Fujian

/ˌfuːˈd͡ʒæn/

:zh:周婉窈
Cambridge University Press
Fujian

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin Chinese pronunciation for 福建 (Fújiàn).

The slogan was not entirely empty of positive reformist content, but Hunan was a part of China's battle belt — a line of provinces stretching from Fujian in the East through Jiangxi, Hunan, and into Sichuan. Reform here was a tenuous thing, dependent upon the ebb and flow of outsiders’ ambitions.

1978, Angus W. McDonald, Jr., “Power”, in The Urban Origins of Rural Revolution: Elites and the Masses in Hunan Province, China, 1911-1927, University of California Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, pages 29–30:

Koxinga’s forces hoped to launch an invasion to recapture the mainland from the Manchus, but instead the Manchu armies captured Taiwan in 1682. For the next 200 years there was substantial migration from the Fujian province across the Taiwan Straits. These immigrants brought with them their culture and language, which are still in evidence today. Taiwan remained a county of the Fujian province from 1684 until 1887, when with a population of more than 2½ million it became a province of China.

1994 July, Robert Storey, “Facts about Taiwan”, in Taiwan - A Travel Survival Kit, 3rd edition, Lonely Planet, →ISBN, →OCLC, →OL, pages 10–11:

Immigrant farmers from Fujian established the first settlement in the area in 1621, though the city formally dates its creation from 1704 when the county government was moved here and the first wooden city walls were constructed.

2007, Stephen Keeling, Brice Minnigh, “Chiayi and around, Central Taiwan”, in The Rough Guide to Taiwan (Rough Guides), Penguin, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 284:

President Ma further noted that in 1683 during the Qing dynasty (1644-1911) the emperor formally included the Diaoyutais as territory of China in Taiwan Prefecture, Fujian Province. In 1812, the Diaoyutais were placed under the administration of the Kavalan Office of the Taiwan prefectural government, he added, pointing out that the Record of Missions to Taiwan and Adjacent Waters 《臺海使槎錄》 and the Illustrations of Taiwan 《全臺圖説》 prove that China effectively ruled over the Diaoyutai Islets during the Qing Dynasty.

2016 [2014 April 17], “President Ma Attends "Examining the Diaoyutai/Senkaku Islands Dispute under New and Multiple Perspectives" International Conference”, in Ying-jeou Ma, editor, Chinese (Taiwan) Yearbook of International Law and Affairs, volume 32 (2014), Brill Nijhoff, →ISBN, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 281:

The Lin Antai Historical House, one of Taipei's oldest residential buildings, is hosting the “Century of Peace and Stability” permanent display area starting Wednesday (May 25).[…]
This Fujian-style 30-room house was first erected between 1783 and 1787, near what is now Dunhua South Road.

2016 May 25, George Liao, “A taste from the past at Lin Antai Historical House”, in Taiwan News, archived from the original on 2021-01-22, Society:

The military expedition and the resulting conflict, known as the Mudan Incident (牡丹社事件), ended with the Qing paying the Japanese to retreat. After the incident, the imperial court, which had long seen Taiwan as a backwater province unworthy of development, started to pay more attention to what was then still part of Fujian Province.

2016 May 8, Han Cheung, “Taiwan in Time: Sovereignty in question”, in Taipei Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2016-05-08, Features, page 12:

In the Cing Dynasty, when Taiwanese scholars advanced to the second tier of the imperial examination (township examination), they needed to travel to the Examination Hall in Fujhou, the capital of Fujian Province, to take the exam.

2017 October, “Fongyi Academy”, in PASS CULTURE Kaohsiung Arts and Cultural Events Monthly, 高雄市政府文化局 [Bureau of Cultural Affairs, Kaohsiung City Government], archived from the original on 2023-03-17, page 1:

But the relationship between the people of Kinmen and the Chinese mainland is complicated. Rather than old enemies, they are historically the same people, citizens of the Chinese province of Fujian. “Our language, our culture, our way of life are the same,” said Chen, 73. “This situation is very difficult for people on Kinmen and very absurd.”

2022 September 23, Richard Lloyd Parry, “Kinmen islanders living in fear of day China attacks Taiwan”, in The Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-09-23:

During most of the Manchu colonial period — the Qing Dynasty — Taiwan was ruled as a prefecture of Fujian.

2023 September 25, Michael Turton, “Notes from Central Taiwan: What is China preparing for?”, in Taipei Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-09-28, Features, page 13:

A province of East Asia. During most of the Qing (Ching) period, Fujian province, mostly on the mainland, included part of Taiwan (until Taiwan became a province in its own right); since the Chinese Civil War, Fujian has been divided between China (PRC/mainland China) and Taiwan (ROC)

Taiwan opened the links between its two small islands and China without talking to Beijing, which has grudgingly accepted the move but hasn't said how much it will cooperate. So everyone closely watched how the two ships were greeted in Fuzhou and Xiamen, the cities in the southeast Chinese province of Fujian.

2001 January 2, “Taiwanese Vessels Make First Sanctioned Direct Crossings to China”, in The Washington Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-03-15:

While North Korea and the South continue to bicker - most recently over the sinking of a South Korean warship - China and Taiwan have been building closer business ties. One project full of symbolism for the two is an undersea cable project that will link the northern Taiwan town of Tamsui (also called Danshui) to China's Fujian Province.[…]
The cable appears to be a replacement for a similar project announced last year to connect Xiamen, a city in China's Fujian Province, to Kinmen, a Taiwanese island within sight of China.

2010 June 10, Dan Nystedt, “China and Taiwan Connect on New Undersea Cable Project”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-03-15, Technology:

Hsi said because Chen did not marry and his direct relatives live in Fuzhou, in China’s Fujian Province, they have been unable to go to Taiwan to apply to the government for compensation and have not received any compensation for his death in 50 years.

2012 September 10, Rich Chang, “Tribute for pilot on 50th anniversary”, in Taipei Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2012-09-11, Taiwan News, page 3:

Water supplied to Taiwan’s outlying Kinmen County from Fujian province on the other side of the strait is not free nor a gift, and misrepresentation of this fact by China is strongly condemned, the Mainland Affairs Council said Aug. 5.

2018 August 7, “MAC strongly condemns Kinmen water supply misrepresentation by China”, in Taiwan News, archived from the original on 2019-09-01, Politics:

Across the water, which is 110 miles wide, is Fujian province, where Xi spent 17 years climbing the political ladder before making the leap to the national stage. Bristling with upgraded naval ports, airbases and missiles trained on Taiwan, Fujian is the most likely launchpad for any Chinese operation.
On both sides of the strait, the story of an invasion of Taiwan from Fujian that did go ahead still looms large for locals and leaders, even though it took place more than 350 years ago.

2022 November 5, Philip Sherwell, “We don’t think China will invade Taiwan. But if they do we’ll fight them”, in The Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-11-05:

A province of the People's Republic of China (mainland China), located on the southeastern coast. Capital: Fuzhou.


Jiangxi

Translingual: Jiangxisaurus

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 江西 (Jiāngxī).

Qingyun Hu, a former officer of the Peoples Supreme Court of Jiangxi Province in China, was diagnosed as having leukemia in 1997.

2001, “People with Cancer”, in Falun Gong Stories: A Journey to Ultimate Health, Golden Lotus Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 22:

At least four people have died in the partial collapse of a workers’ dormitory in the southern Chinese province of Jiangxi, state media report^([sic – meaning reports]).

2021 November 23, “At least 4 killed in southern China dormitory collapse”, in AP News, archived from the original on 2021-11-23:

A province in southern China. Capital: Nanchang.

Anhui · Fujian · Guangdong · Gansu · Guizhou · Henan · Hubei · Hebei · Hainan · Heilongjiang · Hunan · Jilin · Jiangsu · Jiangxi · Liaoning · Qinghai · Sichuan · Shandong · Shaanxi · Shanxi · Taiwan · Yunnan · Zhejiang

Guangxi · Inner Mongolia · Ningxia · Tibet Autonomous Region · Xinjiang

Beijing · Tianjin · Shanghai · Chongqing


Qinghai

/ˈt͡ʃɪŋˈhaɪ/

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 青海／靑海 (Qīnghǎi, literally “Blue Sea”).

bor

Tibetan is found predominantly in Tibet; Tibetan-speaking communities are also found in Sichuan, Qinghai, Yunnan, and Gansu. In Tibet, all official documents are issued in both Tibetan and Chinese, and also in certain regions of Sichuan and Qinghai. Moreover, the radio stations in Tibet broadcast in Tibetan and Putonghua. Similarly, the Chengdu radio station in Sichuan and the Xining radio station in Qinghai also have regular Tibetan broadcasts.

1975, “The National Minority Languages of China”, in Winfred P. Lehmann, editor, Language and Linguistics in the People's Republic of China, University of Texas Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 119:

The source of the Yellow River is in the Qinghai Province on the Tibetan Plateau. This area is often called the "Roof of the World" because of its high altitude, the height of a place above sea level.

2001, Kim Dramer, “China's Sorrow”, in The Yellow River (Juvenile Literature), Franklin Watts, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, pages 7–8:

The decaying clusters of workshops, bunkers and dormitories are remnants of Plant 221, also known as China’s Los Alamos. Here, on a mountain-high grassland called Jinyintan in Qinghai Province, thousands of Tibetan and Mongolian herders were expelled to create a secret town where a nuclear arsenal was built to defend Mao Zedong’s revolution.

2018 January 20, Chris Buckley, Adam Wu, “Where China Built Its Bomb, Dark Memories Haunt the Ruins”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2018-01-20, Asia Pacific:

A province in northwestern China. Capital: Xining.


lingchi

The face of the dying man in the lingchi video monotonously evokes Maria Falconetti in Carl Theodor Dreyer ’s 1928 “Passion of Joan of Arc.”

2007 July 25, Roberta Smith, “Figures Moving as if in a Trance Across an Isolated, Lawless Island”, in The New York Times:

death by a thousand cuts
death by a thousand cuts

A form of execution used in China from roughly 900 to 1905 C.E., the "death by a thousand cuts", in which the condemned was killed by methodical removal of body parts with a knife.


Terracotta Army

A collection of terracotta sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China, located in Xi'an, Shaanxi province, China.

兵馬俑

the Terra Cotta Warriors and Horses of the First Emperor of China


BRIC

Coined by British economist Jim O'Neill in 2001.

coin

(politics, economics) Initialism of Brazil, Russia, India and China: a group of countries with similarly fast-growing economies.


lamaism

Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism#English

(dated, potentially offensive) Synonym of Tibetan Buddhism.


grass mud horse

en-noun

grass mud horse (plural grass mud horses)

A calque of the Mandarin 草泥馬／草泥马 (cǎonímǎ). See 草泥馬 for more.

zh-l

草泥馬／草泥马 (cǎonímǎ)

What began as an entertaining by-product of that internet clean-up has become a sensation. This is because “Grass Mud Horse” in Chinese is a homonym for an unprintable but widely used phrase. Both the phrase – “F*** your mother” – and the name of the mythical animal are pronounced as caonima, although using different tones

2009 March 6, “Chinese fight internet censors with "Grass Mud Horse" cuddly toy”, in Times Online:

A YouTube children’s song about the beast has drawn nearly 1.4 million viewers. A grass-mud horse cartoon has logged a quarter million more views. A nature documentary on its habits attracted 180,000 more.

