posted by mattjelly on February 4, 2012 | 4 comments
Hi everyone,I just have a quick vocab question that I was hoping someone could answer.My friend from Yunnan keeps using the word 蛮 to mean 'quite, pretty etc'. My dictionary tells me that this usage is part of a dialect but it doesn't tell me which one. Is this just general slang that you could use anywhere or is it more region specific?Thanks :)
@mattjelly,A lot of places are using it, so it's really hard to track where it is from. What I'm sure is it's a relatively new word, like 10-15 years old. Definitely came from the south, very likely from Hong Kong or Taiwan TV series. You can write it as 满 too.--Echoecho@popupchinese.com
Actually this word could be used in any Chinese articles, it's not bound to any specific dialect anymore. It may root from some dialect, but has been widely understood. As Echo mention, it's swappable with 满 in terms of 'quite, pretty etc'.
The root of this usage might come from 湖南 area ... people there use this word a lot in compound words dialect. But again, it's very hard to verify.Gracewww.justlearnchinese.com