中文 😮 What is Chinese? 什麼是'中文' Understanding the Chinese Language Part 1 | Tiếng Trung Quóc

This is the first in a series of clips breaking down what the 'Chinese Language' actually is. 中文 'zhōng wén' is a catch all term that Chinese speakers use when referring to the 'Chinese Language', but it has different meanings for different people. If you speak Cantonese, to say the Cantonese equivalent - if someone speaks '中文-zūng màhn', it would mean that they speak Cantonese. For some, it means just the literary or written language. For some the term Chinese refers to modern Mandarin 普通話 pǔ tōng huà and all other forms of Chinese modern and ancient are just 'dialects' or 方言 fāng yán.
In this clip, based on a TEDx talk that I presented in Chinese in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia a few years back, I present many different 'forms' of Chinese and show what 'Chinese' or 中文 'zhōng wén' means to me.
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[@uastæus]

When you learn Cantonese and Mandarin, as a non-Chinese student, you have to admit they are two different languages, and not just dialects of the same one. They are as far from each other as French is far from Italian. There is indeed a big misconception on the concept of ‘Chinese’ because most people who speak a Chinese language which is not Mandarin, will refer to the common texts as ‘Chinese’, even though they could be reading a written version of their own language, or the Standard Mandarin that local authorities may have implemented. I’ve been living a decade in Hong Kong, and that’s how most people feel about it, I guess. So I completely agree with the main points of this video. Talking about Chinese speakers would be a bit the same as talking about ‘Latin speakers’ when referring to Spanish, French and Italian speakers. Thanks for the great video.

[@JohnDoe01]

Stricktly speaking as strickly speaking, Cantonese people are not Han people but pan-Viet people who accepted Han language and culture from Zhongyuan or China proper. You belong to the last batch of assimilated Han people, just like Hokkien people. Cantonese people claim Cantonese is ancient Chinese, in fact it is only a mixture of a certain form of antient Chinese and luoyue骆越/駱越 local language. This is the reason why Cantonese is beyond the comprehension of Mandarin speakers in daily life Cantonese. Same thing goes with Hokkien or 閩南話. It is a mixture of a certain form of ancient Han language and language of local pan Viet people 東甌越/苗越. So the difference between Cantonese and Hokkien is huge apparently. Neither is real antient Chinese. They only contain certain elements of antient Chinese. I watched a video made by a Professor Chen who teaches 閩南話/台語/Hokkien. He claims Hokkien people are real 河洛人, or people from Yellow River黃河 and Luo River洛水. Especially Hokkien is Yayan雅言 of 夏商周 or Xia-Shang-Zhou dynasties. But in fact they could have ancestors from Yellow and Luo Rivers but the main body of Hokkien people are local pan Viet people. This is for sure. Fujian is often shortened to min or 閩. The 蟲 inside 閩 stands for tiger and ferocious animals. The pronunciation of min signifies 蠻man which means wild, untamed, or barbarian. Also, min signifies Hmong/meo/miao. 😊 But what is a Chinese dialect? It is a local form of Chinese language. All Chinese languages and dialects are written inn the same way in Chinese characters (though a simplified form was introduced in 1960s, but is still easily identified by either Simplified Chinese or Traditional Complex Chinese readers.) but pronounce differently according to the local dialect. Again. Chinese language system is not classified by pronunciation but by the same writing system. There are 8 major Chinese dialects: Mandarin官話 (70% of Chinese population), Wu吳語(South Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shanghai, 8%), Cantonese粵語/白話/廣州話/廣府話/廣西白話 (7%), East Fujian dialect閩東話min dong(Fuzhou dialect), South Fujian dialect / 閩南話minnan hua/Hokkien (福建省漳州、泉州、廈門，台灣省，廣東省潮州、汕頭、揭陽，潮汕話 or Diew Chiu/Chaozhou is also considered to be a sub-dialect of Hokkien閩南話.). Jiangxi dialect贛語, Hunan Dialect湘語. The above are 8 major Chinese dialects. The nature of dialect is the language spoken after the local tribes were assimilated into the 中原漢族Han people and hence considered to be a part of 漢族 or 漢人 the han people. Within 官話 or Mandarin, there are many sub-dialects, such as 西北官話 (Northwest)，西南官話(Southwest)，華北官話(North China)，東北官話(Northeast), and the local Mandarin may vary from time to time. Some people say Mandarin is a language of Manchu people. NOPE. Mandarin is pure Han language. Some people from dialect areas such as Zhejiang and Jiangsu may claim the er兒化音 is a symbol of Manchu pronunciation. Er is a native Han pronunciation when a noun is referred to. If you think Beijing dialect is full of er pronunciations and was promoted in Qing the Manchu dynasty, but when you compare subdialecta such as 西安話Xi'An, 山東話 Shandong， 河南話Henan， you will tell er兒化音is everywhere in Mandarin. Even you can find the counterpart of 兒er in other 7 dialects, it is just They are often pronounced as ni or yi. As in 打起黃鶯兒，莫叫枝上啼. Hangzhou is within the Wu dialect吳語speaking area. But Hangzhou dialect you can find er兒 exactly as Henan 河南話. Look at this ring of Hangzhou dialect: 小伢兒，撒姿兒 Xiao ya er, sa zir!.小孩子，去玩！撒姿兒，我猜想本字是耍恣兒. We can tell at once that in North Song Dynasty 兒化音 has been in popular use, at least in the old capital 開封. After Song Dynasty moved it's capital to Hangzhou, it still kept the er until now. In fact according to Han center culture, the 中原 people are real Han. People outside中原 or China proper are just barbarians. When you are assimilated into the han group, then you read 四書五經, and are educated, no longer barbarian. Samething like Rome-centered antient Rome civilation. At first, only Romans are non-babarian. Later people outside of Roman Empire are babarian. Now non-Christians are babarian.

