Tag: Wordnik

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zhēngyì

zhēngyì (zhēng·yì contending · discussing [→ [dispute; controversy]] 争议 爭議) ← 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.]

The Shēngmìng Láizì Chuàngzào Ma? ((Shēngmìng Life 生命) (Lái·zì Came · From 来自 來自) (Chuàng·zào Initiating · {Making, Creating} → [Creating] 创造 創造) (Ma [? ptcl for “yes/no” questions] 吗 嗎)? → [Was Life Created? (lc)]) (Was Life Created? (lc)) brochure and the Shēngmìng de Qǐyuán—Zhíde Sīkǎo de Wǔ Ge Wèntí ((Shēngmìng Life 生命) (de ’s 的) (Qǐ·yuán {Rising → [Starting]} · Source → [Origin] 起源/原)—(Zhí·de Worth · Getting → [Worth] 值得) (Sī·kǎo {Thinking About} · Examining 思考) (de ’s 的) (Wǔ Five 五) (Ge [mw] 个 個/个) (Wèn·tí Asking · Subjects → [Questions] 问题 問題) → [The Origin of Life—Five Questions Worth Asking (lf)]) (The Origin of Life—Five Questions Worth Asking (lf)) brochure were originally published back in 2010, but recently, the English version of the Was Life Created? brochure was updated to the December 2022 Printing, and the Mandarin version of it was updated to the February 2023 Printing. Also, the Was Life Created? brochure and the Origin of Life brochure are now in the Teaching Toolbox section in the JW Library app. So, it would be good to consider some of the expressions used in the Mandarin versions of these publications that can be so helpful when discussing whether life was created.

Controversy!

This week’s MEotW, which appears in the section of the Mandarin Was Life Created? brochure entitled “Jiǎnjiè (Jiǎn·jiè {Simple → [Brief]} · {Being Situated Between → [Introduction]} 简介 簡介)” (“Introduction”), is “zhēngyì (zhēng·yì contending · discussing [→ [dispute; controversy]] 争议 爭議)”:

English:

Was life created, or are you purely the product of random, undirected events? Few questions create more controversy.

Mandarin (WOL; Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus)

📖 📄 📘 Shēngmìng (life 生命) láizì (lái·zì came · from 来自 來自) chuàngzào (chuàng·zào initiating · {making, creating} → [creating] 创造 創造) ma ([? ptcl for “yes/no” questions] 吗 嗎)? Háishi (Hái·shi {still more → [or]} · {is (it a)} 还是 還是) chúncuì ({being pure} → [purely] 纯粹 純粹) yóu ({due to} 由/繇) yìxiē (yì·xiē one · {indefinite number of} → [some] 一些) suíjī (suí·jī {coming along with} · chance → [random] 随机 隨機), bú (not 不) shòu ({having received} 受) zhǐhuī (zhǐ·huī {(pointing with) finger → [pointing]} · {spraying → [directing]} → [directing] 指挥 指揮) de (’s 的) shìjiàn (shì·jiàn events · [mw] 事件) yǎnshēng (yǎn·shēng {having been spilled over} · {having been given birth to} → [having been given rise to] 衍生) chulai (chu·lai out · {to come} 出来 出來) de ({’s (thing)} 的) ne ([? ptcl] 呢)? Zhèixiē (Zhèi·xiē this · {indefinite number of} → [these] 这些 這些) wèntí (wèn·tí asking · subjects → [questions] 问题 問題) bèishòu (bèi·shòu fully · receive 备受 備受) zhēngyì (zhēng·yì contending · discussing → [controversy] 争议 爭議),

As can be seen from the above quotes, the Mandarin Was Life Created? brochure uses “zhēngyì (zhēng·yì contending · discussing [→ [dispute; controversy]] 争议 爭議)” to translate the English word “controversy”.

War!

In “zhēngyì (zhēng·yì contending · discussing [→ [dispute; controversy]] 争议 爭議)”, “zhēng (contend; fight; vie; strive; dispute [→ [argue; debate; ]] 争 爭)” means “contend”, and “yì (discussing; conferring; {exchanging views}; {talking over} [→ [(exchanged) opinion; view]] 议 議)” means “discuss”. Together, they can be understood to mean something like “contentious discussion”, which leads us to the meaning of “controversy” in cases such as its use in the Was Life Created? brochure that is mentioned above.

