Tag: Propaganda

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Culture Current Events Language Learning Science Technology Theocratic

jiǎ xiāoxi

jiǎ (false; fake 假 假/叚)
xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news; information] 消息) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

At the time of this writing, jw.org was featuring the whiteboard animation video “Protect Yourself From Misinformation”. The English and Mandarin versions of this video match the English word “misinformation” with this week’s MEotW, “jiǎ (false; fake 假 假/叚) xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news; information] 消息)”:

Screenshot from the video “Protect Yourself From Misinformation”, 0:32 mark, showing “Misinformation” in the subtitle

Screenshot from the video “消息满天飞，如何辨真假”, 0:32 mark, showing “假消息 (jiǎ xiāoxi)” in the subtitle

[Note: The MEotW post on “shèjiāo wǎngzhàn ((shè·jiāo {god of the land → [society] → [social]} · {meeting → [associating]} → [social contact/interaction] 社交) (wǎng·zhàn {net → [web]} · {stand → [station]} → [website] 网站 網站) → [social networking website; social network])” contains information about how to add unproofread computer-generated Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) to the subtitles of Mandarin videos on jw.org in most browsers.]

“Jiǎ (false; fake 假 假/叚) xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news; information] 消息)” can also be translated as “false news”, “false information”, or perhaps even “fake news”, as confirmed by the entry for this expression in the excellent Referenced Theo. Expressions (RTE) resource.

Disappearing?

“Jiǎ ({[is] false; fake; phony; artificial} | if; supposing; assume; presume | borrow; {avail oneself of} 假 假/叚)” means “false” or “fake”, and “xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news; information] 消息)”, while used to effectively mean “news” or “information”, actually literally means “disappearing news”. Why “disappearing”? Perhaps that is a nod to the fleeting nature of news—relatively quickly, when it’s not new anymore, it’s not news anymore.

The Wiktionary entry for “xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news; information] 消息)” seems to bear this out, as it says:

消息 (xiāoxi) refers to news as in new information; to express the meaning of news as in reports of current events, use 新聞／新闻 (xīnwén).

“Xiāoxi (Xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news; information] 消息)” also appears in the expression “hǎo (good 好) xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news] 消息)”, meaning “good news”, which we use often in the Mandarin field. In fact, “Hǎo (Good 好) Xiāoxi (Xiāo·xi Disappearing · News → [News] 消息)”! is the title of the concluding song for this year’s Mandarin conventions! (English, Mandarin, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus) Also, we will say “Wángguó (Wáng·guó King’s · Nation → [Kingdom] 王国 王國) de (’s 的) hǎo (good 好) xiāoxi (xiāo·xi disappearing · news → [news] 消息)” when we want to refer to “the good news of the Kingdom”. Of course, while the message of this good news will “disappear” as news when it is not news anymore, the Kingdom itself “will stand forever”!—Daniel 2:44.

Myths and Misinformation About Chinese Characters, Etc.

As Mandarin field language learners, we need to be aware that many myths and much misinformation have been spread about the Chinese languages, especially when it comes to Chinese characters. Indeed, there is so much misinformation about Chinese characters that Victor Mair wrote the following in the foreword of the book Ideogram: Chinese Characters and the Myth of Disembodied Meaning, by J. Marshall Unger:

There is probably no subject on earth concerning which more misinformation is purveyed and more misunderstandings circulated than Chinese characters (漢字, Chinese hanzi, Japanese kanji, Korean hanja), or sinograms.

