Home/Taiwanese Mandarin/All pairs/員警 vs 警员
police officer · Different wording
Different wording The two terms share 员警 in their simplified forms but are different words. In Taiwan the standard term is 員警; on the Mainland it is 警员 - both point at “police officer”.
Taiwan’s Ministry of Education dictionaries record 員警、警員 for this concept. The Mainland standard is among them - the difference is which form each side makes the default.
Neither term carries an HSK or TOCFL level in this table - this pair is dictionary-recorded, not syllabus-derived.
Pair source: CC-CEDICT, which tags the Taiwan form as Taiwan usage.
| Taiwan · 台灣 | Mainland · 大陆 | |
|---|---|---|
| Written form | 員警 | 警员 |
| Reading | ㄩㄢˊ ㄐㄧㄥˇ yuán jǐng | jǐng yuán ㄐㄧㄥˇ ㄩㄢˊ |
| Senses | police officer | police officer; policeman (general term for any police officer); police constable (lowest rank in mainland China and Hong Kong) |
| Syllabus | — | — |
| MOE records | 員警 · 警員 | |
| Dictionary | not in the LinZi dictionary | entry → |
| Audio | — | |
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