, that name is ambiguous, as is "Mandarin", which also refers to the whole dialect group. As pointed out above, your assertions about usage of "Standard Chinese" are simply false. But if you wish to explore whether there is consensus to change the name of the article, that can be done by opening a WP:RM. Kanguole 14:52, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Misleading information, Cantonese not standard language of Hong Kong

The article contains misleading information. Modern Standard Chinese is based on the Mandarin variety of Chinese, yet it is not Mandarin, but a pluricentric language with different standard forms in mainland China, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Macau, and Hong Kong. Hong Kong and Macau have used Modern Standard Chinese in the formal written register even before 1997 and Cantonese is used as a colloquial form of Chinese only, although Modern Standard Chinese is read aloud in Cantonese phonology in Hong Kong and Macau. The standard language of Hong Kong officially is "Chinese" with not further specification.Einstein92 (talk) 01:50, 1 September 2022 (UTC)

Hong kong

misleading information,cantonese not standard language of hong ko

ng

41.113.177.146 (talk) 12:42, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

Luanping as reference dialect

There is no mention at all that the PRC putonghua is defined on the Luanping dialect? 80.4.75.97 (talk) 10:51, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

I've never read this. Do you have a source? Remsense诉 18:45, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

One often sees claims that the pronunciation of putonghua was based on Luanping County, Chengde, but they all seem to be sourced to news reports about Luanping (e.g. [1]) or the county government (e.g. [2]). Has anyone seen a better (e.g. linguistic, independent of the county) source for this claim? Kanguole 10:59, 13 November 2025 (UTC)

Why exactly would the national state media outlet of the government that invented the standardization in the first place not be considered a valid source? This isn't an organically linguistic development, this is a political development that is being verified by the political entity that was responsible for it. What better source could possibly be needed? BobSmithME (talk) 12:47, 13 November 2025 (UTC)

The source is not an official statement, but rather a local news report from Luanping, helping to promote the Luanping Putonghua Experience Zone.

The nearest government statement to the claim seems to come from Luanping County,[3] and even that is more circumspect, saying only that pronunciation surveys were carried out at Luanping sites in the 1950s during the standardization of Putonghua pronunciation. It also says that Putonghua evolved from the Beijing dialect. Chengde is more vague,[4] saying only that 3 Luanping sites were surveyed, but making no claim that they formed the basis of the standard. The Beijing government says the main survey sites were Beijing and Luanping.[5]

The language planning work in the 50s was carried out by teams of linguists under government direction. They convened two national conferences on the topic in October 1955, at which Zhang Xiruo, Minister of Education at the time, said that Putonghua "takes the northern dialect as base dialect and the Beijing dialect as the standard pronunciation". They wrote numerous reports and academic papers. There are many secondary sources based on these documents – those would be the better sources. But they don't seem to give Luanping the primary role being claimed here. Kanguole 10:54, 14 November 2025 (UTC)

The source is CCTV News, which copied it from the People's Daily. You know, the official organ of the party that created the standardization. No part of that article states or implies that this is a local news report. Just because it's an interview of the area doesn't mean it's a local paper that put it out. It is not an exaggeration to say that the dialect was based on the Luanping dialect considering the extraordinary differences between the Old Beijing dialect and Standard Chinese. If Luanping is consistently cited as one of two major survey sites, and it is closer to Standard Chinese than Beijing is, then there is no reason not to state that the dialect is at least somewhat based on Luanping. I'd also assume that Beijing has a much larger sample population than Luanping does.

Additionally, there's no reason not to believe that the state media will say it's based on Beijing when it's actually based on Luanping, considering that there is no reason that most of China or any of the world would have heard of Luanping. If the United States standardized English based on the Manchester, New Hampshire accent but used surveys in Boston, they would obviously state that it was based on the "New England dialect, mainly Boston," because Manchester is fairly unknown compared to Boston. That does not mean that the dialect is closest to Boston's, nor does it mean that the dialect was based on Boston's. BobSmithME (talk) 11:32, 14 November 2025 (UTC)

Although the article comes from the People's Daily, its content is entirely sourced from Luanping (except for a mention of Baidu Baike). There is, for example, nothing from a representative of the State Language Commission.