2009 March 11, Michael Wines, “A Dirty Pun Tweaks China’s Online Censors”, in New York Times:

One of the ten "mythical Baidu deities" invented by Chinese internet users for the purpose of circumventing censorship. Usually depicted as resembling an alpaca, and is supposedly living in the Mahler Gobi desert.

кон от глина и трева

Mythical Baidu deity used for circumventing censorship


Taiwan Strait

Partial calque from Mandarin 臺灣海峽／台湾海峡 (Táiwān Hǎixiá)

臺灣海峽／台湾海峡 (Táiwān Hǎixiá)

Formosa (Taiwan) is an island located about 200 miles north of the Philippine Islands, and separated from the southeastern coast of China by Taiwan Strait.

1946, “Japanese Colonies (Before surrender in 1945)”, in Lewis Copeland, editor, The Handy Encyclopedia Of Useful Information, Philadelphia: Blakiston Company, page 147:

This Nation, which has fundamental commitments to the Republic of China, has for many years sought the renunciation of force in the Taiwan Strait.

1971 [1964 January 18], Lyndon Johnson, “Letter to Chairman Khrushchev”, in The Vantage Point, Holt, Reinhart & Winston, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 602:

Kinmen now supplies fully a third of Taiwan’s kaolin and feldspar need. A total of 40,000 tons of kaolin and 4,200 tons of feldspar will be shipped across the Taiwan Strait this year.

1973 September 23, “Porcelain kilns are booming”, in Free China Weekly, volume XIV, number 37, Taipei, page 2:

Taipei lies on the east bank of the Tan-shui river between the mouths of two of its tributaries, the Hsin-tien and the Chi-lung. These rivers drain a fertile and humid basin surrounded by mountains on all sides but the northwest, where the Tan-shui flows into the Taiwan Straits facing the mainland.

[1974, Stephan Feuchtwang, “City Temples in Taipei Under Three Regimes”, in Mark Elvin, G. William Skinner, editors, The Chinese City Between Two Worlds, Stanford, Cali.: Stanford University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 264:

It was New Year's Eve, and the eighteen American officials who had hurriedly gathered in the State Department Operations Room on 31 December 1970, were still sharply divided after four hours of discussion.¹ The issue was what, if anything, the Seventh Fleet should do in the event of Chinese naval action against the U.S. seismic survey vessels then beginning to explore for oil in disputed waters of the East China Sea, the Taiwan Strait, and the Yellow Sea.

1977, Selig S. Harrison, China, Oil and Asia: Conflict Ahead?, New York: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, page 1:

China liked the Taiwanese investment, but could not agree to give up its claim to sovereignty over the island; finding the right balance between economic pragmatism and aggressive nationalism was a constant challenge for China's leaders, especially during election season in Taiwan. I thought China had gone too far with the missile tests, and quickly, but without fanfare, I ordered a carrier group from the U.S. Navy's Pacific fleet to sail to the Taiwan Strait. The crisis passed.

2005, Bill Clinton, My Life, volume II, New York: Vintage Books, →ISBN, page 314:

The strait dividing mainland Asia (China) from Taiwan island and connecting the East and South China Seas.

Straat van Taiwan

the channel of water between mainland China and Taiwan


Liuzhou

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 柳州 (Liǔzhōu).

Employees work on Baojun RS-5 cars at a final assembly plant operated by General Motors Co and its local joint-venture partners in Liuzhou, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, February 28, 2019.

2019 April 16, Yilei Sun, Norihiko Shirouzu, “No-frills no longer: GM's China brand Baojun attempts a major makeover”, in Reuters, archived from the original on 2022-05-12, Business News:

A prefecture-level city in north-central Guangxi, China.


Zibo

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 淄博 (Zībó).

Industry in Tsinan is becoming highly developed. Indeed the day we set out to go west, factories on the outskirts were interspersed with fields of wheat, and everywhere on, into and through the Tzupo municipality, wheat fields were interspersed by factories. Tzupo with its five divisions which roughly correspond to five counties, has 2,000,000 people now, 550,000 of them mostly factory workers in the town portions, and the rest commune farmers who cultivate 93,330 hectares of land, all but 26,667 hectares of hills and downs irrigated.

[1977 June, Rewi Alley, “Shantung Spring”, in Eastern Horizon, volume XVI, number 6, Hong Kong: Eastern Horizon Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 29, column 1:

The explosion on Saturday, which tore through a chemical plant in Zibo, in Shandong Province, killed one person and injured at least nine others, according to the official Xinhua news agency. A microblog post by the Zibo Public Security Bureau late Saturday said the fire had been “basically controlled” and that the injured had been taken to a hospital.

2015 August 22, Dan Levin, “Blast at Chemical Site Jangles Frayed Nerves”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2015-08-24, Asia Pacific:

A prefecture-level city in central Shandong, China.


Changzhou

/t͡ʃæŋ.d͡ʒoʊ/

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 常州 (Chángzhōu).

The Cultural Revolution paved the way for the full implementation of Chairman Mao’s whole set of principles of ‘walking on two legs’, and in the fair one saw many of the advanced industrial products on display which were actually manufactured by medium-sized and small enterprises. A precision self-balancing capacitor bridge was, for example, made by a small plant in Changchou, a small railway town in Kiangsu Province.

[1970, Tsung-ying Lee, “EASTERN DIARY”, in Eastern Horizon, volume IX, number 6, Hong Kong: Eastern Horizon Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 4, column 2:

Ch’ü was born on January 29, 1899, in a small room in the family residence in the southern portion of Changchow, a relatively small city in Kiangsu province.

[1981, Paul G. Pickowicz, “Youth in Changchow”, in Marxist Literary Thought in China: The Influence of Ch’ü Ch’iu-pai, University of California Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 1:

In a brief announcement late last week, the Changzhou city government said that investigators had concluded that the air, soil and water at the school were safe after conducting tests from April 19 to May 20.

2016 August 31, Kiki Zhao, “Chinese School With Mass Illness Is Deemed Safe, but Many Doubt Findings”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2016-08-31, Asia Pacific:

A prefecture-level city in southern Jiangsu, China.


Xuzhou

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of Mandarin 徐州 (Xúzhōu), from a former prefecture administered from the city.

T’ung-shan County in the Hsüchou district of Kiangsu was apparently famous for nonglutenous rice during the Han and Northern Wei dynasties (third century B.C. to third century A.D.).

[1980, Elizabeth J. Perry, Rebels and Revolutionaries in North China, 1845-1945, Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 25:

Earlier this week, 16 foreign teachers and three Chinese were arrested on drug charges at a local language school in Xuzhou, around 370 miles (600 kilometers) southwest of Yantai. On Friday, the British embassy in Beijing said four of its nationals had been arrested Jiangsu province, where Xuzhou is located.

2019 July 14, “China detains another Canadian citizen amid diplomatic tension”, in Deutsche Welle, archived from the original on 2019-07-14, News:

To that end, he said, he planned an overhaul of the company’s ownership this autumn. The city of Xuzhou would retain 34 percent ownership in the company while surrounding Jiangsu Province would obtain 17 percent.

2020 July 30, Keith Bradsher, “China Tries Its Favorite Economic Cure: More Construction”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2020-07-30:

A prefecture-level city in northwestern Jiangsu, China.

شُوجُو

a prefecture-level city of Jiangsu, China


Xuzhou

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of Mandarin 敘州／叙州 (Xùzhōu), from a former prefecture administered from the city.

zh-m

敘州／叙州 (Xùzhōu)

(historical) A former name of Yibin, a prefecture-level city in Sichuan, China, at the confluence of the Min and Yangtze rivers.


Tangshan

At Tangshan, which is half a day by rail from Tangku, I was very kindly received by the engineer-in-chief of the railway and the mining companies and his wife. Tangshan is the northern terminus of the eighty-five miles of railway constructed and open to traffic.

1889 December 2, W. Brereton, “ENGLISH SETTLEMENTS IN NORTH CHINA”, in The Mission Field, number CCCCVIII, Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, →OCLC, page 451:

The freight traffic of the Peking-Mukden Line has steadily increased, and the demand for rolling stock has been so great, due largely to the heavy traffic in coal between Tangshan and Tongho, that recommendations have been made for the addition of two hundred 30-ton coal cars, one hundred 30-ton covered-goods cars, and 12 locomotives. It is also proposed to extend the railway slope at Tangshan.

1915 November 11, Fred D. Fisher, “TIENTSIN”, in Supplement to Commerce Reports, number 52j, →OCLC, page 18:

In Hopei, the Japanese found themselves quite helpless in fighting the Chinese armed resisters, who carried the fighting right to the outskirts of Tientsin. Of the 22 districts under the "East Hopei Administration", 17 have now deserted the Japanese and their puppets. The Chinese also raided Tangshan and Chinwangtao, the mining center and port in this long Japanese-dominated part of the country.

1938 August, Lin Yu, “"The China Incident"”, in Philippine Magazine, volume XXXV, number 8 (364), →OCLC, page 388:

According to the intelligence sources in Taipei, the industrial city of Tangshan, between Peiping and Tientsin, with a population of about one million, was almost flattened by the strong quake.
Quoting documents received from behind the Bamboo Curtain, the sources said that the number of casualties in the area of Tangshan, Peiping, Tientsin and Fengnan "was very great and could not be immediately estimated."

1976 August 1, “M'land quake stirs people's concern here”, in Free China Weekly, volume XVII, number 30, Taipei, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 1:

Women in China have turned to self-defense after a harrowing video of a group of men attacking four young women at a restaurant in Tangshan, Hebei province, sparked outrage and concern for the safety of women.

2022 July 13, “Women turn to self-defense in China after vicious attack goes viral”, in EFE, archived from the original on 2022-07-13:

A prefecture-level city in northeastern Hebei, China.


Shantou

zh-l

汕頭／汕头 (Shàntóu)

A typical example was that of Shantou Special District in Kwangtung where in “full implementation” of party policies all the cadres from the brigades had been sent to the “front line of production” to lead the masses in spring planting and a total labour force of 2.42 million for the whole district, representing 81 per cent of its rural labour force, was mobilized for the purpose.

1967, Gargi Dutt, Rural Communes in China, Organizational Problems, New York: Asia Publishing House, →OCLC, pages 111–112:

A fire at a lingerie factory killed 14 people in Shantou, a city in the southeastern Chinese province of Guangdong, on Tuesday, official news media said.

2012 December 4, Keith Bradsher, “Chinese Garment Factory Fire Kills 14 in Guangdong”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2012-12-05, Asia Pacific:

Shantou, which is more than 800 km (500 miles) from Wuhan city in central China, had also said earlier it would suspend the operation of buses, taxis and ferries from 2 p.m. on Sunday.

2020 January 26, Yilei Sun, Samuel Shen, Tony Munroe, “China's Shantou city will not ban cars, ships, people from entering, state media reports”, in Tom Hogue, editor, Reuters, archived from the original on 2022-08-26, World News:

A prefecture-level city in Guangdong, China.


