Classical Chinese Literature - What languages could be written with it? And why? I understand that classical Chinese (see Wikipedia) was very different from spoken Chinese (at least in the last centuries of its usage). Nevertheless, despite or maybe even because of this, it was used to write more languages than just Chinese.

Three questions:

What languages have been written with it? (I know about Chinese, Japanese, and Vietnamese.)
Why was this possible? These languages are not only spoken differently, they have different grammar (or don't they).
Currently, if a foreigner wants to learn Classical Chinese, (in all cases known to me) he is asked to learn current spoken Chinese first. After pondering the first two questions - shouldn't it be possible to translate it directly? (aka "read" it in the language of the reader.)

As far as I know, classic Chinese is not used to "write" these languages as you think. Classic Chinese was just used as an "international" language among surrounding countries, like English nowadays. Take the Japanese Language for example.

In ancient times, the Japanese had their own language, but they didn't have a writing system. Of course, China was powerful back then and exerted influence over the surrounding countries. Japan also imported Chinese characters and culture, especially during the beginning of the Tang Dynasty (唐朝) in China.

After learning Chinese characters, some Japanese scholars started to use characters to note the pronuciations for Japanese words, something like the PinYin system, as now we use Latin letters express Chinese. However, every character had its own pronunciation and meaning, so the Japanese created their own "letters", now called "hiragana" and "katakana", based on Chinese characters. For example, the "hiragana" "あ" comes from the character "安", "か" from "加". They look similar, right?

This also happened to Vietnamese. The Vietnamese created their Vietnamese characters(喃字) based on Chinese characters.

Nowadays, the Koreans don't use Chinese characters(but some characters are still used, especially in solemn situation and law), the Japanese still use them, and the Vietnamese quit thoroughly because the French instituted the use of a Roman alphabet during the colonization period.

So I think the answers to your questions would be:

None. They developed their own writing system based on Chinese characters and borrowed a lot of words from Chinese
Since characters are used as writing system and letters to note the pronunciation. Grammar is not the point
Meanings for some characters changes through time. Furthermore, grammar also changes, so if you want to learn classic Chinese, you'd better learn mordern Chinese first. After you learn mordern Chinese, it won't be so hard for you to learn classic Chinese

I suggest everyone who wants to learn Chinese: you might as well learn some classic Chinese. Although we don't speak in Classic Chinese, there are many words(especially idioms) from classic Chinese, such as "多行不义必自毙"，“退避三舍”,“秋波”。Also, you can read some classic poems to get a feeling of classic Chinese.

Edit: More explanations on point 2.

To clarify how the claiss Chinese were imported and affected Japanese. Imagine the steps below.

STEP 1: Japanese had their language, so they could say: "この山は　高い" (This mountain is high), but they could not write this sentence.

STEP 2: They got to learn classic Chinese, and they(especially the nobels) decided to use classic Chinese for communication, because Chinese culture was so attractive to them. Now the classic Chinese worked as a popular foreign language, like English nowadays.

STEP 3: Some Japanese scholars thought:"well, Chinese seems good, why not create our writing system based on it?", and eventually they invented the "hiragara" and "katakara", by abstracting the Chinese Characters. For example, now they have "こ" from “己” and "の" from "乃“ and so on.

STEP 4: Now they could use these "letters" to write down the sentence. It could be like this(without any characters): 　この　やま　は、たかい, but it's not so conevnient because they had to divide every word in writing.

STEP 5: "Hey, we have learnt Chinese. In Chinese, “やま” is "山", and character "高" means high, in our language, it's たかい. Why not use characters to simplify the writing system?", Japanese might think this way. Of course, in Japanese, an adjective has serveral kinds of conjugations, but that doesn't matter, because only the suffix(い) should change, the stem(たか) won't change, so they just used the character “高” for the stem and everything works well. I.e. the negative form of "高い" is "高くない".

So I think you understand why importing characters won't affect the grammar.


What is the function of 就是 What does 就  是mean and how do we use it I have seen many times people using like in this sentence 就是关于爱情的 so what does 就是really means

就 has many meanings, In different context, '就是' could mean 'is exactly' ; 'then it is' ; 'just/ only'

Example:

他最怕的话题[就是]关于爱情的话题 = The topic he afraid the most, [is exactly] the topic about love
讨论完关于工作的话题, 接下来[就是]关于爱情的话题 = Finished discussing the topic about job,  next [then it is] the topic about love
他什么书都看，[就是]关于爱情的他不看 = He read any kind of book, [just/ only] the ones about love he doesn't read


Why is 性 in the sentence 你不能吃凉性的水果? From a MandarinCorner.org video I Hate Getting My Period (audio and transcript link; video is also searchable on YouTube), we have the following sentence:

Nǐ bùnéng chī liáng xìng de shuǐguǒ
你不能吃凉性的水果。
You can't eat cool fruits.

I'm confused as to why 性 (xìng) is in this sentence.  It means "nature", so I surmise it goes together with 凉性 (liáng xìng) to give "cool natured" (in the sense "thermally cool"), but I don't see why it's there.  E.g. 你不能吃凉的水果 (without the 性) seems to convey the same meaning, and even sounds less formal to me.
Question: Why is 性 in the sentence 你不能吃凉性的水果?

“凉性水果”  doesn't  exist  in  Chinese  context.  “寒性水果”  is  the  right  way.

“寒性水果”  doesn't  mean  low  temperature  fruit,  or  low  cotent  of  cal.

It  comes  from  Chinese  “中医理论”  and  “阴阳论”。Four  catogries  can  be  summerised  as:  “性寒”、“性平”、“性温”  and  “性燥”。


Using 莫 in Song dynasty Chinese There is this passage in 语类, where the question of 天地之心 is discussed:

  所以明道云：‘天地之常，以其心普万物而无心；圣人之常，以其情顺万事而无情。’说得最好。”问：“普万物，莫是以心周遍而无私否？”曰：“天地以此心普及万物，人得之遂为人之心，物得之遂为物之心，草木禽兽接著遂为草木禽兽之心，只是一个天地之心尔。

I find the following sentence in this passage problematic:

  普万物，莫是以心周遍而无私否

How to understand this 莫 ? Does it relate to 万物 or to 天地之心?

My intuitive understanding of this is that it points to the fact that there is nothing left of the Heart/Mind to be personal Heart/Mind of Heaven and Earth (because it is all  everywhere).  But it is more a guess than a genuine understanding.

問﹒普萬物﹒莫是以心周遍而無私﹒否

i would interpret it as :

[someone] asked (問): “[about] generalising (普) everything (萬物), can it be that (莫 —> 莫非) [the universal] is using (是以) [its] heart (心) to all over (周遍) and (而) without (無) prejudice (私); isn’t it (否)?

  How to understand this 莫 ?

back to your question, i would say it means “莫非“ (roughly “can it be that”). the asker wanted to ask, but without confidence that his statement is correct, so he inserted the “莫” before the verse “是以心周遍而無私﹒否”; as a safe guard.

clearly, you have fun in reading “朱子語類” :)


On average, how literate in Mandarin are overseas Chinese? I'm hoping to be able to provide better service to some Chinese customers I occasionally see at my night job (hardware store) who have difficulty describing what they're looking for in English. I can't be sure what variety they speak (and if they speak a regional dialect of Mandarin, I would still be up a creek), and anecdotally, I gather that some Chinese immigrants in the US do not speak Mandarin fluently.

From what I understand, one of the difficulties of studying non-Mandarin languages such as Yue, Wu, or Min Nan is the fact that speakers of those varieties, from having to read Mandarin in everyday life, simply read and write Mandarin while speaking their own dialect.

Is this the common experience among Chinese immigrants? If so, I think I could focus particularly on reading and writing, which I'm already better at than speaking and listening, and have more of a guarantee of communicating effectively.

For any non-mandarin speaker that doesn't understand the Mandarin culture, this is a common confusion.

This is the unique characteristic of Mandarin language: in Chinese culture, people tend to communicate through the Chinese writing, instead of speaking. The "Pu-tong-Hua 普通话"(China) or "华语“（Taiwan）is indeed a modern language that evolves from Beijing dialect with a history of no more than 200 years. While the official speech used by bureaucrats is called "官话”. But intellectuals are still communicating with each other using the Glyph.

Because China enters imperialism era way ahead of Europe (at least 1000 years), there is little need for "nationalism", i.e. to promote a single language nationwide.  Nevertheless, the nationalism process is on the way. It is no different than many countries that teach "national language" together with localized dialect. This takes time.

In fact, many countries still maintain localized dialect. However, phonetic language cannot retain the same literacy level of Chinese glyph, thus localized dialects are still confusing for other languages.   Nevertheless, localized regional terms still appear in various Chinese dialects that enter the language.

(update)
There is a book call  说文解字(shuo wen jie zhi) (written around year 100-121), which selects a number of words that user by various region.

The online zdic 汉典 contains reference to some localized dialect, under the section 音韵方言


What is the difference between 响，声，and 音 What is the difference between 响，声，and 音. When I check the English translation, it says

响: echo, sound, noise, make a sound, to sound, to ring, loud, classifier for noises
声: sound, voice, tone, noise, classifier for sounds
音: sound, noise, musical note, tone, news, syllable, reading (phonetic value of a character)

Pls help me clarify the difference, it is quite difficult to catch.

请帮我清楚分别“响”，“声”，和“音”。多谢你们。

Tuttle

响〔響〕

  ADJECTIVE

  loud, noisy

  教室里在考试, 你们说话声音别这么响。

  Jiàoshì li zài kǎoshì, nǐmen shuōhuà shēngyīn bié zhème xiǎng.

  There's an examination in progress in the classroom. Don't talk so loudly.

声

  NOUN

  sound, noise, voice

  机器声太大, 我听不清你说什么。

  Jīqì shēng tài dà, wǒ tīng bu qīng nǐ shuō shénme.

  The noise from the machine is too loud; I can't hear what you're saying.

音

  NOUN

  sound

Oxford

  ① sound

  噪音

  noise


What's the Chinese Converse of English "Engrish"? We all know and love Engrish- hilariously bad English sometimes produced by native Chinese speakers. But is there an equally pat Chinese phrase to describe the converse- the weird, pitiable attempts at correct Chinese made by the benighted 老外? Seems only fair that there would be...

I don't think there's a sweeping term for that and I don't think the word Engrish is actually a term either.

But here is something might humour you.

伦敦音: London accent. It's actually from a 相声(Chinese Stand-up comedy) piece. Basically means the way of English speaker trying to say Chinese but can not get the rhyme and all the tones right. And to add humour effect, both 伦 and 敦 are pronounced in flat tone.


Why this header of "世界日报" is written as "世界曰报"？ See the picture.

There is an obvious mistake: the third character is written as "曰" (yue) instead of "日" (ri). Why it is not written correctly as "日" such as the following?

It's correctly written, but in a different font called 隶书 Clerical script. It's one of the archaic style of writing. In general Chinese characters in 隶书 look wider, which makes 日 looks like 曰 in regular fonts.


What does 灒油 mean if no oil spatters or scatters? I screen-shot 0:57. I don't understand how 灒 makes sense here. The chef heated oil, then poured on the 薑葱茸. No oil 灒!

灒

spatter, splash
to scatter

When a chef stir-frying a dish, he would pour wine into the wok at the end to add aroma to the food. This action is never slow and gentle but always a quick sprinkle/ pour (灑/澆).
You would see flames in the wok if the temperature of the wok is very high. We call that 鑊氣 in Cantonese
When you pour liquid in a quick motion, the liquid would scatters on the surface it was poured onto, Therefore 灒 is used for 'to pour (in a quick motion)" as its extended meaning
Also, when boiling oil is poured on food, it sizzle and spatter
Another word we use for 'to pour' in Cantonese is 淋 which can be a gentle or quick-motion pour


Is「天佑美國」the correct translation for "God Bless America"? Look at this mural from Chinatown, San Francisco:

Attribution: American flag in Chinatown San Francisco by Pedro Lozano. License: CC BY 2.0

It says「天佑美國」, but is that correct? Shouldn't it be「天祐美國」instead? Isn't god supposed to be a divine being?

