The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What is Mandarin’s place in its language family tree? Are Mandarin, Cantonese, etc. just dialects of “Chinese”?
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[NOTE: For spiritual food (which is for you yourself to learn spiritual things from, and which ideally should be in your own mother tongue), please go to jw.org.
The supplementary language-learning material mentioned in this post is for helping you to learn about how the Mandarin language is used in an official publication, so that you will be better able to help others in the Mandarin language field.]
Thankfully, an official Pīnyīn PDF file for the current songbook “Sing Out Joyfully” to Jehovah (sjj) is available for download from jw.org. (The short link for the current songbook, tiandi.info/sjj, has the link and additional information.) Note, however, that the currently available official Pīnyīn PDF file (2020 Nián 3 Yuè Printing) only contains lyrics—it does not contain musical notation 🎼. Also, it does not contain songs 152 to 161, which are available in the Mandarin 2025 Nián 3 Yuè Printing of the current songbook.
While we greatly appreciate the official Pīnyīn songbook PDF file that is available, the PDF format itself was conceived of in a world dominated by paper. Unfortunately, that means that PDF files are often not optimal for reading on the mobile devices that are now so prevalent among Mandarin field publishers.
Also, having to share limited display real estate with Chinese characters (and, in the past, musical notation 🎼) can in certain situations force the Pīnyīn text to be rendered in small type that can be difficult to read, especially for older people. (This relegation of Pīnyīn to being ruby text reflects the traditional/orthodox but erroneous and unjust view that Pīnyīn can only be a pronunciation aid, when it really qualifies as and works well as a full writing system.)
Another difficulty that is encountered, especially when one needs to quickly find the song that is about to be sung at a meeting, is that the official meeting schedules only list the numbers of the songs to be used, and the brothers announcing what song is about to be sung often only mention the song number, but in the current official Pīnyīn songbook PDF file, there is no listing of song links in song number order.
The official Pīnyīn “Sing Out Joyfully” to Jehovah (sjj) material that is now available in the JW Library app (iOS/iPadOS; Android; Windows) and on jw.org and the WOL does much to address the above challenges, but it still does not put musical notation 🎼 together with Pīnyīn, and it still gives prime display real estate to Chinese characters, at the expense of the Pīnyīn.
Unofficial language-learning material for all the songs for Mandarin 2025 conventions, in the forms of proofread Pīnyīn web material (more correct than computer-generated Pīnyīn like that displayed by apps like Equipd, and more mobile-friendly than PDFs) or better (including much proofread musical notation 🎼 with Pīnyīn lyrics), have been posted to this resource that seeks to help with the above-mentioned challenges:
Screenshots of the above web resource on iPhone and on iPad 📱. (It can also be used offline with apps like GoodReader, Documents, etc.) Tap/click on a screenshot to see it full-size.
Scheduling notes:
The Pīnyīn songbook material in the above unofficial resource has been designed to be mobile-first, so it works well on mobile devices of various shapes and sizes, including tablets and smartphones 📱 running iOS, iPadOS, Android, etc. Some of the ways in which it does so are:
The introduction for the above resource explains why it’s good to use Pīnyīn as a writing system on its own.
In the material with musical notation 🎼 in the above resource, expressions in the Pīnyīn lyrics do not trigger a Pīnyīn Plus “flashcard” to appear next to them as usual, because the lyrics need to stay aligned with the musical notation 🎼. As time allows, links will be added to Pīnyīn lyrics in the material with musical notation 🎼. Each of these links will cause a Pīnyīn Plus “flashcard” to appear near the top of the display.
Previously, musical notation 🎼 in the above resource was taken from screenshots of an official PDF file. Note (and make it a musical note ♪, at that 😄), though, that the musical notation 🎼 for song 77 marked the debut in the above resource of musical notation 🎼 produced “from scratch” to be mobile-first in design. This should provide for better and more consistent user experiences going forward, especially on smaller mobile devices like smartphones 📱.
