Standard Chinese: Difference between revisions
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{{Infobox language|boxsize=275px|name=Standard Chinese|nativename=華語|image=Jiatai Era Mencius title page.jpg|image_size=275px|pronunciation=[hwa.y˨˩˨]|fam1=Serican|fam2=Sinitic|fam3=Mandarin}}
|boxsize=200px|fam2=Sinitic|fam3=Mandarin|fam4=Namging Mandarin}}'''Standard Chinese''' (華語, ''hwaü'', /hwa.y/, lit. 'Chinese language'), commonly known as '''Mandarin''', is the standard variety of Chinese and official language of [[China]]. It is based on the Namging dialect of Mandarin with significant influence from Cantonese during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The current dialect began its genesis after the [[Canton War]] and formally organized during the early 20th century by Chinese linguists, eventually being selected by the Chinese republican government in 1938. ▼
▲
The language is written with Chinese characters and has possessed one officially recognized romanization system since the 1940s. Today, this standard variety is mostly spoken within China. Nevertheless, it has varying degrees of influence in countries such as [[Mongolia]], [[Serindia]], [[Soenda]], [[Poeja]], [[Tauland]], [[Viet Nam]], [[Pinang]], and the [[Westerzee|Westerzee province]] of [[Tussenland]], among others. ▼
▲The language is written with Chinese characters and has possessed one officially recognized romanization system since the 1940s. Today, this standard variety is mostly spoken within China. Nevertheless, it has varying degrees of influence in countries such as [[Mongolia]], [[Serindia]], [[Soenda]], [[Poeja]], [[Tauland]], [[Viet Nam]], [[Pinang]], and the [[Westerzee|Westerzee province]] of [[Tussenland]], among others.
== History ==
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During the period of partition, the Namging dialect became increasingly influenced by Cantonese, which had been standardized and adopted as one of the primary languages of the southern government. Several phonetic shifts occurred in Namging Mandarin over these seven decades, with many of these changes resembling those of 17th century Mandarin. Notables ones include the revival of the ''-m'' coda and ''ŋ-'' initial, [x] becoming a glottal [h], general de-palatalization, as well as the loss of any retroflex sounds acquired from northern Mandarin dialects up until that point.
By the early 1920s, the new dialect of Namging (what now is Standard Chinese) began being studied by linguists in [[China]] as well as in [[Japan]] and [[Tauland]]. As a consequence of the Sinwei coup
== Phonology ==
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==== Tones ====
Standard Chinese has five tones, along with a neutral tone (sometimes classified as toneless).
{| class="wikitable"
!No.
|1
|2
|3
|4
|5
|6
|-
!Diacritic
|ā
|á
|ã
|à
|ȧ
|a
|-
!Name
|陰平
|陽平
|上
|去
|入
|輕
|-
!Description
|Dark level
|Light level
|Rising
|Departing
|Entering
|Neutral
|-
!Contour
|/˥/ 55
|/˩˧/ 13
|/˨˩˨/ 212
|/˧˩/ 31
|/˥/ 5
|—
|-
!MC
|1
|2
|3
|5
| colspan="2" |—
|-
!Example
|巴 ''bā''
|麻 ''má''
|傻 ''sã''
|把 ''bà''
|札 ''zȧ''
|嗎 ''ma''
|}
Unlike more northern varieties of Mandarin, Standard Chinese preserves the entering tone (入, ''jù'') found in southern varieties of Mandarin and southern Chinese languages. The entering tone is realized as a glottal stop /ʔ/.
== Vocabulary ==
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