According to Wiktionary, 保祐 is a variant of 保佑. Google Ngram Viewer also consider 天祐 to be the same as 天佑: Ngram

Actually, here in mainland China, I think 佑 is much more prevalent than 祐 (I have not been to other Chinese-speaking areas so I cannot give you a definitive answer). You can witness it from the Wikipedia translation of similar subjects, all of them use 佑 instead of 祐:

God Bless America - 天佑美國
God Save the Queen/King - 天佑女皇/女王、天佑吾皇/国王
Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser - 上帝保佑吾皇弗朗茨/天佑吾皇弗朗茨

So if you have to choose between them, I'd say 佑 is actually a safer choice.


Trying to figure out what says here and what this artifact is I'm not sure if this language is Chinese or Japanese, pardon my ignorance, but I'm trying to figure out what it says here and what this artifact is.

Thanks in advance!

This appears to be the end piece of a folding fan. Maybe the rest of the fan is missing?

The characters should be read from right to left:
金澤 jin1ze2
櫻谷特製 ying1gu3 te4zhi4

金澤 is the Japanese city Kanazawa. 櫻谷 means "Cherry blossom gorge" and would be pronounced "Sakuraya" in Japanese. This is probably the name of a place or a company. 特製 means "special product of".

So presumably this is a special product of Sakuraya in Kanazawa. While the names appear to be Japanese, these words would mean exactly the same thing in Chinese.


Is this correct 你一個人到這裡嗎 In the context of asking a chinese person who is living in say, spain, for not too long a period, is the above sentence correct if I want to ask “did you come here all by yourself?/are you here all by yourself?”? Another possibility I thought of was 你到這裡一個人嗎

你一個人到這裡嗎 is mostly correct. The complete version is 你是一个人到这里来的吗
A native way of saying so is 你是自己来这里的吗？A more northern version of it is 你是自个ge3（儿）来这（儿）的吗？
你到這裡一個人嗎 Is not correct.


三长两短: what's long and what's short? （求词源）

三长两短 is a chengyu that means "unforeseen disaster". It can also be a euphemism for death.

Here's an example of its usage:

  明·罗贯中《三遂平妖传》：“万一些后再有三长两短，终不能靠着太医活命。”

What is its etymology though? One way of literally interpreting this chengyu is that it refers to three long things and two short things; what could they be?

There's a theory that it's referring to the coffin box, which is made up of three long and two short pieces of wood, but this seems like a false etymology.

Theory 1: A coffin is made of three long and two short pieces of wood. And a coffin means death, dangerous.

You also can find some clues in the wikipedia article about "使用筷子禁忌".

Theory 2: Taoist forecasts through burning incenses. It is the most dangerous condition that there are three long incense sticks and two short incense sticks after burning five incence sticks in some time.

Theory 3: In ancient times, a master swordmaker called Ouyezi (欧冶子) made five sharp swords. Three of them were long, the others were short. And an assassin used the one called "鱼肠剑" among the five swords to kill the ennemy King. So "三长两短" refers to coming across a dangerous accident.


How accurate is CNN's (or Google Translate's) translation of 把全部心思和精力放在备战打仗上 as "put all our minds and energy on preparing for war"? I quote the following CNN article:

Chinese President Xi Jinping has called on troops to "put all (their) minds and energy on preparing for war" in a visit to a military base in the southern province of Guangdong on Tuesday, according to state news agency Xinhua.
During an inspection of the People's Liberation Army Marine Corps in Chaozhou City, Xinhua said Xi told the soldiers to "maintain a state of high alert" and called on them to be "absolutely loyal, absolutely pure, and absolutely reliable."
Ben Westcott, Chinese President Xi Jinping tells troops to focus on 'preparing for war', CNN, 14 October 2020.

The CNN article links directly to the source, from which I quote the relevant parts:

习近平指出，要把全部心思和精力放在备战打仗上，保持高度戒备状态。……
习近平强调，要坚持党对军队绝对领导，加强党的创新理论武装，狠抓全面从严治党、全面从严治军，确保部队绝对忠诚、绝对纯洁、绝对可靠。……
习近平视察海军陆战队, Xinhua News, 13 October 2020.

Except for the word "(their)" CNN's translations from this article are identical to the result from Google Translate:

[Google Translate:]  Xi Jinping pointed out that we must put all our minds and energy on preparing for war and maintain a state of high alert.
[Google Translate:] Xi Jinping emphasized that it is necessary to uphold the party's absolute leadership over the military, strengthen the party's innovative theoretical arms, pay close attention to comprehensively and strictly govern the party and the military, and ensure that the troops are absolutely loyal, absolutely pure, and absolutely reliable.

So it appears as if CNN used Google Translate here.  However, there's some important nuance in the first part (the other parts seem unproblematic): "preparing for war" sounds rather different to "being prepared against war".  It comes from 备战打仗 which seems to mean something like "ready for war":

备战 = "prepared against war / to prepare for war / warmongering"
打仗 = "to fight a battle / to go to war"

Particularly unexpected for me is the "-ing" suffix (in "preparing") since 备战打仗 doesn't seem to be used as a verb in the 放在……上 grammar structure.
Question: How accurate is CNN's (or Google Translate's) translation of 把全部心思和精力放在备战打仗上 as "put all our minds and energy on preparing for war"?

把全部心思和精力放在备战打仗上 --> "put all our minds and energy on preparing for war"

It is an acceptable translation

把全部心思和精力 -  take all our minds and energy

[放在 (put) ] 备战 (preparing for war) 打仗 (war) [上 (on)]

备战 and 打仗 can be used as verb phrases because they are separable verbs that made up of [v + n], and [v + n] verb phrase can be used as a noun. For example, we cannot say 放在前進上 because 前進 is a [v + v] verb; but we can say 放在打仗上

打仗 can also be a noun for 'war'  e.g. 遇上打仗 (when war happens)

It seems that 打仗 (war/ battle) here is redundant since 备战 already meant "preparing for war".
A reason for saying 备战打仗 is the verb 备战 is often used metaphorically to mean any "preparation". For example, a football team's 备战 refers to their training before a match (备战球賽); A student's 备战 refers to his study before an exam (备战考试)
[备战]打仗 should be understood as "[preparing for] battle"
In a more political phrasing -- "to maintain battle preparedness" (保持战斗准备)


Why is 远 in ...与全球远作相结合的阶段? The subject is ‘跨国公司进入一个新的市场’

第三是企业的标准化阶段，与全球远作相结合的阶段。

I think '相‘ is '互相‘
My guess is 远 works with 作:远作 = ‘remotely do'

The third stage is company standardization stage, mutually(互相） combining with （company）global operations stage.

It must be 与全球运作相结合的阶段。
远作，there is no this compound word.


Is a morpheme bound or is it free: any online source? The online dictionaries I've tried so far do not seem to indicate if a morpheme is bound or is free. Is there any (free?) online dictionary that provides such information? If not, is there a list of the most common bound morphemes?

As far as I know, this is not a free combination.
China has official word statistics. This is used to guide everyday language. The use of words is generally restricted by these official data. If some morpheme combinations are used privately, the resulting words may be too strange to be understood by anyone.
Put another way, the combination of morphemes in Chinese is constrained by words or idioms. Free morpheme combinations can only be used for personal use, or in certain situations (such as emergencies or colloquial expressions).
You can check this online Chinese word website
http://www.xh.5156edu.com/


Differences between 细腻, 细致, 精细 and 深入 All 4 words listed above all in some way have the meaning of fine, exquisite, detailed. So what are the differences between them? Please provice some examples

「细」 in 「细腻」，「细致」 and 「精细」 denotes 'detailed'

「腻」 has the meaning of 'saturated/ rich', 「细腻 mainly means 'exquisite'
Example: 「小说中对感情的描写十分细腻」 - In the novel, the depictions of emotions are very exquisite (rich in details)

~

「致」 has the meaning of 'neat',  「细致」 mainly means 'neat and detailed'
Example: 「小说中对感情的描写十分细致」- In the novel, the depictions of emotions are very exquisite (neatly displayed in details)

~

「精」 in 「精细」 has the meaning of 'refined' 「精细」 mainly means 'precise'
Example: 「小说中对感情的描写十分精细」- In the novel, the depictions of emotions are very  precise (accurately detailed)

~

深入 literally means 'in-depth'
Example: 「小说中对感情的描写十分深入」 - In the novel, the depictions of emotions are very  in-depth (thorough and detailed)

Other Examples:
「细腻刻画」 - exquisite (rich and detailed) description
「细致图案」 - detailed (detailed and neat) patterns
「精细安排」 - precise (refine and detailed) arrangement
「深入调查」 - in-depth (thorough and detailed) investigation


What is the Chinese term for "architrave"? When you put a door frame (or window frame) in a wall there is an ugly gap between the door frame and the wall along the top and on both sides.
Normally, we use strips of thin, moulded wood to cover this gap. In English we call those strips of wood "architrave". I believe the Americans call that "door casing".
What is that called in Chinese?
I came up with 门套管、 阑头、门（边）缘 but I am not very happy.
Any carpenters out there? 这儿有木工吗？

for architrave, it’s “楣樑” (門框上方橫接的承重小樑).

strips of thin, moulded wood to cover this gap

try “門框飾邊“, “門框飾板” or “門框飾條“
have fun :)


Why is 西藏 Tibet but not Xizang in English as are other names of place in China? Perhaps it is the name given by English users when they first reached that region, but as we know after 1949, China adopted the pinyin and unified the spelling of English of names of place, Peking was changed into Beijing, something like Bombay of India into Mumbai, as the result of the nationalist efforts to make special identity. But Tibet is still in use, but not as Xizang. Why is it so? Hope it is not a political question.

The name 西藏 / Xīzàng is fairly recent.

Both Wikipedia and the Encyclopedia Britannica agree that the name "Tibet" is derived from a different language than Chinese, probably Persian "Tubbat", but that may not be the original source of the name (Wikipedia). Britannica says:

  The name Tibet is derived from the Mongolian Thubet, the Chinese
  Tufan, the Tai Thibet, and the Arabic Tubbat.

Dr. Elliot Sperling wrote that " in discussing Tibet as an integral historical unit the name is clearly of limited utility and can create confusion" and that the Chinese edition of the book Authenticating Tibet therefore uses a different name, namely "Tubote" (a name closer to the non-Chinese origin of the name "Tibet"):

  Indeed, it is due to the specific limitations of that term that it was
  decided that the Chinese edition of Authenticating Tibet would employ
  the term “Tubote” 圖伯特, a name that is used now by a growing number of
  writers and bloggers on both sides of the Taiwan Straits. As a result,
  I prepared the following introductory essay for the Chinese-language
  edition of Authenticating Tibet in order to explain the choice while
  at the same time pointing out that the term “Tubote”is not a recent
  concoction: it has a history as a recognized Chinese-language
  designation for Tibet.

His essay Tubote, Tibet, and the Power of Naming also discusses the etymology of 西藏 / Xīzàng.

The origin of the name "Peking" instead of Beijing is a different story. European commercial travellers to China often came to the country through ports in south-east China, where dialects other than Mandarin are spoken. For this reason, some people think that the name "Peking" derives from one of those dialects, most likely Cantonese, where the pronunciation may have sounded like [pakkiŋ]. An alternative theory is that the European name was borrowed from Mandarin before the shift in pronunciation from [k] to [ʧ]. See Bill Poser's article BEIJING, PEKING, PEIPING AND ALL THAT on Language Log.


Similarity in geographically close areas (越南,云南) My question is simple: is it a coincidence that Yunnan and Vietnam (yue nan) are pronounced very similarly because they are geographically close?

Would the nan(南) in (越南,云南) both be referring to a common southern region which categorizes the region of Southwestern China and neighboring countries?

Perhaps the key to looking at the two (越南 and 云南) is in "南" as these regions were all remote and to the south of most ancient Chinese empires/kingdoms.

