Other Set Phrases: 俗语, 歇后语, and Common Collocations

Chengyu are the most studied of Chinese set phrases, but they are far from the only ones. Chinese is rich with other fixed expressions that carry cultural weight, humor, and pragmatic force. This article covers two more categories of set phrase, 俗语 and 歇后语, and then turns to collocations, which are a more mundane but equally important kind of fixed language.

俗语: folk sayings and proverbs

俗语 (súyǔ) means "folk saying" or "common saying." Unlike chengyu, which are four characters long and tied to classical texts, 俗语 are vernacular proverbs of variable length, rooted in everyday life, agriculture, family, and practical wisdom. They sound like things a grandparent would say, because many of them were passed down exactly that way.

俗语 are longer and more colloquial than chengyu, often forming a complete observation in themselves:

• 吃一堑，长一智。(Chī yī qiàn, zhǎng yī zhì.) -- Fall into one pit, gain one measure of wisdom. (Once bitten, twice shy.)
• 百闻不如一见。(Bǎi wén bù rú yī jiàn.) -- A hundred hearings are not as good as one seeing. (Seeing is believing.)
• 近朱者赤，近墨者黑。(Jìn zhū zhě chì, jìn mò zhě hēi.) -- Near red dye you turn red, near ink you turn black. (You are known by the company you keep.)
• 一个巴掌拍不响。(Yī ge bāzhang pāi bù xiǎng.) -- One palm cannot clap. (It takes two; you can't make conflict alone.)
• 路遥知马力，日久见人心。(Lù yáo zhī mǎlì, rì jiǔ jiàn rénxīn.) -- A long road tests a horse's strength; time reveals a person's heart.

俗语 are used in everyday conversation to make a point succinctly or to invoke shared wisdom. Dropping one at the right moment signals cultural familiarity and often lands with warmth or mild humor. They tend to appear more in informal speech, regional dialogue, and popular writing than in formal essays, where chengyu are preferred.

Because 俗语 are longer and syntactically complete, they tend to be easier to understand than chengyu once you have the vocabulary for them. The meaning is usually more transparent from the characters themselves, and the metaphor is usually vivid and concrete.

歇后语: two-part allegorical sayings

歇后语 (xiēhòuyǔ) are one of the most distinctively Chinese forms of wordplay and one of the most delightful. The name means roughly "resting-after saying," because the first part sets up a scenario and the second part delivers the punchline, often after a pause. The second half is the actual meaning, and in conversation the speaker sometimes leaves it unsaid, letting the listener complete it mentally.

The structure is always: setup (scenario) + punchline (meaning)

Many 歇后语 work through puns on homophones or near-homophones:

• 外甥打灯笼 -- 照舅（旧）(Wàisheng dǎ dēnglong -- zhào jiù.) -- Nephew holding a lantern -- shining on uncle (舅, jiù) / as before (旧, jiù). Used to mean "same as always" or "business as usual." The pun is on 舅 (maternal uncle) and 旧 (old, the same as before).

• 擀面杖吹火 -- 一窍不通 (Gǎnmiànzhàng chuī huǒ -- yī qiào bù tōng.) -- Using a rolling pin to blow a fire -- not a single hole, i.e., completely clueless. (A rolling pin has no hole to blow through.)

• 哑巴吃黄连 -- 有苦说不出 (Yǎba chī huánglián -- yǒu kǔ shuō bù chū.) -- A mute eating bitter medicine -- suffering without being able to speak of it. Used to describe someone who must endure hardship silently.

• 老虎借猪 -- 有借无还 (Lǎohǔ jiè zhū -- yǒu jiè wú huán.) -- A tiger borrows a pig -- borrowed but never returned. Used for things that are lent but never come back.

歇后语 are primarily a feature of informal, colloquial Chinese. You will hear them in casual conversation, regional speech, comedy, and popular culture. They are less common in formal writing but appear in fiction, dialogue, and anywhere the writer wants to convey an earthy, humorous, or folk-inflected voice.

For learners, 歇后语 are worth knowing passively: you may not use many of them yourself, but encountering one in a novel or a conversation and recognizing the form helps enormously. When you hear a sentence that seems to stop in the middle and not quite finish its thought, a 歇后语 may be what you are looking at.

Common collocations: the invisible fixed language

Collocations are word combinations that native speakers produce automatically and that learners have to learn specifically. Unlike chengyu or 俗语, collocations are not culturally marked or poetic. They are simply the words that habitually go together, and using the wrong combination sounds unnatural even when it is technically grammatical.

Chinese has a large number of strong verb-noun collocations where only one verb fits naturally with a given noun, even when several verbs seem synonymous.

Verbs that go with specific nouns:

• 提高水平 (tígāo shuǐpíng) -- to raise one's level (not 增加 or 升高)
• 增强信心 (zēngqiáng xìnxīn) -- to strengthen confidence (not 提高)
• 解决问题 (jiějué wèntí) -- to solve a problem (not 解答, which is for answering questions)
• 达到目标 (dádào mùbiāo) -- to reach a goal (not 完成, which is for tasks)
• 发挥作用 (fāhuī zuòyòng) -- to play a role, to put something to use (fixed phrase)
• 承担责任 (chéngdān zérèn) -- to bear responsibility (not 拿 or 接受)
• 取得成绩 (qǔdé chéngjì) -- to achieve results (not 得到)
• 面临挑战 (miànlín tiǎozhàn) -- to face a challenge (not 面对, though this also works and is slightly less formal)

Adjective-noun collocations:

• 宝贵经验 (bǎoguì jīngyàn) -- valuable experience (宝贵 collocates with experience, knowledge, time)
• 重大决定 (zhòngdà juédìng) -- major decision (重大 collocates with serious, high-stakes nouns)
• 切实措施 (qiēshí cuòshī) -- concrete measures (切实 collocates with policy and action words)

Verb-complement collocations:

• 打下基础 (dǎ xià jīchǔ) -- to lay a foundation (打 + 下 here, not other verbs)
• 留下印象 (liú xià yìnxiàng) -- to make an impression, to leave an impression
• 做出贡献 (zuòchū gòngxiàn) -- to make a contribution (做出 + contribution, achievement, decision, etc.)
• 产生影响 (chǎnshēng yǐngxiǎng) -- to produce an effect, to have an influence

The verb 做出 in particular is worth paying attention to. It combines with a wide range of nouns to mean "to make" in a formal sense: 做出决定 (make a decision), 做出选择 (make a choice), 做出贡献 (make a contribution), 做出努力 (make an effort). This is the kind of pattern that learners can leverage productively once they internalize it.

Why collocations matter at the advanced level

Below the intermediate level, being understood is enough. At the advanced level, how naturally your Chinese sounds starts to matter more. The difference between 增加信心 (unnatural) and 增强信心 (natural) is not a grammar mistake; it is a collocation mistake, and it is exactly the kind of thing that marks a gap between competent and fluent.

The best way to build collocation knowledge is extensive reading of authentic texts at a level that stretches you slightly. When you notice a verb-noun combination that differs from what you would have chosen, make a note of it. Over time, the natural pairings internalize through exposure, and your written Chinese starts to sound less like translated English and more like how Chinese actually works.

俗语, 歇后语, and collocations together

These three types of fixed language operate at different registers and in different contexts, but they share an important quality: they are all things that cannot be assembled from scratch by a learner who only knows the grammar rules. They have to be encountered, absorbed, and remembered as units. The grammar-first approach that works so well at the beginner and intermediate level reaches its limits here. At the advanced level, vocabulary in the broad sense, including set phrases, fixed expressions, and habitual collocations, is where most of the remaining work lies.