Survival Chinese

Chilin Shih
East Asian Languages and Cultures
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Chinese Geography

Chinese Language

Chinese Banquet Etiquette

Chinese Geography
China has 1.3 billion people.

5000 years of history

9.6 million square km of area

Chinese Geography
Modern Chinese population
concentrates in the east.

The Yellow River valley was the

cradle of Chinese civilization.

The Yangtze River is the longest

river in Asia. The river basin is
home to one-third of Chinese
population.

Chinese Geography
Chinese Geography
Chinese Population Density
Chinese Geography
Forbidden City, Beijing
Great Wall, Beijing
Xi’an
Guilin
Shanghai
Chinese Language
Mandarin is the official standard
language of China. Though China
is well-known for language
diversity.

There are many dialects such as

Cantonese and Shanghainese.

Chinese Language and Dialects

Chinese Dialect Map
The Chinese writing system
consists of more than 40,000
characters

A typical college students know

about 3000-5000 characters

Chinese Writing System

Some characters retain the
ancient pictographic design.

Some are created with whimsical

combination.

Chinese Writing System

sun moon car horse
ri4 yue4 ming2

sun moon bright

mu4 lin2 sen1

tree woods forest

Most of the Chinese characters
are actually sound-based, with a
component indicating the sound
and another the meaning
category.

Chinese Writing System

 ma
question marker

ma1 ma4
ma3
mother scold

horse
ma3 ma3

ant weight

agate
ma3
In a traditional Chinese book, the
characters are written vertically
and are read from right to left.

Chinese Writing System

In modern books Chinese
characters can be aligned
horizontally and are read from
left to right. This layout is
commonly used for scientific
articles where English words are
often included.

Chinese Writing System

 Chinese Tones

Chinese is a tone language. Different tones, or

pitch contours, change the meaning of the word.

Ma1: mother

Ma2: hemp

Ma3: horse

Ma4: to scold
Chinese Tones

Ma1-ma0 ma4 ma3.

Mother scolds the horse.

Ma3 ma4 ma1-ma0.

The horse scolds mother.
Pinyin is a Romanization
system—a spelling aid using
Latin alphabet to annotate the
pronunciation of Chinese
characters

Pinyin – A Romanization System

a, e, i, o, u, ü
Pinyin uses these letters for 16
vowel sounds. The pronunciation
changes with context, though
generally, say them as if you are
singing Italian songs.

Pinyin – Vowels
bi, ba, bu pi, pa, pu
di, da, du ti, ta, tu
ga, gu ka, ku
bei, bai sa, su
ban, bang pin, ping
puo, pong ma, na, la

Pinyin examples
q = ch j = gee
x = sh zh = jr
(say them with a smile!) with the tongue curled

qing wen May I ask, Beijing Beijing

please
xie xie Thank you Zhong guo China

Pinyin examples
Banquet Etiquette
Banquets serve important

social functions in China.

Friendship is strengthened

and political and business

decisions were typically made

during banquets.
Place Setting
The seat facing the door is the
honored seat for the guest of
honor.
The host sits opposite to the
guest of honor.

Seating Arrangement
Guest

Host
Dishes are served together in a
casual gathering.
Casual Banquet
In a formal banquet, dishes are
served sequentially. There may
be ten to twelve courses,
starting with appetizers and
ending with a soup.
The Appetizer
The host will make a toast and
welcome everyone.
Gan bei!
This means bottom up.

Then the host will invite everyone to

start.
The honored guest is served first. This
custom is enthusiastically followed
for the first few courses.
The honored guest usually makes a
toast to the host when the second
dish is served. After that, every one
can initiate a toast to individual or to
the whole group. There may be many
rounds of toast during the course of
the meal.
When touching glasses, raise
your glass to a height that
reflects the social ranking.
When toasting to your boss or
senior, keep the rim of your
glass a bit lower.
The host is responsible for
ordering. It is an art to find the
perfect combination and
sequence to bring out the
optimal culinary experience.
There may be chicken, duck,
beef, pork and seafood,
alternating with vegetable
dishes.
Only half way through.
Enjoy each dish slowly. The host
will be happy if you sample
every thing.
Looking for a conversation topic?
Ask about the dishes. Many
dishes have interesting stories
behind them.
Is the fish head pointing at you?
Then it is your turn to drink.
The word fish sounds the same as
having more resources.
During New Year, we always leave
some fish in the plate to signify a
resourceful and abundant coming
year.
The Soup
The soup is served at the end of
the meal.
Afterwards, there may be fruit
and/or a simple dessert.
We will return for four modules
of survival Chinese:
•Greetings: Meng Liu
•Shopping: Huang-Lan Su
•Place names: Lingling Yao
•Daily necessities: Di Wendy Wu

We have a webpage for you with

vocabulary , sound recordings and
handout. There are also links to
nursery rhymes, poems and songs.

http://faculty.las.illinois.edu/cls/SurvivalChinese