Editing Mandarin Chinese (section)

==Name==
The English word "mandarin" (from [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]] {{lang|pt|mandarim}}, from [[Malay language|Malay]] {{lang|ms|menteri}}, from [[Sanskrit]] {{lang|sa-Latn|mantrī}}, {{lang|sa-Latn|mantrin}}, meaning 'minister or counsellor') originally meant an [[mandarin (bureaucrat)|official]] of the [[Ming dynasty|Ming]] and [[Qing dynasty|Qing]] empires.<ref>''China in the Sixteenth Century: The Journals of Mathew Ricci''.</ref><ref>"mandarin", {{cite book
| title = Shorter Oxford English Dictionary | publisher = Oxford University Press
| edition = 6th | year = 2007 | volume = 1 | isbn = 978-0-19-920687-2
}}</ref>{{efn|A [[folk etymology]] deriving the name from {{transliteration|zh|Mǎn dà rén}} ({{lang-zh|s=满大人|t=滿大人|l=[[Manchu people|Manchu]] big man|labels=no}}) is without foundation.{{sfnp|Razfar|Rumenapp|2013|p=293}}}}
Since their native varieties were often mutually unintelligible, these officials communicated using a [[koiné language]] based on various northern varieties. When [[Jesuit]] missionaries learned this standard language in the 16th century, they called it "Mandarin", from its Chinese name {{zhp|p=Guānhuà|s=官话|t=官話|l=language of the officials}}.{{sfnp|Coblin|2000|p=537}}

In everyday English, "Mandarin" refers to [[Standard Chinese]], which is often called simply "Chinese". Standard Mandarin Chinese is based on [[Beijing dialect]], with some lexical and syntactic influence from other Mandarin dialects. It is the official spoken language of the [[China|People's Republic of China]] (PRC) and [[Taiwan]] (Republic of China, ROC), as well as one of the four official languages of [[Singapore]], and a high-prestige minority language<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Coluzzi |first=Paolo |date=2017 |title=The Vitality of Minority Languages in Malaysia |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/661345 |journal=Oceanic Linguistics |volume=56 |issue=1 |pages=211 |doi=10.1353/ol.2017.0008 |s2cid=148793910 |issn=1527-9421 |url-access=subscription |access-date=2022-06-21 |archive-date=2022-05-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220524165724/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/661345/ |url-status=live }}</ref> in [[Malaysia]]. It also functions as the language of instruction in mainland China and Taiwan. It is one of the [[Official languages of the United Nations|six official]] languages of the [[United Nations]], under the name "Chinese". Chinese speakers refer to the modern standard language as
* {{zhp|p=Pǔtōnghuà|s=普通话|t=普通話|l=common speech}} in mainland China,
* {{zhp|p=Guóyǔ|s=国语|t=國語|l=national language}} in Taiwan or
* {{zhp|p=Huáyǔ|s=华语|t=華語|l=[[Huaxia]] language}} in Malaysia and Singapore,
but not as {{zhi|p=Guānhuà}}.{{sfnp|Norman|1988|p=136}}

Linguists use the term "Mandarin" to refer to the diverse group of dialects spoken in northern and southwestern China, which Chinese linguists call {{zhi|p=Guānhuà}}. The alternative term {{zhp|p=Běifānghuà|s=北方话|t=北方話|l=Northern dialects}}, is used less and less among Chinese linguists. By extension, the term "Old Mandarin" or "Early Mandarin" is used by linguists to refer to the northern dialects recorded in materials from the Yuan dynasty.

Native speakers who are not academic linguists may not recognize that the variants they speak are classified in linguistics as members of "Mandarin" (or so-called "Northern dialects") in a broader sense. Within Chinese social or cultural discourse, there is not a "Mandarin" identity based on language; rather, there are strong regional identities centred on individual dialects because of the wide geographical distribution and cultural diversity of their speakers. Speakers of forms of Mandarin other than the standard typically refer to the variety they speak by a geographic name—for example the [[Sichuanese Mandarin|Sichuan dialect]] and the Hebei dialect or [[Northeastern Mandarin|Northeastern dialect]], all being regarded as distinct from the standard language, with which they may not share much mutual intelligibility.