[NOTE: While the organization expresses valid general concerns here about posting copies of official publications to the Internet, there are good legal and spiritual reasons for concluding that those concerns do not apply to this particular material, since such material should NOT be considered to be infringing on copyright, and since such material is specifically designed to be, NOT SPIRITUAL FOOD, but rather, material FOR LANGUAGE LEARNING. See this disclaimer for more information.]
The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Does being self-taught as a Mandarin field language learner need to lead to impostor syndrome?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What distinctive feature of the Learn From the Bible book makes it especially beneficial in the Mandarin field?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
In the Mandarin field, what are some ways in which jealousy could affect us if we allow it to?
Maybe this is connected to why so many Chinese people seem to think,
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) April 13, 2024
“I suffered with Chinese characters, so you must suffer with them too!”
rather than,
“I want you to use _Pīnyīn_ so you won’t have to suffer with Chinese characters like I did.” https://t.co/rgv337FoFi
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What connection does Chinese Braille have with Pīnyīn, and what does this tell us about Pīnyīn?
⠪⠆
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) January 5, 2021
is the (Mainland) Chinese Braille representation of
ài (love 爱 愛)
⠪ corresponds to “ai” in _Pīnyīn_, and
⠆ corresponds to 4th tone.
Blind Mandarin-speaking people need to read and write about love too! https://t.co/sXSVzycXre
“_Chinese Braille_…is in principle a conversion of _Hanyu Pinyin_ into braille letters…If braille is a script [writing system], which no one doubts, especially not blind people, then _Hanyu Pinyin_ must also be a script [writing system].” https://t.co/EpGCXe7OOp
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) January 5, 2021
Blind Chinese people cannot see Chinese characters, but they can still read and write Mandarin with _Chinese Braille_.
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) January 5, 2021
_Chinese Braille_ is based on _Pīnyīn_—they both represent the sounds of Mandarin.
Since _Chinese Braille_ is obviously a writing system, so is _Pīnyīn_.
Many claim that _Pīnyīn_ shouldn’t be used as a writing system because characters are required to avoid confusion from all the homophones (different words that sound the same) in Mandarin.
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) April 8, 2025
If that’s true, then people shouldn’t SPEAK Mandarin either! But many do, and it’s fine. pic.twitter.com/1MK0ERuFjc
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
In the Mandarin field, how can a Mandarin word about crystals help us talk about the Creator?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Is it bad to become experts at Mandarin, like some around us may imply?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What can we say to Mandarin-speaking people about why the earth is unique?
Earthrise
This iconic picture shows Earth peeking out from beyond the lunar surface as the first crewed spacecraft circumnavigated the Moon.
Pale Blue Dot
This narrow-angle color image of the Earth, taken from a distance of more than 4 billion miles (6.4 billion km) from Earth, is a part of the first ever “portrait” of the solar system taken by the Voyager 1 space probe. (Earth is the blueish-white speck almost halfway up the rightmost band of light.)
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How can we say in Mandarin that Jesus will end war?
Yes, war will be over, although perhaps not exactly in the way they had imagined. [source]
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
In the Mandarin field, how can we talk about Jehovah being our intelligent Creator, and why should we do so?
Sure, work hard and learn all the Chinese characters you can. (It’s not humanly possible to learn and remember all of them.)
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) December 24, 2024
Work SMART too, though—use _Pīnyīn_ to quickly and easily read and write ANYTHING in Mandarin. While others are mired in tradition, you’ll get ahead. pic.twitter.com/QwbS4mg9h4
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How can we tell Mandarin-speaking people that no one and nothing compares to Jehovah? What shows how great the need is in the worldwide Mandarin field?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How can pondering the Needham Question help us in the Mandarin field?
“Never, never, never in this office say, ‘But we’ve always done it that way.’”