But a bigger problem is that the article doesn't even make the claim that you cited it for, namely that Putonghua was originally derived from this dialect. The nearest it gets is to say that Luanping was one of the sites for pronunciation collection as part of the standardization work, and that Luanping dialect is very close to Putonghua. As for being closer to Putonghua than Beijing dialect, it appears that this article is the only source for that. Old Beijing dialect is not relevant.

And are you seriously claiming that when Zhang Xiruo said "Beijing dialect as the standard pronunciation" he actually meant Luanping? Kanguole 19:00, 14 November 2025 (UTC)

There is no reason for a language commission representative to be present at the writing of a local interest story. If the information is being put out by the central organ of the Communist Party, then republished by the state media organization of the Communist Party, which was responsible for conducting language standardization in the first place, then it is safe to say that the Communist Party has approved this message.

The Luanping dialect is objectively closer to standard Chinese than the Beijing dialect. This is a highly reliable source that is stating that. You don't get to reject an RS because you don't like it. Unless you produce another RS that says it isn't more similar to standard Chinese than Beijing is (and this is a very commonly known fact in China, by the way), then this article is more than enough to at least insert a blurb that states the Luanping dialect is more similar to standard Chinese, and that the collection efforts included both dialects.

Yes. I am. Beijing dialect is objectively not the standard pronunciation, so you tell me which one he meant. So far I have a reliable source openly stating my claim that you have rejected again and again on increasingly spurious arguments. Its content is not "sourced from Luanping," it is about Luanping. I don't think you understand what a local interest media report is. Additionally, half these claims are not sourced from Luanping. Only the second and last couple of paragraphs are actually interviews with local officials, the rest of the article is editorial. Specifically, this sentence is most damning: "可以说在清朝时滦平就是北京官话推广的先行区，影响广泛的北京官话最终成为普通话的前身." All of metro Beijing was undergoing standardization at the same time, so it's impossible to say that this is based on the Beijing dialect when what we know as the modern Beijing dialect came in at the same time as the Luanping dialect. The CCP standardization didn't use the "Beijing dialect," it used a variation of a previously standardized form that ultimately developed into a more pure form in Luanping. The actual Beijing dialect is miles away from what we know as standard chinese.

I'll say it again. If you standardize your language using input from two different locations, and one is objectively closer to the correct dialect but is a much, much smaller sample size, but the second sample size is about 90% similar, then you would say that you used both dialects. If one has 97% similarity, and the other has 90% similarity, and both were used as sample areas, you tell me. It's not rocket science. BobSmithME (talk) 08:41, 15 November 2025 (UTC)

We have many sources saying that the standard pronunciation was based on Beijing. The article you're citing (original archived here, I believe) does not claim that the standard is based on Luanping, and nor does the sentence you quote above. You are inferring that claim from the article's statement that Luanping is considered closer to Putonghua than Beijing is, and using that to re-interpret all the afore-mentioned sources. That is a prime example of OR. But also the premise for your deduction is contradicted by linguistic sources, e.g.

Wu Lijun 吴丽君 and Wang Xiaohuan 王筱欢 (2014). 《滦平方言语音系统调查报告(一)——声母系统》[Survey report on the phonology of Luanping dialect (1) – initial consonant system]. Hebei Minzu Shifan Xueyuan Xuebao 34(4): 56–61. doi:10.16729/j.cnki.jhnun.2014.04.007

which lists numerous examples of differences between Luanping dialect and Putonghua (and Beijing). One of the most striking is the treatment of kāikǒu syllables with the Middle Chinese 影 initial, e.g. 熬 áo, 饿 è, 藕 ǒu, and those with the 疑 initial, e.g. 爱 ài, 安 ān, 恩 ēn. In Luanping, all the words in these classes have the initial ŋ-, in contrast to the zero initial of Putonghua and Beijing. This point is re-inforced in

Lin Shou 林寿 (1987) 《北京官话区的划分》[The Division of Beijing Mandarin Areas], Fangyan 3: 166–172.

which explores the distribution of these initials across the wider Beijing Mandarin area. Figure 3 (on page 170) confirms ŋ- for Luanping, and shows the zero initial as confined to the Beijing urban area, not even all of the area within the municipal boundary, with a zone of n- before the outer ŋ- area. The zero initial here is an innovation specific to Beijing.