There once was a kingdom called "越", which existed roughly from 2032 BC to 222BC (Baidu). It occupied most of eastern coastal areas of modern day China (you can see it on a map on Baidu-the 越 Kingdom is the bright yellow area labeled with a red character
https://baike.baidu.com/pic/越国/24727/0/b7003af33a87e950c7d9a59a19385343faf2b47e?) If you read stories from the Warring States era, you will encounter references to the kingdom of 越. In fact, at one point, one of the Kings of 越 took on another kingdom to its north (齐 Qi- roughly modern day Shandong Province), but failed to wipe out (齐)-which might have led to the demise of 越. By the way, in the same era (millennia), there were references to the existence of 东越 as well as 南越 -- 越 may be an ethnic name as well as a political (aka state/country) one.

Now could it be that the people who occupied 云南 were the same who also occupied 越南? Somebody may be able to dig out some historical documents to verify that. However, historically, 云南 had been called 南夷, "夷" being one of the many derogatory categorical terms used by ancient Chinese to refer to the "barbarians", aka non-Chinese. I am mentioning this because "越南" had been referred to by other names (other than "夷").

According to Baidu, the name "云南" came about in the Tang Dynasty when a Tang emperor asked an emissary from that region "where did you come from?" The emissary responded with a gesture "from the south, beyond the clouds." ("王问：君在何方？使遥指南曰：南边云下")


What's the purpose of 上 in "王教授给那儿的学生上英国文学课, 他课上得非常好"? What's the purpose of 上 in the following sentence?

王教授给那儿的学生上英国文学课, 他课上得非常好, 学生都很喜欢她的课

Although I understand 上 can mean "to attend (class)", I don't see how that fits in the above example.
In the first part of the sentence (王教授给那儿的学生上英国文学课), the only other verb is 给. There is no verb meaning "to teach". Thus, in this case can 上 mean "to teach"?
In the middle part of the sentence (他课上得非常好), what is the meaning of 上? Does it just mean "to go" as in "The class went very well"?

So I checked Cihai and it specifically says 上課 goes both ways:

教師講課或學生聽課
To teach a class, or to attend a class

The subject is 'Professor Wang' (王教授). The verb is 'to teach' (上, note: only makes sense when seeing 上課 together), the direct object is 'a lesson' (課), and the indirect object is 'those students' (那兒的學生), which in Chinese is marked by a second verb literally meaning 'to give' (給).
The second 上 still means 'to teach', with the direct object understood and omitted.


can anyone help identify the chop mark please and translate (Characters identified: 一切惟心艁) I have a beautiful scroll given to me and am trying to find out the history of the seal

well, again, read from right to left, top to bottom. and, don’t fixated on regular script (楷書)
the top right character “一”, and the top left character “心” (in small seal script) are easy to recognise.
Next, the bottom right character, the left component is also a “心”, and I recognised the right component is “隹” (a bird); which made it “惟”.
So, the text is “一x惟心x”.
I known the verse “一切惟心”, a buddhism notion, I would guess the middle right character is “切”. See the link as proof.
The last one, the bottom left character, again, I recognised the right component “告”.
At this moment, my “free association” of it is “一切惟心造”, however, the right component did not like a “⻍“, or a “辵“ (radical 162)
The next inference is: it might be a variant (異體字). So, I would try these two sites, search for variants of “造”:

https://chardb.iis.sinica.edu.tw/variants.jsp?cid=23691

https://dict.variants.moe.edu.tw/variants/rbt/word_attribute.rbt?quote_code=QTA0MTQ2

Voilà, the left component might be “舟”
Last, when the text is found to be “一切惟心艁”, I just google it as “一切惟心造”, and pick a simple, acceptable result, and interpret it in English.
“一切惟心艁” might be interpreted differently, according to the sect. Any further elaboration would be better asked in buddhism forum, imo.
have fun :)


Why is 才 correct but 还 not in 我才27岁? This is the conversation my friend and I had:

X：你多大年纪
I：我还27岁
X：还？
I：27岁是1990年出生的，跟你同一的90后
X：那应该说，我才27岁

I was going to make an impression that I'm only 27, which implies that I'm not so old yet, even from her stardard. But she said 还 is not the correct word and I should use 才 here.
还 has the meaning such as "still" or "yet".
Why is 还 not correct in this situation?

Although you are trying to say "I'm still 27.", "还" does not work in this context, since it is only used to imply an action is still ongoing or something still exists. Grammatically speaking, it should be used before a verb, not a noun.

On the other hand, "才" in this context is used to emphasize a (merely) small quantity. Therefore, it should be put before a noun. There are other usage of "才", making it can be put before a verb, but that's a different case.

Maybe this example will help you to notice the usage of "还" and "才" (example from Chinese Grammar Wiki).

  你才一百斤，还要减肥？


What exactly does 意 mean? If I'm not mistaken, this 300 BC Chinese philosophy is strikingly modern.

世之所贵道者，书也。书不过语，语有贵也。语之所贵者，意也，意有所随。意之所随者，不可以言传也，而世因贵言传书。Source: 轮扁斫轮 http://baike.baidu.com/view/238082.htm

For example, until one sees the colour red, he will never know what the colour red is. No verbal explanation can take the place of a demonstration.

In another example, no one can learn how to swim by just reading a book.

I wonder what exactly 意 means.

Modern translation of colloquial saying considered to be 意义 here, which in english is meaning, sense, ignificance, importance, bearing or something else.
But ancient words are very abstract, abbreviated, modern meanings can't mean the meaning itself.


Choosing a Chinese name based on John the Apostle I'm new and I only recently started getting more serious about learning Chinese. After doing research and talking to people, someone suggested that I should chose a Chinese name and that I should ask native speakers of Chinese what they thought, so that the name sounds natural and not a weird, sinified western name.
My first name is one of those kinds of western Christian names that can be translated into many different languages (Yochanan, Yuhanna, Juan, Jean, Giovanni, Ivan, Sean, Ian, Ianto, Johann, etc.), but it's confusing to me to translate into Chinese, because my parents named after the Apostle John, the person who, according to tradition, write the Gospel of John. In Chinese, different denominations use different translations for this name, and my family has both Catholics and Protestants, so it's hard to choose. I would prefer a more universal name and not one that's denomination-specific, but these are the ones I found on-line. Are these normal 名 míng names? Are they too strange?  I'm also not sure how to read the last two, so I put question marks.

Protestant (基督敎新敎 Jīdūjiào xīnjiào) translation: 約翰 - Yuēhàn
Catholic (天主教 Tiānzhǔ jiào) translation: 若望 - Ruòwàng
Orthodox (正教 Zhèng jiào) translation: 約安 - Yuēān (?)
'Nestorian' (景教 Jǐng jiào) translation:  曜輪 / 曜轮 Yàolún (?)

I have found historical people with these names: 王若望 Wáng Rùowàng (1918-2001) who was born 王壽華 Wáng Shòuhuá but took on the name 王若望 Wáng Rùowàng as a pen name (號 hào name or maybe a 字 zì name). I also found 马约翰 Mǎ Yuēhàn (1883-1966) who was a pioneer in modern Chinese sports and physical education. Lastly, I found a 'Nestorian' (Church of the East) bishop who lived in the 9th century during the Tang dynastay who was Bishop John, or 大徳曜輪 Dàdé Yàolún. But I don't know how nice or even normal sound for actual Chinese speakers.
For the last name 姓氏 (xìngshì), many sources on the Internet suggested that I should chose a last name that was only one syllable and sounded like my real name, which is also translatable into many languages (Andrew, Andreas, Andrés, André, Andrea, Aindreas, Andrei, et cetera). Since the first character in 安德魯 Āndélǔ is 安 Ān, which is already a famous Chinese last name 姓氏 xìngshì, I thought I should just pick 安 Ān.
So the possible options are:

安約翰 - Ān Yuēhàn
安若望 - Ān Ruòwàng
安約安 - Ān Yuēān (?)
安曜輪 - Ān Yàolún (?)

Is any one of these more natural and nicer-sounding than the others? I'm a man too, in case you were wondering, so I would prefer a name not too feminine sounding.  Thank you so much in advance for your help.

You have done a lot of research, and picking a name is entirely your personal choice, there are no right or wrong answer to it, just good or bad choices. Bad choice means something that sounds offensive or taboo, e.g. 徐定富 means '徐 + certain to get rich'  but it sounds the same as 除定褲 (drop the trousers first) in Cantonese. Your four choices have no problem like that.

約翰 and 若望 are common transliterations of John. If you don't want your name to be too common-place and text-book, you can change to other similar-sounding characters

安約翰 --> 安逸瀚
安若望 --> 安若翰
~

安約安 sounds quite strange, almost like a tongue twist

~

安曜輪 is unique and sounds native, but 倫 is much more common and meaningful in names than 輪, so 安曜倫 would be a good choice.


What is the usage of 子 in 「修我戈矛，与子同仇」? This particular phrase comes from《诗经·秦风·无衣》

Full: 岂曰无衣？与子同袍。王于兴师，修我戈矛。与子同仇！

Translation:

Who said that you have no clothes to wear,

I will share with you my robe.

The king has called upon us that,

we make ready with spears and Ge's (戈)，

we fight against our enemies.


What is the difference between 濱 and 瀕? Another pair of homonyms with similar/identical meaning. A dictionary check gives me this:

濱
(1) 水邊。如：「河濱」、「海濱」、「她喜歡在湖濱散步。」
(2) 靠近。如：「濱臨」、「濱海公路」。

瀕
(1) 水邊。如：「河瀕」、「江瀕」。
(2) 臨近、迫近。如：「瀕臨」、「瀕危」。

This isn't very helpful since the definitions of the two characters are almost identical (including some of the examples). However, I do think that 瀕 is more often used in sense (2): 瀕臨，瀕危，瀕於 and so on, and that 濱 is more used in sense (1): 濱海，濱河，濱江. Some quick google checks seem confirms this.

Hypothesis: From a practical, modern point of view, they mean the same thing, but there is a preference for 濱 in the sense of being close to water and 瀕 in the more general sense of being close to something (even something more abstract).

Is this correct? Can these characters be used interchangeably, even if there seems to be a preference for one over the other in certain situations?

On this page there is long explanation, but the summary that 濱 is more used when 濱 has the role of a noun (examples: 水~︱江~︱河~︱湖~︱海~), and 瀕 is more used when 瀕 has the role of a verb (examples: ~江︱~湖︱~海︱~绝︱~临︱~死︱~危︱~于, 东~大海).


Mandarin equivalent for 返嚟? In Cantonese 返嚟 is often used when asking someone about where they obtained something from. For instance, "學返嚟“ could be used in a sentence asking someone, "Where did you learn this from?"

What's the Mandarin equivalent for 返嚟 in this context?

The most usual verbal suffix is just 來/来 lái. This can be combined with 著/着 zhe after it. See Definition 7 here:

  7 用在动词后，表示做过（一般均可用“来着”）：昨天他哭～。

The use of 来着 is very frequent in northern colloquial Mandarin, but is a more general past tense marker with some sense of "just now", with an idea of a continuous state according to some analyses. It is a very well researched construction in academic studies of Mandarin.

The most common equivalent for Cantonese 返嚟 is Mandarin 回來/来 huílai, but this is more restricted in usage as a verbal suffix, and has a stronger connotation of "coming back home" (e.g. buying something back, receiving something back as a ransom), which is not required in this sentence.


How can I translate 不客气 here? I'm doing some translations of New Practical Chinese Reader 2. In lesson 17, there's a dialog between two people, and 不客气 appears as a reply to compliments rather than someone saying 谢谢。Is it supposed to be some kind of joke? I have left it as "don't be polite" in my translation for now.

Thanks in advance.

不客气 is a polite way of acknowledging someone's compliment or thanks. Although it literally translates to "don't be polite", once you consider some equivalent phrases, it's meaning becomes clear.

Equivalents in Chinese:

不用谢 - (no need to thank [me])
别客气

Equivalents in English:

You're too kind
Don't mention it
Not at all


What is the oldest retracable meaning for the character/word 臾? 臾 (yu2) in classical Chinese means "for a while".
I assume "for a while" was not the original meaning this character was associated with in the time when it came, by what mysterious brain activity ever, into this world.
The oldest depiction of this character seem to be composed of hands reaching for a person.

