Wu (simplified Chinese: 吴语; traditional Chinese: 吳語; pinyin: Wú yǔ, Suzhou Wu:  [ŋ˨˦ ɲy˧˩]) is a grouping of linguistically similar and historically related varieties of spoken Chinese also known as a dialect family. Chinese varieties classified as Wu are primarily spoken in Zhejiang province, the municipality of Shanghai, and southern Jiangsu province.

Major Wu dialects include those of Shanghai, Suzhou, Ningbo, Wenzhou, Hangzhou, Shaoxing, Jinhua, and Yongkang. Wu speakers such as Chiang Kai-shek, Lu Xun, and Cai Yuanpei occupy places of great significance in modern Chinese culture. Wu can also be found in the language of Shaoxing opera which is second in national popularity only to Peking Opera as well as in the performances of the nationally popular entertainer Zhou Libo. Wu is also spoken in a large number of diaspora communities, with significant centers of immigration originating from Qingtian and Wenzhou.

Suzhou has traditionally been the linguistic center of the Wu languages and was likely the first place a distinct variety of Chinese known as Wu developed. Suzhou Wu is widely considered to be the most linguistically representative of the family. It was mostly the basis of the Wu pidgin that developed in Shanghai leading to the formation of modern Shanghainese which as a center of economic power and possessing the largest population of Wu speakers has attracted the most attention. Because of the influence of Shanghainese, Wu is often inaccurately referred to in English as simply "Shanghainese" when introducing the dialect family to non-specialists. Wu is the more accurate terminology for the greater grouping that the Shanghai dialect is part of; other less precise terms include "Jiangnan speech" (江南話), "Jiangzhe (Jiangsu-Zhejiang) speech" (江浙話), and less commonly "Wuyue speech" (吳越語).

Nicky Wu (born October 31, 1970) is a Taiwanese singer and actor. Wu found fame in 1988, by joining the Taiwanese boy band, Little Tigers Team (小虎隊), performing alongside Alec Su and Julian Chen. Since then, his career has also expanded into film and television in Taiwan, Hong Kong and mainland China.

In 1988, Wu was spotted by an entertainment agent, and after an audition he was chosen to be part of the Little Tigers Team and given the nickname of "Pilihu" (霹靂虎; Thunderbolt Tiger). The group quickly became successful throughout Asia but disbanded due to one member's compulsory military service requirement. Wu continued solo, and began singing and acting in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

In five years, he released 13 Mandarin and Cantonese albums. As an actor, Wu won the 1993 Best New Artist award in Hong Kong, and the next year played the lead in the 1994 film The Lovers, his greatest commercial success. In February 1997, Wu went into the army to complete his military service. He returned to the entertainment industry in late 1998.

Wu Man (Chinese: 吴蛮; pinyin: Wú Mán; born 1963 in Hangzhou, Zhejiang) is a Chinese pipa and ruan player and composer. She is an exponent of the Pudong School of pipa playing.

Wu received a Master's degree at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, where her instructors included Lin Shicheng, Kuang Yuzhong, Chen Zemin, and Liu Dehai. She became the first recipient of a master's degree in pipa and won the first prize in the 1989 National Music Performance Competition.

Wu came to the United States in 1990 at the age of 25, ostensibly to study English. She lived in Boston, and began playing with an ensemble called Music from China. In 1992, she first played with the Kronos Quartet, the beginning of an ongoing relationship whose first full-length album was Tan Dun: Ghost Opera (1997), containing music written by Tan Dun for quartet and pipa.

Wu performs with Chinese traditional music groups but is also known for her interpretation of contemporary compositions, as well as her work in jazz and cross-cultural music. Many composers (including Terry Riley, Philip Glass, Lou Harrison, Tan Dun, Bright Sheng, Chen Yi, Zhou Long, Gabriela Lena Frank, Bun-Ching Lam, Evan Ziporyn, and others) have composed new works for her.

Wu Ying-hua simplified Chinese: 吴英华; traditional Chinese: 吳英華; pinyin: Wú Yīnghuá) (1907–1996) was a famous Chinese teacher of Wu-style t'ai chi ch'uan. She was born in Beijing and died in Shanghai. She was the eldest daughter of Wu Chien-ch'uan, the best known teacher of Wu-style t'ai chi ch'uan. Her older brothers were Wu Kung-i and Wu Kung-tsao.

Wu Ying-hua began studying Tai Chi Chuan at age nine, and by age seventeen, she was a full-time teacher in her father's school. In 1921, she was invited to teach Tai Chi Chuan in Shanghai. In 1928, her father followed her to Shanghai and she became his teaching assistant. In 1930, she married Ma Yueh-liang who was Wu Chien-ch'uan's senior disciple. In 1935, Wu Chien-ch'uan founded the Chien-ch'uan Tai Chi Chuan Association (鑑泉太極拳社) in Shanghai. Wu Chien-ch'uan died in 1942.

After the Cultural Revolution, at about 1980, it became possible to teach Tai Chi Chuan publicly in China. About this time her brother Wu Kung-tsao was released from prison and moved to Hong Kong. Wu Ying-hua and Ma Yueh-liang, remaining in mainland China, created a simplified Wu Tai Chi Chuan Form and were again able to have public meetings of the Chien-ch'uan Tai Chi Chuan Association. They taught a large number of students in Shanghai and in their travels to New Zealand, Germany and elsewhere. Together with Ma Yueh-liang, Wu Ying-hua published several books on Wu-style t'ai chi ch'uan. The books “Wu style Tai Chi Chuan: Forms, Concepts and Applications of the Original Style,” “Wu Simplified Tai Chi Chuan,” and “Wu style Tai Chi K'uai (Fast) Chuan or Wu Style Tai Chi Fast Form” have been collected in a single volume in China. They also co-authored a Wu style sword book. Wu Ying-hua was the senior instructor of the Wu family from 1983 until she died in 1996.

Harry Wu (born 1937; simplified Chinese: 吴弘达; traditional Chinese: 吳弘達; pinyin: Wú Hóngdá) is an activist for human rights in the People's Republic of China. Wu spent 19 years in Chinese labor camps, and is now a resident and citizen of the United States. In 1992, he founded the Laogai Research Foundation.

Wu was born into an affluent family in Shanghai; his father was a banking official and his mother "had descended from a family of well-to-do landlords." Wu recalled: "My youth was one of peace and pleasure. Then in 1949 came the communist revolution, led by Mao. My life changed dramatically. During my teen-age years, my father lost all his properties. We had money problems. The government took over all the property in the country. We even had to sell my piano."

Wu studied at the Geology Institute in Beijing where he earned a degree. In 1956, the Communist Party began a campaign encouraging citizens, particularly students and intellectuals, to express their true views of the Party and the state of society (known as the Hundred Flowers Campaign). Although cautious, Wu eventually voiced some sentiments, by disagreeing with the Soviet's armed crackdown of Hungary, and the practice of labeling people into different categories. By the Fall of 1956, China's leader, Mao Zedong abruptly reversed course and proclaimed that the true enemies of the Party had been exposed, and 19 year-old Wu was subsequently singled out at his university. Wu later wrote of this experience: "This was the first time I had ever been singled out as a political troublemaker. Most of my classmates were more pragmatic than I, and they just repeated what the Communists wanted to hear." For the next few years, Wu was continuously criticized in Party meetings and closely monitored until his arrest in 1960 at the age of 23 when he was charged with being a "counterrevolutionary rightist", and was sent to the laogai (China’s system of forced-labor prison camps).