Southern Min

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Southern Min" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (August 2016) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

Southern Min
Hoklo-Taiwanese 閩南語; 闽南语 Bàn-lâm-gú
Ethnicity	Hoklo people Teo-Swa people
Geographic distribution	Fujian Chaoshan[a] and Leizhou Peninsula in Guangdong extreme south of Zhejiang much of Hainan (Hainanese) most of Taiwan parts of Malaysia Singapore Philippines Thailand Indonesia Hong Kong Brunei Cambodia Myanmar Vietnam
Linguistic classification	Sino-Tibetan Sinitic Chinese Min Coastal Min Southern Min
Early forms	Proto-Sino-Tibetan Old Chinese[b] Proto-Min
Subdivisions	Hokkien (Quanzhang or Tsuan-Tsiang; e.g. Amoy, Taiwanese, Singaporean) Chaoshan (Teo-Swa; e.g. Kekyeo, Teochew and Swatow) Zhenan Datian (transitional) Sanxiang (Sahiu) Hailufeng (Haklau)
ISO 639-3	nan
Linguasphere	79-AAA-j
Glottolog	minn1241
Southern Min in mainland China and Taiwan
Subgroups of Southern Min in mainland China and Taiwan
Chinese name
Simplified Chinese	闽南语
Traditional Chinese	閩南語
Literal meaning	"Language of Southern Min [Fujian]"
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Mǐnnányǔ Wade–Giles Min3-nan2 yü3 IPA [mìnnǎn ỳ] Gan Romanization Mîn-lōm-ngî Hakka Romanization Mîn-nàm-ngî Yue: Cantonese Yale Romanization Máhn-nàahm yúh Jyutping Man5-naam4 jyu5 Southern Min Hokkien POJ Bân-lâm-gí/Bân-lâm-gú Eastern Min Fuzhou BUC Mìng-nàng-ngṳ̄ Northern Min Jian'ou Romanized Mâing-nâng-ngṳ̌
Notes	^ Chaozhou–Shantou ^ Min is believed to have split from Old Chinese, rather than Middle Chinese like other varieties of Chinese.[1][2][3]

Southern Min (simplified Chinese: 闽南语; traditional Chinese: 閩南語; pinyin: Mǐnnányǔ; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Bân-lâm-gí/gú; lit. 'Southern Min language'), Minnan (Mandarin pronunciation: [mìn.nǎn]) or Banlam (Min Nan Chinese pronunciation: [bàn.lǎm]), is a group of linguistically similar and historically related Chinese languages that form a branch of Min Chinese spoken in Fujian (especially the Minnan region), most of Taiwan (many citizens are descendants of settlers from Fujian), Eastern Guangdong, Hainan, and Southern Zhejiang.^[4] Southern Min dialects are also spoken by descendants of emigrants from these areas in diaspora, most notably in Southeast Asia, such as Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Brunei, Southern Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Southern and Central Vietnam, San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York City. Minnan is the most widely-spoken branch of Min, with approximately 48 million speakers as of 2017–2018.^[5]

The most widely spoken Southern Min language is Hokkien, which includes Taiwanese. Other varieties of Southern Min have significant differences from Hokkien, some having limited mutual intelligibility with it, others almost none. Teochew, Longyan, and Zhenan are said to have general mutual intelligibility with Hokkien, sharing similar phonology and vocabulary to a large extent.^[6] On the other hand, variants such as Datian, Zhongshan, and Qiong-Lei have historical linguistic roots with Hokkien, but are significantly divergent from it in terms of phonology and vocabulary, and thus have almost no mutual intelligibility with Hokkien. Linguists tend to classify them as separate languages.