I think something is lost in translation since first reaction to normal Chinese is Mandarin == 普通话 whose direct meaning is about spoken form. As I think deeper you are mostly correct although I still think writing language, system and the dialects need a quite formal definition and the difference is subtle. Educated Chinese learns ancient Chinese, read some book written in traditional Chinese, laugh at comedy spoken with “topplect” and watch many Hongkong Movies, there aren’t many gaps in understanding.
Historically many dialects evolves from different races that has invaded China and get absorbed(including CCP). In written form it converges to Chinese system. It makes the topic more confusing - does those count as languages
I think something is lost in translation since first reaction to normal Chinese is Mandarin == 普通话 whose direct meaning is about spoken form. As I think deeper you are mostly correct although I still think writing language, system and the dialects need a quite formal definition and the difference is subtle. Educated Chinese learns ancient Chinese, read some book written in traditional Chinese, laugh at comedy spoken with “topplect” and watch many Hongkong Movies, there aren’t many gaps in understanding.
Historically many dialects evolves from different races that has invaded China and get absorbed(including CCP). In written form it converges to Chinese system. It makes the topic more confusing - does those count as languages