For example, English speakers commonly mix up your/you’re or there/their/they’re. I’m curious about similar mistakes in other languages.
For example, English speakers commonly mix up your/you’re or there/their/they’re. I’m curious about similar mistakes in other languages.
Ah, classical mistakes when they write instead of typing. At least when they type they can suggestions from the IME, hinting they might be making a mistake.
Those ‘similar’ words you mentioned all have different tone or vowel in Cantonese. Not at all close to each other. I bet they sound slightly different too in Banlamgu, if you happen to speak that.
I don’t speak Bân-lâm-gú unfortunately. I just looked up those words, and they do sound slightly different!
(For Chinese learners reading this, please note that the tone markers in the romanization of Bân-lâm-gú (Southern Min, a group of languages including Hokkien, Taiwanese, etc.) is different from those used in Pinyin for Mandarin.)
I also looked up how these words are pronounced in Cantonese. They sure are really different! Mandarin really does have a lot more pairs of homophones and near-homophones compared to other dialects.
On a semi-related note, I think it’s really sad that the majority of Chinese dialects are slowly being replaced by Mandarin.
It really is. If not too disruptive, I always make a speaker clarify “which Chinese language” as I guess the propaganda + ignorance has worked leading many to believe there is just one language of China. …And it’s not just English treating it this way either.