Taiwanese Mandarin to Chinese Mandarin

[aerbeisi3]

And another one: using "有" in a sentence like this below, which seems to be uncommon in Beijing Mandarin:

你昨天有沒有看到他？

(Did you see him yesterday?)

Would anyone in Beijing say that

yes,it's a correct sentence, 有 equals to "have "which is in english.

[Long Zhiren]

And another one: using "有" in a sentence like this below, which seems to be uncommon in Beijing Mandarin:

That usage is common in Mandarin in Hunan and other interior areas. Taiwan's Mandarin is largely a melting pot of Mandarin from all areas of China--especially the formerly strong KMT areas like Hunan.

[hetkende]

Do any Mainland speakers say these?

--

question: "你吃完了沒？" "Are you finished eating?"

response: "還沒。"; "Not yet."

And these:

"找到了沒？"; "Have you found it (yet)?"

"他來了沒？"; "Is he here yet?"

"他走了沒?"; "Has he left (yet)?"/ "Is he still here?" (in a context in which someone wants "him" to leave quickly)

"好好笑！" meaning "It's funny!"

"好好吃！" meaning "It's delicious!"

"好好玩！" meaning "It's fun!"

[Mugi]

Some do, but they are intentionally mimicking Taiwanese, or unintentionally mimicking people that are intentionally mimicking Taiwanese!

[fireball9261]

Some of the previous posts seemed to indicate Taiwan's Mandarin pronounce differently from the mainland China's Mandarin especially in the areas of zhi, chi, shi, ri, zi, ci, si. Actually, the standard Mandarin is same on both sides. When people from Taiwan have trouble with zhi and zi or chi and ci or shi or si, it was due to the fact that they have the accent from the Taiwanese dialect. It is not that the teaching of the Mandarin was different. From what I understand, most mainland Chinese have their own local accents from their own dialects coloring their Mandarins. When I was in China in several cities, people knew I was from out of mainland China. I asked them how did they know? They told me because my Mandarin was too accurate and a little bit different from Beijing dialect -- I did not add "er" at the end of my words. Btw, Beijing dialect is not Mandarin either, and many people make the mistake of thinking the two are the same. Anyway, I don't have problems differentiate those pronunciations because I grew up in an environment where people speak less Taiwanese and more Mandarin.

Also, many of the terms mentioned in this thread are used in both Taiwan and mainland China. Some are more often than the others. Some are more popular long time ago, and people in mainland China no longer use them, but people in Taiwan still use them. A lot of terms are different from region to region. Some of the pronunciations are a bit different in Taiwan also, but that is very, very rare.

[Mugi]

Btw, Beijing dialect is not Mandarin either, and many people make the mistake of thinking the two are the same.

The first part of this sentence is wrong - Beijing dialect is most definitely Mandarin. But it isn't Modern Standard Mandarin, which is what many people mistake it for.

[rezaf]

i am a beginner and i study in shanghai.i think in comparison with beijing dialect taiwanese mandarin is easier to understand.

[fireball9261]

The first part of this sentence is wrong - Beijing dialect is most definitely Mandarin. But it isn't Modern Standard Mandarin, which is what many people mistake it for.

Sorry, I will clarify. From what I have read about the modern Mandarin, it was a construct from Beijing dialect/Mandarin and some other stuff. Since I am not a linguist, I do not know what are the other pronunciations were used.

Also, I am not quite sure about the relationship between Beijing dialect and older Mandarin. Could you elaborate?

[muyongshi]

Beijing dialect is most definitely Mandarin. But it isn't Modern Standard Mandarin, which is what many people mistake it for.

Actually you are wrong. Beijing dialect is NOT mandarin. Mandarin is a created language based of the northern dialectal group specifically the beijing dialect. So mandarin is definitely based off of and so has a very strong link to the Beijing dialect however the Beijing dialect is not classified at all as mandarin. The similarities are strong because mandarin is based off it.

[rezaf]

i have noticed that no one uses the mandarin accent that our teachers speak in the classroom. it means that no matter how hard we study mandarin, everyone can easily realize that we are not chinese.

[muyongshi]

Rezaf you are absolutely right! That is why I never get offended when I am told that my mandarin has a 川味 to it. I would rather speak closer to the locals than speak something that only exists in theory. But I make a point to "learn" both as there may come a day when I would wish to teach the language and in that case would prefer them to learn "appropriately" Okay so the real reason is so that my teachers don't get upset with me in class

[hetkende]

Do any Mainland speakers use "不太" like this?

"你想去嗎？"; "Do you want to go?"

"不太。"; "Not really."

[channamasala]

No...tudou is not a peanut in Taiwan, it's huasheng just like in China.

The main difference between the two excepting some basic vocabulary differences (it's not xihongshi for tomato, it's fanqie, and it's not boluo for pineapple, it's fengli...don't get me started on the different word for kiwi) is the accent.

"Duo shao qian?"

"Si si kuai-oh!"

"Si si kuai? Si si kuai shi shenme?"

