Is this correct: "一个游戏有四个季度" I wanted to find out how to say a sports game has four quarters and the translation I received from Google was: "一个游戏有四个季度"

Certain sports games are split into 4 quarters rather than 2 halves and I want to express this, but I was interested in seeing "季度" used to mean quarter.

When I check Wiktionary there is no entry for 季度 but 季 says it is used to mean a quarter of a year or season.

Can 季度 also be used for other things that come in quarters?

No.

A quarter in a sports game is usually translated as 节. For example, fourth quarter is 第四节. The first and second quarters are collectively referred to as 上半场 and similarly, the third and fourth quarters are referred to as 下半场. A sports season is usually translated as 赛季．

季度, when tranlated into English, only refers to a quarter of a year, as you have noted.

I think the 季度 would be 制度（with the meaning of particular institution or system).

The meaning of sentence is "There are four rules in a game."


What is the meaning of 多米 in the music service? My friend often sends me links from the Duomi music service. Where does the name come from? 多米 seems to mean "a lot of rice" if I translate it directly.

My guess is that it comes from the musical scale DO-re-MI in English.  Googling didn’t turn up a standard way to transliterate this – someone used 豆, which may be closer to the English sound, but the more positive connotations of 多 might have led the person coining the name to opt for that instead.  Anyway, 豆米 sounds like some kind of Taiwanese dessert, not the right fit for a music website! :)

You don't care about 多米, it's just a special noun.

think about Youtube or Facebook and it's same to these noun.


How do you translate: she's very fancy Fancy as she dresses well, fashionable or is good decorating, etc.

fancy adj. not simple or ordinary 复杂的；花巧的；精致的(From "Oxford Elementary Learner's English-Chinese Dictionary, 4th Edition")
So the translation should be:
她打扮得很精致。
or
她穿着很华丽。

One of the results from Google Translate for fancy is 花俏
When a sentence isn't translated correctly, try to search each word alone and piece the meaning together from there

She is very fancy -->  她很看中 (here Google translated fancy as a verb and is obviously wrong)

Try:

She --> 她

is--> 是

very --> 非常

fancy --> 花俏(n); 优等/花式的 (adj)

Since fancy here is an adjective, you might think the translation would be 她是非常优等 or 她是非常花式的, However, 优等 or 花式的 is not an adjective for human. They are for objects or moments e.g. 优等鋼材 (High-grade steel), 花式跳水(fancy diving)

Meanwhile, 花俏 as an adjective means:

艳丽漂亮：打扮花俏｜爱用花俏的词语。 (Gorgeous and beautiful: dress up fancy | love to use fancy words.)

"She is very fancy" should be translated as "她(是)非常花俏(的)" or "她(是)很花俏"(的).
是 and 的 can be omitted


What is the meaning of 凝聚人心？ This text discusses 众筹， especially relating to a group of people buying houses.

用发起人的话说，众筹不是在筹房子，而是在凝聚人心。

2 questions really:

In 众筹不是在筹房子, the second ‘筹’, on its own, '筹' means what? Planning? Collecting? Finding?
‘凝聚人心’的意思是什么？ ‘bringing people together'?

众筹 --

众 means many people; crowd;

筹 means plan and prepare;

众筹 in the context means plan and gathering money from many people to buy a house.

‘凝聚人心’的意思是什么？ Bring the people's hearts together, so they can act as one unit and contribute together.

发起人initiator is trying to emphasize that more important thing than gathering money to buy a house is to bring the people's hearts together by doing so.

众筹：crowdfunding like Kickstarter
凝聚人心：将人们团结起来， bring people together


What is the difference between 省 and 省份? Two sentences "他也算是我省的名人" and "他也算是我省份的名人", is the second sentence wrong? If it is wrong, why?

IMO, it's OK.

PS: 省份 means province, but it can't be used with specific names. For example we can say 山东省, but not 山东省份.

Some examples: (from http://www.fantizi5.com/ciyuzaoju/zj23292.html)

1、辽宁是中国的一个省份。
2、有些工作地点遥远，在另一个省份。
3、并不奇怪的是，这些省份都位于中国较富裕的东部。
4、开始的时候，我向其他省份的亲戚朋友们询问，或者向他们传达我的信息。
5、但是，瓶颈已经出现了，一些省份报告说电力短缺，并且煤的库存量很低。
6、有些省份报道了用电短缺和煤炭低库存的现象。
7、在2004年总统选举中，该家族帮助她赢得了在这一省份的绝大多数选票。
8、在荷兰的12个省份中，每个省都会有一双特别设计的木屐鞋。
9、有报道说今年在沿海省份中因为劳动力短缺和工人要求提高工资，工资也大幅上升。
10、在中国的一些省份，其比例史无前例的达到了130比100。
11、我和妻子住在不同的省份。
12、中国政府压低了煤油和其他自然资源的价格，牺牲了内地出产这些资源的省份的利益，造福了使用这些资源的沿海出口商。
13、在收到卫生部的进一步信息之前，世卫组织将发布详情，以表格显示所有24例的发病日期、结果和省份。
14、在2007年，中国最北部的省份黑龙江报告了夏季干旱，这几乎是闻所未闻的事情，通常这时候是汛期。
15、其中许多城市位于远离北京和上海的欠发达的内陆省份。
16、在接下来的四天时间里我们要穿越五个省份，游历其中的三个。
17、在改革税制中，你们和下面的省份没有遇到任何比较强烈的对抗吗？
18、我们已呼吁其他省份的人们加入进来。
19、但是俄罗斯方面没有作出回应，并且一直在轰炸格鲁吉亚这个要求分离的省份周边的一些地区。

the 2nd one is right.

when they("省"and "省份") mean "province", you can  think they are  the same, otherwise not.For example, there can  be "省略"  but no  "省份略"


What's the function/meaning of 就不要 in 过去的事情就不要说了? 就要 normally means "about to" but in this sentence the negated form makes the sentence hard to translate.

过去的事情就不要说了 means it's not necessary to mention those things in the past. Or it's not deserve to mention the things in the past. It implies that just let it go because it is just meaningless/helpless to the current situation.

就 here is kinda like the word just. So, 就不要 here is kinda like just don't because there is no use.

You should comprehend 就不要 as 就 and 不要 in this case. 不要 is like "don't" in an imperative sentence. For example, 不要说话: don't speak! 就不要说话了 is kind of suggestion, meaning just don't say anything.

Another point is 过去的事情就不要说了 can be paraphrased as 就不要说过去的事情了. By pulling 过去的事情 ahead, it's like saying: things passed, so just don't mention it.

过去的事情就不要说了?

不要说了 means "don't talk about". 过去的事情 means "past stuff" or more idiomatically "the past". So 过去的事情不要说了 means "don't talk about the past/past events".

The 就 is a grammatical particle that doesn't really change the meaning of this sentence significantly. The translation of the 过去的事情就不要说了 (including the 就) would be the same as what I wrote above for the same sentence without the 就.

If you want to learn more about the uses of 就, there are many good articles and blog posts you can find on google.


Is there any compilation/resources/dictionaries on the transformations of how simplified characters came to be? I had the same question as the OP of What is the story or reason of how 龙 came from 龍? and I like visuals given by Stan. The hardest part for me in Chinese is remembering the strokes of these simplified characters that came from traditional characters that don't seem very alike. Is there a website/book that explicitly deals with this?

Traditional Chinese refers to Chinese characters that does not contain newly created characters or character substitutions performed after 1946. After new China was founded in 1949, entered a new phase in simplified Chinese characters, simplified characters adapted to early literacy movement. So, Chinese simplified largely promoted the rapid growth of the national. But the policy problem, Taiwan still use traditional Chinese. How to simplified characters came to be? I can recommend the book.

You also can check our Chinese character study card.

You can find more study cards in https://www.pinterest.com/studychinese/learn-chinese-characters-with-hanbridge-mandarin/

There is no specific rules about how they became simplified Chinese, there is a group of expert did that a few decades ago, the goal is to make it easier to write, and don't lose it's original shape a lot. There is actually even a easier version than the current simplified Chinese, but it lost the spirit of Chinese character, so they were abandoned.


transitive verb in Mandarin:外遇李小姐 Is 外遇 used correctly as a transitive verb in the following sentence?

王先生外遇李小姐。

When you use the word 外遇, it is a noun. It should be王先生有了外遇。外遇的对象是李小姐。
有了外遇 is the verb phrase for the noun 外遇. The 3rd person need to be mentioned in a separated sentence. In this way, you know who is the one betrayed the marriage and who is the 3rd person. And the 3rd person's marriage status is not mentioned, it can be anything.
Headlines sometimes tend to use super compact expressions, which are not common elsewhere. Like 或 means 可能， 拟 means 打算. Here I guess is the same thing, even though it is not common to say so, it saves space .

王先生外遇李小姐 and 王先生跟李小姐有外遇 have very similar meaning.
The meaning of 王先生外遇(了)李小姐 would be 王先生 who took the initiative to 外遇李小姐.


How do I say "I've got all his albums"? When talking about my favorite singer, how do I say "I've got all his albums"?
I thought it was "他的光盘我都有" but I don't think it's correct because I can't find any results for that on Google.

光盘 = Disk =

So that's a huge no-no.

唱片 is more of a old fashion way of saying album. So I personally recommend 专辑.

So the result would be: 他的专辑我都有。or 我有他所有的专辑。

我集全了他的（所有）专辑。

或者说，
他的（所有）专辑我都集齐了。


Can you combine sentence structures to denote an extremely short duration? So I learned recently that you can do two things in Chinese

repeat the verb (such as in 看看)
append 一下 to the verb to denote a shorter duration (in this case,
look for a moment).

I was just wondering, can you use both at once? For example, could I say "你看看一下我的书,好吗？" to, in this case, ask someone to look at my book for an extremely short period of time?

Short answer: no.

As you explained, 看看 and 看一下 have the same meaning, so use both of them does not make sense.

If you want to emphasize it's a very little bit time, you can say:
你看看我的书,好吗？就(只)看一下

normally I don't use repeated verb with 一下，not sure if it's legit but it does sound weird.

in that case. 看一下 would be sufficient.


去出回 Where is it appropriate to use each So these three have always threw me through a loop

去 - Qù - Means to go to a place
出 - Chū - Means to go out
回 - Huí - Means to go back

The only case I know to not use 去 (Qù) as a way of going somewhere is when saying your going home at which point you use 回 (Huí)

How can I identify a situation where each version of 'to go' is correct to use?

I don't understand. It seems you answered your own question.

Some example usage:

去学校 (go to school)，去公司 (go to the office; 去上班 go to work)，去旅行 (go on a vacation)，去法国 (go to france)

出门 (leave the building)，出去 (go out)，出来 (come out)，出国 (leave the country)

回家 (go back home)，回去 (go back)，回国 (go home [from abroad])，回公司 (return to the office)，回学校 (go back to the school)

去 is the "all purpose" word for "to go." The others are used for "specialized" cases.


When writing pin yin, should you use a question mark in sentences using "ma"? 你想吃饭吗？
   Ni xiang chi fan ma ?

Is it redundant to use ma and a question mark? Doesn't ma make it a question in of itself? I am unclear on the correct approach here.

For correctness, question marks are always required.

Are they redundant? Perhaps. If so, they are probably also redundant in English. (eg. "how are you." is clearly intended as a question even without the question mark)

"Ma" turns statements into questions. Think about "ma?" as being similar to "correct?" in English. (eg. "you like coffee, correct?")

In total, the “吗” is  one of usual question marks , you can see more words like

么 \ 什么  what do you want ？ （你想要什么）
嘛        shall we ?       ( 一起嘛？ ）
...

and some words in the beginning of sentence, like,

怎么  what happened ! (or use  WTF in some context )   怎么会这样？？！！ (with surprise)
难道  He's a student, isn't he?     难道他不是学生吗？？    (a little guess, but more sure for his statement)


Resources: Modern Chinese -> Classical Chinese (Dictionary/References/etc.) There's a similar question here:

what are some dictionaries about vocabulary of classical chinese?

but I think my question is a little different.

For instance if I want to find the classical equivalent of 您/你 what kind of resources are available (dictionary (hopefully!) /references/etc.) that would return: 汝?

Likewise, 我 would return something like 吾, etc.

