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Q: Is the difference between Mandarin and local dialects just pronunciation?
I was recently told by a Chinese person that the difference between Mandarin and their local dialect is pronunciation. The person then went on to tell me this is the case for all local dialects. They basically use the exact same characters to mean the same words, and the same grammar, the only difference is how you pronounce the words. I had no idea!
Not at all. Some dialects are just slight to moderate twists on Manadrin, but there are many completely different languages out there such as Shanganese, Cantonese (9 tones) and Chuzhou (16 tones).
giadrosich:
16 tones?!! That must be a nightmare for those not raised in that area!
Xpat.John:
Even my friend, who is a natural linguist (his average time to fluently learn a language is about 4 months) and married to a woman from that area can only speak a few words of it.
I've noticed a lot of different phrases and double meanings to words in additional to different pronounciations.
All mainlanders and Taiwanese READ ALOUD Chinese the say way, which is to say, in Mandarin, however well they can pronounce it. But what they actually speak to friends and family is much much much differnet, especially in the southeast.
Hongkongers sometimes write in Cantonese, and sometimes a mix of Cantonese and Mandarin, and you'll find that even the Cantonese/Mandarin mix is extremely difficult to read if you only know Mandarin.
"They basically use the exact same characters to mean the same words, and the same grammar,"
So I think that's where the "exact same characters" thing comes from. Mandarin grammar is unusual for Chinese, and many of the gramatical differences probably come from the northern barbarian invasions. Adverbs before verbs, dependent clauses before their heads, and all that other suspiciously head-final stuff, is not typical of southeastern dialects, or old Chinese.
EDIT: Doing some heavy googling here, but this is 99% true, anyway. Anyway, here's a fun book about Cantonese that should give you an idea of the similarities and differences between it and Mandarin:
http://books.google.ca/books?id=czbGJLu59S0C&pg=PA416&lpg=PA416&dq=Canto...
Supposedly Fujian dialects are evey more different from the other dialects, but I wouldn't know personally
