CHINA

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does China mean? 

• CHINA (noun)
  The noun CHINA has 4 senses:

1. a communist nation that covers a vast territory in eastern Asia; the most populous country in the world

2. high quality porcelain originally made only in China

3. a government on the island of Taiwan established in 1949 by Chiang Kai-shek after the conquest of mainland China by the Communists led by Mao Zedong

4. dishware made of high quality porcelain

  Familiarity information: CHINA used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CHINA (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A communist nation that covers a vast territory in eastern Asia; the most populous country in the world

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Synonyms:

Cathay; China; Communist China; mainland China; People's Republic of China; PRC; Red China

Instance hypernyms:

Asian country; Asian nation (any one of the nations occupying the Asian continent)

Meronyms (parts of "China"):

Hong Kong (formerly a Crown Colony on the coast of southern China in Guangdong province; leased by China to Britain in 1842 and returned in 1997; one of the world's leading commercial centers)

Nan-chang; Nanchang (a walled city in southeastern China on the Gan Jiang)

Inner Mongolia; Nei Monggol (an autonomous region of northeastern China that was annexed by the Manchu rulers in 1635 and became an integral part of China in 1911)

Sinkiang; Xinjiang; Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (an autonomous province in far northwestern China on the border with Mongolia and Kazakhstan; the largest province in the People's Republic of China and the homeland of the Uighur people)

Changan; Hsian; Sian; Singan; Xian (a city of central China; capital of ancient Chinese empire 221-206 BC)

Wuhan (a city of central China on the Chang Jiang; the commercial and industrial center of central China)

Grand Canal (an inland waterway 1000 miles long in eastern China; extends from Tianjin in the north to Hangzhou in the south)

T'ien-ching; Tianjin; Tientsin (a major industrial center in northeastern China on the Grand Canal near the Yellow Sea; 3rd largest city in China)

Tangshan (an industrial city of northeastern China in Hebei province)

Taiyuan (an ancient city in northeastern China noted for coal mining and steel production)

Fengtien; Moukden; Mukden; Shenyang (a city in northeastern China)

Shanghai (the largest city of China; located in the east on the Pacific; one of the largest ports in the world)

Nan-ning; Nanning (an industrial city in southern China)

Nanjing; Nanking (a city in eastern China on the Yangtze River; a former capital of China; the scene of a Japanese massacre in the 1930s)

Gobi; Gobi Desert (a desert in central China)

Taklamakan Desert; Taklimakan Desert (a desert in western China)

Amur; Amur River; Heilong; Heilong Jiang (an Asian river between China and Russia; flows into the Sea of Okhotsk)

Bo Hai; Po Hai (an inlet of the Yellow Sea, on the coast of Eastern China)

Brahmaputra; Brahmaputra River (an Asian river; flows into the Bay of Bengal)

Gan Jiang; Kan River (a river in southeastern China that flows generally north into the Chang Jiang to the north of Nanchang)

Huang He; Hwang Ho; Yellow River (a major river of Asia in northern China; flows generally eastward into the Yellow Sea; carries large quantities of yellow silt to its delta)

Kuenlun; Kuenlun Mountains; Kunlan Shan; Kunlun; Kunlun Mountains (a mountain range in western China that extends eastward from the Indian border for 1000 miles)

Liaodong Bandao; Liaodong Peninsula (a peninsula in northeastern China that extends into the Yellow Sea, between Bo Hai and Korea Bay)

Mekong; Mekong River (an Asian river; flows through a large delta in southern Vietnam into the South China Sea)

Nan Ling (a mountain range in southeastern China running generally east to west)

Pamir Mountains; the Pamirs (a mountain range in central Asia that is centered in Tajikistan but extends into Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan and Pakistan and western China)

Poyang (a lake in central China that is connected to the Chang Jiang by a canal)

Tien Shan; Tyan Shan (a major mountain range of central Asia; extends 1,500 miles)

Chang; Chang Jiang; Changjiang; Yangtze; Yangtze Kiang; Yangtze River (the longest river of Asia; flows eastward from Tibet into the East China Sea near Shanghai)