A reverse classical-dictionary, is kind of what I'm looking for.

What options are available?

Well actually we also use "我" in classical Chinese.
For example: 《曹刿论战》：“齐师伐我。”
And as for 汝, it is not equivalent to 你/您.
Sometimes 君 is also used to refer to 你/您.
Therefore it's very hard to find such a dictionary that convert everything to classical Chinese and even if it exists it may not be correct.( And I guess there is no such a dictionary.)
You may try to read more classical Chinese articles to get familiar with the way people write or simply ask a Chinese to translate for you. There is no standard way of translation. It depends on how you manage your sentence in classical Chinese.
The most simple way is to find a sentence expressing the same thing as what you would like to say and pick out the words you want.
Even Chinese people study classical Chinese by reciting the passages first,so referencing to an existing passage is very important. Hope this can help you.

Maybe you should reference this website:
http://www.amazon.cn/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_3/477-3660655-0519157?__mk_zh_CN=亚马逊网站&url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=古汉语常用字字典&sprefix=古汉语%2Caps%2C248

It is just a book write in Chinese which was used for a reference when I was in school. Hope you can benefit from it.


How to translate "你给我滚" properly? In a sentence like:

“你给我拿一杯水” You would translate it something like: Get me a glass of water.

How is the "给我" in the sentence “你给我滚” supposed to be translated?

Should it just be "Get lost / Piss off" and just ignore the "给我" part?

Adding to Ciaocibai's answer:

"你给我滚" could be same to "给我滚" and then further reduced to "滚".

In both "你给我滚" and "给我滚", personally, I think the "给我" part is used to make emphasis on strong emotions, such as contempt or strong anger. It will therefore depends on the tune/context to translate it.

E.g. "给我滚一边去", can be used by a gangster head to someone else who is not important, to show his/her contempt and therefore show his/her superiority in the gang.

Or when a father is really angry at his son who commit a crime, he is furious and shouts out loud "给我滚!"

I think 给我 has a meaning of 'order' and 'command'. For example:

你们给我听好了... is usually used when a commander is giving orders to his soldiers (and they would never disobey or even doubt the content)


Where should I place 多 in large numbers? Where should I put the "多“ in large numbers?
I saw in one text
300多万人
but
10亿多人

They are different in meaning:

300多万人:

(>300)万, maybe 301万 or 310 万...

10亿多人:

(>10亿), maybe 10亿+10000 or 10亿+1000000...


Can 吧 be used right after every other verb to indicate that one can go ahead and do that? I know 你去吧 means that you can go ahead and leave the place where you are standing in. Thus I think 去吧 is also correct to cut off the word 你. Like instead of saying the meaning You can go, you just want to say yeah, go ahead.
Can 吧 be used right after every other verb to indicate that one can go ahead and do that? Such as:
吃吧 (to indicate that you can of course start eating, no need to wait or to be scared)
看吧 (to indicate that you can of course watch/look at something, it is allowed)
说吧 (to indicate that you can of course say something you wanted to say, it is not wrong)
坐吧 (to indicate that you can of course sit down, don't be afraid, do like your own house).

看吧 is more complex than your expression.
看吧 is often used on the context of showing "After all, What I did/told/spoke/said is right."
e.g.
看吧~~~往東邊才是對的。 (lengthen the sound of 吧)
看吧！就跟你說車子壞了。

I don't have a decent Chinese-English dictionary.  But if you can read Chinese, this dictionary definition addresses very well:

吧 /bɑ/
助词
1  用在句尾或句中停顿处，表示不同的语气。
用于陈述句，表示不很肯定
他大概已经走了吧 / 可以吧，先试试看。
用于祈使句，使语气委婉
你回去吧! / 别说了吧!
用于疑问句，缓和疑问语气
这笔是你的吧? / 会议结束了吧?
2  用在句中停顿处，使语气舒缓
他吧，身体不太好 / 你吧，就不用来了。
3  用在假设复句（常常是正反两种设想对举）前一分句的末尾，表示两难或犹豫
去吧，不好；不去吧，也不好。

Let's say 去吧 for example. Depending on how you use it,  it could be a milder imperative comparing to 去! Or it could express a kind of hesitation as in the example above (去吧，不好；不去吧，也不好。)


Techniques for improving listening comprehension under background noise conditions I have noticed that there is a big gap between my listening comprehension under ideal conditions (f.e. listening to a chinese movie/TV show/ChinesePod at my computer) and real-life listening comprehension (f.e. listening to friends at a loud chinese restaurant or sometimes just stuff like listening to a clarification question after I ordered milk tea at a noisy street).

I'm sure most Chinese learners face similar issues and I haven't come across any good strategy how to tackle this. Since I do not live in China I do not get enough input to use the "just listen more under non-ideal conditions"-strategy.

Do you have any suggestions/ideas?

Try your best.

Similar to any language that being "localised", it took "origin" speaker time to adapt in order to understand different slang. E.g. A GB English speaker will have a hard time following Australian English, New Jersey slang, Mississipi slang.

If you watch series from PRC, it is mostly Beijing slang. If you don't understand most of the words speaking by some Chinese, then you probably hearing some sort of dialect, e.g. Shang-hai-hua, Guang-dong-hua ,etc.

Let me answer that based on my experience as an English learner.
Just keep listening under ideal conditions. Don't worry about that. One day you'll surprise yourself being able to listen to Chinese in noisy background or even multi-tasking. The building of listening comprehension is extremely slow and imperceptible. You may need years of patience especially for a language with totally different phonetic system.
Most foreign language learners around the world don't even manage to do what you can do now. Good job and carry on!


Request for a 成语 to describe a person with all of 貌, 才, and 德 We can use 才貌双全 to describe a person with both 貌 and 才 and 德才兼备 to describe a person with both 才 and 德.

Does there exist a 成语 that describes a person with all of the three?

No, I don't think there is an idiom describing all of the three.

In Chinese, it is very common to use parallelisms, such as "他才貌兼具，德艺双馨".
I used little different terms from yours and parallelize them together to avoid literal duplication.

As a chinesse girl, if we meet a man with three of those at this time, we call him as 男神（just like 女神goddes,who are perfect）.

there is 才貌耀德 you can use it in writing, but don't use in oral Chinese.


How to translate 我知道大概是怎么回事？ 我知道大概是怎么回事，但是能不能有人给我详细解释一下？

I probably know what's going on, but can someone explain the details
to me?

感觉probably know what's going on不是很准确的翻译我知道大概是怎么回事,

我知道 - I know
大概是怎么回事 - roughly what happened
但是 but
能不能有人 can someone
给我详细解释一下？ detailedly explain it to me?

我知道大概是怎么回事，但是能不能有人给我详细解释一下？

I know roughly what happened, but can someone explain it in detail to me?

Agree with last two comments

The answer as offered actually is the best translation.

Just one more thing... In both English and Chinese, the speaker uses the verb know, but then continues to ask to explain. It reminds me that knowing and understanding can be two very different things in other verb centric languages. :)


Difference between learning Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese Hokkien for visiting Taiwan I'm planning on visiting Taiwan as a tourist for about one week next year. Both Wikipedia and Wikivoyage say that Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese Hokkien are common languages there.

What advantages and disadvantages do the two languages have? Is one language easier than the other for a lazy person who only wants to learn a few phrases? Are both of them tonal? How many sounds that don't exist in English are there in the two languages? Does Mandarin Chinese have more learning resources in English-speaking countries like Australia?

(In my case, I'm a native speaker of English, and speak enough Japanese to get around as a tourist in Japan and have a little bit of a conversation)

If you're only going one week, just learn some Mandarin.

The advantages of learning Mandarin is that there are a lot of free resources, cheap and useful phrase books, and most people you will run into will understand Mandarin.

I've been studying Minnanhua (spoken in Fujian and pretty much mutually intelligible with Taiwanese) for about a year and I struggle with a couple of main obstacles:

The pronunciation is tough for English speakers. Lots of labial and glottal nonsense. I haven't counted the differences.
Pinyin is tough to figure out and there are two camps, there is a Xiamen University pinyin which favors consonants, and Peh-oe-ji, which was invented by missionaries in Taiwan.
There are more tones than Mandarin. Also some tones rules are not clearly expressed (some tones are based on pronunciation, for example if it ends in <-n>; <-m>, <-ng> then the word is tone 1)
Native speakers won't let me practice, they will often switch to Mandarin.

Have a good trip.

Also you can check out:

Peh-oe-ji

Hokkien

Learn Hokkien

For a week?  I'm really interested in Chinese but I'd say don't even bother unless you plan on continuing after the trip.  If you must, get yourself a phrasebook with tape or CD.  There's got to be an app for that too.  Have a good trip!


What is the difference in use between 完 and 了? If I understood correctly, both 完 and 了 can be used to indicate a completed action, so what is the difference in use? How do we properly use 完 in a sentence? Which contexts would be valid?

You can use 完 and 了 together or separately.

了 is usually used to indicate the completion of an action. E.g. 你买了好多东西 (You purchased a lot of stuff). See the question "Tense and use of 了" to learn more.
完 is used to indicate the action of completing/finishing something. E.g. "說話沒完的人" (a motormouth, someone who talks to no end). Usually it's verb + 完.

完了 can have 3 different meanings/uses.

Verb + 完了 can indicate that the (verb) action has come to an end.
Noun + 完了 indicate the feeling of despair or the end of something . E.g., 哎呀，我完了！ (On no, I'm finished/done for!) or 那個車完了(That car is finished/done for!).
完了 by itself (usually at the beginning of a sentence) is usually an exclamation of despair. E.g., 完了, 车没油了！回不了家了！ (We're/I'm done [for], the car's out of gas. We/I can't go [back] home [now]).

没完 can be used to describe things left undone, or something never-ending/eternal. E.g., 活儿还没完 (Work is not done/finished yet) or "說話沒完的人" (a motormouth, someone who talks to no end).

没 and 完 can be used together to indicate an action that has yet to be completed in this pattern  没 + V + 完 for example:

  没看完 or 没吃完

To mean I haven't finished watching/reading it or I haven't finished eating (it)

You can also combine the two in this case it would be:

  没看完了 or 没吃完了

To mean the same as above.

However the following:

  没看了 or 没吃了

This means I haven't seen/read (it) or I haven't eaten (it)

e.g.

  这本书我还没看了 or 他的冰淇淋还么吃了

I (still) haven't read this book or He/she hasn't eaten their ice-cream.


How to use 得 without single-character verbs (e.g. 我旅行得很快)? I've been taught that ‘得’ can be used in situations such as, “我打篮球打得很好”, to describe the "degree" that the action has. But I've also been told that ‘得’ only works with single character verbs-- so rather than saying, “我游泳得很快”, I would say, “我游得很快”, instead.

This is all fine and well for verbs like ‘游泳’ which can be replaced by ‘游’ but for other verbs whose individual characters don't mean anything on their own, I'm not sure what to do.

I am unable to say, "I travel very fast," because I can't say “我旅行得很快”. What is the solution to this?

I would say that "A得B"(述语+补语) form does not add constraint on the number of characters of either A or B. But if encountering a choice between "学得快" and "学习得快" in oral language, most native speakers would select the former one since it's shorter, although both of them are correct from the view of grammar.

For the case of "旅行得很快", I don't think it's incorrect in grammar. If you have a reasonable context, it can also appear in oral language, although people would prefer saying "旅游" or "玩" to "旅行" (which sound too formal, like written language). Since people would not often talking about how fast their travelling is, many people may think this odd.

Moreover, although "学" and "学习" can be used as both noun and verb. In most cases orally, "学" uses as verb and "学习" as noun.

Some more examples of "A得B" form with more than one character in A:

这个项目计划得很周密。

This project plans thoroughly.
他高兴得眼泪都流出来了。

He is happy into tears.
这首歌要好听得多。

This song is much better.

“得”前面一般为动词，后面一般为形容词或者程度副词，用于修饰前面的动词


How to pronounce "下载" How to pronounce the word "下载", "xià zǎi" or "xià zài"？

Most Chinese people pronounce it "xià zǎi", but there are some people insist on pronouncing it "xià zài". There are different also different pronunciations in different dictionaries.