Also, in his book The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy, John DeFrancis lists the following myths regarding Chinese characters, that many believe:

  • The Ideographic Myth
    • The MEotW post on “Hāmǐjíduōdùn (Armageddon 哈米吉多顿 哈米吉多頓)” contains a discussion of this myth, with some selected excerpts on this subject from DeFrancis’ book.
  • The Universality Myth
  • The Emulatability Myth
  • The Monosyllabic Myth
  • The Indispensability Myth
  • The Successfulness Myth

Regarding these myths, in p. 2–3 of his aforementioned book, J. Marshall Unger provides this summary:

Passing for the moment over the history of how the hunt for the perfect language unfolded, let us jump ahead to the result: the intellectual baggage about Chinese characters that we have inherited from the Renaissance and Enlightenment. John DeFrancis, in his classic book The Chinese Language (1984), sums up that weighty legacy under six headings, and a better summary would be hard to find. The source of all the confusion is what DeFrancis calls the Ideographic Myth, the notion that Chinese characters represent meaning directly, without reference to language (that is, speech) in any way. Its logical extension is the Universality Myth, according to which Chinese script allows for communication between mutually uninteligible dialects and languages. This leads in turn to the Emulatability Myth, which holds that Chinese script can serve as a model for a general system of signs that transcends natural language. These first three myths have little to do with the actual structure or history of the Chinese language or its writing system, in contrast with the remaining three: the Monosyllabic Myth, Indispensability Myth, and Successfulness Myth. Each of these—the names are more or less self-explanatory—makes a strong claim about language and the writing system, claims that have had significant social and political consequences.

At least some of the political consequences referred to above have been deliberate, meaning that at least some of the myths and misinformation spread about Chinese languages and Chinese characters qualify as political propaganda. If we’re not careful, we could end up parroting this political propaganda. (We could also end up parroting worldly human cultural propaganda, which is also a bad thing for people who seek to be no part of the world.) Also, all the difficulties and confusion caused by all the myths and misinformation surrounding Chinese languages and Chinese characters massively hinder the efforts of Mandarin field language learners to stay spiritually strong and to reach the hearts of Mandarin-speakers with Bible truth. This can result in deeply negative spiritual consequences that should be of great concern to us. To complete the sentence quoted from the video mentioned at the beginning of this post:

Misinformation isn’t just inaccurate; it can also be dangerous!

Categories
Culture History Language Learning Languages Names Science

Yuèyǔ

Yuèyǔ (Yuè·yǔ Yue · Language [→ [Cantonese]] 粤语 粵語) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

This week’s MEotW, “Yuèyǔ (Yuè·yǔ Yue · Language [→ [Cantonese]] 粤语 粵語)”, is a term that over the years one may occasionally have come across in the Chinese fields. For example, it used to be used on publication download pages on jw.org, where it has been replaced by a term that is more familiar to many: “Guǎngdōnghuà (Guǎng·dōng·huà {Wide · East → [Canton]} · Speech → [Cantonese speech/language] 广东话 廣東話)” (“Cantonese”).

The Language(s)

Regarding “Yuèyǔ (Yuè·yǔ Yue · Language [→ [Cantonese]] 粤语 粵語)”, the Wikipedia article on Yue Chinese provides this summary:

Yue (Cantonese pronunciation: [jyːt̚˨]) is a branch of the Sinitic languages primarily spoken in Southern China, particularly in the provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi (collectively known as Liangguang).

The term Cantonese is often used to refer to the whole branch, but linguists prefer to reserve the name Cantonese for the variety used in Guangzhou (Canton), Wuzhou (Ngchow), Hong Kong and Macau, which is the prestige dialect of the group. Taishanese, from the coastal area of Jiangmen (Kongmoon) located southwest of Guangzhou, was the language of most of the 19th-century emigrants from Guangdong to Southeast Asia and North America. Most later migrants have been speakers of Cantonese.

Yue varieties are not mutually intelligible with other varieties of Chinese,[source] and they are not mutually intelligible within the Yue family either.[source]

This Wikipedia page also cites Ethnologue as saying that the number of native speakers worldwide of Yuèyǔ (Yuè·yǔ Yue · Language [→ [Cantonese]] 粤语 粵語) was recently about “86 million (2022)[source]”. That’s not as many as Mandarin has (no other language/language branch currently has as many native speakers as Mandarin does), but that’s still a lot of people.

