官话 (guān huà) — Mandarin (the standard Chinese language, especially in historical context); bureaucratic jargon, officialese

Definition

Historically, the prestige Mandarin dialect used by officials — the ancestor of modern standard Mandarin. Colloquially, it means stiff 'officialese' / bureaucratic jargon.

noun
Mandarin (the standard Chinese language, especially in historical context)bureaucratic jargonofficialese

Examples

  • 官话。
    Míng qīng shí qī de guān huà yǐ běi jīng yīn wèi biāo zhǔn.
    The Mandarin of the Ming and Qing dynasties was based on the Beijing pronunciation.
  • 官话，。
    Zhè piān bào gào quán shì guān huà, méi shén me shí jì nèi róng.
    This report is full of bureaucratic jargon and has little real content.
  • 官话。
    Xué xí guān huà duì liǎo jiě zhōng guó lì shǐ hěn yǒu bāng zhù.
    Learning Mandarin is very helpful for understanding Chinese history.

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.

官guānofficial
话huàspeech

官 points to officialdom, while 话 is speech, giving official speech or the standard language.

Characters in this word

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

  • 宀宀mián
  • 𠂤𠂤𠂤

官 pairs 宀, a roof, with 𠂤, rooms beneath it, to depict an official building.

Open 官 →

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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