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Re the requested move at Talk:Chinese language#Requested move 20 June 2025

There's a lot to consider with this move request.

Firstly, after quite a lot of thinking and research (including writing the stream-of-consciousness paragraphs below), I will support this move.

Background

As far as Wikipedia is concerned, aside from Chinese language, there are a lot of articles that already touch on this topic:

• Sinitic languages, of which the Chinese language(s) make(s) up the main branch, but there is actually another branch—the Macro-Bai languages, a proposed macrolanguage that includes the Bai language and the Cai–Long languages
• Varieties of Chinese and List of varieties of Chinese, and also Languages of China, which includes non-Chinese languages
• Mandarin Chinese, which has loads of its own dialects, including Standard Chinese which is the standard variety, and Sichuanese Mandarin, which has its own sub-dialects and its own Standard Variety
• Written Chinese, of which Chinese characters are a component. Within Written Chinese, Literary Chinese is contrasted with Written vernacular Chinese; the most commonly-used form of Written Vernacular Chinese is Standard Written Chinese which corresponds to spoken Standard Chinese, but there are also Written Cantonese, Written Hokkien, and Hong Kong written Chinese, which is largely based on Mandarin but still differs from Standard Written Chinese and Written Cantonese. There are also special Sichuanese characters, and four Dungan alphabets, including Cyrillic which is the official writing system of the Dungan language

There are lots more that I've missed out (see Template:Chinese language) but even so, this is a lot of articles. There's an argument to be made that there's redundancy somewhere among Chinese language, Varieties of Chinese and List of varieties of Chinese, but I don't think this can be ironed out simply and quickly. (It might help to move Varieties of Chinese to, for instance, Comparison of Chinese varieties, to more clearly indicate the purpose of also having List of varieties of Chinese; I think this might be a conversation for another day!)

A good source

I would advise anyone interested in (or confused about) this topic to check out this book:

Kurpaska, Maria (2010-05-26). Chinese Language(s) : A Look through the Prism of The Great Dictionary of Modern Chinese Dialects. Trends in Linguistics : Studies and Monographs. Vol. 215 (eBook ed.). Berlin/New York: De Gruyter Mouton. doi:10.1515/9783110219159. ISBN 9783110219159. ISSN 1861-4302. Full access available to Wikipedia Library users (URL and doi).

While I can't claim to have read the whole book, it certainly seems to address this issue; Chapter 1 (only 3 pages long) neatly outlines the question at hand, and Chapter 10 provides a good summary of the various arguments and perspectives. Kurpaska emphasises that the issue of whether 'Chinese' is a language or a language family goes is loaded with political, anthropological, historical and ideological significance, and therefore shouldn't be looked at through an exclusively linguistic perspective. However, "differences between Chinese dialects are enormous and that the various groups are in a great part mutually unintelligible" and comparisons are drawn between Chinese and the Romance and Germanic language families.

Ambiguity, specificity

From a Wikipedia perspective, there's an argument for saying that, when most people hear or read "Chinese" in the context of languages, they're most likely thinking of Mandarin (whether they know that or not) because it's by far the most widely-spoken variety, and because it's the basis of Standard Chinese. However, even if there were evidence that "Chinese" usually meant "Mandarin Chinese" in terms of common usage, I don't think anyone would consider moving Mandarin Chinese to Chinese or Chinese language (because "Mandarin" is a natural disambiguator) or having Chinese language be a redirect to Mandarin Chinese (because despite its ubiquity, nobody could argue that it's the only Chinese variety/language that's notable). "Chinese language" is an inherently ambiguous term, and I don't think we need an article with that title.

Official language

According to List of countries and territories where Chinese is an official language, the official languages of China, Taiwan and Singapore are their respective standard varieties (Standard Chinese, Taiwanese Mandarin, Singaporean Mandarin) and although Hong Kong and Macau don't specify, in practice their official "Chinese" is Cantonese.

ISO 639-3

It's also worth mentioning that ISO 639-3 lists Chinese [zho] (along with Arabic, Persian, Quechua, Zapotec, etc.) as a macrolanguage.