Àomìkèróng (Omicron 奥密克戎 奧密克戎) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”
[Note: Tap/click on a Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to reveal its “flashcard”, tap/click on a “flashcard” or its Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to hide the “flashcard”.]
As of this writing, near the end of 2021, the subject of the COVID-19 pandemic has been, to say the least, on people’s minds now for a while. So, it would be good to be able to refer to things related to it in Mandarin when speaking to people in the Mandarin field, or when speaking to our brothers and sisters in the truth.
An electron microscope image of SARS-CoV-2—also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus that causes COVID-19
NIAID
This week’s MEotW, “Àomìkèróng (Omicron 奥密克戎 奧密克戎)”, is one way to say “Omicron”—as in the Omicron variant of the virus that causes COVID-19—in Mandarin.
Another way to say “Omicron” in Mandarin is “Àomǐkěróng (Omicron 奥米可戎 奧米可戎)”.
To get an idea of how commonly used these expressions are compared to each other, consider the numbers of Google search results involving these expressions, together with “biànzhǒng (biàn·zhǒng changed · kind; type; variety → [mutation; variant; variety] 变种 變種)” (a past MEotW) and “biànyì zhū ((biàn·yì changed · {to be different} 变异 變異) (zhū {trunk of a tree → [strain]} 株) → [(virus) strain/variant])”, two common ways to say “variant”:
| Search Terms | Google Results Approx. No. |
|---|---|
"奥密克戎变种"(Àomìkèróng (Omicron 奥密克戎 奧密克戎) biànzhǒng (biàn·zhǒng changed · kind; type; variety → [mutation; variant; variety] 变种 變種)) |
696,000 |
"奥密克戎变异株"(Àomìkèróng (Omicron 奥密克戎 奧密克戎) biànyì zhū ((biàn·yì changed · {to be different} 变异 變異) (zhū {trunk of a tree → [strain]} 株) → [(virus) strain/variant])) |
4,220,000 |
| Search Terms | Google Results Approx. No. |
|---|---|
"奥米可戎变种"(Àomǐkěróng (Omicron 奥米可戎 奧米可戎) biànzhǒng (biàn·zhǒng changed · kind; type; variety → [mutation; variant; variety] 变种 變種)) |
4 |
"奥米可戎变异株"(Àomǐkěróng (Omicron 奥米可戎 奧米可戎) biànyì zhū ((biàn·yì changed · {to be different} 变异 變異) (zhū {trunk of a tree → [strain]} 株) → [(virus) strain/variant])) |
0 |
(Note that the quotation marks in the search terms tell Google to look for the exact sequences of characters that are inside the quotation marks—the results of searching without the quotation marks can be very different.)
Sounds Like…
Note that both “Àomìkèróng (Omicron 奥密克戎 奧密克戎)” and “Àomǐkěróng (Omicron 奥米可戎 奧米可戎)” are Mandarin expressions that were constructed, not because of the meanings represented by the Chinese characters used to write them, but because the Mandarin syllables used to say them sound like the English word “Omicron”.
In fact, when talking or writing in Mandarin about the Omicron variant, it is very common for people to just use the actual English word “Omicron”, which sounds more like the English word “Omicron” than anything else, and is not a Mandarin word written using the supposedly ideographic (representing meaning through visible symbols) Chinese characters.
| Search Terms | Google Results Approx. No. |
|---|---|
"omicron变种"(Omicron biànzhǒng (biàn·zhǒng changed · kind; type; variety → [mutation; variant; variety] 变种 變種)) |
3,880,000 |
"omicron变异株"(Omicron biànyì zhū ((biàn·yì changed · {to be different} 变异 變異) (zhū {trunk of a tree → [strain]} 株) → [(virus) strain/variant])) |
2,850,000 |
It is no surprise to linguists (language scientists/scholars) that people naturally focus on what words sound like when spoken, because, while of course meaning is what, well, gives life meaning, one of the basic principles of modern linguistics (the scientific study of language) is that speech is primary, and writing is secondary. That means that God designed us humans to express meaning via language primarily using speech that is heard, not writing that is seen, no matter how much lovers of Chinese characters traditionally focus on that visually intricate writing system above all else.—1 Corinthians 14:8–11.