Pīnyīn Is a Good, Workable Writing System on Its Own Pīnyīn Is a Good, Workable Writing System on Its OwnWayne Wong
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Reading just Pīnyīn may take some getting used to if you’re accustomed to reading (or trying to read) Hànzì (Chinese characters), but going by first principles of linguistics (the scientific study of language) rather than mere human traditions, it should be more than worth the effort. You should at least give yourself a chance to get used to it.
Just like it’s an established fact that the earth is round, according to modern linguistics this is also an established fact: “Speech is primary, writing is secondary and is always derivative of speech.” Yes, speech is the foundation on which writing must be built, not vice versa. (That is just a natural result of the way Jehovah made us—he gave our bodies the built-in ability to produce speech, but writing requires external aids such as pens and paper, keyboards and screens, etc.) Thus, it is very good that Pīnyīn represents Mandarin speech so straightforwardly and easily, and that it enables us to focus on speech. Yes, while Chinese characters, as beautiful and traditional as they are, demand distractingly large commitments of precious time and energy just for themselves, Pīnyīn frees and empowers us to focus on communicating the good news.
Indeed, in our ministry specifically, we definitely need to understand speech and to speak understandably much more than we need to read and write. (1 Corinthians 14:8–11) So, while many who have received traditional Mandarin language instruction have been influenced to believe that being able to read and write characters is the ultimate goal for a Mandarin language student to aspire to, actually, for us Kingdom publishers, our ultimate goal regarding Mandarin should be being able to understand and speak spoken Mandarin, so that we can preach and teach the good news effectively, from our hearts, using Mandarin speech. So, really, for us Kingdom publishers, being able to read, understand, and write Pīnyīn, which directly represents Mandarin speech, is a more relevant and important (and easy-to-achieve) goal to aspire to than being able to read, understand, and write characters, which unfortunately have become this thing on their own that is warping and obfuscating Mandarin speech rather than supporting it.
But, is Pīnyīn even really a writing system? Interestingly, the Chinese national standard Zhōngguó Mángwén (中国盲文/中國盲文, Chinese Braille) is basically a transliteration or conversion of Pīnyīn into braille letters. Braille is obviously a writing system, so Pīnyīn must also be a writing system (see p. 9), not just a pronunciation aid.
Also, as a Sumerian proverb stated, “a scribe whose hand matches the mouth, he is indeed a scribe”. Pīnyīn can indeed be used to write anything that can be spoken in Modern Standard Mandarin, from the simplest expressions to the most advanced, complex, and deeply meaningful expressions, so it qualifies as a full writing system in that fundamental sense as well—Pīnyīn is indeed “a method of representing the sounds of a language by written or printed symbols”.
Really, after a bit of research into what the definition of a “writing system” is, it becomes evident that a system like Pīnyīn should naturally be considered a writing system, in spite of the efforts of worldly Chinese intellectuals to artificially and unjustly keep Pīnyīn down in order to protect and enshrine the traditional Hànzì writing system that they have so much invested in.
Since Pīnyīn is not just a pronunciation aid, but a full writing system, it is not “training wheels”—it’s regular wheels. On the other hand, Chinese characters are like non-round wheels—more difficult than necessary. While some may find non-round wheels “interesting”, or maybe even “beautiful”, much of the time we just need to get from point A to point B as quickly and easily as possible. We may even need to do so to save someone’s life. For example, what kind of wheels should be on an ambulance? That’s the kind of “wheels” we should be using in our life-saving work.
That Pīnyīn is a full writing system for any and all Modern Standard Mandarin speech also means that, in addition to it being correct to say that “Pīnyīn is Chinese” because it was developed in China by Chinese people, it is also quite correct to say that “Pīnyīn is Chinese” in the sense that, even if it isn’t Hànzì, it is indeed written Mandarin Chinese—it’s not as if Pīnyīn was written English or French or something!
But, aren’t characters more meaningful than Pīnyīn? There are certainly meanings and stories behind how certain characters are written, but taken as a bewitchingly complex, independent system for directly representing meanings visually, the characters can actually be a distraction or a diversion from the Mandarin words themselves, which are already a system of representing meanings through Mandarin speech sounds. Really, a Mandarin word still means what it means, no more and no less, whether it is spoken, written in characters, or written in Pīnyīn. Shakespeare said that “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet”, and indeed, a rose would smell as sweet whether the spoken Mandarin word for it is written as “玫瑰” or as “méigui”. Writing the word in characters does not add to its meaning, and writing it in Pīnyīn does not take away from its meaning.
If someone says that they don’t get much meaning from reading Pīnyīn, that’s not a sign that Pīnyīn is not meaningful. Rather, it’s perhaps a sign that this person has become accustomed to and perhaps dependent on the way characters represent meaning visually, and it’s probably a sign that this person’s understanding of Mandarin speech needs improving, because Pīnyīn is a very simple and direct representation of Mandarin speech, such that if one understands Mandarin speech, one will understand Pīnyīn, and vice versa. Furthermore, as a very simple and direct representation of Mandarin speech, Pīnyīn is thus just as meaningful as Mandarin speech is, and it would be downright unscriptural to say that Mandarin speech is without meaning!—1 Corinthians 14:10.