Interestingly, the “zhēng (contend; fight; vie; strive; dispute [→ [argue; debate; ]] 争 爭)” that’s in “zhēngyì (zhēng·yì contending · discussing [→ [dispute; controversy]] 争议 爭議)” also appears in “zhànzhēng (zhàn·zhēng war · contending → [war; warfare] 战争 戰爭)”, which means “war”. Is it going too far to associate creation vs. evolution discussions with war? Well, for what it’s worth, consider that “Creation–evolution controversy” is listed as a related link on the Wikipedia page for “culture war”.

Culture Wars and Spiritual Warfare

While the expression “culture war” does not seem to appear in the publications of Jehovah’s organization, searching the Watchtower ONLINE LIBRARY (WOL) for “spiritual & (war | warfare)” (not including the quotation marks) returns lots of results. This blog also has a “Spiritual War” tag for posts that touch on this subject. And of course, in 2 Corinthians 10:3–5, the Bible itself explains to us that God’s true worshippers must fight a spiritual war:

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not wage warfare according to what we are in the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not fleshly, but powerful by God for overturning strongly entrenched things. For we are overturning reasonings and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are bringing every thought into captivity to make it obedient to the Christ;

Also, as Jehovah’s Witnesses and Jesus’ true followers, we seek to follow Jesus’ example, as described by Jesus himself at John 18:37:

…For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth.…

One way we can distinguish between the culture wars of this world and the spiritual warfare that true Christians engage in is that the world’s culture wars involve contentions over human ideas embodied in this world’s human cultures, while true Christian spiritual warfare involves bearing witness to and fighting for God’s truth, “the knowledge of God”. Also, the world’s culture wars often spill over into the political arena, whereas like Christ himself, true Christian spiritual warriors stay out of politics.—John 18:36.

Principled Spiritual Warfare

Since the theory of evolution obviously qualifies as a “lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God”, it can rightly be said that witnessing to Mandarin-speaking people—many of whom were taught to be atheists—about creation and evolution is an important part of fighting on the Mandarin front of the spiritual war that true Christians are involved in. Of course, though, it’s not true that “all’s fair in love and war”. Even the world has its law of war, and as true Christians, we fight our spiritual war in harmony with the counsel and principles in God’s Word the Bible, such as this counsel in 1 Peter 3:15:

But sanctify the Christ as Lord in your hearts, always ready to make a defense before everyone who demands of you a reason for the hope you have, but doing so with a mild temper and deep respect.

How can we be effective spiritual warriors, and also be “doing so with a mild temper and deep respect”? Regarding this possible conundrum, I am reminded of a well-meaning circuit overseer I remember who, while saying that although God’s Word is the sword of the spirit, we should use it kindly, was making stabbing motions with his arm. 🤭

Seriously, though, when it comes to discussing creation and evolution with people, we can learn much by noting the example set by Jehovah’s organization re tone, wording, etc. in the Was Life Created? and Origin of Life brochures, in the “Science and the Bible” articles on jw.org, etc. For us Mandarin field language learners, resources like the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) WOL and the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus resources can help us to follow the organization’s example re tone, wording, etc. in Mandarin.

Mandarin Writing System Controversy?

To many, the idea that Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is a full writing system for Mandarin and thus can and should be advantageously used as a full writing system (and not just as a pronunciation aid) in the Mandarin field may still seem controversial. However, the evidence for this idea is quite solid from a linguistics (language science) point of view. It’s only when looked at from a nostalgic, traditionalist point of view that it may seem controversial, even outrageous—Chinese characters have been the traditionally accepted writing system for the Chinese languages for thousands of years, and teachers continue to teach their students accordingly. Indeed, Chinese characters may literally represent the most deeply and widely embedded cultural tradition still in existence.

Even so, ultimately, tradition is now the only reason for using characters, because technically, objectively, characters are not necessary for writing any language (e.g., alternatives like Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音), Hangul, and the Vietnamese alphabet already exist), nor, with their extraordinary complexity, inconsistent design, and inhuman numerousness, are they advantageous, except for fitting in with prevailing tradition.

However, as true Christians, should we be bound by such tradition, deeply embedded as it is? In Jesus’ time, there were also many deeply embedded traditions that teachers promoted and people followed, but which made worshipping God unnecessarily difficult and burdensome. Do you remember how Jesus felt about that?