Is "for a while" already the oldest retraceable meaning for this character or is there an older one?

i wonder what erich von däniken or david icke would have to tell about this character?

臾 is actually a verb meaning "to tie up and drag", hence what the character looked like. But it can be used together with 須 as a noun, i.e. as 須臾, to mean "a while". This practice emerged by the Warring States era and so is just about as ancient as the time the character took definitive shape..


Quenching thirst by thinking about plums Today I was looking in my book for a Chinese saying about the guy that quenched his thirst by thinking about plums.

I'm shy to admit, but it's one of my favorites.

How does the saying go? How do you spell it?

望梅止渴    wàng méi zhǐ kě lit. to quench one"s thirst by thinking of plums (idiom), fig. to console oneself with illusions
The expression is a chengyu (成语, cheng2yu3).

There's a story behind it: in the Three Kingdoms period, general Cao Cao (曹操    Cáo Cāo (155-220)) was leading his troops on a journey to battle. They were in a dry place and his troops were very thirsty. Cao Cao tricked them by telling them they were not far from a wood of plum trees, where the plums were juicy and sweet; they would be able to quench their thirst there. Thinking of the plums got the soldiers' mouths watering. They no longer felt so thirsty and were able to continue their route. Soon after they arrived at a place where they found water.

I got this info from a very good French-Chinese book called "Il était une fois Au pays des chengyu" by Fei-Fei CHEN and Claire JOURNIAC.


你 vs. 妳 for second person When writing to a female, is it appropriate to use 妳 for “you”?

Could it be misunderstood as a reference to breasts or milk?

Example:
我见过你面带笑容，我见过你面带愁容。

妳 is supposed to be the female second-person pronoun, but I don't find it being used as often as the more generic 你 anymore, however。

And no. There is no connotation re: breasts of milk with the use of the word.

Not sure why some posters have the assumption that 你 is only used for both male and female in Simplified Chinese. Is it how it is used in Taiwan? As someone who can only write in Traditional Chinese, it seems that 你 is used interchangeably for the most part (even among my friends from Taiwan on social media, and books from Taiwan, etc.). Some people do use 妳 for female, but it seems rather uncommon nowadays.


Do you know the Chinese character which is formed by 王 on the left and 力 on the right? I can't evey type this word out, because I do not know how to pronouce it. I notice this word when seeing it in the name of an actor for a TV drama, then I thought it to be 功，but it turned out it was not 工 on the left but 王, then I checked Xinhua Dictionary but couldn't get the answer.

玏  http://www.zdic.net/z/1e/js/738F.htm
Pinyin: lè

基本字义 (basic meaning)
See : 瑊 http://www.zdic.net/z/1e/js/744A.htm
瑊 - 似玉的美石 (jade-like gemstones)

康熙字典 (Kangxi Dictionary)

本作。 也。今省作玏，謂石之次玉者。
Original character: . Now simplified as '玏'.  It means "lesser gemstones that is similar to jade"

Note:
In my opinion, naming a child '玉' emphasis his or her nobleness and being precious--(賈寶玉 is a good example).  Some modest people might feel that is too boastful, opt for the more humble word  '玏' instead. wishing the child will has noble-like quality, but can also relate to the common people.


How was Switzerland transliterated into Chinese? So, my real question is: did 瑞 used to be pronounced suì in 官话?

My roundabout way at getting to this is from the transliteration of Switzerland.

Let's look at Chengduese.《现代汉语方言音库 • 成都话音档》records 瑞 with two pronunciations. One being:

  zuei²¹³

which could be roughly written in faux-"pinyin" as rui; which approximately (details aside) matches most MSM pronunciations.

and:

  suei²¹³

which is essentially (for our purposes here) sui.

Now, the rule of thumb for 老派 Chengduese is that names and places are read sui and not rui. Which would make the pronunciation of 瑞士 something more akin to sui si - which sounds much closer to the actual pronunciation of Switzerland. What makes for an even better case for this pronunciation is a comparison to Japanese. The Japanese pronunciation of Switzerland is Suisu (スイス) and it's Ateji (当て字) is 瑞西.

How was Switzerland transliterated into Chinese? Was it through some topolect -or- did 瑞 originally carry the pronunciation sui?

edit: I supposed 瑞典 (Sweden) might also be an interesting case to look into - with similar sui/swe sounds.

edit #2: Looking at wiktionary Min nan/Hakka/Cantonese all seem to be much closer to sui than rui also.

edit #3: Wiktionary’s entry for 瑞士 does confirm some things:

  From French Suisse, borrowed through a southern Chinese dialect (where 瑞 is pronounced with an s- initial). See also 瑞典 (Ruìdiǎn).

But it’s sorely lacking specifics.

edit #4: apparently 山东 topolect also reads 瑞 as sui.

edit #5: Grand Ricci also gives the pronunciation: shuì.

Did 瑞 used to be pronounced suì in 官話?

It was pronounced far closer to suì than today’s ruì, and more than enough to warrant the use of 瑞 as a transcription for Switzerland or Sweden.

Excerpt from
元・周德清《中原音韻》,
detailing the phonology of 13th Century Central Plains speech, a.k.a.
Old Mandarin. The
characters 睡, 稅, 說, and 瑞 are pronounced identically. The expected
Mandarin reflex of 瑞 is shuì.

Excerpt from the Ming Dynasty publication 《洪武正韻》, which details the speech of Ming-era Mandarin. The dictionary gives the Fanqie of 瑞 as 殊偽切.

Whatever changed the pronunciation to r- must have happened relatively recently...


What does 停车期间热浸 mean? I was going through some papers and I'm stuck on this 热浸. Each dictionary says it means "hot dipping", but how can i hot dip a parked car, please help.

this seems relevant （http://exa-china.com/key-off--soak.html）:

  其中一个最极端的恶劣工况叫做“停车”或者“热浸”，这是指汽车在发动机很热的情况下很快停车，因为没有了冷却气流，发动机舱内的零件温度会升高。(1)

I think you are getting this sentence here (http://chinabidding.mofcom.gov.cn/govmain.jhtml?method=detail&channelId=205&docid=223065243):

  测定由于昼夜温度波动、停车期间热浸和城内运转所产生的污染物 (2)

The correct translation for the concept in (1) should be "hot soak": http://esa21.kennesaw.edu/activities/smog-cars/doe-veh-pollutants.pdf

Hopefully (2) is the correct context.  In general it would be good to include at least the entire parent sentence, so we can help you.


What is the biggest font by percentage of CJK symbols already encoded? Only the Unicode-included Unified and six extensions considered for the question (87887 symbols, 12 compatibility included).

Possible contenders:

BabelStone Han: includes all of original map and partially all the extensions.

Source/Noto: includes all possible 65 535 physical TrueType-includable symbols, but also incomplete outside the original map.

MingLiU: circumvents the problem by having multiple files and covers all B.

What is the biggest one?

Hanazono is a good contender:

  U+4E00  .. U+9FA5  URO 20,902 chars (fully implemented)
  U+9FA6  .. U+9FEA  URO addition 69 chars (fully implemented)
  U+3400  .. U+4DB5  Ext-A 6,582 chars (fully implemented)
  U+20000 .. U+2A6D6 Ext.B 42,711 chars (fully implemented)
  U+2A700 .. U+2B734 Ext.C 4,149 chars (fully implemented)
  U+2B740 .. U+2B81D Ext.D 222 chars (fully implemented)
  U+2B820 .. U+2CEA1 Ext.E 5,762 chars (fully implemented)
  U+2CEB0 .. U+2EBE0 Ext.F 7,473 chars (fully implemented)
  U+F900  .. U+FAD9  CJK Compatibility Ideographs 472 chars (fully implemented)
  U+2F800 .. U+2FA1D CJK Compatibility Ideographs Supplement 542 chars (fully
                     implemented)
  IVD .. (version 2016-08-15) 28,770 chars (8,828 variants included)
  (fully implemented)

Another good option would be 天珩

  CJK基本区     [4E00-9FEA] 20971字
  CJK扩展A  [3400-4DB5] 6582字
  CJK扩展B  [20000-2A6D6] 42711字
  CJK扩展C  [2A700-2B734] 4149字
  CJK扩展D  [2B740-2B81D] 222字(原先扩展D废除一字，字库中放于2A6FF，非标准码位请勿乱用)
  CJK扩展E  [2B820-2CEA1] 5762字
  CJK扩展F  [2CEB0-2EBE0]7473字
  CJK兼容   [F900-FAFF] 512码位实际472字
  CJK兼容扩展     [2F800-2FA1F] 544码位　实际542字

Babel Stone only claims:

  53.3%

coverage with their Babel Han font.


Is there a way to discover unique word combinations from a list of characters? I figured that it'd be more beneficial for me currently if I get a better grasp of the characters I already know rather than learning new ones, so I've compiled a list of all the characters I've learned so far. I am wondering if there is a piece of software or website that I can use, where I can input a list of characters and it outputs a list of words that can be formed using only those characters?

As it stands, I can learn how to write characters very easily, and I can remember the pinyin for each character easily, but I can't for the life of me remember what tone should be associated with the character. I hope that by becoming familiar with the characters in as many different combinations as possible I'll hopefully remember their tones better.

If nothing else, I'd be able to expand my vocabulary without increasing the number of characters that I already have trouble remembering the tones for.

Ok, I could have gotten this done a lot sooner but I'm a lazy prick, here it is:

Wasn't what I was originally planning on doing when I got off work but here it is. I searched up "100 most basic Chinese characters" and put those through and it pumped out 1500 unique words. I might work on this further in the future but for now I don't event want to look at it. There's a button to switch between Simplified and Traditional but I haven't set it up yet.

Source:

https://github.com/Jkmcameron/ChineseWordGenerator

Executable Jar:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Ewp5PVxDQv55GuuvF81pDxl9ktlI3QqK/view?usp=sharing


Comparing "as A" and "as B" While poking around the internet, I came across this sentence from a non-native speaker, which sounded off:

  她是朋友比爱人更好。

Intended meaning:

  She is better as a friend than as a lover [for the person saying this sentence].

Firstly, my assessment of this - that this isn't correct phrasing - correct?

Secondly, this prompted me to wonder how I would actually phrase such a sentence in Chinese. As a semi-native speaker, I'm familiar with use of 比 and similar words to use in comparison, but I'm not sure what exactly would be suitable here. While searching for a word corresponding to the English "as" (for instance in "as general of the army"), I found 作为, which seems suitable, but I am not sure if I could use it in a comparison, given that the Nciku examples are all along the lines of "As [A], [B]" or "[A] as [B], [C]", where A, B, and C are placeholders for additional "information".

With my current knowledge, I would attempt to phrase it like:

  她作为（我）朋友比作为（我）爱人更适合。

Is this usage correct, and if not, how could it be better phrased?

Your usage is quite right. And you can also say:

  比起爱人，（把）她作为朋友更合适。


Can a drone make a heroic contribution? Is the style of this sentence acceptable to Chinese ears? What is heroic about a drone?
无论是在生活还是救援等工作中，无人机都立下汗马功劳。
Can a drone 'make a heroic contribution'??
Or 汗马功劳 here just means:工作中的贡献, basically just 'contributions, achievements'?
Maybe she is just using flowery language?? I should forget the 'war hero exploits' implication?

无论是在生活还是救援等工作中，无人机都立下汗马功劳。

it’s very bad, the assumption & consideration behind the sentence.
even if we think of personification (擬人), treat a drone as a human being. then,

do we glorify a train in daily transportation?
a rocket in space mission?
a pen / typewriter in award-winning novel writing?

these’re tools. the quoted sentence only praises the drone, ignoring the factor-workers who made them, the operators to control on site.
it’s these people who make contributions & achievements.
stop of rant :)


Plural marker 们 in 哥们（儿） Can someone explain why 们 is used in the word 哥们 to mean buddy/dude, even if it's referred to a single person? Would it be possible to add 们 to any other family name, like 妈们，姐们，爸爸们 etc.? And if possible, is it just a plural form or does it carry a different meaning like  哥们?
Thanks!

