Chinese (汉语 / 漢語, written in traditional or 中文, written in simplified Chinese characters) is the name of a group of related but mutually unintelligible language varieties of the Sino-Tibetan language family. More than one billion people, or about one-fifth of the world’s population, speak some form of Chinese as their first language. Standard Chinese is based on the Beijing dialect of Mandarin and the Cantonese Chinese originated in the vicinity of Canton (i.e., Guangzhou) and is often regarded as the prestige dialect of Yue. Writing system: Chinese characters Official language in: China, Hong Kong (Yue), Macau (Yue), Taiwan, Singapore, Burma, United Nations