Nantong

The eastern Chinese city of Nantong, with a population of more than 7 million, has introduced a new rule to ban near-term resale of certain cheap homes in the latest step by authorities in the country to curb property market speculation.
On Wednesday the government of Nantong, near Shanghai and a number of other port cities, said property buyers who have bought new homes at prices much lower than the market average are not allowed to resell their properties for five years.

2019 December 25, Lusha Zhang, Ryan Woo, “China's Nantong city imposes five-year ban on resale of cheap homes to curb speculation”, in Kenneth Maxwell, editor, Reuters, archived from the original on 2019-12-26, Business News:

A prefecture-level city in Jiangsu, China.


Vajrayana

Borrowed from Sanskrit वज्रयान (vajrayāna, literally “Diamond/Thunderbolt Vehicle”), in reference to the supposed power, clarity, and difficulty of its methods for attaining Buddhahood.


mainland China

Had my Government remained on the mainland, there would never have been such calamities as the Korean War and the Communist occupation of northern Korea and northern Indo-China. The place to begin combating Communism in Asia, therefore, is mainland China.

1957, Chung-cheng (Kai-shek) Chiang, “Conclusion”, in Soviet Russia in China: A Summing-up at Seventy, New York: Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 348:

In 1953 the city had only 20% of the total value of mainland China's industrial output, but this was officially claimed to be 368% higher than that of 1950.

1968, “SHANGHAI (SHANG-HAI)”, in Encyclopedia Britannica, volume 20, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 346, column 2:

Many Americans were primarily Europeanists in their approach to foreign affairs, dismissing Asia as relatively unimportant. But the United States is a Pacific power, and rapid changes were taking place in Asia—where more than half the human race lived—that might well determine the world's future. Japan would soon be the world's third-ranking industrial power, behind the United States and the Soviet Union. Some of the most rapid rates of economic progress anywhere were being achieved by the nations of non-Communist Asia. And mainland China potentially posed the greatest threat to peace during the final third of the twentieth century.

1978, Richard Nixon, RN: the Memoirs of Richard Nixon, Grosset & Dunlap, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 282:

Chinese Communist rule on mainland China during the past three decades has destroyed the vitality, spirit and cultural heritage of the Chinese people, said Fox Butterfield, during an address at Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall Dec. 11.

1983 December 18, “Butterfield Tells Suffering On Mainland”, in Free China Weekly, volume XXIV, number 50, Taipei, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 1:

At Cihhu (Cihu), near the town of Dasi (Daxi), 30 miles (50 km) southwest of Taipei on Provincial Highway 7, Chiang Kai-shek lies entombed above ground in a granite and marble coffin in one of his former country villas. The gravesite is "temporary," as before his death Chiang had requested his body be returned to his native province of Zhejiang in mainland China.

2004, Phil Macdonald, National Geographic Traveler: Taiwan, National Geographic Society, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 122:

Tsuen Wan is a working-class area near Hong Kong’s border with the Chinese mainland, miles from the city’s gleaming financial district.

[2019 October 1, Mike Ives, “Hong Kong Police Shoot a Protester, 18, With a Live Bullet for the First Time”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2019-10-01, Asia Pacific:

It’s hard to imagine now, but there were once three mountainous, verdant islands between Macau and mainland China. The Portuguese named them Dom João, Montanha and Lapa. Later the islands became known in Chinese as Xiao (Little) Hengqin, Da (Big) Hengqin and Wanzai, respectively.

2021 November 21, “On Chinese islands next to Macau, great stories of pirates, typhoons and war played out”, in South China Morning Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2021-11-21:

Hong Kong and mainland China are among few places in the world still aiming to suppress every COVID-19 outbreak, but the Omicron variant has proven tough to keep under control.

2022 February 12, Twinnie Siu, Marius Zaharia, Jessie Pang, Anne Marie Roantree, “Mainland China to help overwhelmed Hong Kong with COVID fight”, in Edwina Gibbs, Lincoln Feast, Jane Merriman, editors, Reuters, archived from the original on 2022-02-13, China:

In mainland China, authorities have shut down travel out of and within the hardest-hit province, Jilin in the northeast. More than 1,800 cases were reported in Jilin on Friday, out of 2,400 nationwide. Restrictions were partially eased, however, in Shenzhen, a major tech and finance hub bordering Hong Kong that had been locked down since Sunday.

2022 March 18, Dake Kang, Huizhong Wu, “China weighs exit from ‘zero COVID’ and the risks involved”, in AP News, archived from the original on 2022-03-18:

People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China

The People's Republic of China, viewed as the general geographical region administered by the PRC in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War (as opposed to Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan which are coastal and insular areas)

بَرّ اَلصِّين اَلرَّئِيسِيّ

Communist China understood via its geographical position


Mandopop

Last year, Mandopop streams went up 45 per cent on Spotify, which is unavailable in China.

2024 January 20, Ludovic Hunter-Tilney, “An Asian megastar who fills arenas in Europe–so who is he?”, in FT Weekend, Life & Arts, page 14:


C-pop

From C- (“Chinese”) + pop, by analogy with J-pop.

Mandopop and its Cantonese equivalent, Cantopop, are subsets of Chinese pop, or C-pop, whose roots stretch back almost 100 years.

(music) Chinese pop music influenced by western genres.


barefoot doctor

en-noun

barefoot doctor (plural barefoot doctors)

Derived from the practice of farmers in southern China working barefoot in rice paddies.

(historical) A farmer or rural resident with basic medical training who worked as a doctor in rural areas of the People's Republic of China from the mid-1960s until the 1980s, generally under a government-sponsored program.


Shenzhen

/ˌʃɛnˈd͡ʒɛn/

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 深圳 (Shēnzhèn), from 深 (shēn, “deep”) + 圳 (zhèn, “irrigation ditch”).

Encyclopædia Britannica
In 1979 Shenzhen was a small border city of some 30,000 inhabitants that served as a customs stop into mainland China from Hong Kong.

Shenzhen municipal government will give top priority to developing its modern logistics and finance sectors and building the industries into the city's pillar sectors in the following years.

Over the next two years, China set up four “special economic zones” as testing grounds for free-enterprise practices like foreign investment and tax incentives. The largest zone was Shenzhen, about fifty miles south of Dongguan, which quickly became a symbol of a freewheeling China always open for business. Shenzhen was a planned showcase city, willed into being by leaders in Beijing and supported by government ministries and the companies under them.

2008, Leslie T. Chang, Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China, New York: Spiegel & Grau, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 29:

The tiny 0.8-square-kilometer Luohu District was where the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone really got off to a good start.

2009, Lanqing Li, “The Birth of Special Economic Zones”, in Ling Yuan, Zhang Siying, transl., Breaking Through: The Birth of China's Opening-Up Policy, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 122:

The blockage of the Suez Canal in March? No, there is another disruption in global shipping. This time, the problem lies in Shenzhen, a sprawling metropolis adjacent to Hong Kong in southeastern China.

2021 June 21, Keith Bradsher, “Chinese port difficulties amid a Covid outbreak further snarl global trade.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2021-06-21, Business:

A major subprovincial city in Guangdong, in southeastern China.


laogai

From Mandarin 勞改／劳改 (láogǎi, literally “labour rehabilitation”).

zh-l

Ethan Gutmann (2010) Hacker Nation: China's Cyber Assault, archived from the original on 2010-05-16: “The 6-10 Office also created fake refugees—young, trained to mimic Falun Gong behavior, and holding paperwork confirming time spent in laogai, China’s penal system.”

The use of prison labor and prison farms in the People's Republic of China.


Beijing opera

en-noun

Beijing opera (countable and uncountable, plural Beijing operas)

From Beijing + opera, following the growing acceptance of pinyin Beijing in place of the earlier spelling Peking in reference to the capital of China.


red guard

What on Earth could be next, the Chinese red guard-style maltreatment of language learners and yodelers?

In Beijing, Red Guard assaults destroyed 4,922 of the capital’s 6,843 designated “places of cultural or historical interest.” The Forbidden City itself was reportedly saved only by Zhou Enlai’s personal intervention.

2011, Henry Kissinger, On China, New York: Penguin Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 194:

A member of any of several organizations known as Red Guards or Red Guard.


egg tart

A baked pastry commonly made in Hong Kong, Macau and other parts of Asia consisting of an outer pastry crust that is filled with egg custard.

Hong Kong-style egg tart

蛋撻／蛋挞 (dàntà)

Macau-style egg tart

葡撻／葡挞 (pútà)


Sinitic

en-adj

Sinitic (comparative more Sinitic, superlative most Sinitic)

more Sinitic (comparative)
most Sinitic (superlative)

From Latin Sīna (“China”) + -itic, as in Semitic.

Of or pertaining to China or the Chinese peoples


De'ang

An ethnic minority group found in Southern China and Burma. Languages spoken in regions populated by this group include Palé, Riang, Rumai, and Shwe, all of which belong to the Palaungic sub-group of the Khasi-Khmuic family of languages.


Red China

From red + China; see red (“communist”).

The highest military body in Red China, the People’s Revolutionary Military Council, is made up of 22 of these 52 Red generals, and three-fifths of them are on the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.

1951, Robert B. Rigg, Red China's Fighting Hordes, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, →ISBN, page 61:

Kennedy said that he was opposed to recognition of Red China. He indicated, however, that strong arguments had been presented to him in favor of the so-called “two Chinas policy.” Under this policy, Nationalist China would retain its seat on the Security Council, and Red China would have only a seat in the Assembly. This would mean that Red China would have only one vote out of about a hundred in the Assembly and would not be able to block UN action by veto. Kennedy said that proponents of this policy were contending that Red China could not do any damage in the UN under such circumstances.

1962, Richard M. Nixon, Six Crises, Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 408:

Overseas, however, leading public figures urged on us a variety of different courses. For example, former Prime Minister Clement Attlee, returning early in September from a British Labor-party tour of Red China, confirmed reports that Mao Tse-tung had asked him and his fellow Laborites to pressure the United States into pulling the Seventh Fleet away from the waters around Formosa, which, Attlee added, the Communists have a "strong determination" to capture.

1963, Dwight Eisenhower, Mandate for Change 1953-1956, Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 464:

On the rocky island of Tungyin, 50 miles off the coast of Red China, is the headquarters of a little-known military unit called the Anti-Communist Salvation Army. The secret army, 30,000 strong, is Chiang Kai-shek's instrument for the long-promised return to the mainland.

1963 January 11, “The World”, in Time, volume LXXXI, number 2, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 32, column 3:

Millions of citizens are deeply disturbed that the military-industrial complex too often shapes national policy, but they do not want to be considered unpatriotic. Countless loyal Americans honestly feel that a world body such as the United Nations should include even Red China, but they fear being called Communist sympathizers.

1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., “Transformed Nonconformist”, in Strength to Love, New York: Pocket Books, published 1964, →OCLC, page 13:

The whole world has reason to be apprehensive of Red China, for it is likely to be an irresistible [sic] threat on earth. But what the majority of the mankind has as yet no inkling is the bitter fact that Red China is almost solely dependent on the territory of its New Dominion, Sinkiang, to carry out her expansionist design. If rightly evaluated, the land of Eastern Turkestan, which is being introduced to the outside world by the colonialistic [sic] attribution of ‘Sinkiang’ possesses all the necessary elements as a potential base for world wide expansion, not only in terms of its mineral wealth but also of its strategically unique position.