The followings are the interpretations of the character "载" from zdic.net:

● 载 （載）zǎi  ㄗㄞˇ

年；岁：千～难逢。三年两～。
记录；刊登；描绘：记～。连～。转～。

● 载 （載）zài  ㄗㄞˋ

装，用交通工具装：～客。～货。～重。～体。装～。满～而归。
充满：怨声～道。
乃，于是（古文里常用来表示同时做两个动作）：～歌～舞。
姓。

"载" of "下载" has the same meaning as "load" of "download", but which meaning should we choose? The second meaning of "zǎi" or the first meaning of "zài"?

Edit:

I visited an online dictionary site of the Ministry of Education of R.O.C. (http://dict.revised.moe.edu.tw). The followings are the interpretations of the character "载" there:

● 載　　部首：車　部首外筆畫：6　總筆畫：13  ㄗㄞˇ  zǎi

nouns.

量詞。計算時間的單位。相當於「年」。如：「一年半載」、「三年五載」、「千載難逢」。

● 載　　部首　車　部首外筆畫　6　總筆畫　13  ㄗㄞˋ  zài

verbs.

乘坐。說文解字：「載，乘也。」史記˙卷二十九˙河渠書：「陸行載車，水行載舟。」唐˙孟郊˙感興詩：「吾欲載車馬，太行路崢嶸。」
裝運。如：「載人」、「載貨」。唐˙李白˙懷仙歌：「巨鼇莫載三山去，我欲蓬萊頂上行。」
記錄。如：「記載」、「刊載」、「轉載」。
承受。易經˙坤卦˙象曰：「君子以厚德載物。」三國志˙卷二十七˙魏書˙王基傳：「臣聞古人以水喻民，曰：『水所以載舟，亦所以覆舟。』」
充滿。如：「怨聲載道」。唐˙李白˙天長節度使鄂州刺史韋公德政碑：「頌聲載路，豐碑是刊。」

conjs.

且、又。同時做兩個動作。如：「載歌載舞」。詩經˙鄘風˙載馳：「載馳載驅，歸唁衛侯。」

There is no interpretation we can choose if it is pronounced zǎi.

What the online community thinks

From Baidu 百科:

  准确读音 xià zài

  　　“下载”这个词，规范读音按照现代汉语词典、现代汉语规范词典等权威字典的标注应为“xià zài”。随着电脑的普及，这个词使用的频率越来越高，但可惜的是绝大多数人一开口就是从网上“xià zǎi”，就连播音员、主持人也读“xià zǎi”，如央视的晚间新闻在播送“网络侵权BT下载”时就读成“xià zǎi”。可以说电台、电视台的播音员、节目主持人对“xià zǎi”这个错误的读音起了推波助澜的作用。就目前的趋势来看，要推广“下载”的正确读音已非常困难，已经习非成是了。这些现象给人一种感觉，好像电台、电视台的播音员、节目主持人的发音很随意，因为这些错误的读音许多是在同一个播音员或主持人嘴里反复发出的，而这些错误的读音又严重影响了普通话规范语音的推广普及。这是当前语言文字规范化工作中不容忽视的一个问题。

It says: According to the Modern Chinese Dictionary and other authoritative sources, the accurate pronunciation should be "xià zài". But due to the proliferation of computers and rise in the usage frequency of this term, the great majority of the people when they speak, pronounce it as “xià zǎi”. This includes radio and tv hosts, and even a newscaster from CCTV. This mispronunciation has a rippling effect that from current trend seems difficult to reverse and has already become a norm. The phenomenon seems to give one the impression that the these professionals are very lax in their pronunciation. However, the mistake, in most occasions, originated from one host or one presenter, repeated over a number of times. These mispronunciations have seriously impeded the popularisation and standardization of Mandarin as the universal dialect, and is a problem that should not be ignored.

The above is further corroborated with answers to the same question here.

What a research shows

There is an interesting research paper on this “下载”的读音和释义 (http://202.194.40.31:8080/ec2006/C234/res/7/res/201010241009%5B29477%5D.pdf).

To summarize:

The two most authoritative dictionaries give different
interpretations of the same term:

  下载 xià zài: 从互联网或其他计算机上获取信息并装入到某台计算机或其他电子装置上 (跟 “上传” 相对)。

  《现代汉语词典》(第 5 版)

  下载  xià zǎi: 将互联网或其他电子计算机上的信息资料复制到本台计算机上 (跟 “上载” 相对)。

  《现代汉语规范词典》
  According to research [see table], most of the dictionaries indicate
  the pronunciation as "xià zài", however this is inconclusive since
  many of the minor dictionaries take reference from the more
  authoritative sources such as《现代汉语词典》and《新华词典》.
  According to a classroom survey of about 500, 68% respondents
  indicated that they pronounce the term as "xià zǎi" while 32%
  pronounce as "xià zài".
  An online poll was also conducted with a clear majority of 94%
  pronouncing the term as "xià zǎi" out of 225 respondents.
  "记载" and "装载" are the two most closely associated terms with "下载".
  The word "载" is derived from "车" and "装载" precedes "记载" which is
  derived from "containing" in a metaphorical sense.

  The above are some points put forth by the author, I left out part of his argument and conclusion which I find subjective and highly debatable.

Justifications

The use of "xià zǎi" can be justified to be derived from the term "记载" (jì zǎi) since "下载" or download refers to receiving a copy of the original file on the local system. The action of copying can be taken to mean recording or "记载" although it is not so obvious to some.

The use of "xià zài" can be justified by the single word "载" (zài) which means transporting. Downloading is a process of transmitting (or transporting) electronic data from the remote system to the local system.

The verdict

Inconclusive. Use whichever pronunciation that you feel can get the other party understand you.

there is a rule when you meet 2 same tone, that's the second one should be declined.

  In you case "下载", both of their tone are fourth, so it should be
  pronounced as "xià zǎi".

  While in another case of "载人", it should be "zài ren".

In one word, "载" has two tones and which tone should be used depend on the context, remember the rule.


Are the Chinese characters really pictorial? Are the Chinese characters really pictorial?

There is a discussion Here. What is your opinion? Please see the link and come back to give your insight. To be specific so that the question would be able to survive, please provide some good examples with your answer.

The real question behind the issue is that "Is it possible to have a language that is really pictorial or ideograph without any sound indication?"

No. Chinese writing certainly has an early origin in logograms, but so does the Latin alphabet we use – the "A" is actually an ox head, tilted 90 degrees, and borrowed from the first Sumerian cuneiform script.

Since classical times, only a few percent of the Chinese language retains such logograms, while the vast majority (+90%) of characters are phonetic compounds, essentially a rather large and fuzzy alphabet with functional elements as hinting.

几 might be a table, but 叽, 饥 and 肌 haven't got much to do with a table, but are used phonetically.

My answer is YES, but only for Traditional Chinese.

look at these video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRi4uDCOHfQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc3SftYcors

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_NCdH5BscE
.
.
.

and so on.

The path of from picture to word is only presented in the Traditional Chinese.

If you are learning it and you have a teacher, you can ask it "how this word came from".

Teacher may told you the story. This is the fastest way to learn Chinese.


Translation of "Please tell me how to get to your house."? I can only get as far as 请告诉我怎么.

In a less westernised way, you may say,

"請問你的家怎麼走?"

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%AD%90%E5%8C%96%E4%B8%AD%E6%96%87

请告诉我怎么去你家

最简明扼要的应该是这个意思了。
The most concise should be the meaning of the.


How do we correctly translate the XKCD comic snippet "Good News: You recently had close contact with someone who has not tested positive for COVID"? I feel this XKCD comic:

Good News: You recently had close contact with someone who has not tested positive for COVID.
cropped from XKCD comic 2342: Exposure Notification

is incorrectly translated:

好消息：您最近并未与任何确诊新冠肺炎的患者密切接触。
cropped from XKCD comic 2342 translation: Exposure Notification

As I understand this translation means:

Good News: You recently had no close contact with anyone who has tested positive for COVID.

which ruins the joke.  The user should have had close contact with people who have not tested positive.  And each message should refer to an individual (unidentified) person.
Question: How do we correctly translate this snippet from the XKCD comic into Chinese?
My attempt:

好消息：您最近与某个无确诊新冠肺炎的人密切接触。

Although I'm not 100% comfortable with this, as it sounds like the person has "undiagnosed COVID", and using 确诊 (instead of 诊断) indicates a formal confirmation of a diagnosis, whereas the person may not have even been tested.

I would translate it as such:

好消息：你最近密切接触到测试新冠肺炎未测出阳性的人

Using 接触到 removes the need to introduce other complements with 与 / 和 / 跟， which reduce fluency of the joke. It also removes the negation from the main verb, just as in the English original.
未测出阳性 renders more literally "not tested positive" instead of 无确诊, which doesn't sound very grammatical to me (better with 未, by the way)
I wouldn't use 确诊 anyway, because it literally means "confirmed (case)", as in 确认诊断，and the joke is more about the test result, not the diagnosis.
新冠肺炎 in your attempt, is accurate, as it identifies the pulmonary inflammation, i.e. the disease, whereas other frequently encountered terms as 新冠病毒 refer to literally the "new coronavirus", i.e. the vector.
某个～人：this term 某 as in 某人 / 某个人 does translate to "someone" according to dictionaries. However in my experience, the usage of 某 is slightly different than that. I think the most accurate translation is "a certain person". So yes, it's an unnamed person, a "someone", but it implies that you choose to not disclose their identity. An example can be found in newspaper articles, when referring to someone involved in a crime. The perpetrator or the victim can be referred to as "Surname + 某", e.g. 张某, literally "a certain Zhang". I'm not fully sure the "someone" in the XKCD cartoon is actually this kind of "someone". If it is, then 某个人 might be appropriate. Otherwise just 人 also works.

With all that said, I'm afraid this won't sound equally humorous in Chinese... but that's my personal opinion.

I would rather say:
"恭喜：您最近未与任何确诊的新冠肺炎患者密切接触"
Which looks very similar to "您最近未与任何确诊新冠肺炎的患者密切接触"(which is the original post) but with some different meanings, as the position of "的" is different.
"恭喜" is more natural in this situation.
More explanations:
In Chinese Language, we generally uses word order to achieve emphasis.
In most cases, "的" should be positioned after the last adjective (eg: "她是一名优雅美丽的女性"). If this is not the case, it means that the author is emphasizing the adjective before "的". This is usually used in witty or ironic occasions.
For example, "宁做聪明的傻子,不做愚蠢的聪明人. "("Better a witty fool man than a foolish wit"), "愚蠢的聪明人" does not equals to "愚蠢聪明的人"

确诊的新冠肺炎患者: Covid 19 patients who has tested positive. Emphasize test.
确诊新冠肺炎的患者：Confirmed covid 19 patients. No emphasis.


How to translate "读书好 好读书 读好书"? A famous Chinese writer whose pen name is Bingxin once remarked, "读书好 好读书 读好书", which is used to encourage Chinese students to read books.

In this sentence, there are altogether 3 "好"s. The first and the third, both pronounced as "hǎo", are used as adj. to describe "reading" and "book" respectively. And the second one, pronouced as "hào", is used as a verb to persuade us to read.

Is there any good translation for this saying in English?

Thanks.

As other explained,"读书好"

reading is good

"好读书"

love reading

But "读好书” is ambiguious,which may mean "read good books",or "excellent at reading or at learning"

1.the first and the sencod "好" aren't  adj. They're adv in chinese, cus they modify the verb"读".

the word modified the adj and verb is the adv

the word modified noun is the adj

2."读书好 好读书 读好书"  ----> reading is great,love reading,read excellent books

Hope my answer can help ^_^


What is the grammatical structure of: 我把你们带到茶馆来。 I was reading New Practical Chinese Reader Chpater 27 and stumbled upon the following sentence: 我把你们带到茶馆来。  While the meaning of the sentence is pretty clear, I have trouble understanding its underlying structure and hope someone can help me.

Thus far I figured out: You use 把 together with 带到 that something has been moved from one to place to another. In this case: The place of 你们 to 茶馆。

However, what is the idea behind 来 ？

Google translate provides the following translation for the two sentences:

我把你们带到茶馆来。I will bring you to the tea house.

我把你们带到茶馆。I will take you to the tea house.