What about the claim by some English-speaking Mandarin-learners that using Pīnyīn causes their Mandarin to sound like English? This can indeed happen if they let the Latin letters of Pīnyīn make them think of English sounds instead of the Mandarin sounds that they actually represent. In such cases, the problem is not with the Latin alphabet letters used by Pīnyīn—the Latin alphabet is used successfully to write many languages besides English, including French, Spanish, Vietnamese, etc., and it is just as capable of being used successfully to write Mandarin. As English-speaking Mandarin-learners get more familiar with the sounds of correct Mandarin speech, they can come to get used to correctly mentally connecting Pīnyīn to correct Mandarin sounds, rather than to English sounds. Then, they can regularly and reliably use Pīnyīn to help them speak Mandarin-sounding Mandarin, just like people regularly and reliably use written French to help them speak French-sounding French.
So, the key to speaking Mandarin-sounding Mandarin is to mentally get familiar with the sounds of correct Mandarin speech, e.g., by hearing the sounds of correct Mandarin speech a lot, by learning how to use the mouth, tongue, etc. to make Mandarin speech sounds correctly, and by practising making Mandarin speech sounds correctly. Turning to Chinese characters and avoiding the Latin letters of Pīnyīn is not the only or best way to go—if you are not familiar with the sounds of correct Mandarin speech, then your spoken Mandarin is still going to sound off, even if you stick with Chinese characters.
So, Pīnyīn is not necessarily less effective than the hard-to-learn-and-remember characters are at helping people to speak Mandarin-sounding Mandarin. In fact, once people mentally get familiar with the sounds of correct Mandarin speech and get used to connecting those sounds to the familiar Latin alphabet letters of Pīnyīn, Pīnyīn then allows them to leverage or take advantage of their familiarity with the Latin alphabet, such that that familiarity enables them to more easily and more confidently speak Mandarin that is more precisely correct. E.g., with Pīnyīn, no more does anyone need to be uncertain about how in the world “增加” is pronounced, or about whether it starts with a “z” sound or a “zh” sound—the Pīnyīn (“zēngjiā”) uses familiar Latin alphabet letters to literally spell out the correct Mandarin pronunciation so that it is clear and obvious!
Practically speaking, we should keep in mind that, as many in the Mandarin field have found, by investing the minimal amount of time and effort needed to learn and get used to the Pīnyīn system, we will be equipped to always be able to quickly and easily read anything in Mandarin that’s written in Pīnyīn, and we will always be able to quickly and easily write anything in Mandarin using Pīnyīn. In contrast, even those who are fairly familiar with Chinese characters will at times come across unfamiliar or forgotten characters whose meanings and pronunciations they can only guess at. Also, even those who are fairly familiar with Chinese characters will at times be completely unable to remember or figure out how to write a certain character.
But, does using Pīnyīn mean that we are failing to show proper respect for Chinese culture? Since, as mentioned above, the Pīnyīn system was developed in China by Chinese people, it is a product of Chinese culture, and it is a part of Chinese culture. So, using Pīnyīn is not an imposition of Western culture—it is an application of Chinese culture! While Pīnyīn uses the Latin alphabet, it does so because the Chinese developers of Pīnyīn of their own free will purposely chose to base it on this international alphabet (it’s not just the English alphabet) so that users of Pīnyīn would benefit from its familiarity. This Chinese design decision has caused the international Latin alphabet to be adopted as part of Chinese culture. As Zhōu Ēnlái (the first Premier of the People’s Republic of China) said, ‘When we adopt the Latin alphabet, in which we make necessary adjustments to suit the needs of the Chinese language, it becomes the phonetic alphabet of our language and is no longer the alphabet of ancient Latin, still less the alphabet of any foreign country.’
While those who love traditional Chinese culture may dislike such a radical innovation, it can be said that such innovations are actually a sign of positive, healthy cultural development. Another example of such a radical but positive innovation was the West and China moving from always using Roman numerals and the Chinese characters for numbers to mostly using Arabic numerals. I’m sure most would agree that it’s a very good thing that we no longer have to deal with CMXXXVI÷III or 九百三十六÷三, because we can just work out 936÷3! Pīnyīn brings similar benefits as a writing system for Mandarin, while still being Chinese rather than Arabic, etc.
Anyway, the merely human cultures and traditions of this world that is passing away should not be the most important things to us Witnesses of Jehovah. (Mark 7:13; 1 John 2:17) The most important thing for us to consider is the truth about what really works best for our God-given work of sanctifying Jehovah’s name, preaching the good news of the Kingdom, and helping to save the lives of those who respond positively to that good news.—John 4:24; Matthew 6:9; 24:14; 1 Timothy 2:3, 4.
The truth is that, based on first principles of language science that help us to understand how Jehovah actually designed us humans to learn and use language, Pīnyīn is a good, workable writing system on its own for Modern Standard Mandarin. Not only that, but the experiences of many in the Mandarin field also provide living proof that Pīnyīn works much more quickly, easily, and effectively than Chinese characters do for helping publishers who are learning Mandarin to become effective preachers and teachers in the Mandarin field.
For a more in-depth discussion about how we in the Mandarin field should view Pīnyīn, see the article “Pīnyīn Was Plan A”. Here is a quote from it:
“That there are so many different words in modern Mandarin that sound the same is not a good reason not to use Pīnyīn, any more than it is a good reason not to speak Mandarin.”