Mandarin

Some of the main features of Mandarin that distinguish it from other dialects are:

-A small number of tonal categories (4 or 5 tones usually)

The third person pronoun is "ta" (他)

The demonstratives "this" and "that" are "zhè" (這) and "nà" (那)

The plural suffix is "mén" (們) .

Jinyu (Shanxi dialect) is similar to Mandarin except that it has glottal stops on some words where Mandarin does not.

(There is some difference in characters and usage between different chinese dialects)

In periods of Ancient China, members of any class could become public servants by passing a series of tests based on academic skills and religious knowledge (different depending on the period but mostly Confucianism). Then, once within the ranks, one could advance in a series of grades; the nine most senior grades were known as the Mandarin.

These non-democratic but senior and long-lived positions have inspired the use of Mandarin to describe Western public servants with similar mystique. Although our politicians are elected, many of our top officials are appointed, often living out their appointer's term in office. They get there by being both good at what they do and having the right connections.

Taken to its logical extreme, Cancer Man could be described as a Mandarin.

Mandarin phonology is, to say the least, complicated.* For this reason, most romanizations don't do justice to the peculiarities of the language; what's more, most native speakers, even scholars, never really master the ability to phoneticize their own speech. Romanizations are traditionally done by Western linguists, who have a lifetime's worth of experience phoneticizing languages, except that they must do it in Western phonetic scripts, which are ill-suited to the complexity of Mandarin. Bopomofo has become much more popular in recent years, helping to make things like text input, or learning new vocabulary, a lot easier.

Mandarin has three basic plosives: /p/, /t/, and /k/. Although in Pinyin these sounds are represented as "b," "d," and "g," respectively, unlike European languages (and unlike Japanese, for that matter), these letters are not voiced and have no voiced correspondents.

Mandarin is rich in affricatives and aspirations. Those three aforementioned plosives can all be aspirated:

/p^h/ (represented as "p" in the Pinyin romanization)
/t^h/ ("t")
/k^h/ ("k")

The language also has a whopping ten affricatives, the subtleties of which are difficult to communicate in HTML. Basically, they are:

The Alveolars:
/ts^h/ ("c")
/ts^hz/ ("ci")
/ts/ ("z")
/tz/ ("zi")

The Retroflexes:
/tS/ ("ch")
/tSr/ ("chi")
/dZ/ ("zh")
/dZr/ ("zhi")

The Alveo-Palatals:
/tç/ ("q")**
alveo-palatal /dZ/ ("j")

Mandarin also has its share of fricatives:

/f/
/H/ ("h," though stronger than in English and almost like the "ch" in "Loch")
/s/
/S/ ("sh")
/Z/ ("r" when at the beginning of a syllable; retroflex; "r" is a letter which, as we'll see in a moment, does double-duty)
/ç/ ("x;" alveo-palatal)

Mandarin has two glides, /w/ and /y/; two liquids, /l/ and retroflex /r/ (also represented as "r" when not in an initial position); and three nasals, /m/, /n/, and /N/ ("ng"). All in all, that's 29 basic consonant sounds; compare that to English's 24.

The language has nine vocalic sounds (eight vowels and the retroflex syllabic /r/) which can combine in various ways to form diphthongs. Also, Mandarin has a syllabic /z/. These syllabic sounds are rather difficult to represent in HTML. In fact, they're difficult to represent at all; even the Pinyin transliteration is maddeningly complex, and a full discussion would be well beyond the scope of this writeup (and my knowledge).***

On top of all this, Mandarin has four tones, or voice pitches, at which one must say a particular syllable in order to communicate meaning. In Pinyin, the first tone is a high, even pitch. The second tone begins low and rises (similar to what an American English speaker would say if he were asking a one-syllable question); the third tone begins at a normal pitch, but then drops to a certain point before rising back to normal (similar to what a British English speaker would say if he were asking a one-syllable question). The fourth tone begins high, then falls sharply to a low pitch. Some syllables vary in pitch or alter their pitch, depending on the tone of the preceding syllable. Also, there is a "neutral tone" which is unstressed and therefore has a basic mid-level pitch.

Suffice it to say, an alphabetic representation of the Mandarin language would have many more symbols than the standard Western alphabets are capable of furnishing. No wonder they use ideograms!

* Sadly, no, I don't speak the language. But I'm fascinated with phonology of all languages, and there just happened to be a dearth of information on the Internet in general, and Everything2 in particular, on the subject of Mandarin phonetics.

** The difference between the retroflex and alveo-palatal consonants is probably best described like this. The retroflex /tS/ is like the "ch" in the English word "chop," except that the tongue is curled a little bit more, touching the roof of the mouth almost straight up. The alveo-palatal /tç/ is kinda like the "ch" in "cheep," except that the tonge is pushed a little bit further forward, so that the affrication is somewhere between a "sh" sound and a silent "y" sound. Native speakers of Prince Edward Island English (my native accent) pronounce a similar sound at the end of words like "night" and "heat."

