What Is Chinese?
“Chinese” may refer to a national standard, a group of language varieties, or a cultural category. This chapter separates the meanings that ordinary usage often collapses.
How many linguistic realities can one name obscure?
One Name, Many Linguistic Realities
Chinese is not the name of one uniform linguistic system. By separating the umbrella term, the criteria used for classification, and the Mandarin standard most learners study, we can describe both our goals and our knowledge more precisely.
10 min read→
When We Cannot Understand One Another but Can Still Read Together
What connects communities whose spoken varieties may be mutually unintelligible? We examine three overlapping layers: speech, a shared written standard, and policies that assign different forms of Chinese to different domains.
10 min read→