Considering the context of these sentences however: The action all took place in the past. That's why I am a bit wary about Google Translate suggestion.

Can someone explain what the underlying structure of the sentence is - what can be deduced / what cannot be deduced?

Here unfortunately, 来 doesn't indicate completion. Instead, it indicates direction of an action.
我把你们带到茶馆来=我把你们带来茶馆（indicating that the speaker's location is (or was, depending on context) 茶馆）
Comparison:
我把你们带到茶馆去=我把你们带去茶馆（indicating that the speaker is not at 茶馆）

汉语博大精深。"来"表示意愿和热情。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。


Relation between「帳」and「賬」 「賬」is said to be a derivative character (分化字) of「帳」, itself being a derivative character of「張」. The meaning of「帳」is related to tents, screens, or curtains:

《玉篇》帷也，張也，幬也。

「賬」has meanings relating to accounts, bills, and debt, but I don't quite see the connection to「帳」. Outlier outlines the semantic extension like so:

(orig.) to pitch a tent
→ tent, canopy
⇒ accounting records (written on cloth of some sort)

However, the jump from 2. and 3. seems a bit big. Is there something missing in between this gap, or a more detailed explanation describing this jump?

Also branching a bit from the above, but is the relation between「帳」and「賬」similar to that of「帖」and「貼」, in the sense that the latter is derived from the former?

Edit: From Taiwan MoE's 異體字字典:

按：此字本為帳幕之義，後亦用為錢項計簿之義，此義或从貝作「賬」。清．翟灝《通俗編．貨財》云：「幃幄曰帳，而計簿亦曰帳者，運籌必在幃幄中也。今市井或造賬字用之，諸字書中皆未見。」

Seems like this briefly touches on this semantic extension, but I'm hoping someone else can verify this, or provide more insight on the topic.

簡易六書原則

形聲:

在中國文字中，形聲字的比例最多，「形聲」就是形符和聲符的配合，「形符」表示字的類別；「聲符」則表示字的字音

Both 帳 and 賬 are 形聲字 (Pictophonetic characters)

貝 indicates the character is related to 'money/finance'. It is the semantic component of the character 賬

巾 indicates the character is related to 'tent/cloth'. It is the semantic component of the character 帳

長 is the phonetic component of both 帳 and 賬

張 is a 會意形聲字. [弓 = bow --> bow extends + phonetic 長]

Wang_xiao_ming posted:

按：此字本為帳幕之義，後亦用為錢項計簿之義，此義或从貝作「賬」。清．翟灝《通俗編．貨財》云：「幃幄曰帳，而計簿亦曰帳者，運籌必在幃幄中也。今市井或造賬字用之，諸字書中皆未見。

It said 帳 originally meant 'tents', acquired the meaning of "accounting" later because "運籌必在幃幄中也" meaning: "to calculate war strategy, one must be in a tent" (in the army, close to the battlefield)
Since accounting involves money, the 巾 radical was replaced by the 貝 radical.  The meaning of 'account --> (debt)' in '帳' thereafter, was transferred to '賬'.
'今市井或造賬字用之，諸字書中皆未見' However, at the beginning, 賬 was considered a made-up word by the general public, not listed in any reference book.

賬 is a traditional character, its simplfied character is 账.
look its structural part:贝(or 貝), it is related to money. So I can say a word: 账本, equals to account book.
Ok then, 帐, its structural part is 巾, we can simply conclude that it is related to textile. For example: 蚊帐, equals to mosquito net.


Are 平常 and 通常 essentially interchangeable? In a few of my entries on Lang-8.com, several of my Chinese friends have changed 平常 into 通常 and vice versa without providing additional explanation. It it just a matter of personal taste?

The two words share the same character "常“(common, usual,eternal), so the meanings overlap somewhat. Both of them can mean "commonly, usually", however, they are not exactly the same.
"平常“ means (notice 平 means "plain，commonplace" here）

[adj]ordinary, casual/informal
[adv]ordinarily,in a casual/informal way

"通常" means

[adj]common,usual
[adv]in general, generally, in most cases

When something is ordinary, usually you could say it's the most possible case or it's common, that's how the two words have the similar meaning.
Examples:

我平常坐公交车去上班。 Usually I go to work by bus ( in my ordinary life).
我通常坐公交车去上班。 Usually I go to work by bus ( in most cases).
通常情况下，伤口的血液会自动凝固。 Generally, the blood from the wound coagulates automatically.
平常情况下，伤口的血液会自动凝固。 Sounds weird to me.
真理通常掌握在少数人手中。 The truth are held in few people in general.
真理平常掌握在少数人手中。 Sounds weird to me.
我平常叫他老王，但是在公司里我通常叫他王经理。 I call him Lao Wang ordinarily(casually), but I would usually call him Manager Wang in the company(because this is a serious situation).  Not interchangeable in this case.
我只想回到平常的生活。 I just want to return to a common\normal(in a style that average people have) life. Here, 通常 is not acceptable.

Generally, it is the same in speaking, but 通常 is more formal and better use it in a formal contextual.


Characters for Taiwanese As far as I know, Cantonese has its associated characters. But as I searched for Taiwanese characters, I only find the pinyin system to indicate the pronunciation of words, such as:

  遮雨 jia-hōo/lia-hōo

Are there characters for Taiwanese?

I'm not sure how well it's implemented but you can check this out:

台湾闽南语推荐用字

  台湾闽南语推荐用字

  台湾闽南语推荐用字为台湾闽南语书写系统的汉字建议用字表，实施单位为中华民国教育部。

  简介

  台湾闽南语推荐用字于2009年9月中发布完700个字，并发布于教育部国语推行委员会（国语会）1的网站，免费供一般社会人士与学生等下载运用。

  台湾官方以4年时间整理的用字，第一批闽南语推荐用字于2007年5月30日颁布，共有300字2， 2008年5月1日公布第2批100字3， 2009年10月2日公布最后一批300字4。这700个字基本上已经标准化了台湾闽南语用字。未来如果有需要再增加推荐用字的话，国语会会再补。
  国语会选字标准

  选用字之时，国语会的标准如下6：

  使用本字：台湾传统闽南语文所用汉字多为传统用字，例如“山”、“水””、“天”。偶尔，台湾闽南语用字与古汉语一致，例如“箸”（筷子）、“沃”（浇）、“行”（走）、“走”（跑）、“倩”（雇用）、“晏”（晚）、“青盲”（失明）、“才调”（本事）等。
      训用字（训读字）：若是台湾闽南语本字不清楚，而现代标准汉语用字接近台湾闽南语字音与字意，则采用训用字，例如“戆”（gōng）、“挖”（óo/ué）、“会”（ē）等。
      借音字：若是台湾闽南语本字不清楚，再加上现代标准汉语用字不接近闽南语字意，而民间习惯使用音接近之字，则采用借音字，例如“嘛”（mā，也）、“佳哉”（ka-tsài，幸亏）、“磅空”（pōng-khang，隧道）等。

  现况上也配合台湾每县市1到3位乡土语言指导员，来帮助台湾闽南语的语言政策并藉以研发乡土语言等课程发展。
  台湾闽南语常用词辞典

  2008年10月17日公布《台湾闽南语常用词辞典》（试用版），收录一万六千个常用闽南语词汇及单音字7。2009年10月国语会有计划出版《台湾闽南语常用词辞典》。

  用字举例

  问题与建议

  2011年在教育部召开公听会检讨首部官方版闽南语辞典时，桃园社区大学刘志鸿表示，发布的七百个推荐字当中的四百多字有待商榷，有争议的用字不宜贸然推行到学校教学及编成辞典。例如：

  意为贫穷人的“散凶（散乡）人”、“散赤（散食）人”、“瘦呷（瘦吃）人”。

  而台中市海洋台语文研究学会理事长林绍良则认为，至少有一成要检讨修订，举例：

  蚂蚁非哺乳类动物，“狗蚁”建议应作“蚼蚁”；
     “公公、婆婆”依传统古汉字应写成“唐官、唐家”。9

you can download the following pdfs:

台湾闽南语推荐用字（第1批）

台湾闽南语推荐用字（第2批）

台湾闽南语推荐用字（第3批）

MoE's department of lifelong education also has a bunch of downloadable pdfs:

  臺灣閩南語推薦用字

  臺灣閩南語卡拉OK正字字表及內容說明
  臺灣閩南語推薦用字700字詞
  臺灣閩南語推薦用字隨手冊(1) (2)、字卡(3) (4) 及製作說明(5)

  (1) 手冊單面列印

  (2) 手冊雙面列印

  (3) 字卡單面列印

  (4) 字卡雙面列印

  (5) 製作說明

Chinese characters are divided into traditional Chinese and simple Chinese. Simple Chinese is used in the mainland China and traditional Chinese is used in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Before the People's Republic of China, traditional Chinese are also used in mainland China. But after the foundation of People's Republic of China, simple Chinese are set for increasing literacy. As for 遮雨，it is used in Taiwan and mainland China at the same time. Because, some simple and traditional Chinese are same. For example, 書 → 书 the first one is the traditional and the second one is simple. The tradtional characters are more complicated than simple ones. I am a Chinese teacher from hanbridgemandarin and hope my answer can help you.


他很慢地走: why there is 地 if the adjective is monosyllabic? I can't use 地 after the adjective if the adjective is monosyllabic (so 他慢地走 isn't acceptable). Then why in this sentence is there 地 after a monosyllabic adjective?

  他很慢地走

Is it because I can use 地 if there is 很 before the adjective ?

I can't use 地 after the adjective if the adjective is monosyllabic

This is not a grammatical rule. This is an idiomatic rule and mostly for prosody concerns.

All the following expressions are grammatically correct. Only some sounds more natural than the others:

他慢地走 <- sounds unnatural
他很慢地走 <- sounds fine but not idiomatic
他慢慢地走 <- sounds fine and idiomatic

Darlin' who is teaching you this stuff? I hope you are not paying too much!

You can say: 她很慢地走。or 她慢慢地走。

Better might be: 她在很慢地走。 or 她走得很慢。

Goodnight, Miss Chestnut!


What is the difference between 这类 and 这种? As far as I know they both mean this kind (of).
Is the latter more versatile or less?
Does that have any influence on the choice of word?

Is it an etymological feature that provides or shows a differentiation, if such a differentiation is existent ?

种类 (n): 'kind, sort, kind, species'

  种 as a noun means carries the meaning of 'seed'

种: things came from the same origin and divert slightly, but still belong to the same kind nonetheless.

For example, knife and sword are both a kind(种) of cold weapon because 'created to be a cold weapon' is their origin; Football and basketball are both a kind of a ball sport because 'created to be a ball sport' is their origin.

  类 as a verb carries the meaning of 'to classify'

类: things that's being classified into the same sort, type or kind based on similar origin, feature,  function or other qualities

For example, knife and sword are both a kind/ class/ type(类) of cold weapon ; Horse and cow are both a kind of cattle; Football and basketball are both a kind of ball sport. (we classify them based on their similarity)

I think there is no difference between these words


Meaning of repeated "什么" I'm genuinely confused about this. Does repeated "什么" have special meaning? Or are they just wordplay?

I've read something like this "那什么什么" but I can't comprehend it at all. I tried looking for similar phrases and found them to be even more incomprehensible.

There was no context to this "那什么什么" I read, hence my confusion.

什么什么 can be used as a filler like "blabla". In Japanese the pedant is used (何). Good translations would be "and so on" or "blabla", imo.

Example, when trying to explain how "As soon as" works in Chinese:

  "他一什么什么，他就做什么什么。。。"

--> This is the generic version of the usage of "as soon as".

I would translate this with

  "As soon as he [...], he makes/does [...]"

whereas the [...] is filled by 什么什么 and in English this could be "blablabla":

  "As soon as he blablabla, he makes/does blablabla".

Source: My own experience as a non native speaker and my wife (who is a native speaker and whom I am going to ask today evening to confirm my answer)

EDIT: I asked her, she can confirm my answer. But there also is another usage of repeated 什么:
Your question refers to "那什么什么" - which is used as a substitution, in  case you forget a word during a conversation. So instead of saying the name of the thing you use "那什么什么".

Interestingly, a similar concept exists for persons/names. If you forgot a person's name or do not want to use the name the substitute "那谁" would be used.

