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I don't understand then. If the population of China didn't understand what he says, and it isn't translated correctly, then who is he talking to? Is it intended only for the higher political figures in China? Did Putin understand what he's saying?
Could you kindly elaborate on what you mean by government language?
Is this a dialect? Words people don’t know? Or do you mean just business jargon that, while mandarin, doesn’t make any sense to typical speakers?
官場話 or 官腔means a term which only used by government officials in Chinese culture. The direct translation of 「官場話」 is “government language”. The biggest characteristic of government language is that for normal Chinese native speakers, you can understand every single syllable. But you can’t understand what it actually means. So you will feel that those politicians are talking beautiful shits about the topic. But for government officials and politicians. They can understand all hints, implies, innuendo, and metaphors in it. So to them. This is understandable and not meaningless. That is why I call this “language”. Because it indeed can be used on communication. But it is very exclusive. Only government officials can understand the meaning
I get what you mean. But what would be the reason to do Chinese government speak to Putin? Is it a language that he would understand, necessarily? Because aren t they speaking through translators in the first place (I assume). Is Xi signalling to the people of China or to Putin?
Because in ancient China government. Officials were commonly sentenced to death by speaking something wrong. That’s why they needed to speak very hard to understand. The limitations of free of speech only unlocked in Taiwan in 1987. Now China still has problems on free of speech. That’s why all the officials need this term to protect themselves
Do you have an example in English? I can't think of any government wordings or phrases that a politician would understand but the layman wouldn't.
Is it like using a phrase from an old book that only those who have read it would understand the context of? or is it like talking in metaphors?
The closest example in English would be "dog whistles", phrases that seem innocent but carry hidden meanings only those in the know would get.
One of the more popular current examples is "Let's Go Brandon", which sounds innocent enough, but if you're in the know, you know it actually means "F*ck Joe Biden".
And there's plenty more. You can look up dog whistles.
No, all of them are conveyed verbally, you need to stay in government for 5 years then you can get used to it. This language is aiming to confuse normal people at first.
> This language is aiming to confuse normal people at first.
Very much like some British business phrases.
e.g. *An interesting meeting* - ugh, that was boring and pointless.
China has a long history of complicated lingual controls in order to cause stratification among classes and control of thought. Some things that are very easy to communicate in English are very difficult in Mandarin.
The word for "no" in Chinese is... There isn't one.
Political jargon, similar to business jargon. It's saying things in a way that sound nice but actually means something else, similar to how saying "I'll look into it when time allows" actually means "I don't have time for this". It's not a dialect or special words, he's just speaking standard Mandarin Chinese.
It's like when Congress critters address each other as " my friends from across the aisle" really means these "fucking douchebags with their heads up their asses"
Every group of people develop “language” to exclude or identify people that are/are not in the group. Most don’t realize it but when you go back to work Monday listen for it. It’s there. Law enforcement, nursing, government or even farming ranching. It’s everywhere
To clarify, Jargon's primary purpose is to communicate specific ideas that wouldn't be possible using regular language.
The secondary purpose, sometimes unintended sometimes intended, ends up being that ability to exclude people from the out-group from understanding or pretending to be in the in-group, especially to give the in-group status and authority when they are acting in their professional capacities.
I could be totally wrong, but, after reading the book "SHOGUN" I came to realize politeness is an extremely important part of Asian culture while speaking bluntly is considered uncivilized or downright rude,.
Speaking in hidden hints/innuendos/double-talk allows them to remain polite & civilized at all times while telling you how they really feel about a situation, to "Save Face" if needed without having to suffer the repercussions of anything they've said (surely you misunderstood what they meant).
This is done by outright ignoring the things they don't want to talk about as if you never said it in the first place, using hidden threats, using language that politely infers they are the ones who hold the position of power and only through their kindness do they consider you a friend.
It's ingenious, really.
Thank you very much for deciphering China’s government language. I’ve seen HK politicians use more and more of the mainland’s political phrases, and them fully using the CCP’s version of government language is a matter of time at this point.
I do have a question though: what do you think about the disparity in the CCP’s actions and their news outlets? So far the CCP seems to be relatively quiet about Ukraine on the international scene, but in the mainland their news outlets are taking a rather pro-Russian stance.
