How to use 年份？

[philipbeckwith]

大家好！ Can someone tell me how to use 年份 in its most general sense(s)? How is it different than plain old 年? 

 

Thanks so much in advance!

[thelearninglearner]

I'm probably wrong, but I always thought it was like 点钟 and 分钟 but everyone just says 点and分. So I'm curious too 

[EnergyReaper]

I'm not sure but my rough idea is using 年 following numeric, like 2000年，那一年, etc.

When comparing 年份 with 年, I often thought about vintage of wine, e.g. 90年代的香港电影里经常听到有钱人说的一句台词"给我开一瓶82年的拉菲"，因为那是拉菲葡萄酒最好的年份之一。

[philipbeckwith]

Seems reasonable!

[Beelzebro]

年份 and 月份 are used to refer to specific years or months. Eg 我最喜歡的月份是8月，我最喜歡的年份是2007年. If you use 月 or 年 in these sentences it feels a bit weird. Similar for sentences like 一月是一年中最冷的月份.

[dangran]

In my opinion 月份 is something they should teach earlier in the study books. I had studied Chinese for several years when all of the sudden I noticed that all the locals are adding some weird 份 after the word 月. I remember it being absolutely confusing to me, considering how "basic" the word 'month' is. Until seeing Beelzebro's post and example above, I still couldn't have told what exactly is the difference between 年份 vs. 年 or 月份 vs . 月. I've just been treating them as the longer "two character forms" of 年 and 月, and as we know, sometimes in Chinese you need to say the longer form of the word to make the sentence balanced and less awkward. For example 种 vs. 种植。

 

农业生产的种、运输、销售都要平衡发展。<< awkward

农业生产的种植、运输、销售都要平衡发展。 << better

[Lu]

I only know 月份, never learned it formally, only in conversation, and in my head that means something like 'at some point during the month of X'. 二月份 -> in February, on a date that will be further specified at some point, or just during whatever period in February. I think that's what I'd do with 年份 as well, but EnergyReaper's and Beelzebro's explanations sound more useful.

[Demonic_Duck]

I don't think 月份 and 年份 are exactly equivalent in usage. The form  十一月份 is very common colloquially as an alternative to 十一月, but 2020 年份 is almost unheard of as an alternative to 2020 年.

[889]

Then there's the fine term 没[有]年份 for something that's not aged, like a repro antique or a fresh wine.

[realmayo]

41 minutes ago, Demonic_Duck said:

The form  十一月份 is very common colloquially as an alternative to 十一月,

 

I hear a faint "particular" in 份 but perhaps it's my imagination. As in, it's "this particular year", "that particular month". It's less necessary for 年 because there's only ever one 2020年 (though I imagine it could extent to e.g. wine vintage, as above), whereas 十一月 can of course be any November, or Novembers in general, as well as a particular November.

[dangran]

This is a great question actually, I've been thinking about it all day. Finally decided to approach a native speaker to explain it to me. Looks like what I wrote earlier isn't really relevant  He seems to be sure that he cannot hear any difference in 月and 月份。Both are equally "particular" or "not particular". 

 

But 年份 is trickier and not nearly as common  as  年。You cannot say 他是1987年份出生的。 You also cannot say 这件事情是2020年份发生的。Also wrong: 1999年份后我没有和他见过面。 See a pattern here? These all include NUMBERS. Apparently after saying the year in numbers, you can only use 年。Here are some native speaker -approved sentences where it is okay to say 年份:

 

我最喜欢的年份是1998年。

你说你6月份毕业，请问是什么年份呢?

请把你的出生年份告诉我。

越南战争发生在什么年份?

[889]

I'm too lazy to cut-n-paste, but not too lazy to look up 月份 and 年份 in Pleco, which pretty much confirms the discussion here.

[realmayo]

4 hours ago, dangran said:

Both are equally "particular" or "not particular". 

Maybe it's more that 月份 are being referred to as months qua months, rather then a time marker.

Cf. "Mondays are the worst day of the week" vs "Monday is the worst day of the week"?