I think this means "stuff", just like that in British English.


Mixed Simplified-Traditional script on Twins' album cover - why? On the album art for Twins' first album (我們的紀念冊), 紀 and 冊 are written as simplified characters. What's the reason for this (aside from artistic ones), and would people notice this?

Here's the album art in question:

EDIT: Found another mixed script album art (雙生兒). This does not look like sloppy font to me...

A lot of "Simplified" characters existed as short-hand forms of Chinese characters long before the "simplification" of the written language in the PRC. Conversely, the PRC hasn't given up "traditional" characters completely. I wouldn't be surprised to see some mixing here and there.

I think it's just a mistake of staff here. Maybe they used a wrong glyph but didn't find that.
As @K Man said, sometimes, people can't distinguish Simplified and Traditional exactly.


血: xuè , xiě, what's the difference? Is there some sort of logical rule for when 血 is xuè and when it is xiě?

The standard Chinese dictionary (《现代汉语词典》) lists xuè (fourth, not third, tone) as the official pronunciation and xiě as a colloquial variant. As such, in most compounds and technical terms, xuè is preferred. The pronunciation xiě is acceptable when you just want to say "blood" in casual speech.

There are several exceptions: the two modifiers 血糊糊 (xiěhūhū, "covered in blood") and 血淋淋 (xiělínlín, "gushing blood") are never read with the xuè pronunciation. There is also a word "血晕" the meaning of which differs based on which pronunciation of 血 is used.

血晕 (xiěyùn): to bruise
血晕 (xuèyùn): a traditional Chinese medicine term for fainting after childbirth due to loss of blood.

Note that this is only what the dictionary says. I suspect many native speakers make different choices in their own speech.

my teacher back in china always taught us that xue (4th tone) is more formal.


What are the differences in usage and nuances between 现在，正在 and 还在？ I think it's pretty hard to tell the differences between these three words, and here's the dialogue:

A: 你现在在干什么？
B: 我正在做作业。
A: 你怎么还在做作业呀！

Can you help me to understand and remember these words? Thanks a lot!

现在: Now

A: 你现在在干什么？: What are you doing now?

正在: Currently

B: 我正在做作业。: I am doing homework.

正在is this sentence can be translated to doing something at this particular moment, in English you just add ing at the end for currently doing something, but in Chinese you don't have this, so you use 正在 to express doing something now. 我正在做...becomes "I am doing...", or 我正在读...becomes "I am reading..."

还在: Still

A: 你怎么还在做作业呀!: You are still doing homework?

还pronounced "hai" instead of "huan" in this sentence means still doing something.

还在看书：Still reading, 还在这里: Still here...

Also to mention, 还 can also be pronounced "huan", as in 还钱: Pay debt, 还给我: Give it back, it means to return something, but that's a different context itself.

I guess to make it clearer, sometimes you don't really need to add 现在 or 正在，you just say "你在干什么？What are you doing?", or "我在做作业。I am doing homework.", it sounds more friendly like when you are talking to a friend. 你现在在干什么？sounds more like when your boss or teacher would ask haha.

A1: 你现在在干什么？ B: 我正在做作业。 A2: 你怎么还在做作业呀！

I think Frank is correct to say, the 2nd  在 A1 and the 在  in B and A2 has become a particle equivalent to 'ing', except, of course, it sits in front and not behind the word it acts upon. '在干' and '在做'

If you know any Spanish, it is easier to understand. There are 2 verbs for 'be' in Spanish, namely 'ser = be' and 'estar = be in'. 'estar' gets used like '在'. However Spanish has a gerund comparative to the English 'ing', usually formed by adding a 'd' to the verb stem, whereas Chinese does not.

A: 你现在在干什么？

A: ¿tu ahora estás(zai) haciendo que?

¿you now be-in making/doing what?


Tips for pronouncing X vs SH in Mandarin? I'd like to think my Mandarin pronunciation is generally pretty reasonable, but I often get tripped up with X and SH - for example words like 雪 and 水, or 虾 and 莎. Even with different tones, I find these kind of tricky to get right - although obviously context makes the meaning more obvious.

Does anyone have a good tip on how to clearly show the difference in the X sound vs the SH sound? What shape should I have my mouth, and where should I put my tongue for each of these sounds?

'x' is an alveolo-palatal fricative, while 'sh' is a retroflex fricative.

For retroflex 'sh', the tip of the tongue is curled up toward the roof of the mouth while the tongue body is low.
Mandarin 'sh' could be similar to Russian 'ш'.  Start with this wikipedia image of a retroflex stop, but make a slight space for air to pass above the tongue:

For alveolo-palatal 'x', the blade of the tongue approximates the palate while the tongue tip is low.  Mandarin 'x' could be similar to Portuguese or Catalan 'x'.  It can help to press the tongue tip against the lower teeth when learning to pronounce 'x'---this doesn't change the sound, it just keeps your tongue tip out of the way:

More details: Chinese phonology on wikipedia

For most of our English-speaking students, the rule of thumb to acquire Chinese sounds is listen, imitate and practice, but not to refer to sounds in English that much, which would be confusing and sometimes misleading. After all English sounds and Chinese sounds are quite different in many ways!

One exception of the rule is "x" sound in Chinese, it sounds, in my opinion, exactly the same to the alphabet "c" in English (Note: not the phonetic sound of "c" but the alphabet itself)
As for "sh" sound, there is not an equivalent in English. Our suggestion is to find a native speaker or a standard Chinese dictionary and listen repeatedly. Research showed that after an average "seven" different kinds of input, the sound should be acquired by the learners.


What is the difference between 覺得 and 想？ I have hard time making clear distinction between 覺得 and 想.

According to the dictionary:.
- 想：to think / to believe / to suppose / to wish / to want / to miss (feel wistful about the absence of sb or sth).
- 覺得：to think / to feel.

What confuses me is the meaning of "to think".  It is often overused to express many things: personal opinion, judgement, feelings...

Note:.
I understand  the use of 想 to express missing something or someone, ex: 我很想媽媽。

As you learned from dictionaries, 想 and 覺得 have meanings that are not overlapped.

When it comes to the overlapped meaning 'think', the different between 想 and 覺得 are as below:

"我[想]机会不是很大" - "I [think] the chance is not great" (thinking mainly base on imagination/ judgment; mostly a prediction)

"我[覺得]机会不是很大" - "I [think] the chance is not great" (thinking mainly base on feeling; mostly a hint/ feeling)

Both '想' and  '覺得' describe 'expressing opinion' , but with different base. If you what  to emphasize the opinion is base on judgment after some consideration, you should use '想'; If you what  to emphasize the opinion is base on a hint or some feeling, you should use '覺得'

More example:

我(想)德國隊會赢 - in your judgment, team Germany will win (base on the past record and the skill level gap between the two teams)

我(覺得)德國隊會赢 - you personally feel Germany will win (just a hint, because they seem like a winner)

just  remember "觉得" means  "to feel" , not "to think" in the dictionary you use


Glyph origins of 倒 (fall, collapse) Can anyone tell me the glyph origins for 倒 ?
I searched for it in one of the books but I couldn't find anything.

「倒」 (Mandarin: dǎo, dào; to collapse/fall over, upside-down/inverted) is comprised of semantic 「人・亻」 (person, "person falling over") and phonetic 「到」 (dào).

倒 == 亻+ 到 == 亻+ 至 + 刂 （morphed from 人）, two human going backwards against each other


Does pronunciation of a vowel change with tones? As it is extremely hard to find a good online summary of all Pinyin pronunciation rules, I am listening the sounds in a Pinyin chart: https://chinese.yabla.com/chinese-pinyin-chart.php . I have read before that the final -iu is pronounced /iou/, but I can hear the "o" only in tone 3 (eg in Pinyin syllable "liu"). I am unable to hear it in tones 1 (high), 2 (rising) and 4 (falling). Is there vowel reduction in some tones or are those audios in this Pinyin chart bad?

First, it is important to distinguish between the phonemic pronunciation and the phonetic pronunciation. The first represents how native speakers interpret sounds, the latter interpret how the sounds are effectively performed.

The Pinyin final -iu is phonemically pronounced /jəu/, not  /iou/ (reference: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Chinese_phonology#Allophones). When combined with the Pinyin initial l-, that Pinyin final becomes the Pinyin syllable liu, phonemically pronounced /liəu/.

Anyway, much more important to a language learner is the phonetic pronunciation. The phonetic pronunciations of -iu may be [jəu], [jou] or even [jo̝u] (vowel O raises due to assimilation to the adjacent high sounds /j/ and /u/), which sounds similar to /ju/. The latter is the pronunciation in the audio recordings of the Pinyin syllable "liu" in the provided Pinyin table. The same also occurs in the audio recordings of the other Pinyin syllables with the final -iu.

Regarding the 3rd tone pronunciation of a Pinyin syllable with the final "-iu", when pronounced in isolation, it falls ([jo]) and then rises ([u]); in this way, this tone has an effect of separation and therefore tends to block the vowel assimilation that I mentioned before. That's why the [o] sound is heard in this tone and barely heard in the other tones in the audio recordings of the provided Pinyin table.

in Chinese Pinyin, o is prounounced as wooo,so ou can never occur, because wooou is difficult to prounounce in Chinese Pinyin. Only iu is allowed.

For the case ao, actually is au, but au in handwriting is apt to be confused with an, the latter occurs very frequently in Pinyin. To be distinct to an, the pronounce au is taken over by ao.


which sounds more natural? 我今天已经把猫食放了 or 我已经今天把猫食放了 我今天已经把猫食放了 wǒ jīntiān yǐjīng bǎ māoshí fàng le

vs

我已经今天把猫食放了 wǒ yǐjīng jīntiān bǎ māoshí fàng le

(if it matters, the context is that every day the cat should be fed once, and the husband is informing his wife that the cat has already gotten their food for today)

I've checked my standard resources like ChineseGrammarWiki, but they don't address this point.

I'll accept answers to the main question above, but as a subsidiary question: if this were in speech, would it it fine to say

我今天已经把猫食给放了 ／ 我已经今天把猫食给放了?

(i.e. adding 给 gěi for emphasis)

The first one is definitely natural, and moreover, the second is not only unnatural, it is not grammatically correct.

You would put 已经 in front of a time period when an action is happening, for example

  我已经三年没回家了

However, in your sentence, 今天 is the time point when you did something, therefore you would like to put 已经 after it.

For your subsidiary question, it is still the first one that is correct, which is

  我今天已经把猫食给放了


The correct usage of 大约 vs. 差不多 I am a bit confused by the appropriate use of 大约 and 差不多.
I have learned to use 差不多 in many cases where I am talking about an approximate amount, value, extent, etc. of something, or speaking about how two things are similar. Would someone be able to provide an explanation differentiating these two words / concepts? Also, is one or the other more common in colloquial usage?

大约 means "approximately", 差不多 means "almost".

大约 is normally used as an adjective or adverb in phrases like:

大约四英尺厚的雪
snow that is approximately 4 feet thick

差不多 can be used in a similar way, but it's more commonly used as an adjective-verb:

这两本书的内容都差不多
these two books' contents are about the same

However, 这两本书的内容都差不多一样 (with 差不多 as an adverb) means the same thing.

The important thing to remember is that 差不多 means almost, but not quite, so two things that are 差不多一样 are not exactly the same. Whereas something like 大约一个小时 could be exactly one hour, although it could also be a bit more or less.

差不多 is also commonly used in a colloquial sense:

差不多了吧
that should do it

In my experience, 大约 is more common in written language. The spoken equivalent is 大概. But that may be a regional thing. 差不多 is very common in colloquial language, mostly in the sense of "about the same" or "good enough" as in the examples above.

大约 is mostlty to describe quantity ,value,time,date,which are related to numbers.
差不多 is to tell two or many things are similar.


A noun version of "need" I'm trying to write a sentence with the phrase "eliminates the need to do sth..." and have gotten as far as “消除作sth..的————”, any suggestions? I don't think 需要or必须are very good choices because they are usually placed near the beginning of the sentence...

(1) A排除对B的需求 - A eliminates the need for B

(2) A消除对B的需要 - ditto

Don't forget to use 对 as 'preposition'.

I would suggest 避免作sth..的需求

消除 doesn't feel right for the context.