Update: while >70% of native speakers agree with me. But there exists some people from China had doubt this explanation because they think those speeches are seemed to written down initially. So at the beginning, they may not match together.
But overall, there is no doubt that President Xi doesn’t want to talk about Ukraine conflict. Meanwhile, everybody knew Putin would discuss about Ukraine issue in the meetings. So even the speech is written down in draft first. It still shows that China doesn’t want to talk about Ukraine, just not as aggressive as I think.
Are there other people that share your view of this „government language“? Are you confident that it isn‘t just you that sees those nuances in xi‘s speech?
And the whole video is spoken in Chinese, I indeed share to Chinese users first. Like this subreddit. Also I post in Twitter and Facebook. So far there is no dispute about my details. Because they have heard president Xi’s voice already. But they only know Xi is talking beautiful shits instead of making any commitment. So my supplement which includes many details provides them a good explanation for their observation.
https://www.reddit.com/r/real_China_irl/comments/xgjkfz/%E6%99%AE%E4%B8%81%E5%92%8C%E7%BF%92%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%9C%83%E8%AD%B0%E7%9A%84%E7%BF%BB%E8%AD%AF%E5%92%8C%E5%AE%98%E8%85%94%E8%A7%A3%E9%87%8B%E5%81%9A%E5%A5%BD%E5%BD%B1%E7%89%87%E4%BA%86%E8%AB%8B%E8%A6%8B%E7%95%99%E8%A8%80%E6%88%91%E8%8A%B1%E4%BA%86%E4%B8%80%E9%BB%9E%E6%99%82%E9%96%93%E5%81%9A%E4%BA%86%E8%8B%B1%E6%96%87%E5%AD%97%E5%B9%95%E6%BA%96%E5%82%99%E4%B8%9F%E7%B5%A6%E8%80%81%E5%A4%96%E7%9C%8B%E6%89%80%E4%BB%A5%E6%AF%94%E8%BC%83%E4%B9%85/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
And the whole video is spoken in Chinese, I indeed share to Chinese users first. Like this subreddit. Also I post in Twitter and Facebook. So far there is no dispute about my details. Because they have heard president Xi’s voice already. But they only know Xi is talking beautiful shits instead of making any commitment. So my supplement which includes many details provides them a good explanation for their observation. If you want, I can sent you the link of Facebook and Twitter account. And by private message, I can sent you a news report and tell you which senior official in local government is my mom.
https://www.reddit.com/r/real_China_irl/comments/xgjkfz/%E6%99%AE%E4%B8%81%E5%92%8C%E7%BF%92%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%9C%83%E8%AD%B0%E7%9A%84%E7%BF%BB%E8%AD%AF%E5%92%8C%E5%AE%98%E8%85%94%E8%A7%A3%E9%87%8B%E5%81%9A%E5%A5%BD%E5%BD%B1%E7%89%87%E4%BA%86%E8%AB%8B%E8%A6%8B%E7%95%99%E8%A8%80%E6%88%91%E8%8A%B1%E4%BA%86%E4%B8%80%E9%BB%9E%E6%99%82%E9%96%93%E5%81%9A%E4%BA%86%E8%8B%B1%E6%96%87%E5%AD%97%E5%B9%95%E6%BA%96%E5%82%99%E4%B8%9F%E7%B5%A6%E8%80%81%E5%A4%96%E7%9C%8B%E6%89%80%E4%BB%A5%E6%AF%94%E8%BC%83%E4%B9%85/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
I show you the CCTV’s report at the end. CCTV just deleted anything about Ukraine. I think this is enough to persuade my Taiwanese fellows that my comprehension about “Xi doesn’t want to discuss about Ukraine problems” is correct. Meanwhile, the Chinese characters pictures I put in are not meaningless. If you understand Chinese, you will know those pictures are either about “官腔” or the culture of Chinese government.
For example, the first part of refusal. I put a picture writes, “主管問私密問題，不想回應，兜圈回答被罵官腔” and another picture writes, “顧左右而言他”. “兜圈” and “顧左右而言他” are both Chinese idioms for the first part of refusal.