[@uastæus]

@@JohnDoe01 Not talking about people’s blood here but their languages.

[@宇宙大元帅金正恩同志]

The truth is Cantonese is a dialect of Chinese but not a dialect of Mandarin because Mandarin is a dialect of Chinese. We call it 北方方言(northern dialect) and Cantonese is 粤方言(canto dialect). there are 7 dialects in Chinese and Cantonese is one of them. I speak Wenzhounese which is a part of 吴方言(wu dialect). Chinese as a whole is a language and there are many different dialects of Chinese. Cantonese is not a language but a dialect of Chinese, and Mandarin is part of the northern dialect of Chinese as well. Wenzhounese as a part of Wu dialect is less similar to Mandarin compared to Cantonese, and we can still tell how the words and relations from middle Chinese and other dialects. I speak the language I know and also from history.

[@宇宙大元帅金正恩同志]

the reason why they sound different is that they all inherited different parts of pronunciations from Middle Chinese. in my dialect, many words are put in the opposite order. they are different languages man? I doubt if you speak any of the Chinese language. I do not agree that they are different languages because they share the same system, the same words, but some different words and different grammar. when you think they sound different is only because they inherited different parts of Middle Chinese. just like the dialect I speak, no one from outside of my county can understand, less similar than Cantonese to Mandarin, but as a native speaker, I can still tell the strong correlation between my dialect to other Chinese dialects.

[@宇宙大元帅金正恩同志]

Also if you don't agree with what I just said, then plz give me an example of a dialect of Chinese because I really don't know what dialect means in your language.

[@XiaosChannel]

9:59 It should be noted that japanese have multiple systems of phonetically pronouncing kanjis which are borrowed from different periods of the chinese history, three main ones being 呉音 漢音 唐宋音, and if you ask a japanese to read a chinese poem -- if they could -- they would read it with 漢文訓読, not any of the above

[@rogernking]

Cool! 这位youtuber所讲的内容已经不是讲单的汉语教学，而是涉及较为专业的汉语音韵学范畴了。汉语音韵学是一门非常有趣的学问，因为它能把古今中外的很多事情都联系起来。汉语历史悠久，影响广泛。从时间维度来讲，目前能考证的时间轴从诗经时代一直连续到现代，横跨了2500多年，经历了上古、中古、近现代等多个时期。（也有学者在研究商末周初时候的音韵）历史时期交界的时候，汉语的发音系统都发生了较大变化。从空间维度讲，汉语（或者说雅言）不仅随着时间的推移，遍布了整个中国，还随着汉字一起影响了日本、朝鲜、越南（俗称的汉字文化圈）等地。有意思的是，空间维度和时间维度的影响并非是相互独立的，而是像水波纹一样，慢慢向外扩散的。很多外域的汉字发音系统都保留了一些古老的汉语发音特征。比如该视频中反复提到的“入声“，在日语、朝鲜语、越南语都无一例外都有保留。当然，具体发音方式都会有所变化。视频里提到了日语会把入声的闭塞音节补充一个元音，变成开音节，以适应日语原生的发音方式。而现代韩语则把-t变成了-l。但无论如何，其发音系统从结构上来讲，都是可以和中古汉语（可以粗略的认为是隋唐时期的标准汉语）对应起来的。通过研究语言的变化，我们能够了解文化的传播方式，丰富视野，了解到各种不同的可能。我觉得汉字在整个汉语的传播过程中，起到了极为重要的作用。不同于“我手写我口”这样的概念，汉字和具体的语言是一种松耦合的关系。我们不能说汉字跟具体的发音完全没关系，同样也不能说汉字只有普通话（或其他任何一种汉语发音体系）一种发音，只有普通话发音才是对的。汉字和汉语发音就是这样一种似是而非的关系，每个地域的人群都可以去自定义一套汉字发音。但只要用汉字书写，不同民族的人之间都可以互相交流。至少在古代，这其实是一件很了不起的事情。比如近古时期，中国的官员或者文人和朝鲜、日本人交流，就会用到“笔谈”，说白了就是写信。虽然我听不懂你说什么，但你写的东西我能看懂。比如明朝时，明朝的水师将领陈麟，就是靠笔谈和朝鲜的李舜臣联络感情的。我想，这就跟学现代人学高等数学一样，全世界的微积分学生，都能看懂积分和微分的公式吧。（虽然其中有些符号根本不知道该怎么读）这样一套表意符号系统，对推动文化、知识和生产力的传播，无疑是有非常积极的作用的。 非常感谢这位youtuber做了精彩的视频，太厉害了！最后给你提一个小小的建议，由于是多种不同发音体系的对比，视频里面的音标，最好都用IPA音标标注。不然会引起一些不严谨的表述。比如，视频里面的辅音系统没有严格的区分带声（voiced）和不带声（voiceless）的情况，也就是汉语音韵里面所谓的浊音和清音。现代汉语里只有吴语和闽语还有带声的塞音（voiced plosive / voiced stop），其中吴语的是和中古汉语严格对应的，闽语的则是从原来的鼻音演变而成的。普通话的“白bai”，其实声母是不带气流的不带声双唇塞音（/p/，unaspirated voiceless bilabial plosive）。因为拼音系统的不一致，造成严重的误解，这也是现在大多数中国人学英语、法语时候发音困难之一。比如“北京”这个词，可能对英美人士来讲，对着Peking读，还更能贴近实际的汉语发音。同样的例子还有“浙江Zhejiang”，Zh在普通话里是一个翘舌的清塞擦音，但英美人士看到z就会认为是浊擦音。