Mark 7:13 records Jesus saying this to the Pharisees and scribes:

Thus you make the word of God invalid by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like this.”

According to Wordnik, “invalid” could mean “deficient in health; infirm; weak; sick”, or “of no force, weight, or cogency; weak”. The experiences of many in the Mandarin field have shown that giving priority to Chinese characters can indeed lead to Mandarin language skills that are weak and sickly, such that many Mandarin field language learners ended up unable to speak the word of God in Mandarin with cogency, that is, “power of proving or of producing belief; the quality of being highly probable or convincing; force; credibility”.

Regardless of deeply embedded human tradition, do we dedicated servants of Jehovah God not owe it to him to do better than that, if we can?—Malachi 1:6–8.

How Will We Personally Deal with Controversy?

When faced with controversy, many just “go along to get along” (“conform to general expectations so as not to disrupt or endanger one’s sense of security or belonging”). As Jesus said, many just follow the crowd and take the broad road. (Matthew 7:13) However, Jesus did not do that when faced with burdensome, deeply embedded traditions in his day, we Jehovah’s Witnesses do not do that when it comes to widely accepted ideas about evolution, and we do not have to do that when it comes to how we view and use Chinese characters and Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音). As the MEotW post on “Yànwén (Yàn·wén {Proverb (Korean: Vernacular)} · Writing → [Hangul/Hankul (modern Korean writing system)] 谚文 諺文)” pointed out:

Your Own Personal Hangul for Mandarin?

However, while that may be the situation with the proud worldly nation of China, what about each of us Mandarn field language learners, as individuals who are dedicated to Jehovah God and not to any worldly human culture? …we are free to choose for ourselves to use Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) as a full writing system for Mandarin and thus be fully empowered by its simplicity and elegance to serve Jehovah better, as long as we don’t allow ourselves to be shackled by mere human tradition, or by peer pressure.

For convenience:

The direct link for the current generation Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus resource for the Was Life Created? brochure is:

The short link for Chinese field language-learning links for the Was Life Created? brochure is:

More Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) and Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus web material based on the Mandarin Was Life Created? brochure will be made available in the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together of} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus web resource as time allows.

Categories
Culture Current Events History Technology

rèlàng

rèlàng (rè·làng heat · wave 热浪 熱浪) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

Currently, many around the world are being affected by heat waves, which scientists say is part of a pattern of global warming caused by human activity. As of this writing, jw.org is featuring the article “Climate Change and Our Future—What the Bible Says”. The Mandarin version of this article uses the expression “rèlàng (rè·làng heat · wave 热浪 熱浪)”, this week’s MEotW, to translate the English expression “heat wave”.

It seems that “rèlàng (rè·làng heat · wave 热浪 熱浪)” is just a simple, straightforward exact translation of “heat wave”. While sometimes, like with “zhǐnán zhēn ((zhǐ·nán {(points with) finger → [points]} · south 指南) (zhēn needle 针 針) → [compass])” (a previous MEotW), the Mandarin expression for “compass”, East and West approached the same thing from opposite directions, other times, like with “rèlàng (rè·làng heat · wave 热浪 熱浪)” and “heat wave”, the reality referred to is so simple and the applicable metaphors are so obvious that East and West settled on the same linguistic solution.

While “rèlàng (rè·làng heat · wave 热浪 熱浪)” is definitely not a loanword (like previous MEotW “kǎlā’OK (karaoke 卡拉OK)” is), which is a word that’s adopted from one language into another language without translation, it seems possible that it’s a calque, or loan translation, which is “a word or phrase in a language formed by word-for-word or morpheme-by-morpheme translation of a word in another language”, according to one of the definitions of “calque” listed by Wordnik.

Wordnik—Chinese Field Connections

By the way, while this blog is mainly about Mandarin expressions, it’s written in English, mainly for English-speakers, and often it will compare Mandarin expressions to English expressions. Of course, it will use English words—like “loanword” and “calque”—to discuss Mandarin expressions. So, it’s good for it to have a resource to refer to like Wordnik, which claims to be “the world’s biggest online English dictionary, by number of words”. Being online, it is not constrained by the limitations imposed by the millennia-old medium of paper, as delightfully explained in this TED talk given by Erin McKean, the founder of Wordnik:

Here are a few quotes from the above video:

Why are you blaming the ham for being too big for the pan? You can’t get a smaller ham—the English language is as big as it is. So if you have a ham butt problem and you’re thinking about the ham butt problem, the conclusion that it leads you to is inexorable and counter-intuitive—paper is the enemy of words.