Missing someone (but not romantic) Say I have a friend that I like a lot and haven't seen in a while.

Is it possible to say "I miss you" without any risk of a romantic interpretation?

我想念你 or 我想你 ?

Maybe something more like "I hope we meet again" but still that might be interpreted the wrong way.

I would say you should be careful of using 我想念你 or 我想你 , especially to a opposite gender. Usually, we say 我想念你 or 我想你 jokingly to avoid the confusion, except saying it to your 'real honey'.

But if you put 我们都很想（念）你， meaning you are missed among all of our friends, that would get you out of the confusion.

I recommend you a very good Mandarin Chinese Learning Twitter.
"Tony Song"
You can ask any questions through it.
And you can learn oral Mandarin Chinese from it.


What is the meaning of 看场子? "1997年，他到东莞打工，在一家木材厂给人看场子，在那里，他学会了汉族的生活方式，和朋友一起打台球，到歌厅唱歌。"

Hi everyone! I'm trying to translate this sentence, but I don't understand what 看场子 stands for in this sentence.
I know it could just mean "Look at the place" but that doesn't make sense here. Does it mean something like "keep watch/guard"?
Thank you in advance for the replies!

In this context it means "to watch/guard the place", "to look after the place".

1997年，他到东莞打工，在一家木材厂给人看场子，在那里，他学会了汉族的生活方式，和朋友一起打台球，到歌厅唱歌。
In 1997, he went to work in Dongguan as a "watcher" for a timber factory. There, he learned about the the Han lifestyle, played pool with friends and sang in karaoke bars.

I'm translating a bit freely here, but that's the geist. 给人看场子 means "to watch/guard the place for someone else", but it conveys the idea of informal work.
The subject of the sentence wasn't a formal security guard, or supervisor. He was "helping someone look after the place", "making sure things ran smoothly".

Bonus: Baidu Baike has also a page about this term, meaning essentially "bouncer", or even "henchman" for club and bar owners. However it doesn't look like this page is written very professionally, so it's probably a very colloquial, extended meaning, or possibly underworld lingo. I would take it with a grain of salt.


Difference between 如果 and 要是? In the Pimsleur Mandarin course it uses 如果 (rúguǒ) to mean 'if', but the dictionary shows 要是 (yàoshì) to have a similar meaning:

  如果: if; in case; in the event that
  要是: if

Are there any differences between the meanings of the two, and how should I choose which to use?

In my opinion, they mean the same:"if". "要是" is a little informal and more common in oral speaking, while "如果" is formal, I think, but you will see both of them in books.
I could only catch up with one differences in use between them. For "要是“, because there is a "是" inside, when the verb in the "if-clause" is "是(to be)", "是" can be ommitted, however, "是" can't be ommitted when using "如果”.
Some examples:

要是我，[我]就不会那么做。 If [it were] me, [I] won't do that way.
如果是我，[我]就不会那么做。If [it were] me, [I] won't do that way.

Also, I don't agree with Tom Au that only "要是" has a "wish" mood. I think "如果" can be used in this case too.

要是我有100万就好了。 It's good if I have 1 million,really means I wish I could have 1 million
如果我有100万就好了。 It's good if I have 1 million,really means I wish I could have 1 million

Why do you make the problem so complex?
if you just learn Chinese to Communicate in life,you need not differentiate them completely.They almost have the same meaning in spoken language,you can use both of them in spoken language.
Certainly,“如果” is more official than "要是".If you write an article or report,you should use "如果".


Why do 可不 and 可不是 by themselves imply agreement? It seems a little strange that

  可不 and
  可不是

(by themselves) imply agreement (something like 就是).  The textbook 标准教程HSK4上 has some examples, e.g.:

  A: 没想到咱们毕业都已经十年了。
  B: 可不是！时间过得太快了，真想大家。

I'm expecting there's an underlying reason for this I'm unaware of.  Perhaps it's a rhetorical question  like "Is it not?"

Question: Why do 可不 and 可不是 by themselves imply agreement?

It seems like they should both mean "but no" (i.e., disagreement).  Indeed, they also mean this, e.g. (sourced from YouDao):

  然而，这可不那么简单。
  This will not be easy, however.

可不，可不是，可不是吗，可不就是吗，etc are colloquial phrases to agree what the other has just said.

I'm not quite sure of the exact underlying reason, but I echo your suspicion -  perhaps it's a rhetorical question like "Is it not?".

However, we should be cautious that sometimes it can mean negation too as in the OP's example: 这可不那么简单. In this case, we read as 这可/不那么简单. If you add 就 and 吗 in the sentence: 这可不就那么简单吗，it becomes a rhetorical question, meaning Isn't it that simple=it is that simple.

So, the way to determine (negative or positive) is based on the syntax and context. If 不 goes with 可，then it's positive. If 不 goes with the other part, then it's negative.

I suggest you forget the link you post, I have to say there is no "可不" in Chinese.
it sound like "ilik eapp le"

you cant explain[可][不][是]，[可不是,.....]at the front means [indeed....]

然而however，这this可is不not那么that简单easy。 your example is not that complicated


How to translate 'Computer Support Person'? The following seem either incorrect or unprofessional:

电脑支持人
电脑服务员
IT男

What is a common term used in business for 'Computer Support Person'?

Do you mean the person who provides assistance for others on computer-related things? I think it could simply be called 技术支持人员. But the problem with this translation is that 技术支持 is a little general rather than focusing on computer. In some companies people may say IT 人员.

电脑技术人员 or 计算机技术人员
ps I don't think 支援 is a good idea as it means more "help", often for emergency.


How did Chinese people know in the past the pronunciation of words? Nowadays a Chinese person seeing a character for the first time can look it up in a dictionary (it doesn't matter how) and get the phonetic or Pinyin transliteration, so that the pronunciation is obvious.

How did people get the correct pronunciation of unknown Chinese characters without Latin or phonetic alphabets? I mean, I would expect the language to be "self-contained", so to say, without resorting to external alphabets.

The pronunciation of characters was glossed using the Fanqie (反切) system, which uses two existing characters whose pronunciations are known to determine the pronunciation of the unknown character.

Suppose that I wanted to know the pronunciation of「東」. Looking this character up, I'd see that it was phonologically glossed in dictionaries as 德紅切, which means to take the onset (basically the initial consonant) of the first character, in this case「德」, and the "final" (which really is everything after the onset) of the second character, in this case「紅」. In Pinyin,「東」is dong, and reconstructing this syllable with the fanqie system we'd get the initial of「德」(Pinyin de) and everything after the onset of「紅」(Pinyin hong) to get dong.

Note, fanqie dictionaries were compiled by scholars in consideration of all the varieties of Chinese, not favouring any particular topolect, which means that they work equally well for all these varieties. In addition, they also work for Sinoxenic pronunciations of Chinese-originated vocabulary in Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese. This is possible because the two characters used to construct the pronunciation are not phonetic symbols like alphabet letters, but have their own unique pronunciation in all the varieties of Chinese (as well as Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese, due to centuries bordering on millenia of cultural and language diffusion across East Asia). The caveat is that the phonology guide is a good approximation but not always an exact match, as the sound evolution of the different varieties of Chinese from the ancestral language is not always consistent everywhere.

This requires the reader to be somewhat literate already, of course - but then again, which dictionary in any language doesn't?

Demonstration that it is a good approximation for other languages which have used Chinese characters:

東, 德紅切:

Japanese: 東 (tō), 德 (toku) 紅 (kō)
Korean: 東 (dong), 德 (deok) 紅 (hong)
Vietnamese: 東 (đông), 德 (đức) 紅 (hồng)

I don't know specifically about Chinese, but one thing all researchers into historical phonology can use to help them is rhyme. Where two words in a poem or song no longer rhyme where clearly they were meant to when authored, it is an indication of sound change, either in the past, or between dialects.


What is the purpose of 是 in "我应该是感冒了"? I came across the following translated example:

我应该是感冒了，耳朵也有点儿疼，不过没发烧。
Wǒ yīnɡɡāi shì ɡǎnmào le，ěrduo yě yǒudiǎnr ténɡ，búɡuò méi fāshāo 。
I think I caught a cold, and my ears are a little painful, but I don’t have a fever.

What is 是 doing here? I understand 我 - 应该 - 是 - 感冒了 literally as I - should - (?) - catch a cold now / caught a cold.

Edit:
I see some confusion between the answers. I will list the different views to see if we can clarify them:

@blackgreen and @AxelTong claim (应该)是 is just connecting the Subject 我 (I) to the Noun 感冒了 (catch a cold). I don't like this view because when connecting noun A to noun B with 是 , we are essentially saying A = B, where both nouns A and B need to be of the same type. But this is not the case with 我 (a person) and 感冒了 (a state of the person).

@DanielCheung (and possibly @TangHo) claim 是 is part of the structure "是 + information to emphasize + verb (+ object) + 的", to emphasize information in the past. However, here we have 了 instead of 的.

I do not agree that 是 is acting as the copula in the sentence. Because even without 是, the following sentences contain the same meaning and only differ in tone:

我应该是感冒了
我应该感冒了

This answer comes after reading
「是」，「的」與動詞名物化 by professor 石定栩 of PolyU in Hong Kong. (The title roughly translate to: 是, 的, and Normalization of Verb)
感冒 should be acting as a verb in the sentence, as 是 can be optionally added to the sentence to add stress to the statement. 我应该是感冒了 conveys the meaning of: "I think I am really having a cold."
TL;DR, Professor Shi proposes that "是" used in a sentence like

他這樣做是合情合理的。 (What he did was very reasonable) VS
他這樣做合情合理。 (What he did was reasonable)

should be treated as a modal verb, before the main verb of the sentence "合情合理", with "是" treated as a modal verb the same way the 2 other referenced papers have had it analyzed.
By the same argument, I believe we can treat 感冒 as the main verb, and 是 as a modal verb, used to intensify the tone of the sentence.
By removing all descriptive words, the sentence simplifies into: "我感冒了", which still carries the essential meaning.

P.S. I believe some Chinese linguists actually prefer treating 应该 and 是 as just verbs (with 是 pointed out in the paper referenced), which would have changed the sentence analysis. However, for some people, it may be more acceptable to allow for modal verbs in Chinese grammar analysis, with the above argument.

Depends on the the stress.
If the stress falls on "是", "是" could be translated as "do" for a double positive.
For example, I DO want a PS5.
If the stress falls on other words, the "是" could be transaled as "be" simply.


What is the difference between 顾客 and 客户？ This is a relatively simple question， but until now I have not consistently heard or seen a dominant choice. Is there a difference? And if so what is the difference.

顾客 is a customer, a shopper, an end user.

客户 is a client, an intermediary purchaser.

They overlap somewhat, but these are the principal definitions.

顾客 always refers to people as each single person, but 客户 is always a group or organization


Is there any university in Scandinavia where one can study Traditional Chinese (繁體字)? My question is short:

Is there any university in Scandinavia where one can study the Chinese language using Traditional Chinese characters (繁體字)?

If you want to learn  Traditional Chinese characters (繁體字), go to Taiwan.
If you want to learn  Simplified Chinese characters (简体字), go to China Mainland.
And MS office can easily convert those two types of characters for your comparison.
Taiwanese accent sounds pretty the same as PUTONGHUA(Chinese mandarin)


Radicals vs glyph origins (specifically for character 肚 in 肚子) I am trying to learn some vocabulary and am looking at the radicals to help me remember.
The problem is, the radicals in some characters don't seem to make sense to me at all. In 肚, the two radicals separately are 月 meaning the moon, and 土 meaning earth. Somehow "moon earth" does not seem all too related to the stomach to me!
I was curious about how the character came about, so I looked up Chinese character etymology. There don't seem to be very good resources on this, but one website did say:

"From meat 月肉 and phonetic 土. Meaning stomach."