Yes, 哥们 means "men" or "buddies"  But you can still call a single person '你们哥们' (you men). Which refers him as  "one of the men/ men like you". You are not technically addressing him, but addressing his group

For example, saying to a person: "You men are useless" suggest "you being one of them is also useless"

"你也是我的哥们儿了" means "you too are (one of) my buddies now"

If you have more than one older sister, you can refer them as 我家的姐们 (my older sisters).

Or you can refer a single female as 姐们 (one of the women/ women like her) similar to 哥们

You cannot say 我家的妈们 or 爸们 because you only have one mother and one father.

爷们 (males/men) can be used the same way as 哥们. As in  "你们爷们" (you men)


的确, 确实, 实在, and 真正: what's the difference? (Related a bit to Difference between 实际, 现实, 确实, and 实在 I guess. Good to link to it for posterity.)

  的确, 确实, 实在, 真正

My dictionaries all say that all four can be adverbs with a meaning of "really." That's not too helpful when you want to know which one you should use in which situation, and which one you can't use.

My problem culminated with this question: "没错，这本书__________是我的"

A: 的确, B： 实在, C： 真正

If they are all adverbs, and all can mean "really," then in my mind it's a trick question and I can use any. However ...

I asked a native Chinese speaker, and this is the explanation I received:

的确 and 确实 seem to have about the same meaning, both are adverbs and both seem to indicate a confirmation of a state, and rather than "really," makes more sense as "actually," e.g. somebody asks you to try this dish, because it tastes good, and you try it, then, "这个菜确实好吃" ~= "This dish actually is good!"

(Further to this, my dictionary says 确实 appears to be able to be used as an adjective also ... which wasn't covered in the explanation.)

实在 can be an adverb or an adjective, and makes more sense if you think of it as "honest(ly)" when you think something is very good or very bad.

真正 can be an adverb or an adjective, and makes more sense if you think of it as "true/truly".

There are a few areas that I've encountered in Chinese where the "English equivalent" isn't really the same, and there are certain rules and regulations that cover the Chinese word, but don't have the same distinction in English. I feel this is one of them.

I can see that 的确 will fit in the above question (It's not a mistake, this book actually is mine,) but going by the English explanations, to me, 真正 could fit too (It's not a mistake, this book truly is mine.) Oh, but ... "It's not a mistake, honestly, this book is mine"

Can anybody shed any light on this? I would honestly, actually be truly grateful.

A.的确   is a subjective and strong word to confirm. For your example in question, "没错，这本书____是我的", if you translate it into English, "Yes it is, actually this is my book ". Do you feel the mood is so strong? In another word, this book is mine, you never get a change to take it away, also "没错" is the key clue and makes this sentence much stronger. Eventually, the correct answer is "的确"！

B.实在
Among native Chinese, few people speak "实在" as the meaning of "truly" or "actually". They more like to use it as adj, not adv. For an example, "这个人很实在" means "This guy is very good and not selfish".For adv, "实在"+ adj. is much easier for understanding，such as "实在漂亮". Note:
"的确">"实在", if you don't know which word to use under different circumstance, try to use "的确" instead of "实在".

C.真正
There are only few specific phrase which you need to remember, "真正的男子汉","真正意义上的" . It is also not as often as used in daily life.

As a result, all the key is to consider the situation and environment when you speak, there are always several key points and clue that would be found.

PS: If you want to say "really" in your spoken-Chinese, it is easy to use "真" + any word you want.  "真香","真漂亮","真性感","这本书真是我的" :)


Looking for official specification of Putonghua in English There has been some confusion here between different senses of "Putonghua." So to clarify: article 19 of the constitution of the PRC says "The state promotes the nationwide use of Putonghua (common speech based on Beijing pronunciation)."  Pursuant to this the government supported a huge project to create language standards close to Beijing usage, but deliberately not identical to any specific usage in Beijing.  This went along with the character simplification and the creation of Hanyu Pinyin.  These official standards are tested by the 普通話水平測試 and the HSK.  Many jobs, especially in education and the media require some level on the 普通話水平測試.  The standards have been lightly amended over time.  I am asking about this official Putonghua.  Numerous current and older dialects and usages called Putonghua in other contexts are not my concern now.

I am trying to find an official statement of the current standard, and I much prefer English for this (I expect it is a fairly long document).  I am especially interested to know what words are officially given erhua.  I am told some are, but not nearly so many as commonly get erhua in daily use in various parts of China.

I am not looking for help preparing for the HSK.  That is widely available.  I am trying to find the official standard.

普通话测试 儿化音: this link shows you a collection of erhua vocabulary useful for Putonghua test.

普通话常见儿化字认3: this link allows you to know what these erhua sound like


If you are backward you will take a beating I look for Chinese translation for:

If you are backward you will take a beating

I do like the adage.

I think, "落后就要挨打" is the best answer.

This was first said by Stalin, in 1931, but it has been widely cited in PRC. Deng Xiaoping also quoted.


Difference between 特色, 特點, 特性, 特質, and 特徵 Looking up these five words in dictionaries gives results that are almost identical. In Chinese-English dictionaries, I find explanations identical or very close to:

  a characteristic; a distinguishing feature; a distinctive mark

The only difference I can find is that 特性 seems to have the meaning of "property", which the others don't.

Chinese-Chinese dictionaries (below definitions are from this one) give me definitions like:

（特色）事物所表現出獨特優異的地方
（特點）特別的地方
（特徵）事物特殊的徵象、標誌
（特質）異於其他眾物的性質
（特性）某人或某事物所具有的獨特性質

This isn't very helpful (if it is, please highlight the differences, the ones I have found have turned out to be insignificant when checking sentences from an online corpus).

My next step is to check collocations (I used this corpus). Among the top ten collocations for [名詞]+[特X] where 特X represents the words we're talking about here, there are several identical phrases that exist with all five words:

文化[特X]
個人[特X]

There are some collocations which rank very high for some of the 特X words, but low for others, e.g.

歷史特點
學校特色
身體特徵
時間特性
女性特質

I don't know if these differences are significant or not, but I think some are. I now leave the area of actual observation and speculate a bit. I'll edit this bit if I turn out to be wrong. :)

特色 seems to usually refer to a positive defining characteristic and is used more about objects than people. Among the 35 top collocations for this word, only 個人特色 is related to people. Can perhaps also be translated to "style" in certain contexts.

特點 seems to indicate a specific feature which marks something as different from something else (or what makes it stand out). At first, I thought this word was more neutral than 特色, but I'm not so sure. Still, it doesn't have the feeling of "style" mentioned above (compare 色/點）.

特性 seems to... sorry, I have no clue here. It might be the case that human-related activities appear more often, but that's about all I can see. Common examples are 文化特性, 生活特性, 市場特性, 聲音特性, 技術特性 etc. Perhaps this is irrelevant. Still, note that the word "property" appears in dictionaries for this word but not the others.

特質 seems to relate to the inner quality or nature of something (性質), including examples like 精神特質, 藝術特質, 心裏特質. That's about all I can find out from looking at examples of collocations.

特徵 again, I have no clue really. This seems to be a general word that can be used to describe features and characteristics of all kinds. The top collocates for this word all appear in at least some of the other 特X words as well.

So, my question is (obviously), what's the difference between these words? Can some of them be used interchangeably? All these are very common, but can someone perhaps comment on the difference between them?

文化的特X
個人的特X
產品的特X
語言的特X
時代的特X

Are there situations where you have to use a specific word (or where it's extremely common at least)? Are there any other rules or patterns to how these words are used?

This question became very long indeed, but it's also quite complex and I wanted to make sure I included what I've come up with so far. Please feel free to add/edit things I've overlooked.

The words can be differentiated as follows:

特色 - style (abstract)
特点[點] - unique point (general)
特征[徵] - feature (of a person or a product)
特质[質] - quality (of a product or a person)
特性 - property (abstract)

These are usually non-interchangeable if you are specific about what you are saying or writing. An example statement combining all the above would be:

  这台相机有许多特征：它具有防水功能的特性，优良特质的防刮镜头，最主要的特点是它无需对焦就能让你拍出据有专业特色的照片。

  This camera has numerous features: it has a
  water-resistant property, excellent quality scratch
  resistant lens. The most important (unique) point is that it doesn't
  require focusing and can let you shoot photos with a professional style.

The most appropriate character for X that I can think of is:

文化特色 - (cultural style)
個人特徵 - (personal feature)
產品特質 - (product quality)
語言特性 - (language property)
時代的特點/徵 - (unique point or feature about an era, epoch or period of time)


How to say "oink!" in Mandarin in a family situation? This may not be on-topic for the next 4383 days, but hopefully today someone will help me out.

Last year was the year of the dog, and a common way to write (in English) the Chinese version of what dogs say is wang! wang!.

Today is the first day of the year of the pig. How would I write in English and say  what pigs say in Chinese?

I'm looking for something that could be polite and humorous in a family situation and generally recognized in Mandarin, if such a thing exists.

Well, the porcine vocabulary comprises at least 3 sounds. How one may represent them is a matter of choice. To date, no exhaustive linguistic studies, to my knowledge, exist.
'oink' is phonetically interesting, because the sound is produced by inhaling. To mimic the 嗷嗷 grunt adequately, one should also inhale.

grunt: 嗷嗷，呼噜噜
squeal: 吱儿吱儿
oink(somewhere between grunt and squeal): 哼哼, 耶耶

当然，不同地方的猪叫声是不一样的， 因为各个地方的方言不一样。
东北的猪叫声听起来和广东的不一样。


Who can explain me how to use "就"? It seems 就 is a very frequently used word. I'm just confused about its use. Anyone can help to explain how to use it?

就

means emphasize,can translate as "just", for example, "我就是不想去"(I just don't want to go!), used mostly.
means under some condition, once, for example ,"我一吃海鲜就想吐"(I will get a sick once I eat seafood.), used frequencely.
means relying on or with, for example, "就着菜吃饭"(Eating rice with a dish.)
means successful ,like "一蹴而就"(Success at once.), rarely used.

That's all I understood for experience.


meaning of 都 in 从小就好爱看国外都明星街拍！ I found a sentence in an article that says,
"不知道大家是不是和我一样，从小就好爱看国外都明星街拍！"
I understand all the meaning of the sentence but can't understand what part 都 plays in the sentence. Any help will be useful.
Thank you!

都 is in wrong position in your sentence.
"不知道大家是不是都和我一样，从小就好爱看国外明星街拍！" is correct.
or
"不知道大家是不是和我一样，从小就好爱看国外(的)明星街拍！" is also correct.
国外都明星街拍 doesn't make sense.


What do these four phrases mean in English? I infer from context that the red and beigey-yellow curves are labelled to the effect of "Confirmed" and "Suspected*" respectively. Can someone confirm this and also translate the main heading and the tag for blue curves?

These are from this web site, but will not auto-translate as they are apparently rendered as images instead of text ideograms.

Here is the OCR & translation, with thanks to user3306356 for pointing me at the Chinese OCR


What is the meaning of "拜了个拜"？ I heard this phrase from some Chinese-speaking stranger. I assume it's related to farewell since the stranger was waving hand to someone else, but what does it mean exactly? Is there a certain context in which this phrase is used?

Also, is this a dialect? It looks different from the Chinese I have learnt.

拜了个拜 derives from 拜拜 by treating the first 拜 as a verb and the second 拜 as the object of the first 拜 and then adopting the verb+(quantity)个+object pattern.

拜拜 is just a loan word from English bye-bye and mean the same thing.

拜了个拜 is just a novel usage of the word.


Never mind in Chinese I ask someone a question, but then realize I already know the answer.  In English, I'd say: "Oh wait, never mind."  What's 口语 for "never mind" in this context?

Such as  :

  不用了。

or

  算了。

or

  别管了。


How to say "用斜杠包围逗号" in english? Is this sentence "encircle the comma using slash" right?
Actually, I want to figure out this situation \,\
I doubt the word 'encircle' is not accurate.

Yes, the meaning you guessed is correct. Maybe it is best to translate  it as: Put the comma between slashes.


