Chinese is a group of languages spoken natively by the ethnic Han Chinese majority and many minority ethnic groups in China, as well as by various communities of the Chinese diaspora. Approximately 1.35 billion people, or 17% of the global population, speak a variety of Chinese as their first language.
Mandarin is the largest branch of the Sinitic languages. Mandarin varieties are spoken by 70 percent of all Chinese speakers over a large geographical area that stretches from Yunnan in the southwest to Xinjiang in the northwest and Heilongjiang in the northeast. Its spread is generally attributed to the greater ease of travel and communication in the North China Plain compared to the more mountainous south, combined with the relatively recent spread of Mandarin to frontier areas.
Taiwanese Hokkien, or simply Taiwanese, also known as Taiuanoe, Taigi, Taigu, Taiwanese Minnan, Hoklo and Holo, is a variety of the Hokkien language spoken natively by more than 70 percent of the population of Taiwan. It is spoken by a significant portion of those Taiwanese people who are descended from Hoklo immigrants of southern Fujian. It is one of the national languages of Taiwan.
The United States does not have an official language at the federal level, but the most commonly used language is English, which is the de facto national language. In addition, 32 U.S. states out of 50 and all five U.S. territories have declared English as an official language. The majority of the U.S. population (78%) speaks only English at home as of 2023, according to the American Community Survey (ACS) of the U.S. Census Bureau. The remainder of the population speaks many other languages at home, most notably Spanish. Asian languages such as Chinese, Tagalog, and Vietnamese are also widely spoken, in addition to the Indigenous languages of Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and native populations in the U.S. unincorporated territories. Many languages were brought into the United States during its earliest history from Europe, Africa, Asia, other parts of the Americas, and Oceania, with some of them developing into dialects, creole languages, and pidgin languages. American Sign Language (ASL) and Interlingua, an international auxiliary language, were created in the United States.
A lingua franca, also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, link language or language of wider communication (LWC), is a language systematically used to make communication possible between groups of people who do not share a native language or dialect, particularly when it is a third language that is distinct from both of the speakers' native languages.
Manglish is an informal form of Malaysian English with features of an English-based creole principally used in Malaysia. It is heavily influenced by the main languages of the country, Malay, Tamil, and varieties of Chinese. It is not one of the official languages spoken in Malaysia.
Dungan is a Sinitic language spoken primarily in the Chu Valley of southeastern Kazakhstan and northern Kyrgyzstan. It is the native language of the Dungan people, a Hui subgroup that fled Qing China in the 19th century. It evolved from the Central Plains Mandarin variety spoken in Gansu and Shaanxi. It is the only Sino-Tibetan language to be officially written in the Cyrillic script. In addition, the Dungan language contains loanwords and archaisms not found in other modern varieties of Mandarin.
Chengyu are a type of traditional Chinese idiomatic expressions, most of which consist of four Chinese characters. Chengyu were widely used in Literary Chinese and are still common in written vernacular Chinese writing and in the spoken language today. According to the most stringent definition, there are about 5,000 chengyu in the Chinese language, though some dictionaries list over 20,000. Chengyu are considered the collected wisdom of the Chinese culture, and contain the experiences, moral concepts, and admonishments from previous generations of Chinese speakers. Chengyu still play an important role in Chinese conversation and education. Chinese idioms are one of four types of formulaic expressions, which also include collocations, two-part allegorical sayings called xiehouyu, and proverbs.
Chinglish is slang for spoken or written English language that is either influenced by a Chinese language, or is poorly translated. In Hong Kong, Macau, Guangdong and Guangxi, the term "Chinglish" refers mainly to Cantonese-influenced English. This term is commonly applied to ungrammatical or nonsensical English in Chinese contexts, and may have pejorative or deprecating connotations. Other terms used to describe the phenomenon include "Chinese English", "China English", "Engrish" and "Sinicized English". The degree to which a Chinese variety of English exists or can be considered legitimate is still up for debate.