[@熙王-b5o]

你真专业，👍

[@sigma3086]

Your definition of 登鸛雀樓 is just perfect

[@ponta1162]

What an amazing video it is! 👍 Thank you for explaining the different Chinese languages! Yeah, Cantonese, Hokkien, Hakka.. Etc, they're totally different languages from Mandarin! just like Korean, Japanese and Vietnamese. So it's non-sense to say : I can speak "Chinese" or l'm learning "Chinese" anymore since Chinese is a big language family, not a single language! Your videos should be seen by people from all around the world! 👏👏👏

[@tyiu5629]

I agree with your sentiment, but I would add a little nuance. I don't think you're suggesting this, but to clarify: Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese and Thai are in no way part of the Chinese language group. These languages borrowed Chinese words and pronunciations at different time. As Stuart pointed out in his excellent video, the influences do show from time to time. But linguistically, they are in different families. Sorry to be nit-picky - I just want to take a stand against any misinterpretation that "language X is just Chinese" (substitute one of the above languages for "X"). The language groups of Hakka, Minnan (Hokkien, Teochew...), Yue (Cantonese...), Wu (Shanghainese...) are mutually unintelligible. But these are linguistically related and are indeed part of the Chinese language family. (I prefer calling them related language groups and NOT dialects). Putonghua/Mandarin is spoken by the vast majority of Chinese speakers. So even though Mandarin is not my native tongue, I am personally not opposed in principle to people equating the word Chinese with Mandarin. I do this IRL. I prefer the word Chinese instead of Mandarin or Putonghua especially when I do not know the political leanings of the person I am speaking with.

[@ponta1162]

@@tyiu5629 Yeah, Korean, Japanese and Vietnamese are definitely different language families from Chinese language family. I meant Cantonese, Hokkien, Hakka... etc they're distinct languages like all the languages in the world. (I just took Korean, Japanese and Vietnamese for example) I think should say Mandarin, but not "Chinese" as Stuart pointed out in this video, Mandarin is not the "true" Chinese. And as I said above, Chinese is not a single language, but a language family, like Romance language, Germantic language or Slavic language language family. So if someone says : I can speak "Chinese", I just feel like he/she is saying : I can speak Romance / Germantic / Slavic.

[@jokerxback2633]

i can only speak hakka but after i watch mandarin drama i can understand a little what is being said because some words are the same

[@calisthenicsnoob9990]

Chinese should only mean nationality. Ethnicities are the 56 ethnicities in China and languages are the many different languages spoken in China. China is not as homogeneous as people think

[@lizyliz970]

@@ponta1162 It is Chinese. The standard language spoken by all Chinese is Chinese language. Just like the standard language spoken by English people is English language although they have many different dialects too. It is the official language of China so Chinese language is proper and should be. Even though I am hokkien myself and speak a few dialects. I fully support calling the standard language, the Chinese language.

[@winterbalm]

hey Stuart your videos are fascinating very interesting and helpful for someone like me who is interested in languages

[@winkblink8636]

This video was so cool!!! I have a background in Mandarin and Hmong(苗语) and discovered your videos cause I'm learning Thai before I move to Thailand to study at Chula for my masters. Discovering your videos has helped me reignite my desire to study more.

[@chengyanslc]

Awesome video. Enjoyed every phonetic version of the poem

[@wkl747]

I feel ashamed of your ability of mastering the chinese language(s) than myself. You are a genius. Thank you for sharing.

[@CannibaLouiST]

the way you interpret the middle chinese is very cool man

[@cecilma3140]

Yep, in Cantonese shang as a verb (rise) is a rising tone (soeng5) but as an adjective (above) is not (6). Modern Mandarin has only one tone (4).

[@hojack4862]

你對漢字和"漢文化"的了解已經越過我大學的老師😂，你是我認識的外國人中最了解中國文字及文化的人，不只是"了解"，你是完全把它消化掉👍

[@真相覺醒]

華夏文化及漢文字，是歷代諸朝各族裔傳承演變來的，不是只有70餘年的中國，卻自稱是中國的。黃俄中國人被文化大革命及馬列思想刨除了中華文化的良知良能，中國文化變成是馬列無神論的狼性霸權文化，並不是中華文化。中國未來不需要霸權的民族復興，而是要偉大的文化復興。

[@真相覺醒]

中華文化復興之鑰，是繁體字的"國學復興"。

[@真相覺醒]

斯大林指示要中共消滅漢字，以拼音拉丁文字取代象形華夏文字。 簡體字，是馬列獨裁的狼性中共字，是唯物鬥爭，用久了有狼性，刨除了中華文化精髓。 繁體字，是歷朝各族的正宗傳承字，是唯心互助，寫多了有人性，本有華夏文化的根蘊。 台灣使用的是有中華文化本蘊的繁體漢文字。中國使用的是有馬列獨裁狼性的簡體中文字。

[@harryh2660]

@@真相覺醒 看来菜总统努力不够，去中化时间太短，还有人胡扯岛湾有中华本蕴😂

[@真相覺醒]

@@harryh2660 鳳凰衛視北京首席記者胡玲在2012年發文稱：「台灣幸虧有原住民開荒闢野；幸虧有日本人統治了50年，幸虧有國民黨帶去了太多太多的黃金；幸虧有一大批精英帶去了古老的傳統和文化；幸虧有小蔣；幸虧有美國⋯⋯造就了今天的台灣人，和台灣文化，和我們的已大大的不同了，特別是青年！」

[@tjazz979]

Such a comprehensive introduction of Chinese languages! Incredible!!!

