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Cantonese Language



Countries

Countries
Hong Kong, Macau

Total No. Of Countries
2 13

National Language
China, Guangdong

Second Language
Not spoken in any of the countries

Speaking Continents
Asia

Minority Language
Hawaii

Regulated By
Civil Service Bureau, Government of Hong Kong, Official Language Division

Interesting Facts
  • Cantonese have lot of slangs, many of them include words that do not make sense at all and some also have English in them.
  • Even though Cantonese and Mandarin are dialects of Chinese, Cantonese has 8 tones instead of Mandarin's 4.

Similar To
Chinese Language

Derived From
-

Alphabets

Alphabets in
Cantonese-Alphabets.jpg#200

Alphabets
28 10

Phonology

How Many Vowels
8 5

How Many Consonants
20 10

Scripts
Chinese Characters and derivatives

Writing Direction
Left-To-Right, Horizontal, Top-To-Bottom

Hard to Learn

Language Levels
10 8

Time Taken to Learn
88 weeks 19

Greetings

Hello
您好

Thank You
谢谢

How Are You?
你好吗?

Good Night
晚安

Good Evening
晚上好

Good Afternoon
下午好

Good Morning
早上好

Please

Sorry
遗憾

Bye
再见

I Love You
我爱你

Excuse Me
原谅我

Dialects

Dialect 1
Guangzhou

Where They Speak
outside mainland China

How Many People Speak
71,000,000.00 13

Dialect 2
Xiguan

Where They Speak
Hong Kong

How Many People Speak
71,000,000.00 11

Dialect 3
Hong Kong

Where They Speak
Hong Kong

How Many People Speak
70,000,000.00 10

Total No. Of Dialects
3 3

How Many People Speak

How Many People Speak?
60.00 million 27

Speaking Population
16.00 % 2

Native Speakers
52.00 million 21

Second Language Speakers
71.00 million 15

Native Name
Kwang Tung Wa

Alternative Names
Guangfu, Metropolitan Cantonese

French Name
cantonais

German Name
Kantonesisch

Pronunciation
[kʰɐn˧˥tʰœːn˧˥sɨ˧˥]

Ethnicity
Han Chinese

History

Origin
17th century

Language Family
Sino-Tibetan Family

Subgroup
-

Branch
-

Language Forms

Early Forms
No early forms

Standard Forms
Standard Cantonese

Language Position
1 1

Signed Forms
Signed Cantonese

Scope
-

Code

ISO 639 1
No data available

ISO 639 2

ISO 639 2/T
yue

ISO 639 2/B
yue

ISO 639 3
No data available

ISO 639 6
yue

Glottocode
cant1236

Linguasphere
No data available

Types of Language

Language Type
-

Language Linguistic Typology
-

Language Morphological Typology
-

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Origin of Cantonese language

In order to communicate with each other, the origin of language was the essential part. Various languages are spoken all over the world. Cantonese language is one of the Most Difficult Languages. The origin of Cantonese language states that it was put to use in 17th century. The history of Cantonese language reveals that the language is old and used since many years. Check out in brief about Cantonese Language History. Cantonese has no early forms. Standard Cantonese is the standard form of Cantonese language and it is used in government centers. Know all About Cantonese Language.

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Cantonese population

Cantonese population gives us the total count of number of people speaking Cantonese language. Cantonese language is spoken by 60.00 million people in the world. Most of the Cantonese population lies in the Cantonese Speaking Countries. Cantonese language is spoken as first language by 52.00 million people and as second language by about 71.00 million people. Get to know Cantonese speaking population in detail.

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Cantonese writing system

There are numerous writing systems but most widely used scripts are Latin, Cyrillic and Arabic. Cantonese writing system decides the alphabets, vowels and consonants i.e. the written form of Cantonese language. Some languages share common writing systems. Chinese Characters and derivatives script is used by Cantonese language. Learn more about . 

Information about Cantonese language

Check out all the information about Cantonese language here. You may find it interesting to learn Cantonese Alphabets or the vowels and consonants of this language. Also knowing about Cantonese Speaking Countries, Cantonese speaking continents and Cantonese Dialects will help in improving your knowledge about this language. Also while travelling to Cantonese countries knowing common Cantonese Greetings will help you in communicating with Cantonese people.

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