Cantonese is the traditional prestige variety of Yue Chinese, a Sinitic language belonging to the Sino-Tibetan language family, which has over 85 million native speakers. It originated in the city of Guangzhou and its surrounding Pearl River Delta. While the term Cantonese specifically refers to the prestige variety, in linguistics it has often been used to refer to the entire Yue subgroup of Chinese, including related but partially mutually intelligible varieties like Taishanese.
Chinese Pidgin English was a pidgin language lexically based on English, but influenced by a Chinese substratum. From the 17th to the 19th centuries, there was also Chinese Pidgin English spoken in Cantonese-speaking portions of China. Chinese Pidgin English is heavily influenced by a number of varieties of Chinese with variants arising among different provinces.
A contact sign language, or contact sign, is a variety or style of language that arises from contact between deaf individuals using a sign language and hearing individuals using an oral language. Contact languages also arise between different sign languages, although the term pidgin rather than contact sign is used to describe such phenomena.
Juba Arabic, also known since 2011 as South Sudanese Arabic, is a lingua franca spoken mainly in Equatoria Province in South Sudan, and derives its name from the South Sudanese capital, Juba. It is also spoken among communities of people from South Sudan living in towns in Sudan. The pidgin developed in the 19th century, among descendants of Sudanese soldiers, many of whom were recruited from southern Sudan. Residents of other large towns in South Sudan, notably Malakal and Wau, do not generally speak Juba Arabic, tending towards the use of Arabic closer to Sudanese Arabic, in addition to local languages. Reportedly, it is the most spoken language in South Sudan despite government attempts to discourage its use due to its association with past Arab rule.
The languages of Taiwan consist of several varieties of languages under the families of Austronesian languages and Sino-Tibetan languages. The Formosan languages, a geographically designated branch of Austronesian languages, have been spoken by the Taiwanese indigenous peoples for thousands of years. Owing to the wide internal variety of the Formosan languages, research on historical linguistics recognizes Taiwan as the Urheimat (homeland) of the whole Austronesian languages family. In the last 400 years, several waves of Han emigrations brought several different Sinitic languages into Taiwan. These languages include Taiwanese Hokkien, Hakka, and Mandarin, which have become the major languages spoken in present-day Taiwan.
Nagamese is an Assamese-lexified creole language. Depending on location, it has also been described and classified as an "extended pidgin" or "pidgincreole". Spoken natively by an estimated 4 million people in the Indian northeastern state of Nagaland, it developed primarily as a means of marketplace and trade communication. Despite the official language of the state being English, Nagamese functions as a lingua franca and is spoken by nearly all Nagaland inhabitants. It is also used in mass media as well as in official state-regulated domains, including news and radio stations, education and political and governmental spheres. Nagamese is classified as a creole as, despite it being spoken as an "extended pidgin" by the majority of speakers across Nagaland, it is also spoken as the native mother tongue of the Dimasa community in Nagaland's largest city, Dimapur.
Nigerian English, also known as Nigerian Standard English, is a variety of English spoken in Nigeria. Based on British and American English, the dialect contains various loanwords and collocations from the native languages of Nigeria, due to the need to express concepts specific to the cultures of ethnic groups in the nation.
Standard Singaporean Mandarin is the standard form of Singaporean Mandarin. It is used in all official Chinese media, including all television programs on Channel 8 and Channel U, various radio stations, as well as in Chinese lessons in all Singapore government schools. The written form of Chinese used in Singapore is also based on this standard. Standard Singaporean Mandarin is also the register of Mandarin used by the Chinese elites of Singapore and is easily distinguishable from the Colloquial Singaporean Mandarin spoken by the general populace.
Bonin English, or the Bonin Islands language, is an English-based creole of the Ogasawara Islands south of Japan with strong Japanese influence, to the extent that it has been called a mixture of English and Japanese.
Massachusett Pidgin or Massachusett Jargon was a contact pidgin or auxiliary language derived from the Massachusett language attested in the earliest colonial records up until the mid-eighteenth century. Little is known about the language, but it shared a much simplified grammatical system, with many features similar to the better attested Delaware Jargon spoken in the nearby Hudson and Delaware watersheds. It was mutually intelligible with the other Southern New England Algonquian languages.