[@pokya-anakrantau8845]

Enjoyed this video - accurate assessment of the Chinese language. A lot of works gone into this video.

[@peterweng4800]

This is amazing. I have often wondered the parent language of the different East Asian langauges. Their similarities indicate a parentage and now I learn it is from middle Chinese. Thank you so much. I have shared your video with friends with whom I have interacted on the subject.

[@tyiu5629]

AWESOME video! Thank you so much. I really appreciate how you related the many languages in Eastern Asia to Middle Chinese in a non-controversial way. Bravo! While you do touch on evolution of pronunciation through time, I think that how these Asian languages relate phonetically can be even more deeply understood by looking at the history of East Asia, i.e. human migration, conflict and trading patterns throughout time. BUT of course that is another massive topic and your videos are already chockful of information. I'm not sure how you would fit that in, but I believe people movement throughout history could bring a lot of insights to language evolution.

[@jerrydenggm]

Looks like you got the wrong idea --- Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Japanese belong to 4 different language families, they are not related. Languages did borrow words from each other, just like what’s happening today.

[@zxbliz10]

Great demonstration video, but a little misleading. In historical terms, the central government of different Chinese Dynasties would use what is call as “雅音” or “正音“ for how the character should pronounced. If without explanation what is “雅音” or “正音“, you are misleading your audience that old Chinese, mid Chinese, and modern Chinese have not connection whatsoever. Which would not explain, why you can read text written in or from Tang Dynasty, Song Dynasty, or books published from the Ming Dynasty easily when Chinese are educated in 文言文. The concept should be that Speaking Chinese is not the same as written Chinese before the 20th Century. Also shouldn't the meaning of the poem be: 1 - I (or you) can see the day light past through the mountain ends. 2 - I (or you) can see the Yellow River merged into the vast of the seas. 3 - If I (or you) want to see beyond (or more). 4 - I need to get even high, maybe to the next floor.

[@maxkim7937]

knowing hanja allowed me to immediately know the nam of vietnam, means south. how convenient

[@mitismee]

Yeah our country basically is consist the name of our tribe ( Viet ) or what they pronounce in chinese (Yue) and the word south.

[@maxkim7937]

@@mitismee even the word viet makes sense to me now. yue is weol in korean so we say weol-nam for vietnam. we however did start calling the country bet-nam for some reason.

[@mitismee]

@@maxkim7937 yeah in vietnam the word viet might view as V but in reality the V does sound related to the W so vietnam -- vinam - winam if you keep repeating really fast the V eventually fade out naturally and that left with W. But im from the southern viet so we basically pronounce V like Y... So basically its Yiet nam and this goes in sync with how the Chinese would pronounce the word Viet.

[@IRIS-uq8vd]

​@@maxkim7937 bet-nam was introduced back when you guys was Japanese colonial. We called it 皇民化

[@jerrydenggm]

@@IRIS-uq8vd Funny. Looks like you forgot who is the lord in so called Qing dynasty!

[@mitismee]

recently i dive a bit into the Tibetan language but yeah their vocabulary are pretty much acient chinese. no wonder why they group the Han and tibet in to 1 language group called the Sino-Tibet language.

[@yzhang9265]

Wow, your understanding of Chinese is really deep!

[@donkeymonkey7151]

Wonderful!! Thank you for the very informative lecture. Can you please break 中古漢語 down for us in a serie please? That will be really realy helpful.

[@D.Wapher]

Awesome job! Respect your effort and passion. 🙏

[@xz1891]

This poem has some philosophical meaning,,, to achieve your goal, you have to "up" your efforts, talent, whatsoever

[@천희장-w5k]

都是漢字文化圈 🇯🇵🇰🇷🇰🇵🇹🇼🇨🇳🇻🇳🇭🇰

[@membersear9899]

还有🇲🇾🇸🇬

[@xolang]

İt seems that Mandarin among Chinese language is like French among Romance language, which at least phonetically seems to have changed most from Latin, and a very striking similarity is how both Mandarin and Chinese have dropped most of the final consonants.

[@yoongzy]

The longer the time gets, the more complicated everything gets.

[@toonlim5574]

I'd be very facinated to learn which common Thai words actually have Chinese routes, especially words that most Thais do not know come from Chinese like the example of ชั้น you gave!

[@harveylam4294]

Not to be a nitpicker, but the ‘Hokkien’ that you’ve given in this video actually looks more like Eastern Min (Mindong)/Foochowese. While Fuzhou is indeed the capital of Fujian, the term Hokkien normally refers to the Southern Min (Minnan) variety spoken in southern Fujian and Taiwan. 山, in this case would be saŋ⁵⁵ in Fuzhou (as you’ve given) and suã⁴⁴ in Xiamen. Otherwise, a very interesting video! The Sino-Xenic readings were indeed some of the tools linguists used to reconstruct Middle Chinese.

[@woonyoron]

各地方言都有很多片区广东各地的广东话也不一样，只是文化强势的地区相对文化弱势的地区曝光率更高一些，并不存在一个天然的代表性发音，闽南闽东都是福建话这没有错。

[@lizyliz970]

"Hokkien" was a naming mistake made by overseas Chinese after they created the "Hokkien organisation". My family speak XiaMen dialect. We had never call it the Hokkien dialect until one day we were told by some city folks that the language is also known as "Hokkien" now.

[@FireRupee]

@@lizyliz970 Across Southeast Asia, the Quan-Zhang dialects (Quanzhou, Zhangzhou, and Xiamen dialects, and dialects closely related to these) are all called "Hokkien", and those in SE Asia with ancestry from Fujian also call themselves "Hokkien lang" 福建儂 . So, it's not the most precise terminology, but it's not exactly wrong either. To be fair, this terminology distinguishes Hokkien from Teochew (潮州話) and Hainanese (海南話), which are not as strongly associated with Fujian. If they were all called simply "Minnan" (閩南語), then it wouldn't always be clear which Southern Min one was referring to. These groups in SE Asia each have their own cultural identities, too.