1970, Isa Alptekin, “LETTER, ISA YUSUF ALPTEKIN, PRESIDENT OF THE NATIONAL CENTER FOR THE LIBERATION OF EASTERN TURKESTAN, TO PRESIDENT RICHARD NIXON”, in Wilson Center, page 1:

I thought that perhaps a sudden and effective air strike would convince the leaders in Hanoi that we were serious in our purpose and also that the North could not count on continued immunity if they persisted in aggression in the South. I realized the risks of involving the Soviets or the Chinese, as Senator Mansfield feared, I said, but neither of them was trying to bring peace or even urging restraint. I doubted that they wanted direct involvement themselves. I pointed out that our intelligence analysts believed Red China would not enter the war unless there was an invasion in the northern part of North Vietnam or unless the Hanoi regime was in danger of being toppled.

1971, Lyndon Johnson, The Vantage Point, Holt, Reinhart & Winston, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 125:

The criticism is excused in two different ways. First, it is said that the Chinese Communists are not going to attack us. Actually, there is a greater likelihood of that than of the Soviet Union assaulting the United States.
Second, observers say that no matter how many weapons we get, they would be no match for the might of Red China.
These views are as mistaken as those which hold that the USSR would never strike a blow at American and that the United States is already more than strong enough.

1983 January 2, “Prospects amid the dangers”, in Free China Weekly, volume XXIV, number 1, Taipei, page 1:

“This is the competition,” Ryan said. “And if we can’t have a national conversation about the red China communist government trying to displace us, looking the other way when Russia invades Ukraine and trying to outfox us at every turn … then we’re all going to be speaking Mandarin in 10 or 15 years.”

2022 April 30, Dan Merica, “A tough state in a tough year: Tim Ryan looks to overcome Democratic headwinds in Ohio”, in CNN, archived from the original on 2022-05-01:


BRICS

As shown by the BRICS expansion and the long waiting list to join, Xi’s offer of an alternative world order is finding receptive ears in the Global South, where many countries feel themselves marginalized in an international system they see as dominated by the US and its wealthy allies.

2023 August 28, “BRICS expansion is a big win for China. But can it really work as a counterweight to the West?”, in CNN:

(geopolitics, economics) Acronym of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa: an international economic organization comprising these fast-growing economies.


Chicom

Communist Party of China
Communist Party of China

(politics, informal, sometimes offensive) A member of the Communist Party of China, a Chinese cadre.

(politics, informal, inexact, sometimes offensive, ethnic slur) Any citizen of the People's Republic of China.


Kowloon

From Cantonese 九龍／九龙 (gau² lung⁴, literally “nine dragons”), named after its eight mountains and the Chinese emperor Zhao Bing (1272–1279).

bor

By the late 1930's some modern factories, built by outside interests and producing such goods as bricks, beer, and chinaware for export abroad, had already appeared in Tsuen Wan, a market town near Kowloon.

1968, Jack M. Potter, Capitalism and the Chinese Peasant: Social and Economic Change in a Hong Kong Village, University of California Press, page 36:

Next Media said two entryways to its headquarters in Hong Kong’s Tseung Kwan O neighborhood were hit with firebombs around 1 a.m. Monday. At about the same time, a masked man got out of a car outside Mr. Lai’s home in the Ho Man Tin neighborhood and threw a firebomb at the sidewalk outside the gate. Two cars suspected of being those used in the attacks were later found burning in nearby areas of Kowloon.

2015 January 12, Austin Ramzy, “Firebombs Thrown at Jimmy Lai’s Home and Company in Hong Kong”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-08-15, Sinosphere:

Several protesters took up positions on the rooftops of Hong Kong Polytechnic University, armed with bows and arrows, as unrest spread across the territory's central Kowloon district.

2019 November 17, “Hong Kong protesters fend off police with arrows, petrol bombs as unrest spreads”, in France 24, sourced from Reuters, archived from the original on 2019-11-17, Asia / Pacific:

Hong Kong authorities evacuated at least 3,400 people from buildings after a fire broke out in a warehouse in the city's Kowloon district on Friday.

2023 March 24, “Hong Kong warehouse fire forces thousands to evacuate”, in Deutsche Welle, archived from the original on 2023-03-24, Society:


shumai

Hot and sour soup, shrimp toast, shumai, General Tso’s chicken, pork with garlic sauce, beef with asparagus, hot and spicy shrimp, sushi deluxe, cheesecake, fried bananas, litchi sherbet.

2009 May 31, Joanne Starkey, “Old-School Chinese With Efforts at Fusion”, in New York Times:

A traditional steamed Chinese pork dumpling served in dim sum.

燒賣

a traditional steamed Chinese pork dumpling served in dim sum


Yellow River

Calque of Chinese 黃河／黄河 (Huáng Hé), chiefly from the river's golden appearance as far west as Lanzhou caused by the enormous levels of silt it acquires from the Loess Plateau but also influenced by the color schema in wuxing ("Five Element") theory, which associates earth with the color 黃／黄 (huáng), usually translated as "yellow" but also inclusive of shades modern English would consider golden, orange, brown, tan, etc. The earliest Chinese sources simply describe it as 河 (hé, “The River”) but it was later distinguished as the Yellow River after 河 (hé) began to replace 水 (shuǐ) as a generic term for creeks and smaller rivers.

That Riuer of Nanquin which I called (Yamſu or) Ianſu, the ſonne of the Sea, goeth Northward to Nanquin, and then returning ſomewhat Southward, runneth into the Sea with great force; fortie myles from which it paſſeth by Nanquin. And that from hence to Pequin there might bee paſſage by Riuers, the Kings of China haue deriued a large Channell from this to another Riuer, called the Yellow Riuer, ſuch being the colour of that troubled water. This is the other famous Riuer of that Kingdome, in greatneſſe and note, which ariſesth without the Kingdome to the Weſt, out of the Hill Cunlun, conjectured to bee the ſame whence Ganges ariſeth, or one neere to it.

1625, Samuel Purchas, Pvrchas His Pilgrimes, volume III, London, →OCLC, page 340:

Firſt of all, There are in China two famous large Rivers, namely Kiang, and the Yellow River... The Yellow River, by ſtrangers ſo called from the colour of the water, occaſioned by the Yellowneſs of the ground, is named Hoang in the Chineſe Language, and ſeems at firſt to be very Mooriſh; but the ſwiftneſs and great force of its running, makes it appear the quite contrary; for with ſo incredible a ſwiftneſs does this River run, that no Ships are able to Sail up againſt its Stream, but are drawn up againſt the ſame by the main ſtrength of a great number of Track-men: which may proceed from its being contracted within ſo narrow bounds; for in ſome places it is but half a mile broad, and in others a little broader, but in a continued courſe, for in length it extends above 800 miles.

1669, John Nievhoff, translated by John Ogilby, An Embassy from the Eaſt-India Company of the United Provinces, to the Grand Tartar Cham Emperour of China, London: John Macock, →OCLC, pages 235–236:

After passing a short stage, through low lands with very different prospects, a succession of good towns and villages, numerous vessels, and crowds of people, indicated the vicinity of the Yellow River, into which the canal falls with a gentle force.
November 2d, the yachts came to the spot where the canal joins the Yellow River.
The Yellow River runs at this place with such rapidity that the Chinese sailors deemed it necessary to offer a sacrifice to its Guardian Spirit for a safe passage.

1798, Complete View of the Chinese Empire, London, page 400:

As we rode slowly over the Lunghai Line toward Sianfu, across the brown sun-baked plains of Northern Honan, soon to be flooded when the Chinese breached the Yellow River dikes to stop the advancing Yellow Horde, we passed many troop trains en-route to the front.

1941, Edgar Snow, The Battle for Asia, New York: Random House, page 26:

China's Yellow River, or Huang he, is named for the yellow, sandy silt it carries in its water. This silt, called loess, is almost as fine as flour. Over thousands of years, the northwestern wind blowing from the Gobi Desert has deposited hundreds of feet of loess over northern China. As the Yellow River flows through China, it sweeps away the fine, yellow silt and carries it downriver.

2001, Kim Dramer, The Yellow River, Franklin Watts, →ISBN, page 7:

FOR MORE THAN 2,000 years, a branch of the Silk Road — the 600-mile-long Hexi Corridor — has angled southeast from the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts to the Yellow River loess plains.

2020 May 11, Anna Sherman, “A Poetic Journey Through Western China”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2020-05-11:

Central China, where multiple tributaries of the Yellow River crisscross and monsoon rains are exceptionally heavy, has long been subject to flooding.

2021 July 22, Pei Lin Wu, Rebecca Tan, “Death toll in China floods climbs to 33 as rains spread and more cities call for help”, in The Washington Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2021-07-22, Asia:

The chief river of the North China Plain, currently flowing 5,463 km from the Bayan Har Mountains of Qinghai to the Bohai Sea but historically prone to massive floods which caused its course to vary widely over time.

Kunlun

Source of the Yellow River in trad. Chinese mythology


Szechuan

From the Postal Romanization of Nanjing court dialect Mandarin 四川 (Sìchuān).

THE plain of Chengtu is the only large expanse of level ground in the great province of Szechuan; it is also one of the richest, most fertile, and thickly populated areas in the whole of China.

1913, Ernest Henry Wilson, A Naturalist In Western China, With Vasculum, Camera, And Gun: Being Some Account of Eleven Years' Travel, Exploration, and Observation in the More Remote Parts of the Flowery Kingdom, volume I, London: Methuen & Co. Ltd., page 104:

There is a portrait of Confucius at Ch’ü-fu attributed to Wu and another striking picture representing the struggle of a tortoise with a serpent, kuei she t’u, which is in the Prefect's official residence at Ch’êng-tu, Sze-ch’uan.

[1919, John C. Ferguson, Outlines of Chinese Art, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, →OCLC, page 116:

Li Po is also the author of this poem. Pai-ti is on a mountain in eastern Feng-chieh county in Szechuan Province.

1967, Dennis J. Doolin, Charles P. Ridley, THE GENESIS OF A MODEL CITIZEN IN COMMUNIST CHINA: TRANSLATION AND ANALYSIS OF SELECTED CHINESE COMMUNIST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL READERS, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, page 476:

The highway is one that was built to enable the Chiang Kai-shek government to evacuate to Chungking in the War of Resistance days, and Huayuan, our objective, is a county town in the middle of a high mountain plateau, only 25 kilometres from the Szechuan border.

1973, Rewi Alley, 中国见闻 [Travels in China, 1966-71], Peking: New World Press, →OCLC, page 25:

In far-off southern Szechuan province last summer, while helping the peasants to effect the land reform, I saw group after group of young peasants, men and women, volunteer to help the aggressors away from our border and help neighboring Korea.

1980, Ch'ien Tuan-sheng, edited by Harold C. Hinton, How the People's Government Works, 1952 (The People's Republic of China 1949-1979), volume 1, Wilmington, Delaware: Scholarly Resources Inc., →ISBN, page 58:

Szechuan Province in southeastern China is well endowed with natural resources, fine landscapes and a long rich history. In early times, the several states which made Szechuan their home produced a line of famous generals whose lives have become the subject of myth, literary works and operas. Szechuan opera is one of the most classical of all Chinese opera styles.

