土话 (tǔ huà) — local dialect, vernacular; colloquial expression, slang

Definition

Literally 'earth speech', 土话 refers to a regional or rural local dialect, often rough and unstandardized — narrower and more colloquial than 方言 (which can include any regional variety).

noun
local dialectvernacularcolloquial expressionslang

Examples

  • 土话，。
    Hěn duō nóng cūn lǎo rén zhī huì shuō tǔ huà, bú huì shuō pǔ tōng huà.
    Many elderly people in rural areas only speak their local dialect and can't speak Mandarin.
  • 土话。
    Tā jiǎng de nà zhǒng tǔ huà wǒ yí jù huà yě tīng bù dǒng.
    I couldn't understand a single word of that dialect he was speaking.
  • 土话，。
    Zhè ge cí shì zhè lǐ de tǔ huà, cí diǎn shàng chá bú dào.
    This word is local slang; you won't find it in the dictionary.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
偏正piānzhèngModifier + head

The first part narrows down the second: it says what kind of thing the head is.

土tǔlocal
话huàspeech

土 (local) and 话 (speech) combine to mean local speech or slang.

Characters in this word

No reliable origin is recorded for this character.

Open 土 →

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 話; 话 is its simplified writing.

Meaning part形符xíngfú
言言yánword
Sound part声符shēngfú
𠯑
𠯑𠯑話huà
The sound has drifted apartThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

In the traditional form 話, 言 relates to words and 𠯑 gives the sound; the simplified 话 is a shorthand, so its right side is not that sound part.

Open 话 →

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