[@lizyliz970]

@@FireRupee Well, you're talking about me. I'm yours truly southeast Asia Xiamen people. Like I said, Hokkien representing minnan dialects was a mistake made by overseas Chinese, to be precise southeast Asian Chinese. The foochows or fuzhou people is actually "hokkien" too but in SouthEast Asia they're excluded from hokkien which is totally wrong.

[@lizyliz970]

@@FireRupee No. Fujian (hokkien) province is Fujian province. Teochew or chaozhou is actually under Guangdong province. Hainan province is Hainan province. Hainanese is not fujianese (hokkien).

[@romaskogkatt2]

thank you very much, now it can explain why using mandarin to chant buddhism mantra (original from sanskrit) is totally different in sanskrit! As they were introduced in Tang dynasty! they used the language of the time to imitate the sound in sanskrit and written in "chinese". 🙏

[@TrazyTsui]

this video is an excelent analysis of all kinds of chinese! great job done!! a westerner understand chinese better than chinese people!

[@billchow747]

Written Chinese is the same all over the world. (Although Traditional Chinese and Simplified Chinese are slightly different, but they are mutually understandable.) Timestamp 13:45. Good point regarding Cantonese speakers. We generally speak using colloquel words and expressions but write in formal standard Chinese, especially in newspapers and books. Similiarly, in the Outbacks, Austrailians speak using slangs but usually writes standard English in newspapers & books.

[@johannafeb]

The difference between written British English and American English will be shorter than the distance between written Chineses among the mainland (simp.), Taiwan (trad.) and Hong Kong (trad.). The most obvious evidence comes from the laws. You will find the gap in the law of PRC, ROC, Hong Kong and even Macau, all written in "Chinese" but the interpretation makes political and social differences.

[@hobsonchrist7542]

Wow you are truly a language master 👍

[@artfquinn]

This poem was written like in 800 AD or 900 AD. If you turned back clock to early literature written like 1000 BC or earlier, only reading using Min or Taiwanese dialect makes the most sense.

[@bumpty9830]

Love this chart! I'm fascinated that while all your Cantonese syllables were annotated with tones, only a smattering of the Hakka, Hokkien, and Middle Chinese syllables were marked for tone. I imagine there's a reason. Why?

[@theCHUM7]

You have mentioned about Teochew and I was waiting for that the whole clip lol

[@guruofficial2]

Busettt. You are genius Jay.

[@vanavana593]

I am not a expert in language, but I am Chinese and born and raised in China. speak Cantonese and Mandarin been to many places in China and have friends from different part of China. I am just curious many the examples you gave are more focus on southern China, but in reality when I listen to 中古汉语 version poem, the first two lines sounds more close to southern dialects as Cantonese but the last two lines are giving me very strong northern dialects accent, I think there might be more research you should have in northern dialects than just 百越region to give a comprehensive conclusion.

[@leohk2003]

I have to say this comparison is quite unfair. Because, when you read the poem in other dialects, you are using their literate pronunciation, whereas when you read it in Mandarin, you are using vernacular pronunciation. So you find Mandarin so wildly different. However, Mandarin has its own literate tradition. For example, 白 in Mandarin literate reading is bek instead of bai.

[@StuartJayRaj]

I understood that 白 in literary mandarin is still not entering tone and sounds more like /pwo/

[@streetman6661]

勁揪！咁深入嘅你都識，仲唔係淨識中文、廣東話，外國人之中你真係無得頂，好嘢，堅料。

[@BueBucha-co8pe]

You are genius!

[@limedwardster]

you also can write u and l,to form 山 出 凹 凸巾 离 巨 叵 匠 臣.居尸 屋 层居using handphone software, as long write 70% similar word will appear

[@Ultracrepidarian]

does anyone know where to find the full chart?

[@SkyDarmos]

Great program.

[@simonyoso7247]

Amazing. I speak Chinese Teochew (Chaozhou hua/潮州话) and Teochew is more similar to Middle Chinese rather than Mandarin. Thank you.

[@bumpty9830]

That's a MinNan dialect, right? Do the Stuart's Hokkien examples look pretty familiar?

[@NoCareBearsGiven]

家己人!

[@roncheah20]

I thought 家in teochew is like keh1?

[@roncheah20]

I think it should be 自己人

[@roncheah20]

@@bumpty9830 compare to teochew that i speak, it sounds very different but u can find some similarities

[@sangyoonsim]

Chinese as Chinese speech in Korean is 중국어. 중국인 in the thumbnail means Chinese person in Korean.

[@TheFiestyhick]

Maybe you'll consider doing a video on how Taiwanese version of Mandarin came about. For example why they sometimes use different tones and why do they use a different word for "And" (han)?

[@lrt_unimog8316]

Believe that came from one particular variation in Peking which was codified into the Republic’s standard, but which, ironically, wasn’t adopted by 🇨🇳.

[@zaryalace7475]

I imagine forcing the island of Formosa to speak a Northern tongue, which is dramatically different than the Southern "dialects" that were there pre-KMT, required some compromise. So they dropped the hard zh-, ch-, sh- sounds. Even the word wind "feng" still retains the Southern pronunciation "foong" in Taiwanese Mandarin.

[@davegraham7550]

Trade marks and logos has aspects of character writing. Wotaya think? English is somewhere towards Chinese writing with it's loose sound to spelling relationship and the written standard allowing a wide range of spoken varieties..