1981 March 22, “Chinese opera delights audience at international arts festival”, in Free China Weekly, volume XXII, number 11, Taipei, page 2:

But long before that, Parisians will have had ample chance to familiarize themselves with Chinese culture. From Oct. 14 to Jan. 28, the Hôtel de Ville,[…]showcases recent Bronze Age excavations in the Szechuan Province, in western China, including artifacts from the Jinsha site (1200-1000 B.C.) discovered in February 2001.

2003 October 5, Corinne LaBalme, “WHAT'S DOING IN; Paris”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 2015-05-27, Travel:

This gargantuan population and the city’s strategic importance led to Chongqing’s separation from its parent province, Szechuan, in 1997, and it was designated as a “specially administered municipality,” controlled directly by the central government.

2008, Simon Foster, “The Three Gorges”, in Adventure Guide: China (Hunter Travel Guides), Hunter Publishing, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 263:

Despite this aerial assistance, the Chinese were again forced to withdraw westward, this time to Chongqing in the mountains of Szechuan.

2012, Saul David, editor, The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Warfare, Dorling Kindersley, →ISBN, page 283:


wokou

From Mandarin 倭寇 (wōkòu, “Japanese pirates”).

(historical) Pirates of a mixture of ethnicities who raided the coastlines of China and Korea from the 13th to 16th centuries.


Son of Heaven

Calque of Literary Chinese 天子 (tiānzǐ), from the Emperor having the Mandate of Heaven.


Celestial Empire

Calque of Literary Chinese 天朝 (Tiāncháo).

calque

Had it not been for the casual discovery in the year 1625 of a deeply buried black marble tablet near Hsi-an containing nearly 1,700 Chinese characters, and a long list of names of priests in Syriac, the fact that such a sect rooted itself in the Celestial Empire would never have been believed, as indeed after the tablet was unearthed it was for a long time discredited.

1912, Arthur Henderson Smith, “Uplifting Leaders”, in The Uplift of China, →OCLC, page 117:

LIKE THE MANDARINS of old, the rulers of China live behind high walls. When they emerge, which they rarely do, they travel in cars with rear windows curtained like sedan chairs.
They live in the Chung Nan Hai, a walled park adjacent to the Forbidden City from where ancient dynasties ruled the Celestial Empire.

1991, Chris Mullin, The Year of the Fire Monkey (Fiction), London: Chatto & Windus, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 252:


Wenzhou

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of the Mandarin 溫州／温州 (Wēnzhōu).

The issue of land ownership rights came into focus in Wenzhou in April after the local government demanded that homeowners whose land-use rights had expired after 20 years pay fees of up to a third of the value of their homes before they could sell their apartments. The decision provoked protests from property owners in Wenzhou, a coastal city of eight million that was one of the first to set up private enterprise after the government opened up the economy in the late 1970s.

2016 December 26, Sui-Lee Wee, “China Reassures Homeowners Worried About Land Rights”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2016-12-26, Business:

Saola is not the only storm threatening China this weekend, as Haikui, a second Pacific typhoon, is expected to make landfall on Sunday in eastern China, south of the city of Wenzhou, the US Embassy in Beijing said in a weather alert.

2023 September 2, “Super typhoon Saola leaves trail of destruction in southern China”, in EFE, archived from the original on 2023-12-28:

A prefecture-level city in Zhejiang, in southeastern China.

Cambridge University Press
Defense Mapping Agency
Wenzhou

温州

おんしゅう, Onshū; うんしゅう, Unshū


Chinese numeral

en-noun

Chinese numeral (plural Chinese numerals)

From their original development and chief use in China.

A number represented using a Chinese system involving the characters 一, 二, 三, etc.


Temple of Heaven

Calque of Chinese 天壇／天坛 (Tiāntán, literally “Altar of Heaven”).

calque

Jonah Byrde: Y'know, in third grade, we learned about the Temple of Heaven in Beijing. There are like 600 acres and on the grounds there's this building called the Hall for Prayer for Good Harvests. It's circled by this thing called the Echo Wall.
Wendy Byrde: Ok, ok.
Jonah Byrde: You can go there and even when people are whispering you just hear the same things repeated over and over and over.
Wendy Byrde: Ok, enough. You wanna be a smartass? You want to hate me? Fine.

2022 January 21, Chris Mundy, Ozark, 00:41:05

A religious complex in southeastern Beijing, formerly important to Chinese imperial rituals; the present-day park surrounding and preserving the site.


Kuomintang

c. 1912, from the Wade–Giles romanization of Mandarin 國民黨／国民党 (Guómíndǎng), Wade–Giles: Kuo²-min²-tang³.

It is generally believed that the creation of the Kuomintang will somewhat straighten out the political tangle in China caused by the multitude of parties. The Kuomintang holds itself out as the democratic party, and its support of the President will be tempered by the path his future actions take.

1912 September 7, “The Passing of the Tungmenghui”, in North-China Herald and Supreme Court & Consular Gazette, volume CIV, number 2352, Shanghai, →OCLC, page 686, column 3:

The trend of events from the founding of the Republic to the unseating of the Kuomintang members of the National Assembly in November, 1913, however, confirmed the belief held in many quarters that republicanism was not a suitable system of government for the Chinese in their present stage of political development.

1916, F. L. Pratt, “CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT, 1915”, in China Mission Year Book 1916, Shanghai: Christian Literature Society for China, page 24:

He drew lists of Party cadre members of both before and after forty-nine, and pored over the scant details of those entrusted with the takeover of big enterprises where technological know-how was required: in particular the Kiangnan shipyard, a massive affair from which the Kuomintang elements had repeatedly to be purged.

1977, John Le Carré, The Honourable Schoolboy, Folio Society, published 2010, page 238:

The Kuomintang Party, after capturing 62 of the 71 seats in the Dec. 3 legislative elections, has retained control of the Legislative Yuan of Taiwan, the bastion of recovery, that it has held for the past 30 years.

1983 December 4, “6.7 Million Voters Select 71 Legislators”, in Free China Weekly, volume XXIV, number 48, Taipei, page 1:

By 1927, these gangs had come to play a cardinal political role, serving as agents of the Kuomintang in dealing with unions, radicals, and other opponents of the regime.

1985, Harold R. Isaacs, Re-encounters in China: Notes of a Journey in a Time Capsule, M. E. Sharpe, →ISBN, page 6:

If we say that the Communist Parties in West European countries are tainted with some undesirable traditions of the social-democratic parties, the Chinese Communist Party is more or less tainted with the undesirable traditions of the Kuomintang. The concept of “ruling the country by the party”, held by some comrades, is a manifestation in our Party of an abominable tradition of the Kuomintang.

1992 [1941 April 15], Xiaoping Deng, “The Party and the Anti-Japanese Democratic Government”, in Selected Works of Deng Xiaoping, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, →OL, page 17:

Next door, you can't miss the Fushan Illuminated Wall, a huge sign with red Chinese characters on a white background declaring: "Sleep with one's sword ready." Its purpose was to brace the islands' Kuomintang troops and to warn off the Communist troops always watching from just across the waters.

2004, Phil Macdonald, National Geographic Traveler: Taiwan, National Geographic Society, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 203:

In February, the newly elected mayor of Taipei, Chiang Wan-an, welcomed a delegation from the Shanghai branch of the Taiwan Affairs Office. Andrew Hsia, a Kuomintang vice chairman, went to China and met with Wang Huning and Song Tao, two key figures in Beijing’s Taiwan strategy.

2023 March 27, Chris Horton, “Taiwan’s Ex-President Heads to China in Historic and Closely Watched Visit”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-03-27, Asia Pacific:

A nationalist political party founded under Sun Yat-sen in 1912 that ruled mainland China from 1928 to 1949, now one of three major parties in the Republic of China (Taiwan).

Chinese History: A New Manual
Harvard University Press
Kuomintang

國民黨

a nationalist political party in pre-Communist China, and contemporary Taiwan

Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang


Wuhanese

(rare) Of, from, or pertaining to Wuhan, China.


Wuhanese

Within China, Wuhanese have become feared and discriminated against because of the epidemic. Yet the vast majority of people in Wuhan as well as the rest of China stick to meals of grains, tofu, pork and veg.

2020 May 15, Yuan Yang, “Letter from China: Sichuan goes with the flow”, in Financial Times:


Wuhanese

(rare) The dialect of Mandarin Chinese spoken in Wuhan, Tianmen and surrounding areas in Hubei.

(rare) The people of Wuhan, Hubei, China


Sinaic

en-adj

Sinaic (comparative more Sinaic, superlative most Sinaic)

more Sinaic (comparative)
most Sinaic (superlative)

From Sinae + -ic, q.v., under influence of Judaic, Altaic, etc. and French sinique.

We will separate [the 'Yellow Race'] into three branches—the Hyperborean, the Mongolian, and the Sinaic branches.

1872, Guillaume Louis Figuier, The Human Race, page 205:

(rare, obsolete) Synonym of East Asian, with especial focus on Chinese people and culture: of or related to the Sinosphere.


Guoanbu

From Mandarin 國安部／国安部 (Guó'ānbù), short for 国家安全部 (Guójiā Ānquán Bù, literally “State Security Ministry”).

zh-l

國安部／国安部 (Guó'ānbù)

Ministry of State Security (China); the intelligence, security and secret police agency of the People's Republic of China, headquartered in Beijing


dim sim

(Australia, New Zealand) Any of various kinds of Chinese-style meat and cabbage dumplings, similar to shumai and other dim sum and usually steamed or deep fried. Commonly offered by Chinese restaurants and fish-and-chip shops.


Sinocentric

en-adj

Sinocentric (comparative more Sinocentric, superlative most Sinocentric)

more Sinocentric (comparative)
most Sinocentric (superlative)

Focused on China or the people and culture of China.


Sinocentrism

From Sino- (prefix meaning ‘relating to China or the Chinese’) + -centrism (suffix indicating a focus on, or belief in the superiority of, one culture, people, place, or other thing).

confix

[page 81] While Berry is certainly correct in identifying "sinocentrism," which he would rather term "race-centrism," in post-1949 Chinese film, what he sees as "raceization" (or "sinification" as used elsewhere by Paul Clark) is, I would contend, a politically motivated and manipulated process of cultural production. [...] [page 95] To return to Chris Berry's theory of "race," one realizes that he has made an overstatement in treating recent Chinese films as a radical challenge not only to "sinocentrism" but perhaps also "the very assumption of a fundamental duality separating the Han Chinese and the foreign."

1997, Yingjin Zhang, “From “Minority Film” to “Minority Discourse”: Questions of Nationhood and Ethnicity in Chinese Cinema”, in Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu, editor, Transnational Chinese Cinemas: Identity, Nationhood, Gender, Honolulu, Hi.: University of Hawaiʻi Press, →ISBN, pages 81–82 and 95:

(politics) Ethnocentrism among the Han people of China; Han chauvinism.

大漢族主義

ethnocentrism among the Han people of China


Red Army

Calque of Russian Красная Армия (Krasnaja Armija). The red was the traditional color of the communist movement which was the official ideology of the Soviets at the period.

calque

Красная Армия

(historical, informal, military) The Soviet Armed Forces.