Chinese [Topolectical] IPA Placeholder: Ẓ I've asked this elsewhere before but without much luck so I'm just gonna paste what I wrote before:
I ran across "Ẓ" use some what in some old texts used as a sort-of "IPA"
then to make sure I wasn't crazy I did a little googling and found:
http://sinoglot.com/wu/2009/09/i-vs-z/
[this]
which usage is not quite the same but at least it is an instance of the "Ẓ" being used as a sort of ipa symbol in Chinese
but my question to you is:
is there a difference between "Ẓ" and "ẓ"?
At least aesthetically a lowercase 'emphatic z' looks better when it is surrounded by everything else that is also - lowercase... but the texts I have are specifically using a capitalized 'emphatic z' so I was just wondering, ya'know...
edit:
So it's not really an IPA but just a place holder for IPA [z] - but that doesn't really change my question all that much.
is there a reason for using this Ẓ?
is there a difference between "Ẓ" and "ẓ"?

It's quite clear that there is no difference between "Ẓ" and "ẓ" in the 1987 成都话方言词典 as you have shown. If you look at page 26 of the dictionary, you can see everything that starts with "ẓ" in the particular Chengdu Pinyin system that they have, listed from ẓán to ẓùn.

Really then, this is a typographical question. Looking at the page, you see that there's plenty of typographical variation, with severe difficulties aligning the underdot of the ẓ below the line. Occasionally, this stretches the verticality of the ẓ character, e.g. in ẓóng,  making it appear a little like a majuscule character where it should be a normal miniscule.

On a more linguistic level, "ẓ" in this Chengdu Pinyin system corresponds with "r" in the Sichuan Dialect Dictionary 四川方言词典, also published in 1987, although both correspond to   the phoneme /z/. Note that "z" is the romanised version of /ts/ in both, as it is in standard 汉语拼音 too.

Incidentally, Sichuanese does exhibit the phenomenon of 儿化 érhuà, independently of this phoneme (see 桡片儿 ẓáo pěr in the dictionary). The 成都话方言词典 Chengdu Dialect Dictionary treats them as separate phonemes which happen to be in complementary distribution, whilst the 四川方言词典 Sichuan Dialect Dictionary treats them like 汉语拼音 Hanyu Pinyin does, as realisations of a single /r/ phoneme.


Is there any compilation/resources/dictionaries on the transformations of how simplified characters came to be? I had the same question as the OP of What is the story or reason of how 龙 came from 龍? and I like visuals given by Stan. The hardest part for me in Chinese is remembering the strokes of these simplified characters that came from traditional characters that don't seem very alike. Is there a website/book that explicitly deals with this?

Traditional Chinese refers to Chinese characters that does not contain newly created characters or character substitutions performed after 1946. After new China was founded in 1949, entered a new phase in simplified Chinese characters, simplified characters adapted to early literacy movement. So, Chinese simplified largely promoted the rapid growth of the national. But the policy problem, Taiwan still use traditional Chinese. How to simplified characters came to be? I can recommend the book.

You also can check our Chinese character study card.

You can find more study cards in https://www.pinterest.com/studychinese/learn-chinese-characters-with-hanbridge-mandarin/


了 as "perfect" aspect vs 了 as "actual" aspect theory Couple of times in my research on Verb+了aspect, I've stumbled across really interesting nonstandard ideas about what this particle really means. Only one theory strikes some notes in my mind. Namely it is a theory that 了 is not a perfect aspect marker (there is a GROUP of perfect aspects one of them is 了)  but rather an "actuality" ("reality or existential") aspect marker.
Can anyone suggest some reading about 了 from "actual\existential\realization" stand point of view? Thanks.
Please, don't talk about "sentence final 了". This problem is solved for me. I'm intereted only in verb+了.

Ok. I think I need to elaborate on the difference between "perfect" and "actual".
You can negate perfect aspect of a verb in question. But you can't nagate a verb once you make it "actual" by adding 了 to it.

For example:

我吃了饭了, 但是没吃了完. - "I have eaten, but haven't eaten."

It  is absurd. You can't just negate something you just made "real"!! (by stressing it's actuality, the thing took place in reality)
But you can nagate perfect aspect (完) of the verb.

我吃了饭了, 但是没吃完 - "I've eaten, but didn't finish!".

This is ok, sicne in the second case we negate the 完 part (perfect aspect) and not the 吃了 part (actuality aspect, the stressing that "eating" really took place).
P.S. I have forgotten one more name for the 了 - 'actuallity aspect". 了 is used whenever the "thing" actually was or 100% will take place.
P.S.S.
Some papers I've gathered in my research:

"Aspect in Mandarin Chinese: A Corpus-based Study" by Richard Xiao,Tony  McEnery (chapter 4.1.4)
"The Influence of Worldview on Second Language Acquisition: A Study of Native English Speakers Acquiringthe Chinese Aspect Marker -Le." by Yang Li-qiong
"Corpus-Based Contrastive Studies of English and Chinese" by  Tony McEnery,Richard Xiao (page 11-12 and so on)
"Lecture 17: Existential Sentences in Chinese: Syntax and Semantics" by Barbara H. Partee

Answering your new edited question.  Your first reference, "Aspect in Mandarin Chinese: A Corpus-based Study" by Richard Xiao,Tony McEnery, indeed gives a novel fine-grained analysis of perfective particles in Mandarin.  But it is their own theory and so far as i can see more people cite it than expand on it. A list of 186 works citing it is given at https://scholar.google.com/scholar?oi=bibs&hl=en&cites=14017749010703840750&as_sdt=5

The issue here is grammaticalization.  If we want to say 了 has a purely grammatical role in the sentence 我吃了 then we obviously cannot just say that role is as a perfect aspect marker.  The word clearly does more than indicate perfect aspect.  So we must define some much more specific subdivision of perfect aspect like "actuality aspect."  But other grammarians prefer not to subdivide aspect that way, and rather say 了 has a lexical or pragmatic role in addition to its grammar.  There is a vast literature on this, and references in Michaelyus answer are one good way into it.


Is the first stroke of "啟" 点 or 撇 or 横？ The above images seem to indicate different answers.

Under which regional standard are you studying your characters? That'll be your answer.

  Note: 橫 is a 隸書 style, and no region really writes it like that. You'll see Japanese people write 戶 with a 橫 instead, and that's where the influence comes from.


What does 是 mean in 因为比读书有趣味的事情实在是太多了? In the following sentence:

  在我的心目中，一个好的作家是长生不死的，他的肉体当然也和常人一样，迟早要化为泥土，但他的精神却会因为他的作品的流传而永垂不朽。在今天这种人人都想致富的社会里，说这样的话显然是不合时宜 —————— 因为比读书有趣味的事情实在是太多了。

Looking at the Pleco, I found the following:

  [pronounced with stress, indicating certainty]

Is this usage of 是 to indicate certainty of the sentence, indicating it is certain that "there are more interesting things than reading"?

Or is it another usage of 是, and in that case what the 是 works for in the sentence?

Actually, I think 实在是 hangs together. Your 是 I would interpret as 'those are'.

1因为     2比          3读书     4有趣味的事情 5实在 6是          7太多了。
1because 2compared to 3read-books 4have-fun-things  5really     6those are  7very many

You could rewrite this:

因为有很多事情实在是比读书有趣多了。or 因为有很多事情比读书有趣多了。

在我的心目中，
To my mind,
一个好的作家是长生不死的，
a good author is immortal,
他的肉体当然也和常人一样，
his body, of course, is the same as normal people's,
迟早要化为泥土，
sooner or later, it will become dust,
但他的精神却会因为他的作品的流传而永垂不朽。
but his spirit, because his works are circulated, will not be forgotten and will be immortal.
在今天这种人人都想致富的社会里，
In today's world full of people seeking only wealth,
说这样的话显然是不合时宜
saying such words is evidently unfashionable,
因为比读书有趣味的事情实在是太多了。
because compared to reading books there are many other things which are more fun.


How would we more accurately translate 那胸前凸起的完美弧度 (published translation: "perfect curve of the convex in front of her chest")? Reddit's /r/MenWritingWomen laughed at this awful-sounding description of a female character's appearance (original translation):

  Her long and thin eyebrows, water-like eyes, tall and beautiful nose, pink and soft lips, perfect curve of the convex in front of her chest, and in addition, her snow-like white skin. It really made people’s heart bump loudly. Even if it was said that she was a descended fairy, it would be correct.

Particularly jarring is the use of "convex" to describe her breasts.  It was translated from the Chinese (so there's some translation problems):

  那修长的睫毛，那水润的眼眸，那高挺的琼鼻，那粉嫩的小嘴，那胸前凸起的完美弧度，再加上如雪一般的白皙肌肤，真的是美到让人砰砰心跳，说其是仙子下凡也不为过。

My own translation of this would be:

  Those slender eyelashes, those watery eyes, that tall nose, that pink tender small mouth, that bosom which protrudes like perfect arcs, and additionally with skin as white as snow. It really is beautiful enough to cause a person's heart to beat *peng peng* and say that she is a descended fairy.

I'm finding this tricky since 凸起 means "to protrude" and "convex", and the 的 indicates it's used as an adjective.  Maybe I'm adding a nice spin on this, and it really does say "convex".

Question: How would we more accurately translate 那胸前凸起的完美弧度?

(I reiterate, this question is about accurately translating this phrase, not making it sound nice.  What does it say? not What should it say?)

那修长的睫毛，
Those slender eyelashes,
那水润的眼眸，
those doe-like eyes,
那高挺的琼鼻，
that exquisite straight nose
那粉嫩的小嘴，
those tender pink lips,
那胸前凸起的完美弧度，
the perfect curve of her ample bosom,
再加上如雪一般的白皙肌肤，
also her snow-white skin,
真的是美到让人砰砰心跳，
really amount to beauty which makes my heart pound,
说其是仙子下凡也不为过。
it is not an overstatement to say, she really resembles an immortal descended to our world.

也不为过: not too much to say, not an overstatement

Must be a lady-boy from Bankok!


"Do what you can": Is 做可做的 natural? The title pretty much says it all. It makes sense to me, but Google gives "do it" when I plug the Chinese phrase into it. If 做可做的 sounds awkward or stilted, what would be a better way to express it?

做你能做的

or

做你可做的 sometimes means 'Do what you allowed'

and

做你力所能及的, Do what you are abled to


Accent on "dou1" (all) after a subject Let's take into consideration these examples:

Ta1 men dou1 bu4 xi3 huan1 wo3. They all dislike me.

Zhong1 guo2 de cheng2 shi4 dou1 hen3 da4. All the Chinese cities are big.

To my European brain "dou1" is a part of a subject. I see/ hear/ think:

Ta1 men dou1 --- bu4 xi3 huan1 --- wo3.

Zhong1 guo2 de --- cheng2 shi4 dou1 --- hen3 da4.

But when Chinese native speakers speak slowly, they never part sentences like this! For them "dou1" is a part of a verb... Which to me is extremely strange. They would say:

Ta1 men --- dou1 bu4 xi3 huan1 --- wo3.

Zhong1 guo2 [probably also "de" goes to "cheng2 shi4" here!] --- de cheng2 shi4 --- dou1 hen3 da4.

Is there an explainable reason of that? I can guess it has to do with another or archaic meaning/ use of "dou1".

Yes this is correct.

都 dōu is most commonly encountered as an adverb, and fits into the pre-verbal position shared by adverbs of manner (e.g. 慢慢 mànmàn). It has a stronger link in prosody to the verb than to the noun/pronoun before it, just as your Mandarin speaking friends have demonstrated.

It does also emphasise the subject, but its semantic value is different, close to English "even" than to "all", and it is still in pre-verbal position rather than than some kind of post-noun position (I don't think that really exists to be honest).

Chinese does have ways of putting "all" in the noun phrase: the use of 所有 suǒyǒu, and also the use of 全 quán to mean "whole, entire" which can be translated "all" in certain contexts. Note though that 都 is still present pre-verbally in such constructions.


