(n) The mangled, garbled, butchered, malapropriated or trashed Chinese spoken by native speakers of English.
Pronunciation notes: Similar to Joan-glish. The ZH is NOT pronounced
like the S in "fusion" but
like the DGE in
fudge.
Origin: "zhong" is taken directly from the first syllable of the Mandarin word for Chinese; "lish" is from English, of course.
Usage: Zhonglish is the mirror image of Chinglish but is
less likely to be hurled as an insult. It is amusing, not abusing, and is usually applied to learners of Mandarin, although it could conceivably be applied to Wu, Cantonese, or others.
History: "Zhonglish" has been used by learners of Chinese at least since the early 1960s.
Bemused by
Kevin's Zhonglish, the Beijinger said kindly, "You speak very
well -- it sounds like you're singing a
song."