Mongol Empire

An empire of the Mongols and Turkic peoples which existed in Asia from 1206 to 1368 and became the largest contiguous land empire in human history, stretching from Central Europe east to the Sea of Japan and from Siberia south to the Indian subcontinent and the Middle East.


Ming dynasty

Partial calque from Mandarin 明朝 (Míngcháo).

The Outer city, also known as the Chinese city, was added during the reign of the emperor Chia Ching (1522-66) of the Ming dynasty. It is in the form of an oblong adjoining the Inner city. with walls 14 mi. in length, including 4 mi. of the southern wall of the Inner city.

1968, “PEKING (PEIPING)”, in Encyclopedia Britannica, volume 17, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 532, column 1:

A Chinese dynasty that lasted from 1368–1644 C.E..


Peiping

From Wade–Giles romanization of Mandarin 北平 (Pei³-pʻing²).

1934 — Anon., All About Shanghai: A standard Guidebook, The University Press, Shanghai. 1983 reed., Oxford University Press, Oxford, →ISBN. p. 146;
Peiping, one of the oldest cities in the world, and one of the most interesting! He who has not seen Peiping has really not seen the China of fable and history.

On July 7, 1937, the Japanese during maneuvers attacked the Marco Polo bridge (Lu-kou-ch'iao) across the Yung-ting Ho southwest of Peiping to sever the last railroad link with the rest of China.

Commenting on a wire service report of March 9 saying that a foreign journalist stationed in Peiping has been in contact with counterparts in Taipei via Tokyo tele-communications facilities, the GIO said "This is another form of Chinese Communist united front conspiracy carried out through foreign journalists."

1979 March 18, “Peiping plot uses foreign journalists”, in Free China Weekly, volume XX, number 10, Taipei, page 1:


Zhongdu

From the pinyin romanization of Mandarin Chinese 中都.

the capital of the Jurchen Jin dynasty of medieval China, located in modern Beijing's southwestern Xicheng District


Chung-tu

From the Wade-Giles romanization of Mandarin Chinese 中都.


Cambaluc

From Italian Cambaluc found in the account of Marco Polo's travels, from Mongolian and East Turkish Khanbalik, "City of the Khan".

(historical) Alternative form of Khanbalik


Dadu

From the pinyin romanization of Mandarin Chinese 大都.


Ta-tu

From the Wade-Giles romanization of Mandarin Chinese 大都.


Khanbaliq

Peking consists essentially of two walled cities, the northern Inner city and the southern Outer city. The Inner city, also known as the Tatar city, lies approximately on the site of Khanbaliq of the Mongol dynasty. It is in the form of a square with walls nearly 15 mi. in length.


Beijing duck

By substitution of Beijing, the Pinyin name of the city, in place of the earlier spelling Peking.

The art of preparing Beijing Duck became popular in the 15th century, although the dish had existed much earlier as a delicacy for the aristocracy.

1985, Fredric M. Kaplan, Julian M. Sobin, Arne J. De Keijzer, The China Guidebook 1985, Houghton Mifflin, page 283:

Beijing duck is the capital's famous invention, now a production-line of sorts. Your meal starts at one of the agricultural communes around Beijing where the duck is pumped full of grain and soya bean paste to fatten it up[…]

1988, Alan Samagalski, Robert Strauss, Michael Buckley, China: A Travel Survival Kit, Lonely Planet, page 501:

We were disappointed by the Beijing duck, which we tried in one of the restaurants best known for that dish. Every part of the duck was brought in at one time or another, and every part was too bland and fatty for our tastes.

1990, Roy Blount (Jr.), First Hubby, page 215:

Beijing Duck This is made on the same principle as that other great delicacy, paté de foie gras, namely by force-feeding ducks.

2001, Caroline Liou, Robert Storey, Beijing, Lonely Planet, page 132:

(uncommon) Alternative form of Peking duck


Khanbalik

From Classical Mongolian ᠬᠠᠨᠪᠠᠯᠢᠺ (qanbalik), from Middle Mongol ᠬᠠᠨᠪᠠᠯᠢᠺ (qanbalik, “City of the Khan”), from ᠬᠠᠭᠠᠨ (qaɣan) + ᠪᠠᠯᠢᠺ (balik), both possibly from Old Turkic. Compare Mongolian Ханбалиг (Xanbalig).

der

Genghis Khan initiated Beijing's nearly 800-year dominance over the Middle Kingdom. The city's current population numbers ten million people, far more than lived here in 1215 A.D. when the Mongol warlord conquered the strategically significant power center of Yanying and built Khanbalik, his new residence.

1999, “Beijing”, in The Book of the World, 2nd United States edition (Atlas), Macmillan, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 367:

(historical) The capital of the Mongolian Yuan dynasty, at site of present-day Beijing.


Peking opera

en-noun

Peking opera (countable and uncountable, plural Peking operas)

(music) A form of traditional Chinese theatre which combines music, vocal performance, mime, dance and acrobatics.


John Chinaman

John Chinaman is playing the devil with us shipmasters of the English nation.

1840 March 25, The Colonist, Sydney, page 2, column 1:

The simple cup of tea, and frugal meal of rice and salt fish, are the principal factors to " John Chinaman's " success wherever he goes.

1887, Harriet W. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 234:

My head was full of stories about John Chinaman: opium, slavery, how they ate the hands of Christian babies.

1985, Peter Carey, Illywhacker, Faber and Faber, published 2003, page 193:

(now offensive) A Chinese man; the Chinese people generally.


Tiele

zh-m

鐵勒／铁勒 (Tiělè)

A member of a confederation of Turkic peoples living to the north of China and in Central Asia, emerging after the disintegration of the Xiongnu confederacy.


Xianbei

zh-l

鮮卑／鲜卑 (Xiānbēi)

(historical) An ancient Mongolic nomadic people who resided in what is now eastern Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, and northeast China.


China hand

(historical) A 19th-century, non-Chinese merchant in the treaty ports of China.

Anyone with expert knowledge of the language, culture, and people of China.


Sinosphere

From Sino- + -sphere, coined by James Matisoff along with Indosphere in his 1990 article "On Megalocomparison".

The area of East and Southeast Asia considered greatly influenced by Han Chinese culture.

Sinoesfera

Area considered greatly influenced by Han Chinese culture


Tomb Sweeping Day

From its former Chinese name 掃墳節／扫坟节 (Sǎofénjié, “Sweep-Tomb Festival”), from the traditional act of cleaning one's family grave with willow branches during the holiday.

An annual Chinese holiday on the first day of the fifth solar term in the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar (April 4 or 5), during which families gather to honor their ancestors and clean their tombs. The festival is also associated with the consumption of qingtuan.


Qingming Festival

Partial calque from Mandarin from the pinyin romanization of Mandarin Chinese 清明 (Qīngmíng, "pure brightness") and the English translation of 節 (jié, "festival")

Tomb Sweeping Day
Tomb Sweeping Day#English


trade dollar

(historical) A silver coin minted as a trade coin by various countries to facilitate trade with China and the Orient.


Shaoxing

From the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of Mandarin 紹興／绍兴 (Shàoxīng), named for an era of the Song dynasty.

Now, demand is waning in the United States, and Shaoxing, a coastal city that is one of the world’s biggest textile centers, has fallen victim to the global downturn.

2009 February 27, David Barboza, “A Textile Capital of China Is Hobbled by a Downturn Gone Global”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2011-04-01, World Business:

A prefecture-level city in eastern Zhejiang, China, along the southern shore of Hangzhou Bay, the site of the former capitals of the Yue kingdom and Kuaiji Commandery.

Cambridge University Press
Chinese History: A New Manual
Harvard University Press
Shaoxing


NoHo

Blend of north + Hollywood
* (Los Angeles): Acronym of North Hollywood.
* (Hong Kong): Acronym of north of Hollywood Road.

Gough Street, in newly trendy NoHo, is now home to Ralph Lauren and other top brands.[…]
As part of the larger "NoHo" area, Gough Street has attracted tenants priced out of its larger neighbour SoHo. Once home to family-run stores and printers and now known locally for its casual Cantonese restaurants and art galleries, the Gough Street area's tenant mix was "internationalised" one or two years ago.

2014 September 30, Nick Bradstreet, “New retail districts a welcome trend but challenges remain”, in South China Morning Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2014-12-10, Property:

Hong Kong Island
Hong Kong Island#English

A neighbourhood of Central district, Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong; along Gough Street.


Tibetan Buddhism

The body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet, Mongolia, Tuva, Bhutan, Kalmykia, Buryatia and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, and India.

ဝဇိရယာန

body of Buddhist religious doctrine characteristic of Tibet and surrounding areas


Chinese studies

(humanities) An academic discipline that includes the study of literature written in the Chinese language, Chinese linguistics, and Chinese sociolinguistics.


Szechwan

Latin: szechwanensis

From the Postal Romanization of Mandarin 四川 (Sìchuān).

We shall then have two great streams of traffic at this point intersecting one another, the waterway of the Yangtse bringing produce and people down from Szechwan and the west to the coast, and taking back the imports and produce of the coast provinces, as well as numberless travellers to the far interior; while the great trunk railway from Canton to Peking will convey an enormous traffic between these cities and all intermediate places.

1907, Mark Tennien, edited by Marshall Broomhall, The Chinese Empire: A General & Missionary Survey, London: Morgan & Scott, page 118:

The Rev. Howard Smith of Washington, Pa., missionary of the Christian and Missionary Alliance at Pengshui, in Northwest Szechwan Province, has been kidnapped by "rouges," crimson-clad Chinese irregulars, it was learned here today.

1934 May 12 [1934 May 11], “MISSIONARY SEIZED BY BANDITS IN CHINA; Rev. Howard Smith, American, Held for Ransom -- Hull Is Urged to Aid Release.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-08-27, page 4:

Chungking became the wartime capital of Free China, and Szechwan, that vast, barely accessible province hidden behind steep mountain ranges, became the country’s wartime base.

1943, Hubert Freyn, Free China's New Deal, New York: Macmillan Company, →OCLC, page 6:

Before leaving the Old Stone Age in Pleistocene China, it may be worthwhile to mention two additional sites in South China which have recently been investigated. In 1951 the remains of the Tzŭ-yang Man was unearthed at Huang-shan-hsi, in Tzŭ-yang, Szechwan (48. 49-50).

1966, Chêng Tê-kʻun, Prehistoric China, volume 1, England: W. Heffer & Sons, page 37:

Shielded from China proper and the central government by mountains, Szechwan is a huge "rice bowl" whose population of seventy to eighty million makes it larger than all but nine countries in the world. When the Communists took Szechwan in 1950, they were determined to bind the province tightly to the rest of the nation. National leaders, despite objections from Szechwan, concentrated on doubling Szechwan grain. In achieving an agricultural surplus, Szechwan 's leaders won a reputation for astutely applying mechanical innovation, work incentives, and technical training. In the Cultural Revolution such pragmatism was denounced for neglecting politics and pursuing "capitalist restoration."

1971, The Cultural Revolution in the Provinces, Harvard University Press, page 8:

Radio Szechwan reported on Feb. 3 that many "security organizations" in Szechwan had sent cadres to schools at various levels to instruct students on the class struggle. . . to criticize and destroy the class enemy.