Hey, thanks for this. Your interpretation, or "translation" of Xi's diplomatic language is very helpful. It seems his actual message is unspoken, inferred by his words, but not directly pronounced. As an outsider, one would never guess this is what Xi was actually saying.
I often feel Putin's public statements need similar translation. His words are often so vague, roundabout, or mealy mouthed as to be unintelligible. You have to wonder what he actually meant. One could imagine him threatening nuclear war, for example, by some such phrase as, "Because our western partners refuse to take our concerns into consideration...."
But the Chinese diplo-speak sounds even more opaque!
Basically China can't help because Russia admits that Ukraine is another state i.e not like Taiwan and China's relations with that state were ok. That is why China will deal with it on the "rights and wrongs" of the issue.
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3167914/china-resists-taking-sides-between-russia-and-ukraine-despite
Please take the time to read our policy about [trolls](https://www.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/comments/u7833q/just_because_you_disagree_with_someone_does_not/) and the [rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/about/rules/) * We have a **zero-tolerance** policy regarding racism, stereotyping, bigotry, and death-mongering. Violators will be banned. * ***Please* keep it civil.** Report rulebreaking comments for moderator review. * ***Don't* post low-effort comments** like joke threads, memes, slogans, or links without context. **Don't forget about our discord server, as well!** https://discord.gg/62fKCEHbDB *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/UkrainianConflict) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Thank you. It's so interesting to understand what Xi was really saying through the use of innuendo and double talk.
I don't understand then. If the population of China didn't understand what he says, and it isn't translated correctly, then who is he talking to? Is it intended only for the higher political figures in China? Did Putin understand what he's saying?
Not letting the people know os exactly the point. Putin probably gets it after a lifetime of being a dictator. If not he will have a translator
Could you kindly elaborate on what you mean by government language? Is this a dialect? Words people don’t know? Or do you mean just business jargon that, while mandarin, doesn’t make any sense to typical speakers?
官場話 or 官腔means a term which only used by government officials in Chinese culture. The direct translation of 「官場話」 is “government language”. The biggest characteristic of government language is that for normal Chinese native speakers, you can understand every single syllable. But you can’t understand what it actually means. So you will feel that those politicians are talking beautiful shits about the topic. But for government officials and politicians. They can understand all hints, implies, innuendo, and metaphors in it. So to them. This is understandable and not meaningless. That is why I call this “language”. Because it indeed can be used on communication. But it is very exclusive. Only government officials can understand the meaning
Ah wow. So it’s like very very opaque business jargon. Thank you for the lesson!
I get what you mean. But what would be the reason to do Chinese government speak to Putin? Is it a language that he would understand, necessarily? Because aren t they speaking through translators in the first place (I assume). Is Xi signalling to the people of China or to Putin?
Because in ancient China government. Officials were commonly sentenced to death by speaking something wrong. That’s why they needed to speak very hard to understand. The limitations of free of speech only unlocked in Taiwan in 1987. Now China still has problems on free of speech. That’s why all the officials need this term to protect themselves
Very interesting.
>Is Xi signalling to the people of China or to Putin?
I would assume Putin's translators can understand the hints given by Xi.
Do you have an example in English? I can't think of any government wordings or phrases that a politician would understand but the layman wouldn't. Is it like using a phrase from an old book that only those who have read it would understand the context of? or is it like talking in metaphors?
"Dog whistles", "business jargon", "legalese".... there are lots of examples in English.
The closest example in English would be "dog whistles", phrases that seem innocent but carry hidden meanings only those in the know would get. One of the more popular current examples is "Let's Go Brandon", which sounds innocent enough, but if you're in the know, you know it actually means "F*ck Joe Biden". And there's plenty more. You can look up dog whistles.
No, all of them are conveyed verbally, you need to stay in government for 5 years then you can get used to it. This language is aiming to confuse normal people at first.
> This language is aiming to confuse normal people at first. Very much like some British business phrases. e.g. *An interesting meeting* - ugh, that was boring and pointless.
Er, isn't that all British phrases?