I have not seen meat as 月肉 before, only 肉. So if 月肉 is another word for meat, I'm not sure why the moon radical is in there either! And there doesn't seem to be any significance to the 土 part according to the website, but I fail to believe that part of a character was just chosen at random!
My current ideas are that, sometimes 月 seems to be used for round things like in the character for face 脸, which may motivate its use in the character for stomach.
As for 土, perhaps it dates back to some ancient Chinese belief about the stomach 'grounding' you, i.e. the brain/head represents a connection with the heavens, the heart with the emotional realm, and the stomach with earth? I'm only guessing here, but am very much interested if anyone knows.
Also, I'm curious in general if someone can comment on how well radical content reflects character meaning. As my repertoire of characters is rather limited still, I don't have much to go by myself to evaluate this; but I do suppose that in many cases the radical usage would make more sense to someone with a familiarity with ancient China and ancient Chinese beliefs...
Thank you in advance.

Look at the middle parts, they are different.
月 = 月 (moon)
肉 = ⺼ (meat)

⺼ - 肉部首
(俗稱「提肉旁」）：CJK RADICAL MEAT (U+2EBC)
簡體將從此形的字歸入月部。

Simplified Chinese characters merged ⺼radical into 月 radical

The '土' in '肚' is the phonics component

I can offer you another way to remember this word. God made human beings by dirt, in Chinese, 土. I think in this way， it is easier for you remember the word. But it's not the correct explanation.


Is 医好了 outdated in favour of 治好了? I have been working through a grammar book with exercises where one of the solutions is "医生把病人医好了." My language partner said that 医好了 is unusual and that it is better to say 治好了 instead. Is this correct or is ti still OK to use 医好了? (I suspect that the main author of the grammar book is over 80; the book itself is less than 10 years old.)

医好了, to me, is more often used in old times, that's why it's totally ok to say that in HongKong, considering HK is still using traditional Chinese. In modern Chinese, 治好了 is more natural, but in some formal occasion we can use 医 and 治 together as one verb, i.e. 医治

examples:

张医生医好了无数病人。(it's ok, but less used in daily communication, I would use it in a composition, or in HK maybe? I don't know since I didn't go there)

张医生医治了无数病人。(sounds formal, I would use it in a report)

张医生治好了无数病人。(sounds more familiar and nature, I use it in my daily life)

普通话的确说“治好了” 多一些， 按照北方语系的习惯，  只好了更加口语话而且用于更多的语言环境。

治好了， 可以有 医好了， 治理好了， 管理好了， 等等其他的意思（依照语境不同， 更加灵活）


Is there an "official" translation of Malcom X's You can't hate the roots of a tree and not hate the tree"? Malcom X once said:

  You can't hate the roots of a tree and not hate the tree. You can't hate Africa and not hate yourself.

It is a fairly well known quote.

Are there any “official” translations of this quote? (Not Google translate, etc.)

Such sayings have their culture background and only Malcom X himself could tell whether a translation is right or not.

"背祖忘宗" or "數典忘祖" may carry a similar meaning but does not have the same context.  Not to say creative translations like "惱根怎可不惱樹, 厭鄉也該厭自己".

I think there are many chinese saying

人穷怪屋基、屋漏怪瓦稀
人醜不要怪父母，人窮不要怪政府


Can one learn to comprehend Chinese texts while being unable to read aloud? I've been enjoying the book Chineasy and it make me wonder if it would be possible to read Chinese without knowing how to speak it phonetically.

Technically it might not be "reading Chinese" because you can't read the words out loud.

But the question is if you could learn the meaning of most characters and understand them well enough to comprehend Chinese texts?

Well, this is what Japanese speakers do when they look at a Chinese text – they have some understanding of it since they recognize the characters.
One fundamental problem, though, is that in modern Chinese, the majority of words are made up of two characters.  There are two types of dictionary for Chinese, one that gives character meanings (字典) and one that gives word meanings (詞/辭典).  For reading, you need the latter type.  Knowing the meaning of the characters is not enough to comprehend texts.
One reason for this is that characters have multiple meanings.  For example, the character 節 can mean something like (A) ‘joint, section’, or (B) ‘season, holiday’, or as a verb (C) ‘to restrain, control’.  There are numerous two-syllable words containing the character, and if you’re not familiar with the word, you can’t tell at a glance which meaning applies.  The character can also appear in either position.

環節 ‘link’ (meaning A)
節奏 ‘rhythm’ A
情節 ‘plot’ A
情人節 ‘Valentine’s day’ (meaning B)
節日  ‘festival, holiday’ B
過節 ‘to celebrate a holiday’ B
節省 ‘to save, economize’ (meaning C)
節儉 ‘thrifty’ C
節育 ‘birth control’ C
[Source:  zhongwen.com]

(Note the different parts of speech of the last three – having 節 in first position tells you nothing in this respect.)
This is why most people who learn Chinese as a second language spend quite a while building up their active (spoken) knowledge and getting the most common words down before they tackle texts.  Looking at real Chinese texts, it requires substantial background knowledge to even sort the characters into words.  Trying to learn to read first would quickly become overwhelming, unless you have a very unusual mind!

Given enough effort, I suppose you could read, silently, the text of any language without having to actually pronounce the words out loud.

Like the way we look at long medical terms spelled in the "English" alphabet, knowing what it is but would not bother to actually pronounce them?

Doing this for any language may, I suppose, miss the enjoyment of learning the language, especially in social verbal communications with native or non-native speakers, which for many people is the first objective of learning the language in the first place.


What is the equivalent of "make sense" in Chinese? I am trying to explain the phrase "make sense" to my cousin, who is learning English. The dictionary suggests "有意义", but I believe that "有意义" is "meaningful" and that "make sense" should be "讲得通", "说得通", or "符合逻辑".

Consider the following situation:

  我一个北京的朋友居然在上中文入门这门课！

  One of my friends from Beijing is taking Chinese 101! [It doesn't make
  any sense!]

How do I translate the part in brackets? “这根本说不通？” Or maybe "居然" alone suffices?

Here is another example on Tatoeba.org. Is "你说的没有意义" "what you said is insignificant"? Since "有意义" is used pretty often in Chinese, I am wondering whether there is an English equivalent.

The most appropriate translation to make sense would probably be 有道理, which literally means has sense or reason.  For example:
你说的有道理
What you said is reasonable / What you said makes sense.

The phrase 说不通 would probably work, but it is not used frequently in Mainland China Mandarin (普通话) as 有道理 for the same context, if at all.
As for 符合逻辑, the phrase means the same thing as 有道理, but it is more verbose and academic.  It is like saying:
That is well reasoned.
---as opposed to---
That makes sense.

As you can see the latter is what people use in daily conversations, while the former make you sound like some College Professor. ;-)
[It doesn't make any sense] would translate to 这没有道理。  Though in the context of your example, I think it sounds more natural in the Chinese context to say It is ridiculous (这太荒唐了） in response to the situation. Cultural differences in the way we think I suppose.

One of my friends from Beijing is taking Chinese 101! [It doesn't make any sense!]

[It doesn't make any sense!]
这根本不可能。/这是不可能的事。


Meaning of 说话人最可能 **是** 什么关系？ 是,有

Would you please let me know if in this sentence "说话人最可能 是 什么关系？", we can use 有 instead of 是 to be read as:

说话人最可能 有 什么关系？

Heavily dependent on the context, I guess it means 说话人最可能**(和谁)**是什么关系？ (omitted some words). The 谁 should refer to someone (or something) mentioned right above. Check the context.

是/有 can work in the sentence. 是 might sound a little bit better here.

In the "说话人最可能 是/有 什么关系？", '说话人' could be more than one person, maybe two or three. So, the questioner might want to check the relationship among these speakers (说话人s).


What's the Chinese word for "bare-metal" (computer programming)? Bare-Metal Programming

  Bare-metal programming is a term for programming that operates without various layers of abstraction or, as some experts describe it, "without an operating system supporting it."

Example:

A: I made a nice motor controller with a STM32 MCU.
B: Interesting, what OS did you use?
A: No OS, bare metal.

The informal Chinese word for this bare metal seems to be 裸奔.

Although this word is widely used and understood among the programming community, I find it hard to use on a more formal occasion.

Any suggestions?

Bare Metal could be tanslated as 裸金属 literally, but it doesn't make sense for Computer Science. I prefer to translate is as 裸机 (Bare machine).

Bare machine

  Bare machine (or bare metal), in computer parlance, means a computer
  without its operating system.

Example from youdao:

  A new remote boot technology based on IP storage area network was
  designed, and the core technology of it is the firmware protocol stack
  running under bare machine platform.

  设计了一种基于IP存储区域网络的远程引导技术，该技术的核心是运行在裸机下的固件协议栈。

From baidu:

  For example, you might choose to allow the results from the virtual
  machines to vary within 10 percent of the results from the bare metal
  control machine.

  例如，您可以选择允许来自虚拟机的结果与来自裸机控制机器的结果存在10%的偏差。

It should mean, a computer without OS, no software, only hardware. In programming, it means the programmer directly operate the machine, the chips without drivers, operating systems, and any other software.


What does 乃 mean here? On a particular forum is a banner reading:

  此乃舊貼唯讀區

which I imagine is a highfalutin way of saying that this thread is read-only.

Now, 乃 has many senses in my dictionary. What is the sense of 乃 being used here? My best guess would be "only", in the sense that this page is "nothing more than" a read-only area.

Here "乃" means "be". This sentence means "This area is for old posts, and these posts are read-only."

Next time, if you find "此乃" these two characters together or a noun+乃 together, "乃" properly means "be". For example:

  此乃我的书.
   This is my book.

  意识乃是大脑的一种自然属性。
   Consciousness is an emergent property of the brain.

In your giving sentence, it means is (be)

but as a chinese ,this verb is hardly use in communicating or writing, this is a verb which uses in ancient chinese


What is the origin of '日' as a curse word? I read a bunch of answers on 百度知道 but they are all very vague, indecisive and unauthoritative.
1

为什么人们喜欢用那字，那是因为用的人多，人们大多都没有自己的想法，别人说什么，别人什么说地多，他觉得不用就是落伍了。就这样，时间一长就很多人在说了，而且觉得自己特牛，会用那字。恨不能见谁都说。这不是很幼稚吗。
就像“晕”字，现在人们聊天也老喜欢用，跟那是差不多的。只是骂人跟觉得别人不懂表达的区别。 一楼那人说这跟日本有关系。这应该有关系。
但是这肯定是没有什么可查的。谁都不知道是怎么用起来的。 如果真的是抵触日本情绪，那用这字来骂同胞，真让人搞不懂！

2

西北一带都用这个字骂人的，意思都是一样的，其实这个”日”字并不是正确的，真只表达这个意思的那个”日”是一个”尸”字头的字，至于到底怎么写就不记得了，曾经在红楼梦里见过的，康熙字典里应该能查的到的．．．．汉语里很多关于”性”方面的字都是”尸”字头的，只是现代汉语里已经不常见了
有一种解释为骂日/本/人

3

日是象形字，可分成“口”和“一”，口是女性性器官的象形意思，“一”就不用讲了，一插进口，你也懂了，就是操。

My guess was that it had to do with Chinese peoples hatred of Japanese people and thus becoming a curse word. So whats the deal? Where does this word come from?

日 sounds like 入 when stressing the vowels. Compare with the character 肏 for the literal meaning of 入 in this context.

Actually the Chinese chanters is actually from 象形文字 slowly become traditional Chinese character then simplified Chinese characters. for more accurate information you may do more research on 象形文字 so that you will understand the transformation process of the character characters .I think it will help.

Edit : I did some of research.. I dont think the word  日 got to do anything with Japanese
This is what I found “日”字就像一个圆形，中间有一点，很像人们在直视太阳时，所看到的形态。


Is it okay to ask 你的电话号码是什么? Is it ok to ask:

你的电话号码是什么? (What is your telephone number)

Or do I have to say:

你的电话号码是多少? which is the translation on Duolingo.

Also, can I just say:

"你的电话是多少?

because 电话 already means phone number.

I'd say all of your sentences are used in practice within the  mainland.

These are all correct expressions:

你的电话号码是什么？
你的电话号码是多少？
你的电话是多少？

Colloquially, we even brief it like 你电话多少？ or 电话多少？

Hope this could help you.

是什么 /shi  shenme/ = 'is what'
是多少 /shi duoshao/ = 'is how many'

A telephone number is not an amount or quantity,  It is a specific code made up of numbers, not unlike an serial number made up of numbers . If you don't say "你手机的 serial number 是多少", then you shouldn't say "你的电话是多少"

We always ask people " what is your phone number?" instead of "how many is your phone number"

The correct answer is "你的电话号码是什么" /Nide dianhua haoma shi shenme/

  Also, Can I just say, "Nide dianhua shi duoshao?"

