[alephnerd]

> they do speak Taiwanese

Do you mean Hakka and/or Hokkien?

Hokkien which is primarily spoken across the strait in Fujian.

Hakka is primarily spoken in Guangdong, Fujian, and Jiangxi.

Xi himself was the Party head of Fujian for most of his career and Xi's father was the Party head of Guangdong when he was rehabilitated in the Deng Xiaoping era.

This is why most manufacturing in China ended up coastal Southern China - most Chinese Taiwanese trace their heritage to there barely 2-5 generations ago at most.

The younger generation (post-1989) in Taiwan speaks and understands Mandarin.

[alisonatwork]

This whole thread has a bunch of answers which are confusing the topic.

The issue is why would Taiwanese businesses care about the China market? Aside from the fact that the China market is massive, there is a simple answer: Taiwan and China have the same business language, and that is Standard Chinese aka Mandarin.

Yes, lots of Taiwanese people also speak other Sinitic languages that are not Mandarin, and are not mutually intelligible with it. And lots of Chinese people also speak other Sinitic languages that are not Mandarin and are not mutually intelligible with it. And even some variants of Mandarin itself are not mutually intelligible. But - outside of Cantonese in HK and Macau - none of those languages are used as the primary business language anywhere in either China or Taiwan, so it's an interesting side note but doesn't change the point.

All that said, aside from the Chinese market being massive, and the common language being convenient, there is a much bigger elephant in the room that explains why Taiwanese companies might not have a fun time doing business in China: politics.

It doesn't matter how much money Taiwanese companies might want to make if the CCP can threaten to turn off the spigot any time they want to influence Taiwanese politics, which unfortunately nowadays appears to be all the time. Sure, it's leaving a lot of money on the table, but doing business with Japan or the US or other countries that aren't run as a single party dictatorship whose leadership has a stated platform of dismantling your own government might be a less risky option.

[alephnerd]

> none of those languages are used as the primary business language anywhere in either China or Taiwan

我同意。

I was just trying to dig into what OP meant by "Taiwanese" as a language.

It's always going to be Mandarin for anything commercial.

That said, you can't deny the benefit the Hakka and Hokkien diaspora provided to China's manufacturing capacity - it was diaspora Chinese from Thailand (CP Group was the first foreign private company to incorporate in China), Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and Taiwan had on PRC's catchup.

[throwaway2990]

In Taiwan it’s called Taiwanese. It’s similar to Hokkien which is why it’s often referred to as Taiwanese Hokkien. But it’s not 1:1. And people outside of Taipei will assume you speak it and understand it.

[seanmcdirmid]

> Xi himself was the Party head of Fujian for most of his career and Xi's father was the Party head of Guangdong when he was rehabilitated in the Deng Xiaoping era.

This is because the CCP does not trust southerners (people from Fujian/guangdong especially) and will send northerners in to manage/rule those provinces. China is still afraid of Fujian revolting and joining Taiwan.

[alephnerd]

Yea no.

If that was the case, then Hakka wouldn't be so overrepresented within the CCP.

Deng Xiaoping himself was Hakka, as were most of the the core CCP leadership until recently [0]

Hakka is the primary language spoken in TW after Mandarin btw.

If you're a fellow Bay Area native, maybe visit Fremont or Richmond District in SF sometime and actually learn about us Asian subcommunities.

[0] - https://www.jstor.org/stable/654189

[seanmcdirmid]

Deng Xiaoping was born/raised in sichuan, only his ancestors were kejia. I’m sure if you look at anyone in china’s family tree long enough, you’ll find a lot of mixing, which is about as weird as a German having ancestry from Italy or France. It’s even weirder, as the paternal side was originally from Sichuan moving to GD during Ming and back to Sichuan during Qing.

> Deng Xiaoping himself was Hakka, as were most of the the core CCP leadership until recently [0]

I’m going to not believe your source given how much wrong you’ve gotten already. But even if true, Chinese identity politics are more attuned to region than ethnicity. Southerners also were trusted because the KMT was heavily southern biased while the communists were the opposite. This is why the capital is in BJ and not NJ.

> Hakka is the primary language spoken in TW after Mandarin btw.

No no no. It is definitely Hokkien, a dialect of Min, which is the base dialect for Fujian.

> If you're a fellow Bay Area native, maybe visit Fremont or Richmond District in SF sometime and actually learn about us Asian subcommunities

Is that some kind of Asian American thing? You can learn plenty about Chinese ethnicities in China, why bother doing it in the states? Southern ethnicities are also over represented in overseas Chinese communities given the propensity of people from GD or FJ to go abroad, and then cultures kind of diverge a bit (another reason the CCP doesn’t trust GD/FJ).

[alephnerd]

> Deng Xiaoping was born/raised in sichuan

Guang'an, the town he was born, was and is Hakka speaking, after the Hakka-Punti wars were lost by the Hakka.

> Chinese identity politics are more attuned to region than ethnicity

I can agree with that with the post 1970 generation. Deng Xiaoping and his ilk were from before that era, during the Long March.

> It is definitely Hokkien

Yes, Hokkien is prominent in TW but so is Hakka. Around 10% Hakka speaking based on the last census.

> Is that some kind of Asian American thing

Taiwanese (and HK) American specifically. Iykyk I guess. Hence why I equally smell shit from your response.

[seanmcdirmid]

My perspective is primarily mainland where I lived for 9 years, and primarily interacting with mainlander coworkers (eg from Fujian, talking politics was ok).