They’re like, “Oh my, people are going to take away my beautiful paper dictionaries?” No, there will still be paper dictionaries. When we had cars, when cars became the dominant mode of transportation, we didn’t round up all the horses and shoot them. You know, there’re still going to be paper dictionaries but it’s not going to be the dominant dictionary. The book-shaped dictionary is not going to be the only shape dictionaries come in, and it’s not going to be the prototype for the shapes dictionaries come in.

[I still use the illustration about cars and horses when talking to people who worry about what would happen to Chinese characters if Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) were ever to get widely adopted.]

Lexicography [the practice of compiling dictionaries] is not rocket science, but even if it were, rocket science is being done by dedicated amateurs these days. You know, it can’t be that hard to find some words.

This is a little-known technological fact about the Internet, but the Internet is actually made up of words and enthusiasm, and words and enthusiasm actually happen to be the recipe for lexicography. Isn’t that great?

If we get a bigger pan, then we can put all the words in. We can put in all the meanings. Doesn’t everyone want more meaning in their lives?

The web page for this TED talk says it was part of the TED2007 conference. I remember that after I saw it, it influenced my thinking as I subsequently contributed to some of the projects for Chinese-field unofficial language-learning resources. (E.g., “We can do this, whether or not it’s rocket science!” “We can transcend paper now!” “Including the meanings is good! Doesn’t everyone want more meaning in their lives?”) Many such resources, like the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus Expressions (Web) resource, the Referenced Theocratic Expressions (RTE) resource, and even, in a way, the 3-line, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus, etc. material resources can be thought of as specialized dictionaries. (In 3-line, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus, etc. material resources, you can look up Mandarin words in the order in which they appear in certain official Mandarin publications!)

Making Good Use of Bigger Pans

Years ago, there was one project that was discussed, for creating an unofficial pocket-sized paper dictionary for Chinese theocratic terms that was to be…about the size of what we now call a smartphone, except, of course, thicker. Looking back, it’s not surprising that that project never came to fruition, partly because of the limitations of paper. Those limitations would have necessitated selecting for inclusion in the proposed pocket-sized dictionary a subset of the full dictionary also being worked on (which we now have in the form of the RTE), and they also would have led to difficulties regarding formatting and printing out for such a small form factor—it was just too small a pan.

Also, note that 2007, the year that the above-mentioned TED talk was given, was also the year that the iPhone came out. The iPad followed not long after in 2010, and pretty soon, smartphones and tablets proliferated among those in the Chinese fields, along with resources like apps, websites, digital publications, etc. that were designed for such mobile devices. When entire libraries can be contained in one’s smartphone or tablet, one is probably not usually inclined to seek out paper equivalents. Indeed, to many who grew up with touchscreen mobile devices, paper publications that don’t allow things like resizing of text or looking up information on words seem broken.

Categories
Culture History Language Learning Languages Science

fāngyán

fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

The term “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)” has been used in the Chinese-speaking world in various ways, but the literal meanings of the words that make it up indicate that it refers to the speech pattern of a place, even a place as small as a village. For reference, the “fāng (direction [→ [side; party | place; region | method; way [→ [prescription; recipe]] | power (math.)]] | {[is] square} [→ [[is] upright; honest]] | [mw for square things] 方)” in “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)” is the “fāng (direction [→ [side; party | place; region | method; way [→ [prescription; recipe]] | power (math.)]] | {[is] square} [→ [[is] upright; honest]] | [mw for square things] 方)” in “dìfang (dì·fang {(section of) earth → [place]} · {direction → [place]} → [place] 地方)”, and the “yán (speech; word; talk; language | say; talk; speak | character; syllable; word 言)” in “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)” is the “yán (speech; word; talk; language | say; talk; speak | character; syllable; word 言)” in “yǔyán (yǔ·yán language · {(type of) speech} 语言 語言)”.

“Fāngyán (Fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)” has customarily been translated into English as “dialect”, but this practice can be misleading and confusing, because while “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)” and “dialect” can sometimes both be applied to a particular speech pattern, the two terms don’t mean exactly the same thing.

What is a Chinese “Dialect”?