No, it means "你的电话是多少" (your telephone is how many), which doesn't make sense;  If you say "你的电话是什么" people would understand you meant "你的电话号码是什么" (omitted 号码). But, grammatically 电话 /dianhua/ only means "telephone" , you need to add 号码 and say "电话号码" if you meant to ask "what is someone's phone number" instead of "what brand someone's telephone is"


Can I communicate without changing tones? I'm not sure why this question has not been posted yet (I might have overlooked), but is it possible to communicate with native Chinese people even if you don't change its tones?

For example, I only memorize Chinese words by pinyin just to be able to type in the keyboard, like wo, not wǒ. And thus I want to speak all the sentence as if all the words consist of the same tone.

But I just wonder if it is possible to make myself understood in oral communication even if I only use the same tone (or first tone). Does Chinese people understand it, or are they not able to understand it if it is not pronounced properly? Or more concretely, how much can I make a communication (e.g. 70%, 30%, etc...)?

I've been also curious about this and I think this could easily be a research topic. Chinese people often happen to understand me even when my tones are flat, and I highlight that they understand me a lot less when my tones are wrong.
Of course this depends a lot on the context, and on the sentence. In a known context and with basic (high frequency) words tones are not that important (I would agree with @NS.X, 80/90%). The speech could sound weird to Chinese people but they can understand. Take also into account that they are used to a wide variety of accents from all China.
But, the grammar and the set phrase is better to be perfect.

If conditions are not so particular, tones are important as grammar and words, so recognition percentage could easily fall below 50% of the sentences.

I want to add that:

Sometimes I noticed for some words Chinese people have difficulty to remember which tone it is. For them is natural to put that tone on that sentence.
When they wisper, or better, when they speak crying (you can see sometimes in the movies) tones almost disappear.

About your study I can say tones are really important, you have to study them and try to learn, but I also say you that I memorized most of them just hearing and using them. You will end up repeating a sentence in your head and saying "Ok, wo is third tone".

I don't think so. Try this:

石室诗士施氏，嗜狮，誓食十狮。施氏时时适市视狮。
十时，适十狮市。是时，适施氏适是市。施氏视十狮，恃矢势，使是十狮逝世。氏拾是十狮尸，适石室。
石室湿，施氏使侍拭石室。石室拭，施氏始试食十狮尸。食时，始识十狮实十石狮尸。试释是事。


What Chinese characters are rare in modern but common in classical Chinese? I browsed randomly through texts written in classical Chinese, and I noticed there were a lot of Chinese characters that were frequent in classical Chinese but never or rarely being present in modern Chinese.
Some examples:
吾，爾，而，谐，虞，乎,乃，伊，卿，叟，孰，弥 。。。

Could you provide further examples, especially characters which are used lexically?

There are people studying this.

Classical Chinese Character Frequency List

Modern Chinese Character Frequency List

Now do your own comparisons because I'm lazy.

Update -- I feel less lazy today so I'll give it a shot.

For obvious purposes, let't take the first 1000 characters in the classical list and see where they go in the trend. I can't do scripts so I'll do excel. Anyway, here are words that are falling out of favor:

Ancient date and time system: 甲乙丙丁, 子丑寅卯, etc
Ancient bureaucracy: 丞, 诏, 诛, 朕, 卿, 吏, 郡, etc.
Some daily words are also fading away: 吾, 汝, 焉, 哉, 勿, 曰, etc.
Moral concepts: 孝, 贤, 贞, etc.
Hard to categorize: 骸, 淮, 朔, etc. Either the concepts are no longer popular, or there are substitutes that is becoming popular....

I think you should think about there are two sets of Chinese charaters. In Hongkong, Taiwan and some Chinese communities in the UK, US, traditional Chinese charaters are still used; whereas people on mainland China use simplified Chinese charaters. Here there is a traditional Chinese word, 後, which may mean "behind" and the word 后 means "queen". In simplified Chinese, 後 is replaced by 后 and hence Chinese in China may not know 後 and think it is an obsolescent word but Chinese in other regions are still using it.


Chinese ellipsis marks How is an ellipsis 省略号 written in Chinese?

。。。

...

or

......

The only reference I can find on this is this word reference forum which states ....... This also says 6 dots.

E.g.,

在這裡輸入您的訊息...... （Type your message here...）

Six dots.

It is called 刪節號 in Taiwan, and 省略号 in China. Both use 6 dots.

The last one is right，we use 6 dots in china，“。。。”is just three “。” sometimes will be used to have a chat online


但是, 可是 and 不过 - how to know which one to use? According to my dictionary, 但是, 可是 and 不过 all mean "but/however"? However are there any differences between them? Are there some cases, where one can be used but not another?

Check out this page: 3 ways to say 'but' in Chinese - difference between 不过 bù guò - 可是 kě shì - 但是 dàn shì.

That page says that:

不过 is softer.
可是 is usually associated with something unfortunate.
但是 is more formal and stronger.


Headline: "YouTube创始人从雅虎手中收购Delicious". What is the purpose of "手中" If you take out 手中, isn't the translation, YouTube founder buys Delicious from Yahoo, still conveyed? What does 手中 add?

http://tech.sina.com.cn/i/2011-04-28/09065460713.shtml

手中 actually indicates somebody possess something.
For example B从A手中拿走C means A used to possess C and B take it from A, the sentence is to emphasize the action "take".

“手中” means Delicious belonged to Yahoo, in this Headline the author treated Yahoo as a person (of cause a person with hands) —— Yahoo hold Delicious in his hands, and the creators of YouTube take Delicious from Yahoo's "hands".
“手中” 相当于“那里”（there）

“YouTube创始人从雅虎手中收购Delicious”
has the same meanig as
“YouTube创始人从雅虎那里收购Delicious”


How bad does a sentence with an inicial 了 sound here? There's a rule in Chinese that says that when you have two or more verbs in a sentence, you should put 了 in the last one. As in:

  他们请经理吃了饭。

How bad would it sound if you put 了 before 请?

  他们请了经理吃饭。

If it's not bad at all, what would be the differece between the two?

Thanks!

他们请经理吃了饭- subtle emphasize what they eat, but not necessarily.

他们请了经理吃饭- to emphasize who they buy dinner for

There's another possible way to say this:

他们请经理吃饭了- subtle emphasis on the thing happened, but not necessarily.

It really depends on how you say it, your tune can change the emphasis too. They all have the same meaning. The second one probably has stronger effect.

Please correct me if i'm wrong.

他们请经理吃了饭。

It was dinner that they invited the manager to have.

他们请了经理吃饭。

It was the manager that they invited to have dinner.


Are there words in Mandarin written by characters for other words that mean the same thing? For example, in written Chinese 给 is used a ideograph for "to give" and is read with whatever the word for "to give" is in the various languages, even if the word is not cognate or in any way related to the etymology of 给. Are there words in Mandarin that are written with characters for words that are not etymologically related?

If it's just selecting a phonetic loan for a word that has never been written before, that is understandable because you have to start somewhere. I'm more curious about stuff where the pronunciation/etymology is completely unrelated but a character is used just because of its meaning.

A good example is numbers in Chinese.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_numerals#Standard_numbers

There are words that have different shapes(uncognated）yet share the same meaning in Mandarin. Written Mandarin is relately a new form of writing, words have been simplifed more than once during the 50s-80s (and even some of the words' pronounciaton have been altered).

Sorry for just answering your TITLE.

If what you meant by "Mandarin" is not the thing I percieved (which I think is a spoken standard based on Beijing dilect),then you may show some e.g to clarify your original question.


How do you say "to stay" or "to visit" a business instead of a person or vacation destination? How do you say 'to stay' or 'to visit' a business?

For example:
"How long do you plan stay at the coffee shop?" or
 "We are glad you came to visit our store."

Words like 看，访问，住，下榻，... All seem to pertain to traveling, or visiting someone. But my topic is about visiting a business or store instead of a person or vacation destination.

Would 坐 be appropriate? Like 你多久坐在咖啡店？But, I guess that does not work for 'to visit' if it is a grocery store.

How do you say 'to stay' or 'to visit' a business?

上 (visit)

上酒家 (dine in a restaurant)
上洒店 (*rent room in a hotel) * short stay for a night or few hours
上酒吧 (visit a bar)

光顧 (patronage; patronize | [粵]: 幫襯 )

光顧某店( shop at some store)
光顧髮型屋 (visit the hair salon)

other usage of 光顧:

被小偷光顧 (visited by a thief)

逛 (visit/ tour)

逛公司 (shop at or window shopping at department store)
逛遊樂場 (visit / touring amusement park)

泡 (visit / linger)

泡酒吧 ( visit a bar / linger in a  bar)
泡網吧 (visit or linger in an internet bar)

"We are glad you came to visit our store."

"我們很高興閣下光顧/ 光臨本店" or "歡迎閣下光臨本店。"
閣下: (formal) you
光臨: (formal) to honor with one's presence; to attend


How to translate “就这么着吧”？ 普通话口语里常用。语境：

女性跟闺蜜抱怨丈夫：「虽然我跟你这么抱怨，但真要和他离婚也不现实，唉，就这么着吧！」（带着点无奈，日子凑合过的味道）
论坛网友：「反正不管我再发布多少次，网站都会给我删除的，所以就这么着吧，我也没辙」（虽然不接受，但是也无可奈何的意思：不然我能咋办呢？）

网上搜到一些翻译，感觉味道不太对：例如Alright，如果没有音调的辅助，只凭文字传达，Alright没有“就这么着吧”里面的无奈感吧？

所以，怎么翻译好呢？

Edit: In this context, 就这么着吧 means 1) we disagree or dont want sth in heart or at first, 2) but have to accept it in reality or now, because we have no choice and nothing more we can do.

so be it

  used for saying that you accept a situation in which something has
  been decided or is necessary, although you are not happy about it

https://www.macmillandictionary.com/us/dictionary/american/so-be-it

着 [verb particle] indicating the continuation of an action or a state
Example:
走 = walk
走着 = walking
看 = watch
看着 = watching

Base on the context, a verb is seemingly omitted in "就这么(?)着吧". The omitted verb could be the following:
"就这么(保持着)(現狀)吧
"let's just (maintaining/ keeping) (the current situation) like this"
"let's just (keeping) (it) at that"
"Just let it be" would be a good translation too


沒 simplified to 没: What is the origin of the change? I've just discovered that the simplified form of the character 没 is different from the traditional form (沒). With them both being nearly identical with exception of a single stroke, why was there a need to alter it at all? Does anyone here know the origin of the change?

"Simplification" is a process. If it's not reduced in stroke count, it's not actually "Simplified" - the mix-up in language is due to PRC's standard of Chinese being popularly known as "Simplified Chinese", even though PRC Chinese may have the same number of or even more strokes.
「没」 came from a popular variant of 「沒」, because the right hand side of 「没」, 「殳」, occurs more frequently among characters, while the right hand side of 「沒」, 「」, occurs in...「沒」.

It is important to look at a character's earliest traceable meaning before further analysing its components.

Some of the earliest traceable meanings of 「沒」 is to be underwater / be submerged (cf. 「沉沒」). This is the reason for its 「氵・水」.

「殳」, if it's a semantic component, is usually used as an active verb marker, cf. 「發」 (to shoot arrows > emit), 「擊」 (to attack), 「殺」 (to kill), etc. 「殳」 is therefore not a semantic match for the meaning submerge (and is not a phonetic match for the sound of the word either).

So, what exactly is 「沒」?

秦簡秦103睡虎地秦簡隸定
「沒」 was originally a compound of a hand 「又」 under deep waters (represented by a whirlpool 「洄」). 「回」 was later gradually corrupted into the shape of 「勹」 or 「刀」.
西漢隸602銀雀山簡編三國・魏隸孔羨碑　今楷
Note: as a consequence of this development, we can be certain that 「」 was not really a character before, but was made up to decompose 「沒」 into 「氵・水」 and something else.

References:

季旭昇《說文新證》
《王力古漢語字典》
小學堂
漢字源流

No that’s not even simplified. It has only improved the writing. It’s exactly the same character.