Regarding how Cantonese relates to other Chinese speech varieties, note the following excerpt from the MEotW post on “yǔzú (yǔ·zú language · {ethnic group → [group of things with common characteristics] → [group]} 语族 語族)”:

It’s interesting to note that according to Prof. [Victor H.] Mair’s article (p. 737) mentioned above, not only are Mandarin and Cantonese separate languages (not just “dialects”), it would be more accurate to consider them to be in separate language branches, as defined by the language classisification scheme he uses:

Cantonese and Mandarin are separate languages. Cantonese is not a ‘dialect’ of Mandarin or of Hanyu, and it is grossly erroneous to refer to it as such. Since Cantonese and Mandarin are separate languages (or, perhaps more accurately, separate branches), it is wrong to refer to them as ‘dialects.’ The same holds for Hokkien, Shanghainese, and so forth.

That Mandarin and Cantonese should really be considered to be in separate language branches emphasizes to us politically neutral Mandarin field language-learners that we must not repeat or be misled by the politically motivated erroneous assertion that Mandarin, Cantonese, Shanghainese, etc. are just dialects of “Chinese”. That might be even more wrong than saying that English, French, Spanish, etc. are just dialects of “European”!

Some Geography

To clarify regarding some of the places related to “Yuèyǔ (Yuè·yǔ Yue · Language [→ [Cantonese]] 粤语 粵語)”:

  • Guǎngdōng (Guǎng·dōng Wide · East → [Guangdong (Canton) Province] 广东 廣東)
  • Guǎngzhōu (Guǎng·zhōu Wide · Prefecture → [Guangzhou (Canton (city))] 广州 廣州)
    • This is the capital city of Guǎngdōng (Guǎng·dōng Wide · East → [Guangdong (Canton) Province] 广东 廣東) province.
  • Guǎngxī (Guǎng·xī Wide · West → [Guangxi (Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region)] 广西 廣西)
    • This is an autonomous region that’s located just to the west of Guǎngdōng (Guǎng·dōng Wide · East → [Guangdong (Canton) Province] 广东 廣東).

Some History

This summary from the Wikipedia article on Baiyue provides us with some historical background:

The Baiyue, Hundred Yue, or simply Yue, were various ethnic groups who inhabited the regions of Southern China and Northern Vietnam during the 1st millennium BC and 1st millennium AD.[source][source][source] They were known for their short hair, body tattoos, fine swords, and naval prowess.

…

The Yue tribes were gradually displaced or assimilated into Chinese culture as the Han empire expanded into what is now Southern China and Northern Vietnam.[source][source][source][source] Many modern southern Chinese dialects bear traces of substrate languages[citation needed] originally spoken by the ancient Yue. Variations of the name are still used for the name of modern Vietnam [Yuènán (Yuè·nán Yue · South → [Vietnam] 越南)], in Zhejiang-related names including Yue opera, the Yue Chinese language, and in the abbreviation for Guangdong.

…

The modern term “Yue” (traditional Chinese: 越、粵; simplified Chinese: 越、粤; pinyin: Yuè; Cantonese Jyutping: Jyut6; Wade–Giles: Yüeh4; Vietnamese: Việt; Early Middle Chinese: Wuat) comes from Old Chinese *ɢʷat.[source] It was first written using the pictograph 戉 for an axe (a homophone), in oracle bone and bronze inscriptions of the late Shang dynasty (c. 1200 BC), and later as 越.[source]

Is Cantonese Only Spoken?

Native Cantonese speakers I have known, like those in the Cantonese congregation that I used to be in, would tell me that the Cantonese we spoke was spoken Chinese, and that the Chinese in the official publications of the time, which was different in some ways from spoken Cantonese, was written Chinese. However, as I gained more knowledge about the history and the language situation of China, I came to understand that actually, the Chinese writing in the publications we were using was Mandarin, which was used because Mandarin-speaking people had gained political power in China, resulting in Chinese publications generally being published in Mandarin—it wasn’t a matter of spoken and written Chinese being different, but rather, of Cantonese and Mandarin being different.