Perhaps differences like these are the reason your source put the "closer" claim in quote marks. Kanguole 23:48, 15 November 2025 (UTC)

You are deliberately excluding the several instances of the Beijing dialect being distinguishably and noticeably different from Standard Chinese, and note that I never said we rewrite the article to completely exclude mentions of the Beijing dialect altogether. Your assertion that I used that sentence to justify my claims of Luanping being closer to the Beijing dialect is a deliberate misrepresentation of my statement, which was that both the Beijing and Luanping dialects are offshoots of a singular imperial standard dialect and neither is more well-established than the other. If you want me to cite the statement you accused me of making, here: "从普通话的规范来看，滦平话音准分明，字正腔圆，语调比当时的北京话要“硬”一些，显得直接、清晰，尤其是没有北京胡同里那种儿化、省字、尾音等发音习惯，易于学习推广." Note that this is not a quote from a local, this is an editorial produced by the paper. Would you care to explain how that sentence falls under OR?

I never said Luanping was 100% similar. I said we have reliable sources stating it is more similar and therefore should be mentioned as such. If two different regions are sampled, and one is much more similar to the final product than the other, like I said - you tell me which one should be at least mentioned. You are not refuting my statement in any meaningful way, you are simply flooding me with research about singular differences, none of which implies that the Beijing dialect is closer to standard. That is OR. I can produce just as many citations on how the Beijing dialect is noticeably different. BobSmithME (talk) 06:41, 16 November 2025 (UTC)

You asked for sources showing that Luanping is not more similar to Putonghua than Beijing is, and I produced two which state that it has a different initial consonant inventory than Putonghua and Beijing. Looking at sources is not OR. OR is adding to an article statements that are not directly supported by sources, such as the claim that Putonghua was originally derived from Luanping dialect.

To be clear, the statement I am defending is that Putonghua takes its phonology from Beijing and its vocabulary from Mandarin dialects more broadly (to exclude regional forms, including those of Beijing). This is directly supported by many sources, and even your source (singular) does not contradict it. The statement in the lead "It is largely based on the Beijing dialect" doesn't really summarize that accurately, despite the "largely" qualifier.

The sentence you quote is full of impressionistic statements, and hardly a suitable basis for encyclopedic text. And by the way érhuà is also part of Putonghua phonology, though it occurs in fewer words than in Beijing. Kanguole 11:29, 16 November 2025 (UTC)

"Began acquiring native speakers in 1988"

For a long time, under "Native speakers" in the infobox, this article has read "Began acquiring native speakers in 1988". There are several problems with this statement. First, it is patently false. Standard Chinese has existed for centuries, as explained throughout the article. Second, the sentence cites Norman (1988:251). In fact, Norman says nothing of the kind. (I do not have access to Liang.) Third, this section is generally used to give numbers, and not dates when a language started acquiring speakers. Dogwith4shoes (talk) 22:27, 5 August 2025 (UTC)

Modern Standard Chinese was defined in the early 20th century, but existing does not mean it had native speakers.

Norman's book was published in 1988, and on p251 describes how some children in Taibei have Standard Chinese as their first language – he doesn't say this began in 1988, but implies some time before. Liang describes a similar process in Shenzhen.

So the standard language has had native speakers since the late 20th century, but no-one gives a number. Kanguole 22:47, 5 August 2025 (UTC)

(Mea culpa on the misidentified edit reversion while typing.)

Standard Chinese has existed for centuries, as explained throughout the article.

It is explained throughout the article that Mandarin was existed for centuries. This datum is referring to Standard Chinese as standardized and promoted in the 20th century, i.e. Putonghua, which the article explains has additional priors than just the previous lingua franca of imperial bureaucrats.

this article has read "Began acquiring native speakers in 1988"

I am at a loss for why this date though—Liang describes new native Putonghua speakers in Guangdong during the 1980s, but not a claim like this. my thought was the result of nationwide obligatory schooling in Putonghua, but none of the dates line up. My singular guess is someone mixed up sound and script, since 1988 is the year simplified characters were essentially standardized for good. Remsense 🌈 论 23:05, 5 August 2025 (UTC)

Maybe we should move this sentence (with a bit more clarification) to the history section? It seems out of place in the infobox. Dogwith4shoes (talk) 23:13, 5 August 2025 (UTC)