"Si si kuai si senme? Si si si kuai-la!"

"Shi-si kuai haishi si-shi kuai ah?"

"Si si kuai!"

"Whatever here's a hundred."

I don't consider the "er" to be standard Chinese anymore, as the only place I hear it consistently used is northern China. Taiwan Shifen Daxue still teaches with textbooks that incorporate the "er" sound but nobody...nobody! - uses it.

[muyongshi]

I am so comfortable with the Taiwan accent because in many similarities it is very close to the Sichuanhua accent. Not Sichuanhua itself but if you used the accent to speak mandarin. And in terms of the words for tomato and pinapple and the such, all those are used in the mainland as well they are just not as common. And fengli I see a lot on the "fruit flavored" (pick any item) but in spoken its still boluo. So, still not many differences there.

[Mugi]

Actually you are wrong. Beijing dialect is NOT mandarin. Mandarin is a created language based of the northern dialectal group specifically the beijing dialect. So mandarin is definitely based off of and so has a very strong link to the Beijing dialect however the Beijing dialect is not classified at all as mandarin. The similarities are strong because mandarin is based off it.

Actually, it is you who is categorically wrong. Mandarin is the name in English given to a group of dialects which share certain common characteristics in terms of pronunciation, grammar and lexicon. Beijing dialect is a form of Mandarin. What you are describing is Modern Standard Chinese (MSC) [i mistakenly wrote Mandarin for Chinese in my last post - apologies], or 普通话. Mandarin = 北方话 and includes 普通话 as well as 北京话 and a myriad of other dialects, whose speakers together account for about 70% of the Chinese population. These dialects are for the greater part mutually intelligible. Beijing dialect is not the same as MSC, but it is Mandarin. Saying Beijing dialect is not Mandarin is like saying Australian (English) isn't English! (Although, I'm sure you could find some people who would agree with that latter statement! )

[Mugi]

No...tudou is not a peanut in Taiwan, it's huasheng just like in China.

While some people in Taiwan may use 花生 for peanut, and many more (if not most people) understand the term, 土豆 most certainly means "peanut" in Taiwan as is regular (most common) term for peanut.

"Si si kuai!"

14 or 40? The tones will tell you!

[Lu]

People use both huasheng and tudou for peanut, but in any case, in Taiwan tudou is peanut not potato whereas on the mainland it is potato not peanut.

Someone said something about the over-use of 有 here, that seems to come from Taiwanese, not so much from other dialects. Lots of 有 in Taiwanese, if it feels like a sentence is missing something, often adding a 有 (u7) will fix it.

bike is jiaotache instead of zixingche

trash is le4se4 instead of la1ji1 (Taiwanese is something else, I forgot now, will look it up, but definitely not le4se4)

[channamasala]

14 or 40? The tones will tell you!

No they won't, when it's an old lady in the day market with four teeth telling you and she's hoarse from shouting at passerby all morning "wo kuai ah! li mian zuo! wu kuai wu kuai wu kuai!"

Anyway old ladies don't use tones, don't you know?

It goes more like this:

"Si si kuai!"

"Shi2 si4 haishi si4 shi2?"

"Si si! Waiguoren hao qi guai oh!"

I've not seen "tu dou" for peanut once in my 1.5 years in Taiwan...nor heard it spoken as such. (I have heard 'tu dou' used for some other bean that I don't know the English name of, looked like a pulse of some sort.)

I know fanqie exists on the mainland but is rare enough that I never bothered with it. Fengli, you may well be right but I wasn't very good at Chinese - could sorta speak but barely write at all - when I lived on the mainland so only learned boluo and found it was all I needed.

To go back to another post: I don't know if "Ni chi bao le mei?" (In Taiwanese sounds more like "jia ba bu'ei?" is used on the Mainland, but locals in Taipei have told me it's a distinctly Taiwanese way of speaking. Whether that's true or their just speaking from national pride, I don't know. In Guizhou they'd ask "Ni chi fan le ma?" or "Yao de bei'ah?" (yao de = good, bei de = bad. Might have come from 'bao' and 'mei'...)

[channamasala]

I'm gonna do a little experiment tonight. I'm gonna go to the night market here in Jingmei (Taipei) and take note of everything - signs, boxes, anything - that has 'peanut' listed. I'll point to peanuts and ask proprietors how they say it in Chinese and in Taiwanese, pretending I don't know. I'll get some peanut shaved ice - I wanted some anyway - but order it as tu dou bing, not hua sheng bing. We'll see what I find out.

As for now, my pocket dictionary which focuses mostly on the Mandarin vocabulary used in Taiwan has 'huasheng' and the Made in Taiwan peanut butter in my fridge is "huasheng jiang".

[Lu]

In Taiwanese it's Li chiah pa boe meaning Ni chi bao [le mei], le mei is one word in Taiwanese. I did once hear a mainlander say Ni chiguole mei, close but not the same. I think Chinese wouldn't say chi bao in this situation, but rather chi or chi fan.

And Channamasala, nice to see you're back! Enjoy your peanut ice tonight!