[@kkamiya9038]

Those who say dialects by citing the same written language, obviously missed the historical event that is Emperor of Qin's purge of all other scripts and institutionalized one script.

[@dudeeeee50]

how much cia paying you? 5 cents?

[@luckybiby8968]

First of all, when one mentioned 中古漢語, he/she should put down a time stamp for reference, then based upon that historical background, wars, migration pattern and intermingling of among tribes in different regions in different periods, languages evolved with different tones , pitches and different expression and idioms, 中古漢語 is not one size fit all universally, stayed in one pronunciation and claimed that this is 中古漢語..

[@kawings]

Hi Im a chinese speaker from Malaysia. The dialects you describe namely Hakka, Cantonese, Hokkien are in fact a spoken language on major oversea chinese population throughout the world. During the 19th century these dialect spoken population are the major foreign labour exporter throughout the world namely to USA, south east asia, Europe and South America. From these countries where they worked, they permanently settled down and blend into the host nation. These communities are the major driving economic force making fortunes on the country they settled. Hakka dialect in Guangdong China is just a speck of microscopic dust which negligible to be mention about. Yet they are considered giants in every oversea Chinese throughout the globe. But in today's era Mandarin are the dominant language replacing all the dialects mention above.

[@lordkent8143]

Thank you for explaining that Mandarin is not the only Chinese language. Nowadays it's just so political, and every time you see Mandarin is promoted as the solely legitimate language of the Chinese. Sad to see other Chinese languages go under because of this.

[@skazka3789]

Sorry but no Chinese languages are "going under" because of this. Cantonese has some 90 million speakers. Shanghainese has some 12 million speakers. The other Chinese dialects also have millions of speakers. For a country as large and diverse as China, it is necessary to have a lingua franca and Mandarin fills this role nicely.

[@lordkent8143]

@@skazka3789 in time it will. It's already happening, with assimilation gradually happening with the young.

[@skazka3789]

@@lordkent8143 Young people in China are the most capable bilingual people you'll meet. Go to Macao and young people will code switch between perfect Cantonese and accentless Mandarin.

[@lordkent8143]

@@skazka3789 yes I've been there and mainland China. It's different for Macau and Hong Kong because there is a dominant Cantonese presence. But when you go to Shenzhen, Cantonese is nearly gone. Guangzhou is half way there to seeing Cantonese being gone too. You're thinking of the present generation, a generation or two after we can see it being endagereed just like other Chinese languages or dialects in China.

[@skazka3789]

@@lordkent8143 Shenzhen is different because the city did not exist 40 years ago. It's population is 99% economic migrants from all over China so it makes sense it would be mainly Mandarin speaking. There are a lot of migrants in Guangzhou including a lot of foreigners too so that would dilute the presence of Cantonese, but overall it is still going strong.

[@woodyblahblah5241]

Hi Stu, have you ever thought about this? We say 英国人讲英语写英文, 日本人讲日语写日文, 法国人讲法语写法文, but 中国人讲华语写中文呢？can we say 中国人写中文讲中语呢？but we cant say 华国人讲华语写华文，do we?

[@leohu2011]

You must be a Ph.D. in Chinese languages. Bravo!

[@dudeeeee50]

You must be a Ph.D. in sinophobic racism Bravo!

[@kkamiya9038]

If Cantonese is a dialect of mandarin, then French is a dialect of Italian.

[@DunDun-e43]

What about anciant anciant chinese?

[@NamNguyen-jr3lw]

Interesting from the vid I could say Vietnamese sounds closest to Middle Chinese lol whereas Mandarin is quite distant =))))

[@mitismee]

because when Vietnam was under china since 1st century to 10th century that's when middle chinese are still in use . Middle Chinese start changing to later and mondern day like this after 10th century. by then Vietnam already has their independent from China. therefore the Vietnamese are left with old way of pronouncing word that originally from china .

[@jerrydenggm]

Tiếng việt is a very beautiful language.

[@vanavana593]

Many Zhuang ethnic minorities dialects in Guangxi especially in Baise area where closes to Vietnam are very similar to Vietnamese, because in ancient time Vietnam Guangxi Guangdong(canton) are the where Yue people locate.

[@ThiNguyen-ud4bi]

10:47 Bạch nhật y sơn tận Hoàng hà nhập hải lưu Dục cùng thiên địa mục Canh thượng nhất tầng lầu .......................... 登鸛雀樓 白日依山盡， 黃河入海流。 欲窮千里目， 更上一層樓。 Đăng Quán Tước lâu Bạch nhật y sơn tận, Hoàng Hà nhập hải lưu. Dục cùng thiên lý mục, Canh thượng nhất tầng lầu. Dịch nghĩa Mặt trời theo núi lặn, Hoàng Hà hướng biển sâu. Muốn trông xa vạn dặm, Phải bước lên tầng lầu. Tác giả: Vương Chi Hoán Thể thơ: Ngũ ngôn tứ tuyệt dịch theo thể thơ lục bát Mặt trời dần khuất non cao, Hoàng Hà chảy mãi rót vào biển khơi. Muốn xem được khắp mọi nơi, Lên tầng cao nhất tận nơi ta nhìn.

[@StuartJayRaj]

🙏🙏🙏🙏

[@JackLuong]

The Vietnamese version actually sound nice. For the average Vietnamese person, they will hardly understand the meaning tho, since some of them are rarely used Sino-Vietnamese words and written with Chinese 'Adjectival - noun' grammar. For poems like this in Vietnamese textbook, we usually have a "translated" version with the literal meaning for people to understand it easier, and sometimes with a bit better flow to the rhyms. Although technically it's the same language.