[889]

Pleco doesn't show it, but a quick Google search produced several examples of 周份, as in 本周份.

 

Any other time words that can take it?

[EnergyReaper]

8 hours ago, dangran said:

Apparently after saying the year in numbers, you can only use 年

I don't think it's absolute. I found this article, http://fashion.sina.com.cn/luxury/taste/wine/2017-10-29/0722/doc-ifymzqpq4032184.shtml.

It sounds to me as if it's better using number+年份 as adjective before wine especially without 的 between two parts, but I prefer to use 年 when using double-digit numbers, e.g. 95年赤霞珠干红葡萄酒 VS 1995年份赤霞珠干红葡萄酒, and this's just a rhythm choose personally.

[Dawei3]

On 11/12/2020 at 12:04 PM, dangran said:

He seems to be sure that he cannot hear any difference in 月and 月份。Both are equally "particular" or "not particular". 

Native speakers aren't always aware of the subtleties between words.  We just know when to use them.  Sometimes people will say the meaning is the same, but in actual speech they use them differently. 

 

I've sometimes been stymied when trying to explain the differences between English words to native Chinese speakers.  I suggest checking with a few others (and see my caveat below).  

 

My understanding is that 月 is used with a specific date.  三月五号。  月份 is used for the month, 三月份 without a specific day.  我要三月份去中国·.  versus 我要三月五号去中国。This fits with Dangran's example 你说你6月份毕业 and Lu's comment that 月份 is in the month of.  

 

I'm glad to be proved wrong (ok -maybe not 哈哈 - but I do want to know if what I've been told is incorrect).  I can't comment on 年 versus 年份 because I don't remember seeing or hearing the latter.  

 

 

I was about to post the above and I found this discussion:  https://forum.wordreference.com/threads/月-月份-in-month-names.1410353/  To me, it remains confusing.  When reading the Q&A, I started to think "this makes sense", until I read follow up comments that confused me.  It sounds like there are many nuances.  It appears what I wrote above is generally correct, but that in casual speech the 份 made be dropped. 

 

Years ago, a Chinese friend noted that sometimes the 2-character equivalent is chosen over the 1-character equivalent word to make a "sentence sound balanced."  At that time, my Chinese was too weak to understand their perspective. I lost touch with that individual, so I can't ask for further clarification.   It may be that in some cases, native speakers feel 月份 or  月 feels more "balanced" in a sentence (but this could be wrong....).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[dangran]

8 minutes ago, Dawei3 said:

Native speakers aren't always aware of the subtleties between words.  We just know when to use them.  Sometimes people will say the meaning is the same, but in actual speech they use them differently. 

 

You are absolutely right about this. Keeping this is mind, I tried to push him even harder to think of ANY subtle differences, but he couldn't come up with anything. So my conclusion was: in reality there might be some different nuances, and probably is, but because they seem to be so subtle, I can just treat 月 and 月份 as exactly the same with a pure conscience.  

 

16 minutes ago, Dawei3 said:

Years ago, a Chinese friend noted that sometimes the 2-character equivalent is chosen over the 1-character equivalent word to make a "sentence sound balanced."  At that time, my Chinese was too weak to understand their perspective. I lost touch with that individual, so I can't ask for further clarification.   It may be that in some cases, native speakers feel 月份 or  月 feels more "balanced" in a sentence (but this could be wrong....).  

 

Yes! I tried to explain this very same concept a few posts earlier, but you said it better than me   I understand your meaning very well. 

 

On 11/12/2020 at 8:57 AM, dangran said:

I've just been treating them as the longer "two character forms" of 年 and 月, and as we know, sometimes in Chinese you need to say the longer form of the word to make the sentence balanced and less awkward.

 

[889]

That's absolutely correct. There's a certain rhythm to naturally spoken Chinese and the proper mix of one-two-three syllable words in the proper order produces that rhythm.

[realmayo]

I wondered about that, but then tried and failed to work out whether 十一 月 and 十二 月  would sound better/worse with a 份 compared with the single-syllabic 1-10 月s.