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) September 10, 2024
—Admiral Grace Hopper, computer programming pioneer
Re writing Mandarin with Chinese characters, many say, “But we’ve always done it that way.”
However, as _Lǔ Xùn_ asked, does that make it right? pic.twitter.com/eFCN6fPYtY
Chinese characters are the punched cards of writing systems. Punched cards were not totally impossible to use, but there are now much better and easier-to-use ways to control computers.
BinaryApe
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What kind of spiritual attack do Jehovah’s people, including those in the Mandarin field, need to be on guard against?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
In the Mandarin field, how can we avoid acting indecently in God’s eyes?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How can we talk to Mandarin-speaking people about how well-coordinated the molecular machines inside our cells are?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Who is Lǐ Huá? Why have so many Chinese people and American people been talking about Lǐ Huá on the Chinese social media app Xiǎohóngshū (RedNote)?
Learning Mandarin out of spite? You're not alone.
— Duolingo (@duolingo) January 15, 2025
We’ve seen a ~216% growth in new Chinese (Mandarin) learners in the US compared to this time last year. https://t.co/9hzwBxfTgD pic.twitter.com/qWM9f5oFYA
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[NOTE: For spiritual food (which is for you yourself to learn spiritual things from, and which ideally should be in your own mother tongue), please go to jw.org.
The supplementary language-learning material mentioned in this post is for helping you to learn about how the Mandarin language is used in an official publication, so that you will be better able to help others in the Mandarin language field.]
The Enjoy Life Forever! (lff) book is currently officially recommended for use on Bible studies, and it is currently part of the Teaching Toolbox in the JW Library app. To help us Mandarin field language learners to be prepared language-wise to make good use of this book without being unnecessarily hindered by the Great Wall of Chinese characters that’s mandated by mere human tradition and cultural pride, the following unofficial Pīnyīn Plus web material resource is being made available, which matches the 2024-07 Printing now on the Watchtower ONLINE LIBRARY:
can be used offline in supporting browsers, icon can be added to the home screenVideos are used extensively in the Enjoy Life Forever! book, and a noteworthy feature of the above resource is Pīnyīn Plus video transcripts. These should help us Mandarin field language learners to analyze and understand the Mandarin speech used in the many videos referenced in the Mandarin Enjoy Life Forever! book. This in turn should help us make more effective use of these videos while participating in Mandarin Bible discussions using this book.
Also, using the Pīnyīn Plus video transcripts while watching and listening to the corresponding Mandarin videos gives us good practice at listening to Mandarin speech, with help when needed so that we can actually follow along and understand it, and learn to use it ourselves in the future.
(Tapping/clicking on the above image will take you to the web page represented.)
In the above resource, material matching both the current 2024-07 Printing of the Mandarin Enjoy Life Forever! book and the current 2024 Study Edition (nwtsty) of the Mandarin NWT Bible is now available that covers the following:
(Even in the latter category above, headings and relatively short paragraphs are typically rendered with fully proofread Pīnyīn Plus material.)
Material with a grey background has been partially proofread. Pīnyīn material with a golden-hued background has been proofread, but not all of its “flashcards” have been added and proofread.
More Pīnyīn and Pīnyīn Plus web material based on the Mandarin Enjoy Life Forever! book will be made available in the above resource as time allows.
(NOTE: While the organization expresses valid general concerns here about posting copies of official publications to the Internet, there are good legal and spiritual reasons for concluding that those concerns do not apply to this particular material, since such material should NOT be considered to be infringing on copyright, and since such material is specifically designed to be, NOT SPIRITUAL FOOD, but rather, material FOR LANGUAGE LEARNING. See this disclaimer for more information.)
The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What are some Mandarin expressions that we could keep in mind when speaking with Mandarin-speaking people about extreme weather and climate change?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
What message do we have to offer to Mandarin-speaking people about the meaningfulness of life?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Why should we Mandarin field language learners not hesitate to discuss the technically challenging subject of creation with Mandarin-speaking people?
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