[@samuelyang9729]

It is a pitty that you can not read the books written by your ancestors.

[@vanhoang4587]

@@samuelyang9729 But it is also a pity that our kids' future is limited by the script their ancestors used. Look forward or backward? Vietnamese people already decided on this matter.

[@samuelyang9729]

@@vanhoang4587 In fact in East Asia's tradition it is pity sometimes even shameful for people who discard their ancesetors' culture, language and custom. Vietnamese had used Chữ Hán Chinese characters for more than 2 thoundand years while only less 200 years using Latin letter.

[@vanhoang4587]

@@samuelyang9729 Then you and I should both live in caves because that is our ancestors' custom. Should never move out of Africa too:)). All ancestors just wish their descendants to thrive for a better future.

[@mitismee]

would be nice to see you make a video why middle chinese were no longer use by the mass in china and what cause them to change it to modern day mandarin , and what cause mandarin to be the main when it's not even sound original ? and do you think in the next 100 year China will just eventually use pinyin instead of script ? to make everything much more simplified and basically in sync with the modern day era where you want to be a super power and other nation can start cooperate with you and learn your language in a much easier way ? like how English are being use as international language nowaday ? because from a polittical point of view China does look like gearing up to become world superpower like how US has alway been ... so basically China need more ally and that's why i think they will eventually use pinyin instead of script , so others can feel more open / confident learning chinese and it's culture. i mean hey if your culture and language are nice and easy to learn your economy are strong then who doesn't wanna go there and be friend with you right ?

[@tyiu5629]

You could pose a similar question as to why people in today's Europe who speak a Romance language - why they no longer use Latin? The short answer would time, distance and history. Heck, even in a short span since the widespread use of texting, I can no longer understand messages from teenagers. 😂

[@mitismee]

@@tyiu5629 hahaha , yeah I'm pretty young and start to get annoying at what new generation nowadays has created in their's text.... Even when i was teenager we were also create a few new term too. I mean language are evolving through time it's not just gonna stay the same for every 100 year i believe. Imagine 1000 year from now English will eventually fillled with many many international terms and barely recognizable .

[@mitismee]

@@tyiu5629 I understand with the old/middle chinese now it's just im a Vietnamese and i find it kinda interesting that when china end the 1000 year rule of vietnam by the time they end the rule also that's is around 10th century when middle Chinese are in it's last stage before fade out and replace by i guess mandarin? But im curious how mandarin was formed... Or maybe teenager at the time start to get lazy and pronounce stuff in the stupid way just like how teen today are?

[@瑞-t7u]

@@mitismee Middle Chinese was not “replaced” by Mandarin. I dun think replace is a good word. First of all, people in different areas speak different regional languages, even when u say middle Chinese, it’s not like all “Chinese” at that time speak the same language. Secondly, all these regional languages evolve gradually, due to various reasons, the most significant one would be mass migration, which happened at war times. So what is Mandarin, it’s basically the official language of Qing dynasty, which was based on some northern Chinese languages, but probably got some influence from the Qing rulers, who are exotic. And in modern China, they adopt it as the official language and/or common language.

[@瑞-t7u]

@@mitismee Throughout the history of China, people from the north always invade China, so the Han Chinese in the middle land move to the South, and some northern ethnic groups move in China. Therefore, the northern languages are actually influenced greatly by some exotic ethnic groups, on the other hand, middle Chinese is preserved in today’s southern languages.

[@etlay5684]

Hakka sounds so much like the middle Chinese .

[@agogbin]

It should be 황/hwang/ for 黃 actually. :)

[@mitismee]

agreed

[@elioelioinmel5336]

Incredible

[@mariowang924]

Your knowledge of Chinese is much better than 99.9% Chinese, amazing!

[@richardkleinberger7031]

You are forgetting Taiwanese as it has a certain dialect different from mainland.

[@zanteidesu]

c国の普通話に言及が少なかったような？上海語は何処かに有りましたか？以下横書き 作者：王之渙 登鸛鵲楼 白日依山盡 黄河入海流 欲窮千里目 更上一層樓 日本語で漢語を習うときは動画のような音読みはせず書き下し文(訓読み)になります。声調言語を現代音で発音しても当時の音には近づきません。

[@mitismee]

for your info the Cantonese area after Qin dynasty along with northern part of Vietnam was formed in to 1 king dom called the Nan Yue king dom ( south Yue/Viet ) King dom . so it's not strange to have Vietnamese and Cantonese way of pronouncing middle chinese word . the kingdom was later on conquered by the Han dynasty and basically everyone in that area called the Yue people are officially under the influence of the Han chinese .... and that's when everyone in the Guangdong and guangxi and northern vietnam start to learn middle chinese .

[@woonyoron]

广东人学习汉语？粤语本身就是汉语，并且广东人本身就是汉人，南越在建立时并不包括今天的越南，汉语（粤语）一直是官方语言，只有越南和广西部分地区使用越语。

[@mitismee]

@@woonyoron i didn't argue over the fact cantonese it self wasn't chinese ? did i ? i know that cantonese does remain quite alot of middle chinese in it . i know that .

[@ct9245]

Modern Mandarin are heavy influenced by Manchurian and Mongolian’s learners

[@shannonhsin9613]

Incredible and stunning language talent. Shame on me!. I cannot exactly pronounce the poem in Fukenhua even though I am Taiwanese.