Canton River; Chu Kiang; Pearl River; Zhu Jiang (a river in southeast China that flows into the South China Sea)

Hangchow; Hangzhou (a city of eastern China on Hangzhou Bay; regarded by Marco Polo as the finest city in the world)

Chinese Wall; Great Wall; Great Wall of China (a fortification 1,500 miles long built across northern China in the 3rd century BC; it averages 6 meters in width)

Manchuria (a region in northeastern China)

Beijing; capital of Red China; Peiping; Peking (capital of the People's Republic of China in the Hebei province in northeastern China; 2nd largest Chinese city. In Chinese, 'Beijing' means North Capital ('Bei' means North, 'Jing' means Capital))

Chongqing; Chungking (a city in south-central China on the Chang Jiang; a commercial center for western China)

Canton; Guangzhou; Kuangchou; Kwangchow (a city on the Zhu Jiang delta in southern China; the capital of Guangdong province and a major deep-water port)

Gansu; Gansu province; Kansu (a province in north-central China; formerly part of the Silk Road to Turkistan and India and Persia)

Hebei; Hebei province; Hopeh; Hopei (a populous province in northeastern China)

Sichuan; Szechuan; Szechwan; Szechwan province (a populous province of south central China)

Yunnan; Yunnan province (a province of southern China)

Luda; Luta (an industrial conurbation in northeastern China on the southern end of the Liaodong Peninsula; it now includes the cities of Dalian and Lushun)

Dairen; Dalian; Talien (a port and shipbuilding center in northeastern China on the Liaodong Peninsula; now a part of Luda)

Loyang; Luoyang (a city in east central China; the capital of ancient China during several dynasties)

Lushun; Port Arthur (a major port city in northeastern China on the Liaodong Peninsula; now a part of Luda)

Hunan; Hunan province (a province in southeastern central China between the Nan Ling mountains and the Chang Jiang; noted for its timber and valuable mineral resources)

Meronyms (members of "China"):

Chinese (a native or inhabitant of Communist China or of Nationalist China)

Domain member region:

yin (the dark negative feminine principle in Chinese dualistic cosmology)

yang (the bright positive masculine principle in Chinese dualistic cosmology)

Hangchow; Hangzhou (a city of eastern China on Hangzhou Bay; regarded by Marco Polo as the finest city in the world)

Chinese Revolution (the republican revolution against the Manchu dynasty in China; 1911-1912)

Yalu; Yalu River (river in eastern Asia; rises in North Korea and flows southwest to Korea Bay (forming part of the border between North Korea and China))

acupressure; G-Jo; shiatsu (treatment of symptoms by applying pressure with the fingers to specific pressure points on the body)

acupuncture; stylostixis (treatment of pain or disease by inserting the tips of needles at specific points on the skin)

I. M. Pei; Ieoh Ming Pei; Pei (United States architect (born in China in 1917))

cattie; catty (any of various units of weight used in southeastern Asia (especially a Chinese measure equal to 500 grams))

ch'i; chi; ki; qi (the circulating life energy that in Chinese philosophy is thought to be inherent in all things; in traditional Chinese medicine the balance of negative and positive forms in the body is believed to be essential for good health)

Chinese (any of the Sino-Tibetan languages spoken in China; regarded as dialects of a single language (even though they are mutually unintelligible) because they share an ideographic writing system)

falun gong (a spiritual movement that began in China in the latter half of the 20th century and is based on Buddhist and Taoist teachings and practices)

Red Guard (a radical political movement by Chinese youths who espoused Maoist principles)

egg roll; spring roll (minced vegetables and meat wrapped in a pancake and fried)

egg foo yong; egg fu yung (omelet containing onions and celery and chopped meat or fish)

brown sauce; Chinese brown sauce (a sauce based on soy sauce)

fortune cookie (thin folded wafer containing a maxim on a slip of paper)

dim sum (traditional Chinese cuisine; a variety of foods (including several kinds of steamed or fried dumplings) are served successively in small portions)

