Mandarin,Cantonese and other dialects

Mandarin,also called Putonghua, is the official language of China.The northeastern part of China,Beijing,Tianjin and places nearby,speak Mandarin only,but only the Beijing accent is regarded as the normal accent.

As for other parts of China,there are people understand little Mandarin,people speak Mandarin with such a strong accent that I may never get it(Deng Xiaoping had a strong Sichuan accent.Have you ever heard his recordings?),and people speak both Mandarin and a local accent or dialect.

Cantonese is one of the most successful (or ubiquitous) dialects in China.It's spoken in Hongkong,Guangzhou andwestern Guangdong Province with strong accents,and most importantly,in some Chinatowns all over the globe.It may be more convenient for a Cantonese speaker to work or live with HK people because many of them speak English and Cantonese fluently.

In other parts of China,numerous dialects are used. In fact,they may come from other language families,such as TIbetan and other languages spoken by other ethic minorities,Chaoshan dialect(came from Mingnan language family,the same as Taiwanese),Wu dialect one of which is very famous, and the Shanghai dialect.

In all,you may understand Mandarin all right,but it's possible that you couldn't manage to communicate with local people.Me too.

mandarin,cantonese and other dialect

Mandarin,also called Putonghua, is the official language of China.The nothern east part of China,Beijing,Tianjin and place nearby,speak Mandarin only,but only Beijing accent is regarded as the nomal accent.

As for other part of China,there are people understand little Mandarin,people speak Mandarin with such a strong accent that I may never get it(Deng Xiaoping had a strong Sichuan accent.Have you ever heard his record?),and people speak both Mandarin and local acent or dialect.

Cantonese is one of the successful dialects in China.It' spoken in Hongkong,Guangzhou,western Guangdong Province with strong accents,and most importantly,in some Chinatowns all over the globe.It may be more convenient for a Cantonese speaker to work or live with HK people because many of them speak English and Cantonese fluently.

In other parts of China,numerous dialects are used. In fact,they may come from other language families,such as TIbetan and other languages spoken by other ethic minorities,Chaoshan dialect(came from Mingnan language family,the same as Taiwanese),Wu dialect one of which is very famous:Shanghai dialect.

In all,you may understand Mandarin all right,but it's possible that you couldn't manage to comunicate with local people.Me too.