Communist Expressions

[Guest Yau]

Modern China is well-known for having plenty of slogans and communist expressions, and i really love to learn them. When I throw some of them in a conversation, I feel i'm an insider and have a semblance of knowing much about china.

Here are some of my suggestions and please tell me more of must-knows .

為人民服務! (In order to serve people!)

If you're a journalist and confronted a question like 'why do you choose this job', you can say '為人民服務嘛!' It's not really what you mean, but just for fun.

打倒帝修反! (Overthrow imperialism, revisionism, reactionism!)

I use it to describe who hate everything, no matter it's for money or politics. '他大概要打倒帝修反了!'

延安精神 (Yan-an spirit )

Yan-an was a place to breed and lead communist revolution in 1930s and it became a holy city in propaganda. If someone is over idealism, i'll say '你真有延安精神!'.

[madizi]

As I know, Yan-an was communist place in 1940s, during WWII.

One more slogan:

必須堅持馬列主義毛澤東思想。

Meaning: We must uphold Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong's thought.

[sunyata]

haha, great topic! keep it coming, please...

[madizi]

Another one:

打倒資本主義

I like this one!!!

[berylchan]

How about "跟着党走“

[galitonwu]

how to tanslate "毛主席万岁！万岁！万万岁！！！"

[Guest Yau]

how to tanslate "毛主席万岁！万岁！万万岁！！！"

probably it can be translated as "president mao, long life! Long life! Long Long Life!" but ynder what circumstance you can use this expression today?

btw, i think of another popular communist expression.

"某某是第一生產力!" (something is the first productivity).

The concept of "productivity" is vague here but it means anything important.

The word is often used in more formal style.

"人民是第一生產力" (people are the ....)

"客戶是第一生產力" (customers are the...)

"MBA 是第一生產力" (MBA is the first....)

However, you can also intend to use it for fun.

"do you really mean you marry mary?"

"當然! 她是我第一生產力! 沒有她, 我可活不了" (Absolutely, she's my first productivity. I can't live without her. )

[madizi]

how to tanslate "毛主席万岁！万岁！万万岁！！！"

probably it can be translated as "president mao, long life! Long life! Long Long Life!" but ynder what circumstance you can use this expression today?

In my opinion the proper translasion would be: "Long live Chairman Mao! Long live! Long, long live!"

[pazu]

I was in Shanghai when they announced Beijing won the bidding for the Olympics 2008.

Students (university ?) shouted, "北京萬歲!"

"中國萬歲"

"統一萬歲" (???)

"祖國萬歲" ..........................

[Guest Yau]

Patriotism is extremely widespread in chinese slogans. Though some of us feel uncomfortable and amusing on these cliches, it's good to learn them for survival.

I just read one of them in this forum that suggests a slogan like this : 把 XXX 帶到全世界/ or 讓全世界都知道XXX.

if you confront questions like 'why do you study chinese?", you may say:

"我希望把中國文化帶到全世界!!!" (i hope to promote chinese culture to all the world)

"要把中國的聲音響遍全世界!!!! " ( to broadcast the voice of chinese to all the world!!)

Again, just take it for fun.

[confucius]

When dunces do what they're not supposed to do I always throw in the "3 represents" to let them know it's a crime against the Communist Party.

"Wei, zheli shi bu chou yan de jiefang qu. Anzhao Zhongguo 3 ge daibiao ni bu yao zai huo che shang xi yan!"

(Hey, this is a no smoking liberated area. According to China's 3 Represents, you shouldn't be smoking on the train!")

Most Chinese peasants don't have a clue what the "3 represents" are, but they believe that it must be something strict and important.

[Altair]

how to tanslate "毛主席万岁！万岁！万万岁！！！"

"Long live" is an example of archaic English grammar that even most native speakers do not understand. While one can say: "Long live Chairman Mao," one cannot say "long live" by itself. Technically, "Chairman Mao" is the subject of the verb live. When you omit it, it must be replaced by a pronoun. The problem is that "Long live he" sounds so archaic as to be obsolete. I would prefer: "Long may he live."

So, I vote for: "Long live Chairman Mao! Long, long may he live!

In reality, no one in the U.S. would ever speak like this. A better equivalent would be something like: "Hurray for Chairman Mao! Hurray! Hurray!"

In a formal speech, someone would be more likely to invite the audience to applaud, saying something like: "Let's all show our eternal gratitude to Chairman Mao with a warm round of applause."

[Altair]

Since we are talking about "communist expressions," can anyone explain to me what is so bad about "running dogs" (走狗)? I know that "dogs" seem to have a bad reputation in Chinese cultural imagery, but why is it so bad that they are running?

By the way is 走狗 originally a Chinese expression, or something translated from Russian or some other language?

[Guest Yau]

is 走狗 originally a Chinese expression, or something translated from Russian or some other language?

Interesting question. "Running dog" originally means a gundog. Todays, it refers to a peppet-type person who works for authority and "bite" people, just like a gundog.

It's an original expression in chinese, dated back to 400BC. During that age, a famous politican Fan-Li (范蠡) helped Yue Dynasty to conquest. After the sucess, he retired immediately. In a letter, he asked his colleagues to leave too. The letter said "飛鳥盡，良弓藏; 狡免死, 走狗烹". (You conceal a bow when all birds are killed; You cook your running dogs when a rabbit get caught). His friend didn't believe him and eventually were killed by the King of Yue.

Another famous chinese idiom, 鳥盡弓藏, is drived from this tale too. If there's a layoff in a company, many senior employees are fired, you can say "唉, 這叫鳥盡弓藏."

[madizi]

During study of sinology, we also read sometimes Mao's collected works, bilingual edition. There was also this term 走狗, which was translated as "lackey". The word was used for "capitalist lackey", that means for person, who was Chinese but served foreign capitalists.

[Xuan Yuan]

Do not forget a more recent phrase "三个代表“ - three representative. Its been used as a joke ever since Jiang created it.

[shibo77]

"毛主席万岁！万岁！万万岁！！

Do people use "Vive! Vive!"?

[laurent]

I thought communism had been thrown in the dustbin of history as useless rubbish. All those expressions are quite funny and meaningless. Someone should have strangled Karl Marx in his crib. He never worked a day in his life, used his wife to wait on him and lived off other people's money. In the communist world he would have been declared an ennemy of the people and probably shot.

[Lu]

Someone told me that 好好学习，天天向上 was also a phrase from Mao.

I like the Chinglish translation even better: Good good study, day day up :-)

[Guest Yau]

Hey Lu, you can read more of these translations in Jonathan Spence Book.

地動天搖, 鬼泣神號 was translated as

"the sky is shaking, the earth is angry; Demons cry and gods howl."

This is an ancient expression that can still be seen in comics and movies. The translation is exactly the same as the original but it's really fun to see it in english.