Simplified Chinese font easily readable, suitable for documents and OK for commercial use? For the English alphabet there's a site, FontSquirrel, that provides great free fonts for commercial use, handpicked and tested. I haven't found anything similar for Chinese fonts, the only very good free font and commercial-use OK is Google Noto, but I'd need something more "traditional-looking", a type of font you'd find in school books. If there isn't anything good for free, I am also OK with purchasing something, but I haven't found online neither a store for Chinese fonts.

You may want to try WenQuanYi bitmap fonts.

http://wenq.org/en/


how “from” and “since” meanings originated for 自 I am going through the word: 自幼 zìyòu since childhood
自 zì self, oneself, from, since, naturally, surely; private, personal
Understand 自 originally a nose symbol.
how the meanings “from” and “since” evolved for zì? Etymology?

Understand 自 originally a nose symbol

When someone identifies himself, one of the most common gestures is pointing at his own face, and the most protruding part of the face is the nose, therefore, pointing at one's own nose represents 'oneself' (自己).
自 in the sense has the same meaning as 本 (origin, source). Your action came from yourself, your voice came from yourself, You see things from your point of view, therefore the extended meaning of 'from' was added to the character '自'


What does 冲 in 大老鼠冲着胆小先生嚷嚷 mean? 大老鼠冲着胆小先生嚷嚷

What does 冲 mean here? It comes before 着, so it's a verb.
I asked a Chinese person about this sentence, they said "这种文字没有然后意义阿". Why? And why to you this sentence does make sense?
It comes from: http://chinesereadingpractice.com/2020/05/08/chinese-childrens-stories-mr-coward/

冲着 in this case means towards. 'Toward' itself can be regarded as an action, even though it may not be in the literal sense of 'movement'.
冲 indeed generally means physically rush. However, in case of 冲着, it is never physical, but directional. Compared to 对着, 冲着 implies a sense of urgency and harshness.
A simple example:
我对他喊 vs 我冲他喊
Both means 'I shout to him'. The later can be used in scenarios such as calling for help or shouting angrily. The former is neutral by itself.
In your specific case, 大老鼠冲着胆小先生嚷嚷. 嚷嚷 is complaining/scolding/make a fuss. 冲着 here is used to emphasize the negativity of 嚷嚷.
Maybe the below example would help you understand why 冲 (physically rush) can convey a negative sense in conversation.
When we want to describe someone's way of talking to others is aggressive, we may say that they 说话(the way they talk)很(very)冲.
Rush is an action about advancing quickly and often with little regard of consequence or surrounding. It's not hard to connect the dots and figure out why it could be compared to aggressiveness


Is 上下 always interchangeable with 左右? Example sentence 1:

  他的汉语能力已经达到了HSK 11级左右的程度。

Example sentence 2:

  他貌似30岁上下年纪。

While 左右 sounds more natural (to me) in 1 and 上下 in 2, we can interchange them and the two sentences would still be correct and have the same meanings as before (tell me if I'm wrong). What dictates when to use 上下 and when to use 左右?

Mostly,上下 and 左右 have the same mean when you describe something.

When you describe something high or low(mostly abstract things,like level), you can use 左右,比如 他的水平很高，有十级左右了。Abstract things usually use 左右, like level, time(十分钟左右,how long is your own feel). And not say 十分钟上下.

When you describe something big or small,young or old(mostly you can tell by eyes) you can use 上下,比如，他看起来有十岁上下.But, you can also say, 他看起来十岁左右.

Usually, they are quite similar, just remember how people say and use in that way is ok.


Meaning of 踏破铁鞋无觅处，得来全不费功夫 I understand the overall meaning of this saying, but I don't understand the specific meaning of the characters 无觅处.  It literally would mean 'unsearched location,' which semantically doesn't make sense.  Can anyone explain the meaning of that bit?

It literally would mean 'unsearched location,'

The point is that 无 is used for 处 (place) here, not 觅 (seek). So 无觅处 should be parsed as 无|觅处, which literally means "there's no seeking place", i.e. there's not such place for seeking, semantically means "(something) can't be found at all (and you even don't know where to look for)".

If you parse it as 无觅|处, you'll get "unsearched location" which literally means 没有找的地方, which indicates that there're still places which could be sought; they're just not be sought by now.


If I forget how to write a character during the HSK, can I copy it from the supplied exam materials? Writing Chinese characters is difficult, but I can copy them easily enough.  Presumably, I won't be able to utilize my mobile phone, a dictionary, etc., during the HSK, but it seems there might still be one legitimate source where I could copy characters from: the exam materials themselves.

The reading and listening sections would contain a vast number of characters which I can read, but for which I haven't memorized how to write.

Question: If I forget how to write a character during the HSK, can I copy it from the supplied exam materials?

I'm interested if this is prohibited, or somehow thwarted by the examiners.

I remember when I was in middle school 语文 test, I forgot how to write a character, I jumped to following questions, then occasionally I found that character in question descrpition. That moment..., it is like I found Blackbeard's treasure.

I don't think it is cheating, it is a gift. No one would stop you to look at your exam paper and copy them.


How should you start a letter in Chinese? How should you start a letter in Chinese? More specifically, what's the difference between starters such as 尊敬的，亲爱的，and 敬爱的, and in which cases should you use which one?

写信的时候，“尊敬的”、”亲爱的“、与“敬爱的” 有什么分别？

Edit:
I do know that 尊 and 敬 both mean respect, and 亲 means love between friends or family.

"尊敬的": to your boss or leader (the person who has power and you are not familiar with)

"亲爱的": to your mother or lover, etc.

"敬爱的": the person who teach you, guide you, and also care about you or love you. (tutor, teacher, mentor, etc.)


Does 宝 have its own history separate from 寶? I was trying to figure out the characters for Sapporo, the Japanese beer, the other day and found:

  七宝

was one of the translations for it.

My initial reaction was to search 「七寶」 in my Japanese dictionary, which returned nothing(!); searching 「七宝」 though returned

  しっぽう, しちほう【七宝】

  noun

  the seven treasures (gold, silver, pearls, agate, crystal, coral, lapis lazuli)
  noun, の-adjective
  cloisonne ware (abbreviation) (see also: 七宝焼)

I figured Japanese would use 「寶」 over 「宝」.

Even in Hong Kong Sapporo is called 「七宝」 and not 「七寶」.

I don't really get it.

Does 「宝」 have its own history separate from 「寶」?

As Stan hinted at, 宝 is a Japanese Shinjitai character. It is also a simplified Chinese character, but that's coincidental.

Perhaps this fact isn't so well known, but PRC aren't the only ones that performed simplification to Chinese characters - it is merely the most well known and widespread. Japan attempted their own simplification process, but theirs was less extensive and less radical.

Therefore, to the uninitiated, it may seem that Japanese Kanji is identical to Traditional Chinese. But there are simplified forms that are not as simple as PRC's Simplified Chinese, e.g.

  廣: (Shinjitai: 広), (Simplifed Chinese: 广)

And those that have been simplified differently, e.g.:

  圓 (Shinjitai: 円), (Simplified Chinese: 圆)

And forms that happen to be the same; 宝 is an example but so are 台 and 国.

Although the two simplification systems happened independently, may simplified characters are based on cursive forms so it's no surprise that there are many characters that are the same between the two systems.


Where to put the adjective when asking for something that comes in multiple sizes? This morning in Taipei I went to buy a coffee.

I knew how to say 我要一杯咖啡 and I knew the word for big is 大.

But I didn't know where in the sentence to put the 大. Does it go before 杯 to mean "big cup"? Or if 杯 is a classifier rather than a noun here, I guess it can't take an adjective. Unless it can actually function as both noun and classifier at once?

Or alternatively would it go before 咖啡? That sounds odd when I back-translate literally into English "I want one cup of big coffee". But you can never trust literal translations to be idiomatic anyway.

I'm not a linguist, just a native speaker. My opinion is that 大 should go before 杯, i.e. 我要一大杯咖啡, since I have never heard anyone said 我要一杯大咖啡.

Words like 杯 are called 量词(sorry I don't know the exact term), and the adjectives about amount are always placed before 量词. For example,
一大碗饭= a bowl of a lot of rice， 一大把花= a bunch of many flowers.

Maybe this solution is not satisfying; sorry I can't explain it in detail. 量词 is actually quite sophisticated, and is often omitted when translated into English. I hope this article will help (well it's written in Chinese).


Establishing the difference between 综合, 结合 and 组合 So, I am trying to work out the difference in usage between 综合, 结合 and 组合. I have written out my current understanding of them based on internet searches. If anyone feels I got it wrong, it'd be great to hear from you.

综合 means to synthesise (in the sense of combine) and appears to be used when you are trying to get diverse objects to work harmoniously with each other, e.g. data, characteristics, good design/principles/patterns.

结合 means to combine/link, but seems to be used in much the same way as 综合, e.g. with text/graphics/data, integrating style/graphics. The only difference I can see is that maybe 综合 means to bring things together and in doing so, create something new, whereas 结合 might be more like combining something new into something which already exists??

组合 means to combine but not in an integrated way - they are just in the same place, e.g. Gordon's surname is Flint-Johnson, which is a combination of his father's and mother's surnames; this combination of flowers is very pretty; if people regularly combine a particular verb and noun, this is known as a collocation.

综合 can be adjective or verb

结合 is a verb

组合 can be verb or noun,

It is hard to compare the three when they are different types, therefore, we only look at them as verbs here.

综合 (+ objects) = to collect objects from different areas or categories into one unit. E.g. 综合各人的意見 = Sum up everyone's opinion
结合 (+ objects) = to combine/ merge individual objects into one unit. E.g. 结合两人的力量 = Combine the two people's power
组合 (+ objects) = to assemble parts into one unit. E.g. 棺材是用四塊半木版组合而成的，所以棺材又俗稱 '四塊半' = Coffin is assembled with four and a half wooden plates, so coffin is also commonly called 'four and a half'


Beauty is in the eye of the beholder Which of the following is better to use?  Or it depends on the context of the conversation?
美在旁觀者的眼睛
情人眼里出西施
So just to clarify, I am looking for something generic as close to as possible to the English version.  One that can be referred to any objects not just female.  I personally do not like this 情人眼里出西施 even if it is used in expression for a female.  Because I do not know who was 西施 or I agreed if I had seen her.  And it limited to 西施!

If using 西施, (as a general / traditional indication of physical beauty), is not comfortable to you, then you can say, 情人眼里出美人 or 美在情人眼.
BTW, 旁觀者 means "bystander", i.e., someone who is an "objective observer", whereas "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" denotes a "subjective assessment / opinion" by an involved beholder.
So, 美在旁觀者的眼睛, (which is unnecessarily verbose and awkward) could be "idiomized" to 美在情人眼.
However, if you are looking for a "generic" phrase that applies to both persons and objects of interest, then perhaps 美在各眼中？which takes away the narrower application to 情人 only.


Is it acceptable to omit 的 before a noun in degree complement, when the verb follows the noun? In the example sentence (according to Chinese grammar wiki):

你的菜做得很好。
你的字写得很漂亮。
你的中文说得很好。

In these cases, all use 的 before a noun, once it moves before the verb. The original sentence does not use 的 to modify the noun (e.g. 你做菜做得很好。).
But I feel I have also seen such sentences without 的 modification, for example:

你菜做得很好。
你字写得很漂亮。
你中文说得很好。

Or the sentence that made me determined to open this question:

凭着他的才能和经验，他在云南事情办得很顺利。

Maybe syllables are also taken in consideration here. 你中文说得很好 sounds more natural than the others, as those nouns are just one character.
So is it acceptable or not to omit 的 here? Or is it grammatically wrong but used commonly?