Eventually, the organization came to also publish publications written in other Chinese varieties in addition to Mandarin. As of this writing, searching for “Chinese” on jw.org results in the following options, which includes Cantonese options:

Chinese varieties on jw.org as of 2024-04-14

Something to Remember

This week’s MEotW, “Yuèyǔ (Yuè·yǔ Yue · Language [→ [Cantonese]] 粤语 粵語)”, reminds us that while the central government of China wants everyone to just think of China as one monolithic political entity that should be governed by them, the central government, modern China actually is made up of many different parts. If it wasn’t for Qín Shǐhuáng ((Qín {Qin (dynasty)} 秦) (Shǐ·huáng Beginning · Emperor 始皇) (the founder of the Qín dynasty and the first emperor of China)) (Wikipedia article), who (rather forcefully) united several warring states and became the first emperor of China, China could have ended up like modern Europe, with its several independent nations.

These different parts of modern China, that in an alternate timeline could have become independent nations, each have their own history, including their own linguistic history—just like modern France, Spain, Germany, etc. have historically had their own mutually unintelligible languages, modern Guǎngdōng (Guǎng·dōng Wide · East → [Guangdong (Canton) Province] 广东 廣東), Shànghǎi (Shàng·hǎi Upon · {the Sea} → [Shanghai] 上海), Fújiàn (Fú·jiàn {Blessing (abbr. for the city name Fúzhōu)} · {Established (abbr. for the city name Jiànzhōu)} → [Fujian (Province)] 福建), etc. also have historically had their own mutually unintelligible languages, even if China’s central government would like everyone to just (erroneously) call them dialects of “Chinese”. This reality of China’s many mutually unintelligible languages is being emphasized, not for any political purpose, but rather, to help us language learners in the Chinese fields to be equipped with the truth as we try to make practical progress in learning and using Chinese languages to spread our God-honouring and life-saving message.

Categories
Culture Language Learning

piānjiàn

piānjiàn (piān·jiàn {inclined; slanting; leaning → [partial; prejudiced]} · seeing → [prejudice; bias] 偏见 偏見) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

[Notes: Tap/click on a Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to reveal its “flashcard”; tap/click on a “flashcard” or its Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) expression to hide the “flashcard”. 📖 📄 📘 icons mean 📖 Reveal All, 📄 Reveal Advanced, and 📘 Reveal None re all the “flashcards” in the heading, paragraph, etc. that they are placed at the beginning of.]

At the time of this writing, jw.org was featuring the article “Prejudice​—Are You Infected?”. The Mandarin version uses this week’s MEotW, “piānjiàn (piān·jiàn {inclined; slanting; leaning → [partial; prejudiced]} · seeing → [prejudice; bias] 偏见 偏見)”, to translate “prejudice”.

The “piān (incline; slant; lean [→ [insist on | diverge; deviate]] | inclined; slanting; leaning [→ [partial; prejudiced | stubbornly; wilfully; insistently; persistently; contrarily]] 偏)” in “piānjiàn (piān·jiàn {inclined; slanting; leaning → [partial; prejudiced]} · seeing → [prejudice; bias] 偏见 偏見)” literally means “inclined; slanting; leaning”, and the “jiàn (see | seeing → [view (opinion)] 见 見)” used here is a well-known expression that means “seeing”. So, “piānjiàn (piān·jiàn {inclined; slanting; leaning → [partial; prejudiced]} · seeing → [prejudice; bias] 偏见 偏見)” literally refers to a way of seeing that’s not on the level—an accurate way of describing prejudice. The “piān (incline; slant; lean [→ [insist on | diverge; deviate]] | inclined; slanting; leaning [→ [partial; prejudiced | stubbornly; wilfully; insistently; persistently; contrarily]] 偏)” in “piānjiàn (piān·jiàn {inclined; slanting; leaning → [partial; prejudiced]} · seeing → [prejudice; bias] 偏见 偏見)” literally meaning “inclined; slanting; leaning” is an interesting contrast to the “píng ({[being] flat, level, even} [→ [[being] peaceful; calm | peace | [being] equal; fair; just | standard; level]] | {make [to be] flat, level, even} [→ [make peace; pacify; calm down]] 平)” in “gōngpíng ({[is] just; fair; impartial} · {[is] flat, level, even → [[is] equal; fair; just; objective]} → [[is] fair; just; impartial; equitable | fairly; justly] 公平)” (“fair; just; impartial; equitable”) literally meaning “flat, level, even”.

