What is the differences between Mandarin and Chinese

Different meanings

What is the differences between Mandarin and Chinese ?

When used as a noun, Mandarin means PUTONGHUA and senior officials of the old Chinese government. When used as an adjective, it means bureaucratic, Chinese style clothing, and excessively elegant. English Mandarin (from Portuguese mandarim, maleic Menteri, Sanskrit mantrin) originally meant to be officials of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, and later extended to Mandarin. The name of PUTONGHUA is very young. It was established after the people’s Republic of China. Today, standard Chinese is still called Putonghua in mainland China. Mandarin in Taiwan and Mandarin in Singapore. If the name follows the owner’s name, it should not only be Putonghua, but also Guoyu, Huayu. In addition, the word Mandarin has another meaning, that is, Mandarin, the largest branch of Chinese.

When Chinese is used as a noun, it means Chinese language, Chinese people. When used as an adjective, it means something belong to China or belong to Chinese language.

Different sources

The word Mandarin first appeared in Matteo Ricci’s notes on China in the Ming Dynasty, meaning “bureaucrat” and originated from the Portuguese. The Portuguese borrowed the Malaysian word Menteri, which means minister.

The term “senior Portuguese officials” used to refer to the Chinese government officials. But because the Portuguese did not know how to pronounce the word, they added an n after it, that is, menterin, which was pronounced Mandarin. This is the differences between Mandarin and Chinese.

The form of Chinese is the word formation of ancient English. The original spelling of China in English is CIN and China, which comes from Sina in Latin. It belongs to weak case and needs to be changed into Shengge by adding ESE. The root – ese comes from the Latin word – ense (neutral), which is added after a place name to indicate something in a certain area. Therefore, the words ending with – ese are not very respected for people. The appellation comes from this.

Different usages

Mandarin, when used in Putonghua, is only used to refer to the modern standard Chinese with Beijing pronunciation as the standard pronunciation, the northern dialect (Mandarin) as the basic dialect, and the typical modern vernacular writings as the grammatical norms.

Chinese refers to all the languages in China, including various dialects.


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