1976 February 15, “Red security personnel involved in power struggle”, in Free China Weekly, volume XVII, number 6, Taipei, page 3:

But the fighting was not yet over. The province of Szechwan in the far west did not fall for three more years, while Yunnan in the south-west remained in the hands of Yuan loyalists until 1382.

1998, Chris Peers, Warlords of China 700 BC to AD 1662, Arms and Armour, →ISBN, page 144:


Tibetology

The study of Tibet and its history and culture.

藏學

the study of Tibet and its history and culture


China watcher

A person who monitors current affairs in the People's Republic of China.


cross-strait

From cross- + strait (referring to the Taiwan Strait).

The aim of this paper is to examine the continually evolving dynamics of cross-strait relations.

Pertaining to relations between the People's Republic of China, commonly known as mainland China, and the Republic of China, commonly known as Taiwan.

海峽兩岸的

pertaining to relations between the PRC and the ROC


ping-pong diplomacy

Coordinate term: panda diplomacy

(historical) The exchange of ping pong players between the United States and the People's Republic of China in the early 1970s, marking a thaw in relations between the two countries.


China proper

Chowta-Zhin, who is ſaid to be a man of buſineſs and preciſion, and cautious of advancing facts, at the requeſt of Earl Macartney, delivered to him a ſtatement taken from one of the public officers in the capitol, of the inhabitants of the fifteen ancient provinces of China, or China proper, within the great wall ; according to which the number of inhabitants, taken by a regular enumeration, amounts to 333,000,000!

1798 October 20 [1797], “CALCULATIONS OF THE INHABITANTS OF THE GLOBE.”, in The Rural Magazine, volume I, number 36, Newark, →OCLC, page 2:

Tun-huang, which means 'Blazing Beacon', was thus the last caravan halt in China proper for travellers setting out along the old Silk Road.

1980, Peter Hopkirk, Foreign Devils on the Silk Road, Oxford University Press, published 1984, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 156:

The site is located in the Hexi Corridor, a critical section of the Silk Road, and the multi-room layout of the buildings and the wheat/barley crops hint at dual directions of inspiration, but it is yet uncertain whether the Xichengyi community absorbed the mud-brick building technology from Central Asia. The microscopic and particle size analyses, however, confirm that the second type of mud-brick was ingeniously fused with the earth ramming technique from China proper.

2018, Liangren Zhang, Dongju Zhang, Xiaohong Wu, Kai Wang, Guoke Chen, Hui Wang, Peng Wang, “Ancient mud-brick architecture of Northwest China”, in Paléorient, volume 44, number 1, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC:

To accommodate a fast growing urban population, real estate developers favor tall, rectangular, concrete apartment buildings over traditional Chinese architectures. The buildings in northern cities no longer look distinguishable from buildings in southern cities. Revisiting those diverse architectural motifs serves as a reminder of how diverse China proper really is.[...]East of the thick red lines is a rough definition of China proper (Lin et al., 2015)

2020, Shiqi Liang, “Architecture and Geography of China Proper: Influence of Geography on the Diversity of Chinese Traditional Architectural Motifs and the Cultural Values They Reflect”, in Culture, Society, and Praxis, volume 12, number 1, →ISSN, →OCLC, pages 1, 2:

China excluding Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, Mongolia, Taiwan, Tibet, Tuva, and Xinjiang.

中國本部

parts of China excluding outer frontiers


Sichuanese

en-adj

Sichuanese (comparative more Sichuanese, superlative most Sichuanese)

more Sichuanese (comparative)
most Sichuanese (superlative)

Of or relating to the province of Sichuan in China.


Little Red Book

In reference to the book's red colour, and because red is the traditional colour representing Communism.

Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, a book widely distributed in Communist China.


Pingju

From the pinyin romanization of Mandarin 評劇／评剧 (píngjù).


Four Olds

Calque of Chinese 四舊／四旧 (Sìjiù, “the four old (things)”)

cal

(historical) The four traditional things targeted for destruction during China's Cultural Revolution, usually translated as old customs, old culture, old habits, and old ideas.


Beacon Hill

A neighbourhood of Kowloon Tong, Kowloon City district, Hong Kong


circuit intendant

en-noun

circuit intendant (plural circuit intendants)

zh-l

道臺／道台 (dàotái)

(historical) The chief magistrate of an imperial Chinese circuit, overseeing both its civil operation and local defense.


literary inquisition

en-noun

literary inquisition (plural literary inquisitions)

(historical) The persecution of intellectuals on the basis of their writings as practiced in imperial China.


lion dance

zh-l

獅子舞／狮子舞 (shīziwǔ)

A traditional Chinese dance where performers mimic a lion's movements in a lion costume.


chicken feet

(Singapore, erroneous) Alternative form of chicken feed (“A simple or easy task”)


human flesh search engine

en-noun

human flesh search engine (plural human flesh search engines)

Calque from Chinese 人肉搜索 (rénròu sōusuǒ).

The Chinese phenomenon of distributed research using Internet media such as blogs and forums, sometimes as a form of vigilantism against an individual person/doxxing.


guoxue

From Mandarin 國學／国学 (guóxué, literally “country learning”).

zh-l

In recent years, education officials have made a number of proposals, including revising elementary and middle school textbooks to increase the proportion of guoxue, or the study of Chinese culture, and reducing the importance of English on some versions of the gaokao, or university entrance examination, in favor of a greater emphasis on the Chinese language.

2015 September 30, Amy Qin, “A Fervor to Glimpse ‘China’s Mona Lisa’”, in New York Times:

Knowledge of the culture of a country (especially of China).


Suzhou numeral

A calque of Chinese 蘇州碼子／苏州码子 (Sūzhōu mǎzi), from their use at the formerly important market town of Suzhou in Jiangsu Province. Mistakenly entered into Unicode as "Hangzhou numerals", which Unicode's policy precludes changing.

calque

A system of Chinese numerals based on Southern Song rod numerals.


snow lion

A Tibetan national emblem and religious and cultural icon, depicted as a white lion with green manes and a green tail.


myriarchy

/ˈmɪɹiˌɑɹki/

From myriarch + -y, after the pattern of heptarchy etc.; see myriarch for more. As a military unit, Calque of Mongolian түмэн (tümen).

(obsolete, rare) A government of 10,000 people.

(military) A regiment of 10,000 soldiers, especially (historical) a Mongolian toman.

(historical) An area controlled by a Mongolian myriarch and theoretically comprising 10,000 households.


Shang

Wilma Fairbank strongly supports the piece mold theory but points out that the mastery of bronze technology by the Shang people was an outgrowth of their earlier mastery of ceramic technology.

1969, Rutherford John Gettens, The Freer Chinese Bronzes, volume II, Washington, D.C.: Meriden Gravure Company, →OCLC, page 28:

In the Shang and Chou periods our knowledge from archaeology of ordinary dwellings is thus far poor, but something can be said of the more pretentious edifices.

1971, William Watson, Cultural Frontiers in Ancient East Asia, Edinburgh University Press, →ISBN, page 81:

Hsing-t'ai, Han-tan, and Shih-chia-chuang are thus among the numerous Shang sites marked by heavy upper Erh-li-kang cultural manifestations.

2011, Ralph D. Sawyer, Ancient Chinese Warfare, Basic Books, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 135:

(historical) an ancient dynasty in China


Yin

zh-l

陰山／阴山 (Yīnshān)

A mountain range in northern China at the southeast end of the Gobi Desert.


imperial examination

en-noun

imperial examination (plural imperial examinations)

(historical) A civil service examination system in imperial China to select candidates for the state bureaucracy.


Three Kingdoms

I deeply regretted having to miss seeing Hsing-ping, a very old town built by the ruler of the Wu Kingdom in the Three Kingdoms period of the third century.

1977, Yee Chiang, “Kuei-lin and Yang-shuo”, in China Revisited, New York: W. W. Norton & Company, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 155:

(historical) The tripartite division of China between the states of Wei (魏 (Wèi)), Shu (蜀 (Shǔ)), and Wu (吳／吴 (Wú)), during AD 220–280, following the Han dynasty and preceding the Jin dynasty.


Qiang

An ethnic group in China, living mainly in a mountainous region in the northwestern part of Sichuan on the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau.

(historical) Any of various groups of people at different periods in ancient China, generally thought to have been of Tibetan-Burmese origin.


The telephone number for firefighting assistance in China, Bolivia, Japan, and South Korea.


Like 911, 119, etc., selected as a number both fast and easy to call from rotary or touch-tone phones and less likely to be mistakenly dialed.

110 handles police emergencies in Japan and Korea but fires and medical emergencies have a separate number, 119.

The telephone number for law enforcement in China, Japan, Germany, Indonesia, Latvia, Bolivia, Guatamala, Andorra, Nauru, and the Ivory Coast and on Taiwan.


Kham

In the summer of 1956, Chinese troops bombed a large monastery in the eastern Kham region. The Chinese had begun to destroy the religious and cultural artifacts of Tibet.

1996, Whitney Stewart, “The Chinese Takeover”, in The 14th Dalai Lama: Spiritual Leader of Tibet, Minneapolis: Lerner Publications, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 86:

The exiled Tibetan spiritual leader told the French newspaper Le Monde that the army opened fire during a protest in the eastern Tibetan region of Kham on Monday.[…]
“We know about disturbances in the Kham region. But we do not have any details or figures about injuries or deaths,” said the aide, Chhime Chhoekyapa, in the northern town of Dharamsala.[…]
“The military presence in Tibet is old, but the frenzy of new construction in the Amdo and Kham regions makes me say that this colonisation by the army is designed to last,” he said.

2008 August 21, “China to crack down on use of leanness enhancers in cattle and sheep”, in Reuters, archived from the original on 2022-05-17, Top News:

For Samdhong Rinpoche, this tour around the world is also his last trip as PM, now that his term is over and cannot be extended. He has decided to take his future after March 20 as it comes. If he could do what he wanted, he would go back to his home monastery in Kham, where he has not returned since 1959 and where he used to sit under the trees and meditate as a young man. He said, "they are wonderful and they are still standing."

2011 February 23, Adrienne Woltersdorf (sb), “Tibetans searching for a future beyond the Dalai Lama”, in Thomas Baerthlein, editor, Deutsche Welle, archived from the original on 2021-05-25, Asia:

Tibet Autonomous Region
Tibet Autonomous Region

One of the three traditional regions of Tibet covering a land area largely divided between eastern parts of the Tibet Autonomous Region, western parts of Sichuan, and smaller parts of Qinghai and Yunnan.


Ü-Tsang

Borrowed from Tibetan དབུས་གཙང (dbus gtsang).

bor+

The Northern Plain (U-Tsang)
The Northern Plain is the largest region of the country. This vast area called the Changthang, covers a large portion of the country. To the extreme north is a cold, desolate desert quarter neighboring on the Chinese-Turkestan border that is mostly uninhabited. The western part of this region, which borders on Ladakh, supports a small number of nomads who live off the scant vegetation. In the 1950s, U-Tsang was sectioned off by the Chinese and named the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) (See photo, pg. 37).

