Sichuanese

Sichuanese, also known as Sichuanese Mandarin or Chuānhuà, refers to a group of Mandarin varieties spoken in Sichuan Province and adjacent areas. It is classified as part of Southwestern Mandarin, one of the major branches of Mandarin Chinese. The most prominent forms are the Chengdu and Chongqing varieties, but there are numerous local subdialects across the Sichuan Basin and nearby regions such as parts of Guizhou, Yunnan, and Hubei.

Sichuanese varieties share the basic grammar of Mandarin but differ in pronunciation, vocabulary, and everyday expressions. They are typically distinguished from Standard Mandarin by a distinct regional sound and lexical set, though mutual intelligibility varies by speaker and subdialect. Many speakers are bilingual, using Sichuanese in informal settings and Standard Mandarin in formal contexts such as education, government, and national media. In urban areas, it is common to hear code-switching between Sichuanese and Mandarin.

In writing, Sichuanese is usually recorded with Standard Chinese characters. There is no single widely accepted orthography for the spoken dialect, though linguists and language learners sometimes employ romanization or phonetic transcription for study. Sichuanese communities maintain regional cultural practices, media, and literature that reflect their linguistic identity, even as Standard Mandarin remains dominant in formal domains.

Overall, Sichuanese represents a regional branch of Mandarin with its own distinctive pronunciation and vernacular, contributing to the linguistic diversity of the Chinese-speaking world.