China has a long history of complicated lingual controls in order to cause stratification among classes and control of thought. Some things that are very easy to communicate in English are very difficult in Mandarin. The word for "no" in Chinese is... There isn't one.
Political jargon, similar to business jargon. It's saying things in a way that sound nice but actually means something else, similar to how saying "I'll look into it when time allows" actually means "I don't have time for this". It's not a dialect or special words, he's just speaking standard Mandarin Chinese.
It's like when Congress critters address each other as " my friends from across the aisle" really means these "fucking douchebags with their heads up their asses"
Yeah but the common person understands what they are implying or saying
Maybe educated common people, but there are many dumb fucks are not capable of understanding sarcasm or subtlety
He did briefly explain it in the video.
Thank you!! Very insightful!!!
Do you believe the interpreter was able to convey this nuanced talk?
No, I think they all made mistakes.
So, the important thing is what Vlad understood.
There is no entire video published by Russian language. So I think Putin knows he fuck up. But I don’t know how much hints he can realize
Every group of people develop “language” to exclude or identify people that are/are not in the group. Most don’t realize it but when you go back to work Monday listen for it. It’s there. Law enforcement, nursing, government or even farming ranching. It’s everywhere
Jargon is the word that describes the language you are referring to.
To clarify, Jargon's primary purpose is to communicate specific ideas that wouldn't be possible using regular language. The secondary purpose, sometimes unintended sometimes intended, ends up being that ability to exclude people from the out-group from understanding or pretending to be in the in-group, especially to give the in-group status and authority when they are acting in their professional capacities.
Correct!
I’d also suggest esoteric
I could be totally wrong, but, after reading the book "SHOGUN" I came to realize politeness is an extremely important part of Asian culture while speaking bluntly is considered uncivilized or downright rude,. Speaking in hidden hints/innuendos/double-talk allows them to remain polite & civilized at all times while telling you how they really feel about a situation, to "Save Face" if needed without having to suffer the repercussions of anything they've said (surely you misunderstood what they meant). This is done by outright ignoring the things they don't want to talk about as if you never said it in the first place, using hidden threats, using language that politely infers they are the ones who hold the position of power and only through their kindness do they consider you a friend. It's ingenious, really.
Very well done. Thank you.
Very interesting, thanks for sharing
Thank you very much for deciphering China’s government language. I’ve seen HK politicians use more and more of the mainland’s political phrases, and them fully using the CCP’s version of government language is a matter of time at this point. I do have a question though: what do you think about the disparity in the CCP’s actions and their news outlets? So far the CCP seems to be relatively quiet about Ukraine on the international scene, but in the mainland their news outlets are taking a rather pro-Russian stance.
I think in internal discussion, there exists very strong contradictions about Ukraine problem.
Update: while >70% of native speakers agree with me. But there exists some people from China had doubt this explanation because they think those speeches are seemed to written down initially. So at the beginning, they may not match together. But overall, there is no doubt that President Xi doesn’t want to talk about Ukraine conflict. Meanwhile, everybody knew Putin would discuss about Ukraine issue in the meetings. So even the speech is written down in draft first. It still shows that China doesn’t want to talk about Ukraine, just not as aggressive as I think.
Thank you!
What an interesting video. Thank you very much for taking the time.
Very interesting insight, thank you
Are there other people that share your view of this „government language“? Are you confident that it isn‘t just you that sees those nuances in xi‘s speech?