1998, Robert Z. Apte, Andrés R. Edwards, “The Geography of the Land of Snows”, in Tibet: Enduring Spirit, Exploited Land, 1st edition, Heartsfire Books, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 20:

The government-in-exile calls Tibet “Cholka-sum”, meaning “The Three Provinces”. These historic areas are U-Tsang, which roughly corresponds to the TAR, Amdo centred around Qinghai Province, and Kham centred around Sichuan in China’s southwest.

[2008 March 21, “Who are the Tibetans, what is Tibet?”, in Reuters, archived from the original on 2022-06-27, Global Coverage 2:

The Tibetan plateau — the geographic and cultural region associated with Tibet — has traditionally been divided into four historical regions. Three are almost entirely in China: Amdo in the north, now associated mostly with Qinghai and Gansu provinces in China, Kham in the east, split between Sichuan province and TAR, and Ü-Tsang, or central Tibet, the region is generally identified with the idea of Tibet, both culturally and administratively, although parts of Ü-Tsang extend to northern Nepal and the Indian states of Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh.

2020 July 11, Akhilesh Pillalamarri, “History of Tibet-Ladakh Relations and Their Modern Implications”, in The Diplomat, archived from the original on 2020-07-13:

One of the three traditional regions of Tibet covering a land area largely corresponding to most of the Tibet Autonomous Region.


Mainland China

Under this strategy we would mine the major harbors and, perhaps, bomb port facilities and even consider blockade. In addition, we would attack systematically the rail lines between Hanoi and Mainland China.

1971, Lyndon Johnson, quoting Walt Rostow, “The Making of a Decision: Vietnam 1967—1968”, in The Vantage Point, Holt, Reinhart & Winston, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 367:

Alternative letter-case form of mainland China


Swatow

From the Postal Romanization of Teochew 汕頭／汕头 (suan1 tao5).

The ports of Cháu-chau or Swatau, in the province of Kwangtung, and Taiwan on Formosa in the province of Fuhkien, will be opened to American commerce, and for Americans to reside with their families, on and after the first day of January, 1860.

[1862 [1859], John E. Ward, “Proclamation of JOHN E. WARD announcing exchange of ratifications of Treaty”, in Treaties between the United States of America and China, Japan Lewchew and Siam, Acts of Congress, and the Attorney-General's Opinion, with the Decrees and Regulations Issued for the Guidance of U.S. Consular Courts in China, Hongkong, →OCLC, page 22:

This was much too plain speaking for the Imperial devotee, and Han Yü was sentenced to death. On the remonstrance of his fellow-ministers this sentence was commuted, and he was banished under the guise of an appointment to the post of governor of what was then the barbarous region near Swatow. Here he taught the barbarous people, and is still remembered as their greatest benefactor. His expulsion from the demon of ignorance is symbolised in a legend of his expulsion from the rivers of a huge crocodile. The remonstrance which he addressed to it, which is to be found among his works, is a curious combination of solemnity and humour.

1902, J. Campbell Gibson, Mission Problems and Mission Methods in South China, 2nd edition, Oliphant, Anderson & Ferrier, page 56:

Bangkok is twenty-five miles from the mouth of the River Menam Chow Phya. The usual route to the city is from Singapore, by steamer or rail, though several shipping lines carry cargo direct. There are also steamship connections with Hong Kong, direct or via Swatow, a coastal service between Bangkok and the ports of French Indo-China, and occasional sailings to Java.

1920, Irving National Bank, Trading with the Far East: How to Sell in the Orient: Policies: Methods: Advertising: Credits: Financing: Documents: Deliveries, 2nd edition, New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, page 265:

With Waichow subdued and the enemy troops in the entire area surrendering or in headlong flight, Chiang struck at another malcontent general and captured the coastal city of Swatow.

1938, Robert Berkov, Strong Man of China: The Story of Chiang Kai-shek, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, page 46:

A "public trial" at the "people’s park" in Swatow, Kwantung^([sic – meaning Kwangtung]) on April 5, the anniversary of the Tienanmen riots in Peiping, was followed by execution of 11 citizens.

1977 May 15, “Political executions scare mainlanders”, in Free China Weekly, volume XVIII, number 19, Taipei, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 3:

There were none, and the only evidence of hostile action was some inaccurate anti-aircraft fire far below the F-7B as it made landfall just south of the first target, the port at Swatow.

2015, Stephen Harding, Last to Die : A Defeated Empire, A Forgotten Mission, and the Last American Killed in World War II, Da Capo Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 25:

The extant scholarship on Sinophone Thai literature attributes the uniqueness of such works as Stormy Yaowarat Road to three aspects of their evocation of Teochew: their use of the Chaoyang-Swatow (Chaoshan) dialect of Teochew (particularly in the spoken dialogues of the text), their depiction of specific Teochew cultural practices like the regions' unique opera (ngiu) and tea ceremony (gongfu cha), and their emphasis on Teochew cultural and linguistic cultivation and preservation-an emphasis woven into the theme of the narratives.

2015, Brian C. Bernards, Writing the South Seas: Imagining the Nanyang in Chinese and Southeast Asian Postcolonial Literature, University of Washington Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 180:

My family in Swatow prepares this using a fresh fish and just a few pantry staples as part of a quick meal.

2018, Diana Danxia Zheng, Jia! The Food of Swatow and the Teochew Diaspora, →ISBN, →OCLC:

(dated) Shantou (a prefecture-level city in Guangdong, China)

Encyclopædia Britannica
National Industrial Bank of China


jiedushi

Borrowed from Mandarin 節度使／节度使 (jiédùshǐ) via Hanyu Pinyin.

(historical) A regional military governor in China during the Tang dynasty and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period.


Chinese evergreen

en-noun

Chinese evergreen (plural Chinese evergreens)

north-facing rooms: These rooms receive the least light if you live up north, so choose plants that can endure low-light conditions and keep them directly on the windowsill. Some suggestions include pothos, philodendrons, arrowheads, Chinese evergreens, peace lilies and zamioculcas (or “ZZ”).

2015, Nathan Williams, The Kinfolk Home: Interiors for Slow Living, Artisan Books, →ISBN, page 277:

Any of various plants of the genus Aglaonema.


Long March

The encirclement and the economic blockade proved so effective that the Red Army and Government were forced to adopt the bold strategy of retreat - to escape annihilation by retreating westward, then southward, the northward, and then northeastward, finally reaching their destination in northern Shensi. This retreat has been called "the Long March," which lasted for a whole year and covered about 6,000 miles.

1965 [1950 October], Shih Hu, “China in World Politics: International Communism: Stalin's Grand Strategy”, in The Kuomintang Debacle of 1949: Conquest of Collapse?, D. C. Heath and Company, published 1966, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 55, column 1:

People's Liberation Army
People's Liberation Army

(historical) A military retreat undertaken by the Red Army of the Communist Party of China, the forerunner of the People's Liberation Army, to evade the pursuit of the Kuomintang (KMT or Chinese Nationalist Party) army.


Balhae

(historical) A kingdom in southern Manchuria and northeastern Korea in the late first millennium.


era name

Cities were not infrequently named after the era name in which they were founded (e.g., Shaoxing 紹興 in Zhejiang, after the Shaoxing era, 1131-62).

2000, Endymion Wilkinson, “Geography”, in Chinese History: A New Manual, Rev. & enl. edition, Harvard University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 135:

The regnal year, reign period, or regnal title used when traditionally numbering years in an emperor's reign and naming certain Sinospheric rulers.


yaodong

zh-l

窯洞／窑洞 (yáodòng)

A type of earth shelter dwelling common in the Loess Plateau in northern China.


Tudigong

A tutelary deity of a locality and the human communities who inhabit it in Chinese folk religion.


New Territories

One of the three main regions of Hong Kong.


people's commune

en-noun

people's commune (plural people's communes)

Calque from Chinese 人民公社 (rénmín gōngshè).

A scene from China’s great drought of 1960. Members of the Sanhsiang people's commune in Yiyang County form a "bucket brigade" to bring water from the Lo River, reduced to a trickle.
China Reconstructs (Peiping), November 1960

1961 May [1961 January 22], “China: Re-educating Capitalists”, in East Europe, A Monthly Review of East European Affairs, volume 10, number 5, New York: Free Europe Committee, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 14, column 1:

Members of the Chinghsin people's commune in Hunchun County, Kirin Province, on the anti-revisionist forefront, demonstrated through the night.

1969 March 14 [1969 March 13], “Report from Border Areas”, in Daily Report: Foreign Radio Broadcasts, number 50, Foreign Broadcast Information Service, sourced from Peking NCNA International Service, →OCLC, page A 6:

An administrative level in rural areas of the People's Republic of China from 1958 to 1983.


daigou

daigou (countable and uncountable, plural daigous)

From Mandarin 代購／代购 (dàigòu, “to buy on someone's behalf”).

zh-l

A business practice in which a person outside of China purchases commodities for a customer in mainland China.


little emperor syndrome

The situation in China where, because of the one-child policy, children of modern upper-class and wealthier Chinese families receive excessive attention from their parents and grandparents.


Tuoba

(historical) an ancient Xianbei tribe of China


Three Principles of the People

Calque of Chinese 三民主義／三民主义 (sānmínzhǔyì)

cal

(historical) The political philosophy espoused by Sun Yat-sen and the Chinese Nationalist Party.


Chinese white

From its supposed origin in China. Compare China white, typically used for a white lead-based pigment.

A form of zinc oxide used in white paints.


Tridemism

Calque from Chinese 三民主義／三民主义, tri- + demo- + -ism.

Three Principles of the People
Three Principles of the People

(historical, politics) The Three Principles of the People.


drum tower

A fortification in the form of a cylindrical tower, typically resembling a drum.

lieriötorni

A tower in the center of a premodern Chinese city that houses signal drums.


Serica

Learned borrowing from Latin Serica, from Ancient Greek Σηρικά (Sēriká), from Σῆρες (Sêres, “Seres”) + -ική (-ikḗ), from σήρ (sḗr, “silkworm”), likely ultimately from Old Chinese 絲 (*sə, “silk”).

(historical) An ancient empire in East Asia, North China reached overland as opposed to the Sinae, the South Chinese reached by sea.

Σηρικά

Northern China as known to the ancient Greeks and Romans — see also China, Cathay


Amdo

安多

one of the three traditional regions of Tibet

One account of a religious movement organized around spirit-possession and magical practices with millenarian overtones comes from official Chinese sources. A report was distributed among Party officials in 1982 documenting the suppression of the "Heroes of Ling" (gling gi dpa' brtul) movement in Amdo county, a nomadic area 300 km. north of Lhasa.

1994, Ronald D. Schwartz, “Conclusion: The Dimensions of Tibetan Nationalism”, in Circle of Protest: Political Ritual in the Tibetan Uprising, New York: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 227:

A county of Nagqu, Tibet Autonomous Region, China.

安多

county in Tibet Autonomous Region, China


Dunhuangology

The academic study of the city of Dunhuang, China, in particular its cultural and historical heritage.


lauriat

→ Tagalog: loryat

/ˈlaʊ̯.ɾɪɐt̪̚/

Ultimately from Philippine Hokkien 鬧熱／闹热 (lāu-lia̍t, “bustling; filled with activity”), with semantic shift and slight phonological change due to /l/~/ɾ/ allophony in Hokkien.

bor

(Philippines) A special Chinese banquet with many courses and dishes (especially as served in the Philippines).