Recently, we have been getting a lot of queries about what Taiwanese language is, and whether it is possible to communicate with them in standard Chinese. So, we continue our exploration of the Chinese language and introduce the differences between pǔtōnghuà 普通话 in mainland China and guóyǔ 國語 in Taiwan. Both pǔtōnghuà and guóyǔ are phonologically based on the Beijing dialect. There are slight differences in pronunciation, in the meanings of certain words and in characters.
PRONUNCIATION. Taiwanese guóyǔ has a "softer" pronunciation due to the influence of the Minnan dialect, as you would hear in southern China. This is most pronounced in the retroflex consonants zh [dž], ch [č], sh [š], r [~ž]. In standard Chinese, these sounds are pronounced clearly, whereas in Taiwan they are more similar to the non-reflex counterparts z [dz], c and s, in other words, zh and z sound similar. For example, the question "what's up?" in China would sound like "zhè shì shénme?" [zhè shì shámma], whereas in Taiwan it's more "zè sì sénme?" [dzè sì samma]. Guóyǔ is not characterised by the use of the "er" syllable, e.g. the question "where?" will be nálǐ哪里, not nǎr哪儿 as in pǔtōnghuà. However, these differences do not matter very much - it is easy to understand what is meant.
CHARACTERS (hànzì 汉字). In Taiwan, as in Hong Kong and Macao, the traditional characters fántǐzì 繁體字 are used, while in China the simplified jiǎntǐzì 简体字 is used. In the 1960s and 1970s, mainland China undertook a reform to simplify writing by reducing the number of strokes in some characters according to certain principles. For example, love ài 愛 became 爱 , dragon lóng 龍 → 龙, study xué 學 → 学，door mén 門 → 门, state guó 國 → 国. However, although China uses simplified characters, Chinese intellectuals also recognise the traditional ones, which are used in all classical Chinese works. Knowing the basic principles of characters simplification, it is not difficult to learn to recognise traditional characters or vice versa. By the way, students of Sinology at Vilnius University also have the opportunity to get acquainted with traditional characters during their studies. It is quite easy to learn the simplified ones and at the same time to learn the traditional characters.
WORDS. Some words have different meanings in China and Taiwan: e. g. tǔdòu 土豆 (literally "ground bean" means “potato” in China and "groundnuts" in Taiwan). ● Characters may be interchanged: e.g. in China, panda is xióngmāo 熊猫 and in Taiwan it is māoxióng 貓熊. ● Different words may be used, e.g. bicycle in China is zìxíngchē 自行车，while in Taiwan it is jiǎotàchē 腳踏車, taxi is chūzūchē 出租车 and jìchéngchē 計程車。● The tone of some words may also be different e.g. hair 头发/頭髮 will be tóufa in China and tóufà in Taiwan, week 星期 will be xīngqī in China and xīngqí in Taiwan.
Importantly, these linguistic differences are not substantive, comparable to the differences between "American English" and "British English". Thus, once you have learnt standard Chinese, you can speak it in both mainland China and Taiwan.