Yesterday, Girl and I were discussing whether China has one main language or many. Here is a map that shows what a linguistically diverse place China is.
China has 56 nationalities,but 55 is minority nationalities, the main one is the Han nationality. maybe the language you said is the minority nationality language. but they are actually just dialect. based on mandarin...anyway, at least cantonesase is based on mandarin.
As the map shows, both Mandarin and Cantonese (in the map, it's called "southern") are Sino-Tibetan languages. That is to say, they belong to the same language family and share many aspects. Certainly Mandarin is the dominant language, but to say that one is based on the other is like saying that my brother is based on me. It makes no sense.
By the way, this map is very simplified. Best estimates show that there are well over 200 languages used in China. Yes, they are minority languages, but many are not dialects of Mandarin any more than English is a dialect of French. They come from completely different language families. The languages spoken in the far east of Xingiang province, for example, are much closer to Turkish than Mandarin. One of these languages, Khazak, is spoken by over one million people in China, only 15% of whom can use Mandarin.
The idea that these are only dialects is Chinese government propaganda. It is false and is a political tool used to control and suppress independence movements. Don't believe it.
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China has 56 nationalities,but 55 is minority nationalities, the main one is the Han nationality. maybe the language you said is the minority nationality language. but they are actually just dialect. based on mandarin...anyway, at least cantonesase is based on mandarin.
As the map shows, both Mandarin and Cantonese (in the map, it's called "southern") are Sino-Tibetan languages. That is to say, they belong to the same language family and share many aspects. Certainly Mandarin is the dominant language, but to say that one is based on the other is like saying that my brother is based on me. It makes no sense.
By the way, this map is very simplified. Best estimates show that there are well over 200 languages used in China. Yes, they are minority languages, but many are not dialects of Mandarin any more than English is a dialect of French. They come from completely different language families. The languages spoken in the far east of Xingiang province, for example, are much closer to Turkish than Mandarin. One of these languages, Khazak, is spoken by over one million people in China, only 15% of whom can use Mandarin.
The idea that these are only dialects is Chinese government propaganda. It is false and is a political tool used to control and suppress independence movements. Don't believe it.
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