Cantonese or Mandarin?

[PHiuR]

i like cantonese its... 'cooler' but it defintily sounds more 'rough and rude' like when my friends come over who dont understand cantonese think that my mom is always upset or mad at me or something... its funny tho : )

 

[prontospyder]

Mandarin

In China (except for Hong Kong), they use simplified Chinese characters while Chinese people outside of China use traditional Chinese characters. I remembered my HS Chinese teacher teaching us simplified Chinese while all the Chinese newspapers/books in Southern California were using traditional characters. Well, she got relieved from that job after 1 year.

 

[kt]

Originally posted by: Semidevil
mandarin is more used(I think), but cantonese has all the slang and trash talk.

Yeah, Cantonese has the best slang and trash talk. I spew my guts out whenever I watch a HK movie and the translator does a direct word for word translation of slangs and trash talks to English instead of the intended meaning.

But, yeah.. Mandarin is the official education language. If you go to school that is all you learn. The rest are just dialects.

 

[kt]

Originally posted by: Pepsei
Okay... I think Mandarin can be taught is because of the phonic symbols for the written Chinese is used. Just like there are two type of phonic system for English. If you look at an English dictionary..you can see that they are two type of phonic for (American English and er English English) One can learn to speak with an English accent that way.

I don't think there's a phonic system for Cantonese...so it's hard to teach that in school. You have to pick that up from talking to people who speak the same language.

 

[HamSupLo]

cantonese is cooler, but the drawback is that there are no classes in cantonese. just the mandarin people keeping us down! i know deep down, the mandarin speaking envy the Cantonese cuz they ain't as cool, but hey that life! 🙂

 

[andylawcc]

Mandarin is more popular BY FAR.....

personally I think all HK have to learn Mandarin, but oh well, we all are spoil childs, right? 🙂


also, Taiwanese the language is very different from Mandarin, and not many Taiwanese People speak Taiwanese the language.


and Cantonese has WAYYYYYYYYY more swear words 🙂
imo, I think it has the most variety of swear words compare to any other language.

 

[Alphathree33]

It is interesting to note that, in my experience, most of the people our age (when I say 'our' I mean teens and 20s) who immigrated from China are from Hong Kong and speak cantonese.

If you're looking to speak Chinese in North America, I would recommend Cantonese. It's really funny when someone who's mandarin stumbles on a group of cantonese people. "Oh, she doesn't understand... she's mandarin... (strange looks follow)"

I believe Cantonese is also more widely spoken in business, but I could be entirely wrong and have no personal experience in this area.

Plus if you ask me, Cantonese sounds better. 🙂

 

[PsychoAndy]

Cantonese is more prevalent around older people/regions, such as Boston and NYC, off the top of my head. But FOBs, Mainland China, and people in Cali, or so I assume, speak Mandarin. Of course, there are some that speak the opposite, and some who speak both, but those are majorities.

I wonder how many people in this thread are gwey loh.

 

[gopunk]

Originally posted by: jooksing
cantonese is cooler, but the drawback is that there are no classes in cantonese. just the mandarin people keeping us down! i know deep down, the mandarin speaking envy the Cantonese cuz they ain't as cool, but hey that life! 🙂

that's right, get back down you dirty cantonese! 😀 actually i'm half cantonese.

 

[Moonbeam]

Putongua is the official language of China. Most immigtants to the US and many other places speak Cantonese. I prefer the sound of Manderin, the official language, but Cantonese is more useful in the Sbay Area. Nei ho ma?

 

[wiredspider]

I can only speak Cantonese, don't understand a word of Mandarin. I can't write or read in Chinese, anyone else like me?

 

[Aquaman]

It's all about Toisan dude 😉

Cheers,
Aquaman <<<<<<<<< can understand Cantonese 😀

 

[Angrymarshmello]

Mandarin is more popular, cantonese is a distant second. And not all cantonese speaking people can understand Mandarin, and/or vice versa.

 

[AndyHui]

Originally posted by: Aquaman
It's all about Toisan dude 😉

Cheers,
Aquaman <<<<<<<<< can understand Cantonese 😀

Bahaha...my dad's native language is ToiSan as opposed to Cantonese.

Mandarin, or PuTongHua, is the official national language. In terms of the number of people speaking it, it far outstrips every other language on earth.

Cantonese is a much more "cooler" language that is more flexible and has a far more "colourful" vocabulary.

Mandarin's PinYin makes it very easy for a learner, since it maps almost directly to English letters. There are only 4 tones.
Cantonese "pingyum" doesn't work nearly as well due to the way the dialect works. There are 9 "official" tones, and many more very subtle variations.

I speak Cantonese.

 

[PeeluckyDuckee]

I'm 100% chinese, and cantonese is my mother tongue. English is 2nd language (took ESL in elementary!). Can speak cantonese quite well, can recognize characters when I see them on karaokes and recognize enough to sing along 😀 But can't write much. Mandarin? If you speak slowly, I can piece together some recognisable words to form a few sentences.

