Southern Vietnamese language

Also known as: Cochinchinese language

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Last updated

July 14, 2026

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Southern Vietnamese is a regional variant of the Vietnamese language, which is the official language of Vietnam. While the standard Vietnamese is based on the speech of Hanoi, Southern Vietnamese, centered in Ho Chi Minh City, differs in having fewer tones and modified consonants. Vietnamese belongs to the Viet-Muong subbranch of the Mon-Khmer family, which is part of the Austroasiatic stock. It has a significant amount of vocabulary borrowed from Chinese and shows influence from Tai languages. The language uses tones, word order, and modifiers to convey meaning, tense, and voice.123

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Viet-Muong languages
…Vietnamese, centred in Hue, and Southern Vietnamese, centred in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), differ from the Northern norm in having fewer tones and in modifying certain consonants. All three use the same writing system, which is called Quoc-ngu. The dialects spoken in the city of Vinh and in much…
Read More
…Vietnamese, centred in Hue, and Southern Vietnamese, centred in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), differ from the Northern norm in having fewer tones and in modifying certain consonants. All three use the same writing system, which is called Quoc-ngu. The dialects spoken in the city of Vinh and in much…
Read More