*** For the sake of completeness, the eight vowels to which I referred are: the "a" in "father;" the "a" in "about;" a sound somewhere between the "u" in "fun" and the "u" in "fur" (such as it is); "e as in "get;," the letters "i," "o," and "u" as they are pronounced in Italian; and the "ü" sound as it is pronounced in German (or "u" as it is pronounced in French). Some people include a ninth vowel, the "u" in "fun," but for most speakers under most circumstances this will coincide with the schwa. Some of these sounds are represented by two or more combinations of letters in Pinyin, and each letter may mean a different sound in different contexts; the letter "i" is used to represent at least five different sounds, depending on the surrounding letters. I've therefore ommitted discussing vowels in too much detail.

Thanks to Gritchka for helping me with IPA and vowels, and Chattering Magpie for helping me with tones.

I begin to wonder what these wee Christmas oranges are, exactly. These days I often see clementines at my grocer's, and I'm not sure if they're the same as the mandarins of my youth, nor how each relates to tangerines and navel oranges and all of that ilk.

So a bit of poking around gets me confused. An alternate name for the mandarin orange is the tangerine, but a source informs me that "in the trade" that name is usually restricted to orange-skinned varieties of mandarins with thick, rough skins and sweet flesh. (Tangerines were named after Tangier, and indeed Morocco is still a major producer of mandarins, though they originated in Asia, which explains the mandarin moniker.) One source tells me that mandarins are "treated as" members of a separate orange species, Citrus reticulata, but the wording is obfuscatory: are they really a separate species, or aren't they? Another source avers that mandarins are a category of oranges with loose skins, sometimes called kid glove oranges. (Kind of makes them sound like old ladies who smell of lavender but were once real classy, doesn't it?) Turns out this group or category or species or faux-species or whatever it is is a motley crew, ranging in size from "small as an egg" to "large as a grapefruit", with sweet and sour varieties, some seedless, some seedy; only their loose skins unite them. That, and the fact that their segments separate easily.

Besides the thick-skinned tangerines, there's also little sweet mandarins, often called clementines, with thin peels and no seeds, and the similar dancy oranges, which have seeds. Satsuma oranges are Japanese and seedless, and are the ones which are usually confined to canny coffins. These are the most common types, but like most citrus fruits, mandarins hybridize freely, so there's lots more varieties already, and more being developed every year.

There are two recipes at the moment here on e2 that obviously contain mandarin oranges: Mandarin Orange Jell-O Salad and Chicken with Mandarin Oranges and Almonds. Forgive me dear friends if I look askance at these two recipes, for they incorporated canned mandarin oranges. My motto is always: use fresh if you can. But what do I know; I've never made either. Not likely to either, with those canned oranges. :-P

www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/morton/mandarin_orange.html
infoplease.com
epicurious.com

The Mandarin's real name has never been revealed, but it is known that prior to China's adoption of Communism, the Mandarin's family was very wealthy. Raised by a relative after his parents' death while he was young, the Mandarin showed an amazingly advanced understanding of science. He used his family fortune to further his understanding and knowldege as well as gaining a position within the government. He became a powerful official or mandarin through his efforts.

But with the coming of Communism, the Mandarin lost his fortune and his position within the society. He began to seek a way to regain his former glory and visited the Valley of Spirits, a legendary area within China. There, the Mandarin discovered a crashed spaceship and the remains of one of its crew. The ship was from the planet Maklu-4 and its crew were natives of that planet who resembled the legendary dragons of Earth. Within the spaceship, the Mandarin discovered ten rings that were used as part of the ship's engines. After much study, The Mandarin discovered how to use the rings and decided that with their power, he would be able to regain not only his former power, but to dominate the world.

The rings each have their own power and the Mandarin can mentally activate the rings by the force of his will. The rings are as follows:

• Ice Blast, which can project a beam that will drop the temperature of what it strikes to near absolute zero.
• Mento-Intensifier, which allows the wearer to mentally dominate those around them
• Electro-Blast, which firest bolts of electricity
• Flame Blast, which firesa beam of intense heat
• White Light, which produces energy along the electromagnetic spectrum
• Black Light, which produces both an area of utter darkness that no light can penetrate or makes posters of flaming skulls look really cool
• Disintegration Beam, which produces a beam that disintegrates the bonds between the atoms of the object it strikes
• Vortex Beam, which creates a wind vortex rather like a tornado
• Impact Beam, which creates a force beam, and
• Matter Rearranger, which allows the wearer to rearange the molecular structure of whatever it strikes.

The Mandarin has also come into conflict with the X-Men when one of their number, the mutant telepath Psylocke came under his control and she went by the name Lady Mandarin for a short time.

Man`da*rin" (?), n. [Pg. mandarim, from Malay mantri minister of state, prop. a Hind. word, fr. Skr. mantrin a counselor, manira a counsel, man to think.]

1.

A Chinese public officer or nobleman; a civil or military official in China and Annam.

2. Bot.

A small orange, with easily separable rind. It is thought to be of Chinese origin, and is counted a distinct species (Citrus nobilis).

Mandarin duck Zool., a beautiful Asiatic duck (Dendronessa galericulata), often domesticated, and regarded by the Chinese as an emblem of conjugal affection. -- Mandarin language, the spoken or colloquial language of educated people in China. -- Mandarin yellow Chem., an artificial aniline dyestuff used for coloring silk and wool, and regarded as a complex derivative of quinoline.

© Webster 1913.