You cannot omit the possessive 的 in 你的菜, 你的字, 你的中文, if your comments are about 'your cooking', 'your writing' or 'your Chinese'

However, you can remove (not omit) '的' to change the topic from '你的~ (your~)' to '你 (you)'

  [你的菜 (topic)] [做得很好(comment)] - "your cooking is cooked very well"

  [你的字 (topic)] [写得很漂亮 (comment)] " your writing is written very beautifully"

  [你的中文 (topic)] [说得很好 (comment)] "Your Chinese is spoken very well"

  '你的菜', '你的字' and '你的中文' are the topics

~

  [你 (topic)] [菜做得很好 (comment)] - "you cook very well"

  [你 (topic)] [字写得很漂亮 (comment)] - "you write very beautifully"

  [你 (topic)] [中文说得很好 (comment)] - "you speak Chinese very well"

  '你' is the topics

~

  '你做得很好', '你写得很漂亮' and '你说得很好' are basic [subject + verb]  phrases


Has 朅 (qiè) ever been commonly used for 去 'to go' In Modern Standard Mandarin, the common word for the verb "to go" is 去, while in southwestern Mandarin, the same concept is expressed with 朅.

Has 朅 (qiè) ever been commonly used for 去 'to go' in the past or in other topolects?

I think this Zhihu post might be of help.

To sum up:

Not just southwest, many topolects, including even the good old Beijing dialect, read 去 along the lines of qie or khe.
The OP's quoted text used the character 朅, probably to distinguish it from the standard mandarin qu, but in fact it is just 去 but with a different sound.


時刻 (shíkè) vs 瞬間 (shùnjiān) vs 時候 (shíhòu) for "moment" As a beginner I'd like to learn the most useful word to express the equivalent to English “moment” meaning “a very brief period of time.”

I've found at least three Chinese words and would like to know the difference between them and which I should choose as the most common or important to add to a beginner's small vocabulary.

shùnjiān 瞬間
shíkè 時刻
shíhòu 時候

Of these, only 瞬間 is really equivalent to moment in the sense of a brief period of time.

瞬間 means "a very short period of time, an instant".
時刻 can either mean "the time (of the day)", e.g. 5pm, or "constantly" (typically as 時時刻刻).
時候 can mean "time" in the sense of e.g. it's time to go. Alternatively, it can refer to an unspecified period of time, e.g. 小時候 -> when I was little.

There's a great deal of words that mean "moment" in the sense you're looking for. Here are some of the more common ones: 轉眼 霎時 剎時 剎那 瞬息 片刻 頃刻 一時之間

It is acceptable/common to append -之間 to these (e.g. 轉眼之間/霎時之間) to express the sense of something "happening within a very short period". Additionally, the character 一 (one) can be prefixed to some (一轉眼/一剎那/一瞬間).


What is being said in this scene from Looper? I'm a user over at another Stack site, for Movies & TV. Someone posted a question there about the film Looper and a Chinese broadcast that is played for a few seconds during the film. We may be film buffs, but we've certainly been proven to be hopelessly unknowledgeable about about the Chinese language.

I'm hoping some of you good folks would be able to lend a hand with this and offer a translation. I'm aware this challenges the "what's on-topic" a little, as I haven't shown an attempt, but I'm hoping my reasons will allow it. The scene in question can be found here (it starts at right place):

There's a few lines of dialogue on the television about The Rainmaker, but that's all I can understand.

The dialog says: "随着神秘的Rainmaker在中西部的暴乱事件中继续他的帮派战争, ..."

My translation is : "As the mysterious Rainmaker continues his gang war in the Midwest, ..."


Is 會 an aspect marker? It is my understanding that Chinese does not employ tenses, but does rely on grammatical aspect in order to convey meaning.

I'm still trying to fully grasp what exactly an aspect is, but viewing the Wikipedia page for Chinese Grammar provides some clarity. This page provides examples such as 了, 過, 在, 正在, and 著. I'm unclear if this is strictly a complete list or not given the formal definition of grammatical aspect and how grammatical aspect operates in Chinese.

Similar to how 了 describes a completed action, my understanding is that 會 can be used to describe an action that hasn't begun but will happen afterwards. Would this also count as a grammatical aspect? Or something else? If so, are there any other aspect markers to add to Wikipedia's list?

Example:
每天我回家，然後我會學習中文。
Every day, I would go home, and then I would study Chinese.

會 is a modal verb.

From the classic Li & Thompson (1981) Mandarin Chinese: A Functional Reference Grammar:

  Most languages have morphemes for signaling the of a reported event relative to the time of speaking (tense) or the duration or completion of a reported event relative to other events (aspect)...

會 and 要 are on the other hand examples of the last portion of the T-A-M trinity for verb morphology: M for mood or modality. The standard moods in Western European verb morphology are: indicative, subjunctive, conditional and imperative. Other examples are optative, jussive, hortative, interrogative and volitional.

In Mandarin Chinese, 會 can act as an epistemic modal, i.e. with the idea of ways of knowing and confidence in the knowledge. These are of the same category as 可能 and 應該. As well as being like a "potential" mode, it is can act as a "conditional":

  她如果去看牙科就會遲到。

  Tā rúguǒ qù kàn yákē jiù huì chí dào.

  If she has gone to see the dentist, then she'll be late.

These words are definitely in a different category to the aspect particles 了、過、著, because 會 can be combined with them, under certain circumstances:

  他不會去了中國！

  Tā bù huì qù-le Zhōngguó!

  He can't have gone to China!

On the other hand, 要 is a deontic modal, expressing shades of obligation / permission, and is in the same category as 可以 and 得 (děi).

These are actually very similar to English will, which derived from the modal verb meaning "want" (compare its noun form e.g. God's will, the will of the people, which retains that older meaning), and English shall deriving from a modal verb meaning "should" or "ought to" (compare its German cognate sollen). The future tense meaning is naturally implied.

Also, there are restrictions for both languages on which modal can combine with which aspect marker. Only a select set of verbs can take both "future"-orientated modal markers and perfective 了 at the same time, e.g. 饒 ráo:

  你要饒了他嗎？

  Nǐ yào ráo-le tā ma?

  Are you going to spare/forgive him?

Nonetheless, perfective 了 and experiential 過 aspect markers can appear with the future-orientated modal 會 or others when occurring in a non-final event clause in a sequence:

  我會辭了行再動身。

  Wǒ huì cí-le xíng zài dòngshēn.

  I will say goodbye / take leave then get up and go.


What does "蕊屁" mean? At https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyNNvgW1dSg&lc=z13jt1khfxr4zzw0k225sjfzzyn1hhebs04, someone wrote:

  看完電影後整晚都在蕊屁OST

Another person wrote in reply:

  +1 瘋狂蕊批

What does "蕊屁" mean?

蕊屁==repeat, you can think it's a kind of transliteration.


What is the difference between “比照” and “比较”？ I started learning Chinese not too long ago but have come across these expressions (比照 and 比较) when comparing things. I am confused as to whether I'm using it correctly. Would anyone be able to help tell me what situations to use which term?

In oral, we all say "比较". 比照 is seldom used in oral. They are almost equal. You'd better learn sentences first. Examples:
通过比较/比照，旧手机更好用。

那款手机比较漂亮。You can't use 比照 here. Here, 比较 means more or pretty.


和这个白人女子, 在鸟不下蛋的地点. Hanging out in the middle of nowhere with this white girl Does anyone know if this colloquial phrase "鸟不下蛋的地点" is always taken as "middle of nowhere"?

Also I have started a fun sort of instagram account to try to learn how to write Chinese that I would speak - https://www.instagram.com/p/B2vXdnYFzTJ/

Does anyone know if this colloquial phrase "鸟不下蛋的地点" is always taken as "middle of nowhere"?

I think the answer is 'yes'. It's a figure of speech. It could be taken as a euphemism for "鸟不拉屎的地点", which is frequently used in informal speech.

Literally, 鸟不下蛋的地点 is the place where birds won't lay their eggs; 鸟不拉屎的地点 where birds won't defecate.


What does this character mean?  What does this mean: ?
It's in traditional form, because that is what appeared when I copied and pasted an emoji from Gmail into Gchat. I don't have a traditional dictionary, so I looked up what I figured should be the simplified version: 艹 on top of 领. Can anyone help me?

谢谢！

Is it 䕘 ?

《集韻》同苓。又良郢切，音領。草名

means
According to Jiyun, same as 苓. And pronounced as 良郢切, i.e. 領. (良郢切 means the combination of the initial consonant of 良 (liang) and the vowel of 郢 (ying), i.e. l + ing = ling. It's grass' name.
http://www.zdic.net/z/12/kx/4558.htm
And

苓
líng ㄌㄧㄥˊ
　1. 指“茯苓”。
　2. 古书上说的一种植物。
　3. 古同“零”，零落。

means

poria cocos
a kind of plant in ancient books
same as 零, withered and fallen


为什么“道友”被译作“fellow cultivators”？ 原作 《我被系统托管了》
译作 Seized by the System

“各位道友请了，本座刚刚渡劫失败，先来地球歇歇脚。”
"Greetings, fellow cultivators, I, the master, am just dropping by the
Earth to rest after I failed some of God’s tests."

Looked up cultivator, I just found this
I think it should be "fellow Taoism participators".

「道友」該釋爲「養道之友」，英語＂cultivate＂可翻譯成中文「養育」。

「道友」= "Fellows (友) who cultivate the way (養道)".

＂Cultivator＂也可翻譯成「耕田機」，因爲「耕田」在英文也可以叫＂cultivate＂，圖像由此意。


What's the difference between 入(root) and 人 (men) http://zhongwen.com/d/164/x74.htm

This character looks like 人 alot.

That website says that it's the character of roots descending into earth

I search for root in mgdb and can't find it.

I search for 入 and I found this
https://www.mdbg.net/chinese/dictionary?page=worddict&wdrst=0&wdqtm=0&wdqcham=1&wdqt=ru%0D%0A

What's the difference between 入and人?
They look almost the same to me. When inside other pics how do I know which one is which?

You can put them side by side on MDBG:

Where is the difference? Have a look:

You can see on the two circled parts that the right side of 入 actually slants a little to the left, where as 人 is generally left is left and right is right.


What is Chinese for CFD (Contract for Difference)? Is there a term for CFD (Contract for Difference in stock trading) in Chinese?
I googled it but could not find anything.

差价合约（Ccontract For Difference,CFD）

  差价合约是一种比较新兴的金融衍生工具，目前只在7个国家的证券交易所交易。投资者以某一个商品的价格进行买卖，而不涉及该商品实体的交易。差价合约的商品，理论上可以是所有有浮动价格的东西，包括有各国指数，外汇，期货，股票，贵重金属以及其他商品。

股指差价合约(Contract for Difference)
差價合約- 维基百科，自由的百科全书


What are these "riddle jokes"? In Chinese there are these jokes which are delivered as a small riddle followed by the answer. They are often used humorously, with the answer used as an insult. Here are some examples:

哑巴吃黄莲/有苦说不出
狗拿耗子/多管闲事
打灯笼捡粪/找死(屎)

Do they have a proper name? Where did they come from? Is there any regionality with these, or are they encountered across all Chinese languages?

歇后语
KEY

≪xiehouyu≫, witty folk simile (popular witty or humorous simile consisting of two parts, of which the second is the "punch line" and is often left unsaid because the listener is assumed to be familiar with it)

We have this in English as well:
•Make like a banana—and split
•Make like a tree—and leave
(Although I'm not sure what we call these in English)
A Chinese-English Dictionary

a two-part allegorical saying, of which the first part, always stated, is descriptive, while the second part, sometimes unstated, carries the message, e.g. 泥菩萨过河-自身难保 like a clay idol fording a river-hardly able to save oneself (let alone anyone else)

The Chinese Wikipedia entry for xiehouyu has a 粤语常见歇后语 and 客家话歇后语 sections - so while some xiehouyu certainly are regional - and every topolect has them -  the ones in dictionaries or that are "well known" will be understandable everywhere.


What's the difference between saying '我不比她差' and '我比她不差'? I have a question about making comparisons in Chinese.

What's the difference between saying '我不比她差' and '我比她不差'?

Judging from a native speaker point of view, use '我不比她差' only.
'我比她不差' doesn't make sense in Chinese, as no one uses '我比她'+ '不' + adjective.

When you want to say 'I am better than her', say '我比她好' instead of '我比她不差'
When using '我比她' + adjective, don't use '不' in front of the adjective; native people don't understand it and don't use it like that.

When you want to say 'I am not worst than her', say '我不比她差'.

More example: When you want to say 'I am taller than her', say '我比她高' instead of '我比她不矮'