Cultural Revolution; Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (a radical reform in China initiated by Mao Zedong in 1965 and carried out largely by the Red Guard; intended to eliminate counterrevolutionary elements in the government it resulted in purges of the intellectuals and socioeconomic chaos)

Sino-Tibetan; Sino-Tibetan language (the family of tonal languages spoken in eastern Asia)

feng shui (rules in Chinese philosophy that govern spatial arrangement and orientation in relation to patterns of yin and yang and the flow of energy (qi); the favorable or unfavorable effects are taken into consideration in designing and siting buildings and graves and furniture)

Holonyms ("China" is a part of...):

Asia (the largest continent with 60% of the earth's population; it is joined to Europe on the west to form Eurasia; it is the site of some of the world's earliest civilizations)

Sense 2

Meaning:

High quality porcelain originally made only in China

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("china" is a kind of...):

porcelain (ceramic ware made of a more or less translucent ceramic)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "china"):

bone china (fine porcelain that contains bone ash)

crackle; crackle china; crackleware (glazed china with a network of fine cracks on the surface)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A government on the island of Taiwan established in 1949 by Chiang Kai-shek after the conquest of mainland China by the Communists led by Mao Zedong

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Synonyms:

China; Nationalist China; Republic of China; Taiwan

Instance hypernyms:

island (a land mass (smaller than a continent) that is surrounded by water)

Meronyms (parts of "China"):

capital of Taiwan; Taipeh; Taipei (the capital of Nationalist China; located in northern Taiwan)

Taichung (a city in Taiwan)

Meronyms (members of "China"):

Chinese (a native or inhabitant of Communist China or of Nationalist China)

Taiwanese (a native or inhabitant of Taiwan)

Holonyms ("China" is a part of...):

South China Sea (a tropical arm of the Pacific Ocean near southeastern Asia subject to frequent typhoons)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Dishware made of high quality porcelain

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

china; chinaware

Hypernyms ("china" is a kind of...):

crockery; dishware (tableware (eating and serving dishes) collectively)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "china"):

willow-pattern; willowware (chinaware decorated with a blue Chinese design on a white background depicting a willow tree and often a river)

 Context examples 

China, the largest consumer of farm antibiotics, has advised its citizens to cut meat consumption to 40 – 70 grams per person per day or about half of the current consumption.

(Eat less meat to cut drug resistance, SciDev.Net)

To counter this limitation, Prof. LIU and collaborators surveyed the sky with China's Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST), looking for stars that orbit an invisible object, pulled by its gravity.

(Unpredicted stellar black hole discovered by astronomers, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

Over the Yangtze basin in China, north India and Polynesian islands south of the equator, rainfall is decreasing.

(Global disasters linked to warming Indo-Pacific seas, SciDev.Net)

In the study, published in the journal Science Advances, scientists grew 18 varieties of rice in fields in China and Japan.

(Planet-Warming Gases Make Some Food Less Nutritious, Study Says, Steve Baragona/VOA)

China invests billions to protect its panda habitat and conserve the 1,600 remaining endangered supported by this habitat.

(Belly up to the bamboo buffet: Pandas vs. horses, NSF)

Scientists say they have almost eradicated populations of the world’s most invasive mosquito species from two test sites in China using a novel two-pronged approach which renders the insects infertile.

(Mosquitos rendered infertile by biological engineering, SciDev.Net)

Bangladesh, China, Haiti, India, Pakistan, North Korea and South Sudan are some of the most affected countries.

(Pollution is the World’s No. 1 Killer, VOA)

The most affected countries are Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan though arsenic pollution is also present in China, parts of Europe and the Americas.

(Watermelon rind a cheap filter for arsenic in groundwater, SciDev.Net)

A NASA-led, international study finds Asia's high mountain glaciers are flowing more slowly in response to widespread ice loss, affecting freshwater availability downstream in India, Pakistan and China.

(NASA Finds Asian Glaciers Slowed by Ice Loss, NASA)

The research, carried out by Fuzhou Children's Hospital in China, involved 54 obese children between six and 14 years old.

(Supplements of 'Good Bacteria' Can Enhance Weight Loss in Dieters, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)