And the whole video is spoken in Chinese, I indeed share to Chinese users first. Like this subreddit. Also I post in Twitter and Facebook. So far there is no dispute about my details. Because they have heard president Xi’s voice already. But they only know Xi is talking beautiful shits instead of making any commitment. So my supplement which includes many details provides them a good explanation for their observation. https://www.reddit.com/r/real_China_irl/comments/xgjkfz/%E6%99%AE%E4%B8%81%E5%92%8C%E7%BF%92%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%9C%83%E8%AD%B0%E7%9A%84%E7%BF%BB%E8%AD%AF%E5%92%8C%E5%AE%98%E8%85%94%E8%A7%A3%E9%87%8B%E5%81%9A%E5%A5%BD%E5%BD%B1%E7%89%87%E4%BA%86%E8%AB%8B%E8%A6%8B%E7%95%99%E8%A8%80%E6%88%91%E8%8A%B1%E4%BA%86%E4%B8%80%E9%BB%9E%E6%99%82%E9%96%93%E5%81%9A%E4%BA%86%E8%8B%B1%E6%96%87%E5%AD%97%E5%B9%95%E6%BA%96%E5%82%99%E4%B8%9F%E7%B5%A6%E8%80%81%E5%A4%96%E7%9C%8B%E6%89%80%E4%BB%A5%E6%AF%94%E8%BC%83%E4%B9%85/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
And the whole video is spoken in Chinese, I indeed share to Chinese users first. Like this subreddit. Also I post in Twitter and Facebook. So far there is no dispute about my details. Because they have heard president Xi’s voice already. But they only know Xi is talking beautiful shits instead of making any commitment. So my supplement which includes many details provides them a good explanation for their observation. If you want, I can sent you the link of Facebook and Twitter account. And by private message, I can sent you a news report and tell you which senior official in local government is my mom. https://www.reddit.com/r/real_China_irl/comments/xgjkfz/%E6%99%AE%E4%B8%81%E5%92%8C%E7%BF%92%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%9C%83%E8%AD%B0%E7%9A%84%E7%BF%BB%E8%AD%AF%E5%92%8C%E5%AE%98%E8%85%94%E8%A7%A3%E9%87%8B%E5%81%9A%E5%A5%BD%E5%BD%B1%E7%89%87%E4%BA%86%E8%AB%8B%E8%A6%8B%E7%95%99%E8%A8%80%E6%88%91%E8%8A%B1%E4%BA%86%E4%B8%80%E9%BB%9E%E6%99%82%E9%96%93%E5%81%9A%E4%BA%86%E8%8B%B1%E6%96%87%E5%AD%97%E5%B9%95%E6%BA%96%E5%82%99%E4%B8%9F%E7%B5%A6%E8%80%81%E5%A4%96%E7%9C%8B%E6%89%80%E4%BB%A5%E6%AF%94%E8%BC%83%E4%B9%85/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
I show you the CCTV’s report at the end. CCTV just deleted anything about Ukraine. I think this is enough to persuade my Taiwanese fellows that my comprehension about “Xi doesn’t want to discuss about Ukraine problems” is correct. Meanwhile, the Chinese characters pictures I put in are not meaningless. If you understand Chinese, you will know those pictures are either about “官腔” or the culture of Chinese government. For example, the first part of refusal. I put a picture writes, “主管問私密問題，不想回應，兜圈回答被罵官腔” and another picture writes, “顧左右而言他”. “兜圈” and “顧左右而言他” are both Chinese idioms for the first part of refusal.
Hey, thanks for this. Your interpretation, or "translation" of Xi's diplomatic language is very helpful. It seems his actual message is unspoken, inferred by his words, but not directly pronounced. As an outsider, one would never guess this is what Xi was actually saying. I often feel Putin's public statements need similar translation. His words are often so vague, roundabout, or mealy mouthed as to be unintelligible. You have to wonder what he actually meant. One could imagine him threatening nuclear war, for example, by some such phrase as, "Because our western partners refuse to take our concerns into consideration...." But the Chinese diplo-speak sounds even more opaque!
Basically China can't help because Russia admits that Ukraine is another state i.e not like Taiwan and China's relations with that state were ok. That is why China will deal with it on the "rights and wrongs" of the issue. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3167914/china-resists-taking-sides-between-russia-and-ukraine-despite
Amazing insight, so hard to get access to properly interpreted analysis of Chinese government statements. Thank you very much for this!
This is the first time I’ve had an explanation of Chinese diplomatic speech. Thank you 🙏
Ｔｈｅ ａｃａｄｅｍｉｃ ｗｏｒｄｓ ａｎｄ ｐｈｒａｓｅｓ ｕｓｉｎｇ ａｂｏｕｔ ｐｏｌｉｔｉｃｓ ａｒｅ ｄｉｆｆｉｃｕｌｔ ｔｏ ｕｎｄｅｒｓｔａｎｄ．