Buried Prejudice Illustrated

Of course, we who are Jehovah’s people especially consciously avoid having and displaying prejudice. However, as it happens, last week’s MEotW post on “Dōng (East 东 東)‐Xī (West 西)” mentioned that scientists have observed that there is such a thing as buried prejudice (prejudice that we may unconsciously have and act on), while the above-mentioned article (which originally appeared in Awake!) being featured on jw.org applies the following interesting illustration to prejudice:

English:

Prejudice is like a virus. It harms its victims, and people can be unaware that they are infected.

Mandarin:

📖 📄 📘 Piānjiàn (Piān·jiàn {inclined → [prejudiced]} · seeing → [prejudice] 偏见 偏見) jiù (exactly 就) xiàng (like 像/象) bìngdú (bìng·dú disease · {poison → [virus]} → [virus] 病毒) yíyàng (yí·yàng {(of) one} · {pattern → [way]} → [the same way] 一样 一樣) huì (will 会 會) duì (towards 对 對) rén (people 人) zàochéng (zào·chéng make · {to come to be} 造成) shānghài (shāng·hài {hurting → [harming]} · harming → [harm] 伤害 傷害), érqiě (ér·qiě and · moreover 而且) yí (one 一) ge ([mw] 个 個/个) rén (person 人) wǎngwǎng (wǎng·wǎng {going towards} · {going towards} → [often] 往往) chájué budào ((chá·jué scrutinizes · {to wake to → [to become aware of]} → [is aware of] 察/查觉 察/查覺) (bu·dào not · {arriving at} 不到) → [is not aware]) zìjǐ (self 自己) yǐ (already 已) bèi ([passive signifier] → [is] 被) gǎnrǎn (gǎn·rǎn {feeling → [being affected by]} · {having caught (disease)} → [infected] 感染) le ([indicates a change] 了).

We Don’t Have Time for This!

As also mentioned in last week’s MEotW post on “Dōng (East 东 東)‐Xī (West 西)”, the Mandarin field is one in which East often meets West, and while people can find the differences interesting, differences can also pose spiritual challenges, since something being different than what we are used to means that we are not used to it, and it generally means that we do not deeply know or understand it.

Will we respond to the unknown with fear of the unknown? Let us make good use of the above-mentioned Awake! article and other provisions from Jehovah and his organization, to help us rise to the spiritual challenges posed by the people and things we encounter in the Mandarin field that are different from what we have been used to. That way, we can focus on contributing positively to all the important God-honouring and life-saving work we still have to do in this field.

The worldwide Mandarin field may in fact be the largest language field that has ever existed in human history, and with about 95% of the planet’s Chinese people living in China itself, all the government opposition there has been to our work, all the traditions-based encumbrances and propaganda-fueled confusion that Mandarin field language learners have had to deal with, etc., we may just have scratched the surface of the work that still needs to be done in this massive worldwide field. So, we really don’t have time for the problems that can be caused by prejudice, buried or otherwise.

Screenshot of spreadsheet table and chart showing the estimated numbers of Chinese people inside & outside China in 2023

(The above is from a spreadsheet which contains source links. A PDF file (with working source links) for that spreadsheet can be downloaded here.)