I'm also an immigrant from Vietnam. Its kind of sad how a lot of us first generation Canadians/Americans have lost much of our ancestors knew or expect us to know. How many of us really follow the chinese calendar, the festivities, the religious beliefs, etc. ??

My sister is born here in Canada, and whenever she speaks, its 20% cantonese with 80% english 🙁 Sounds really pathetic.

Mandarin sounds more subtle and sounds more formal. Cantonese sounds like a couple of sticks to a tin can. I don't understand Vietnamese, so it sounds that way to me too.

Being chinese, I can hardly stand any of the "ghew lo" music at all, sounds like a bunch of mumbo jumbo with hardly any rthymic beat or following to it. Listen to those 70s and 80s cantonese classics and you'll know what I mean.

 

[Kaieye]

My talented wife( I am ABC) who is a Taiwanese born person can speak Taiwanese, Mandarin, Cantonese,English and a little Arabic...

But her driving and parking skills using a automobile sucks...

 

[spanky]

mandarin.

 

[0roo0roo]

cantonese sounds more harsh to me.. gutteral i guess(i'm cantonese btw)

manderin can sound ok, as long as it isn't too err tongue curling back of the throat beijing style..

not that you know what i'm talking about probably🙂

either way they both are written the same, go figure.

 

[brtspears2]

Cantonese by far. Seems to be more of em shoot em up gang bang Asian mob movies in Cantonese anyways.
<-- can listen to Cantonese, can speak enough to get by in a Dim Sum place

 

[bolido2000]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
cantonese sounds more harsh to me.. gutteral i guess(i'm cantonese btw)

manderin can sound ok, as long as it isn't too err tongue curling back of the throat beijing style..

not that you know what i'm talking about probably🙂

either way they both are written the same, go figure.

I thought they are not written the same? My cousin and aunt were bitching the other day because they couldn't understand "cantonese subtitles". They said that the characters were mapped phonetically rather than by the meaning. 😕

Yeah the curling tongue by beijinese (sp?) give me shivers sometimes. My taiwanese mandarin treats all "zge" the same 😉

 

[swai]

ok.. to sum up what people have said and to clear any confusion...

Mandarin is the official language both in China and Taiwan. From my experience, the vast majority of chinese people can speak mandarin (ie. can hold at least a simple conversation)

Cantonese and Taiwanese are chinese dialects.. spoken variants of chinese language... the written chinese language is the same everywhere, regardless of dialect

taiwanese = fukienese = dialect of Fujian province
cantonese = dialect of Canton (Guangdong) province

... and there are many more dialects...

 

[Aceshigh]

I like the way Cantonese sounds better. I have friends in Malaysia and Cantonese is popular among the Chinese there.

 

[WalkingDead]

Cantonese comes from the true original Chinese language. If you can read ancent Chinese literatures, historic records, poetry works and others works, the Cantonese sounds much smoother because those works were originally written for it. This has to do with invasions by the northern barbarians during and after the Song Dynasty. In that time there was a mass exodus of scholars and intellectuals from the northern part of China to the south.

The so call mandarin didn't existed until one of those barbarian tribe, the Mongol, took over Northern China and setup their capital in Beijing in the later part of the Song Dynasty. The Mandarin is based mostly on the local language of Beijing. The Mongols eventually conquered the whole China and made mandarin as the offical language. The 2 following dynasties (one of those is the Qing Dynasty which formed by another barbarian tribe: the Manchu) just did bother to change the offical language nor move to capital. So, historically speaking, mandarin is the language created by the barbarians.

 

[jlee75]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
cantonese sounds more harsh to me.. gutteral i guess(i'm cantonese btw)

manderin can sound ok, as long as it isn't too err tongue curling back of the throat beijing style..

not that you know what i'm talking about probably🙂

either way they both are written the same, go figure.

I know what you're talking about. The curling sound is mandarin spoken from Beijing. It's a Beijing accent I guess you would call it. Cantonese is a harsher sounding language. Ask most people and they think they're always shouting at each other. Mandarin is the more commonly spoken dialect of the Chinese language. You'll find alot more Mandarin speakers. For those of you that think otherwise... you're more likely in a certain area dominated by cantonese.

I'm taiwanese, american born. Speak Mandarin fluently, can understand most taiwanese and a little cantonese (mostly dim sum words 😛)

The majority of taiwanese parents wanted their children to learn Mandarin. I actually went to school on weekend for chinese.

 

[bcmind]

Originally posted by: bolido2000
In China is Mandarin. Outside I think is mandarin too.
Vancouver seems to have more cantonese/HK, but here in SoCal I think mandarin will take you further

Northern Cal are full of cantonese too...

and yeah Mandarin is like more popular language around the world cuz US school taught it.

IMO mandarin is easier to learn.

I'm cantonese tho 😉