[@ct9245]

There is Chinese Nationality Culture, and there is Han Chinese Ethnicity Culture. This are 2 different level of groups in legal category What are you speaking is only Ethnically Han Chinese languages and their variants

[@李金瑞-c5v]

基本上每个讨论方言的视频都默认只有普通话，吴，粤，闽，客这么几种。广大北方方言好像不存在似的。最后得出普通话很奇怪的结论显然是不对的，广大北方方言都跟普通话相同甚多。

[@嗰個嗰個嗰個]

陽江話試吓😂

[@nattkullav8657]

👍👍👍

[@cimingjeng1201]

The most important characters for Chinese people are Han(漢)and hua(華),so Mandarin seems to have a lot of flaws, but because the pronunciation of these two characters has been passed down so well, it deserves to be the national language of China. Hokkien is the same, but not many people speak it.

[@pandabear153]

@Ciming Zeng I don't know about you but we never use Han to describe us. We say Hong ngin or Tang people! People who speak Mandarin are bak fong ngin

[@cimingjeng1201]

@@pandabear153 Teochew? Hong is the pronunciation of what Chinese character?

[@Tongzhiyaoxiansheng]

看外国人一本正经得讲解中国古诗，感觉好好玩的样子。

[@nr655321]

Your knowledge of Chinese is amazing. Can you eat with chopsticks?

[@cdshop1301]

The Minnan -q ending is a weird choice to introduce the rusheng because it's actually a Minnan innovation, Middle Chinese (and proto-Min) did not have a glottal stop ending, they were converted from other rusheng endings. Similarly, Cantonese long aa is also an innovation, it does preserve an earlier distinction between two a sounds, but it's most like influenced by Vietnamese than the other way around.

[@saihalsakda6108]

ອາຈານ ເຮັດໃຫ້ການສຶກສາພາສາ ເປັນສິ່ງທີ່ໜ້າສົນໃຈຫຼາຍ. ການອອກສຽງຂອງແຕ່ລະພາສາ. ☺☺👍👍👍💗

[@林谢-c8g]

太复杂了

[@我没有昵称]

受教了

[@TrazyTsui]

wow，中古音跟广东话好像，我还以为你在念不怎么标准的广东话！好厉害！！！

[@xz1891]

居然知道前鼻音，后鼻音的区别

[@XiaosChannel]

I thought any so called classic chinese pronunciations are just modern guesses

[@ngoctrinhle4646]

I Love you. Nhìu

[@tommytam6433]

7:12 😂😂😂What kind of Hokkien variety is this sounds neither like teochew nor minnan nor taiwan

[@hanzhewang7411]

我一个中国人在yt上听老外讲中文……lol

[@jeromeqi539]

鹳雀楼不是在陕西省，而是在湖北省。

[@garychang3010]

山西

[@vincentliu744]

湖北的是黄鹤楼

[@12388696]

Funny

[@西斋主人]

你居然会说粤语，厉害了

[@FFFF-ct6oj]

一层楼 yi4ceng2 lou2 not yi1ceng2lou2

[@jtinalexandria]

Excellent video, but he means Japanese and Italian words must end in a vowel, not a consonant. (He corrected himself later).

[@gfm9565]

Recite the old poem, use the tone of Hongkongese (Cantonese you can say) is much better than the tone of Putonghua (Mandarin is marginally accepted). Anyway, your work is amazing

[@ErwinLau]

五胡亂華之後，漢人南遷。鮮卑人盤踞長江以北。他們漢化的辦法是把中古漢語難讀的音扔掉。

[@carxinxing9312]

I just didnt know how to say my feeling. I really got a shock when you said 越南话 and not越南语。 Even i was afraid of hurting peoples feeling when I stayed in America, so I just told my Japanese friend, we share the same thing kanji. but you put it so bluntly here. 😂

[@NoCareBearsGiven]

话 doesn’t necessarily translate into dialect I don’t think. And 越南话 is more commonly used and sounds more natural

[@goteyescansee]

话 is the spoken language as in 说话， while 语 is a bigger set including the written form as well，as in 学汉语，日本语，韩语

[@JohnnyAdobo]

For is chinese we know which is a dialect and the official 'Chinese' language. Most people know it anyway.

[@iany2448]

In terms of pronunciation, Mandarin is much more simplified compared to Cantonese which is closer to older Chinese. Mandarin only came into being after Manchu conquered China and established Qing dynasty. Isn't it likely that Mandarin is the result of Manchu's learning and simplification along the way of Chinese.

[@vincentliu744]

温州话怎么读？感觉会像日本话

[@citrusblast4372]

Chinese, the language spoken by chi people

[@jasonng0211]

中文=Cantonese language, Cantonese language= 中文，only this, no other, please everyone should know this fact. (Mandarian language is NOT 中文, this is the kind of Mongolian or Manchurian system language)

[@oou8269]

Mandarin has little to do with the Manchus. This word was invented by Europeans in the Ming Dynasty, meaning officials😅 Chinese is a language family, and there are Germanic, Romance, and Slavic languages that can be compared. Chinese people → Chinese languages: Mandarin, Yue/Cantonese, Wu, Southern Min, Hakka, Jin, Gan, Xiang... Germanic peoples → Germanic languages: English, German, Dutch, Swedish… Slavs→Slavic languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Czech, Slovak... 國際標準化組織將漢語族分為13種語言： 閩東語、晉語、官話、莆仙語、徽語、閩中語、贛語、客家話、湘語、閩北語、閩南語、吳語、粵語。 各種下屬語言之間地位平等，它們都是漢語裡的一分子。 漢語（或中文）是它們的集合體，並非專指它們當中的其中一種。

[@printhelloworld7753]

If you can speak Mongolian, you won’t be so ignorant

[@Gios-c1w]

Another Chinese imperialist propaganda. I was waiting for John Cena on the video.

[@to04buk]

"Chinese" is nationality not ethnicity