American sinologist and University of Pennsylvania Professor of East Asian Languages and Civilizations Victor H. Mair wrote an extensive article on this subject, “What Is a Chinese ‘Dialect/Topolect’? Reflections on Some Key Sino-English Linguistic Terms”, which can be found here (PDF) and here (web page) on his website Sino-Platonic Papers.

It has been said that “a language is a dialect with an army and navy”, but in his article Professor Mair gives us a more linguistically correct and useful way to distinguish between a language and a dialect:

Regardless of the imprecision of lay usage, we should strive for a consistent means of distinguishing between language and dialect. Otherwise we might as well use the two terms interchangeably. That way lies chaos and the collapse of rational discourse. Mutual intelligibility [emphasis added] is normally accepted by most linguists as the only plausible criterion for making the distinction between language and dialect in the vast majority of cases. Put differently, no more suitable, workable device for distinguishing these two levels of speech has yet been proposed. If there are to be exceptions to the useful principle of mutual intelligibility, there should be compelling reasons for them. Above all, exceptions should not be made the rule.

What is mutual intelligibility? Simply put, in linguistics, two or more speech varieties are said to be mutually intelligible if they are “able to be understood by one another’s speakers”. For example, if one person only knows English, and another person only knows Spanish, they can’t really understand each other if they try to talk to each other—English and Spanish are not mutually intelligible, and are suitably recognized as being different languages, not just different dialects of “European”.

Similarly, if one person only knows Mandarin, and another person only knows Cantonese, they can’t really understand each other if they try to talk to each other—Mandarin and Cantonese are not mutually intelligible. So, while they may be “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · {(patterns of) speech} 方言)”, linguistically, Mandarin and Cantonese should really be considered to be different languages, not just different dialects of “Chinese”.

If many of the varieties of speech in China are really different languages, as linguists would refer to them, why have so many people come to think that they are just dialects of a single Chinese language? China’s central government is highly motivated to convince people that China is one unified political and cultural entity which should thus be governed by one central government—them—so they have promoted this idea. In other words, it’s basically political propaganda!

Being Clear on What’s What

Why is it especially important for language-learners in a language field like the Mandarin field to recognize, in spite of the commonly accepted political propaganda, that Chinese varieties of speech like Mandarin and Cantonese really function like different languages, and not different dialects of the same language? Well, as someone who along with many others has come to the Mandarin field from the Cantonese field, I have had the dubious pleasure of observing how some have tried to speak Mandarin by just taking the Cantonese they knew and twisting it a little, since they were relying on the conventional wisdom that Mandarin and Cantonese are just different dialects of the same language. As well-meaning as they may have been, the results were often just as bad as when someone sings badly off-key, or as Star Trek fans may say, they often sounded like the language equivalent of a transporter accident 🙀. Even after decades in the Mandarin field, some publishers who had come over from the Cantonese field still say some Mandarin words with Cantonese-y pronunciations.

In contrast, when one recognizes, for example, that Cantonese is Cantonese and Mandarin is Mandarin, and that neither one is just a slightly mutated version of the other, then that paves the way for language-learning progress that is free of being distorted by untruthful and misleading beliefs. Yes, by recognizing and accepting a variety of speech for what it really is, we can go on to freely learn to speak it well and properly, so that we can be as effective as possible at helping people whose mother tongue is that variety of speech.

As with everything else in life, in language-learning too, the truth matters. As Jehovah’s people, we especially want to “worship the Father with spirit and truth”, and when we seek to do so as we learn a language to use it in Jehovah’s service, we will find that ‘the truth will set us free’ from the distortions and burdens of untruthful and misleading beliefs.—John 4:23; 8:32.

Some Official Recognition

The organization has recently demonstrated that it recognizes the truth about how different many of the Chinese varieties of speech are from one another. For example, whereas before there was one Chinese edition of each publication (using Mandarin wording), now, some publications are available in different Chinese editions for different Chinese languages (including Cantonese), each with different wording.

List of different Chinese languages in which publications are available on jw.org
jw.org now has publications in different Chinese languages.

To help reduce the confusion around the inappropriate use of the English word “dialect” to translate “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)”, Professor Mair proposed that the word “topolect” (topo- (“place”) +‎ -lect (“[language] variety”)) be used instead as an exact, neutral English translation of “fāngyán (fāng·yán {direction → [place]} · speech → [topolect; dialect (common but misleading translation)] 方言)”. While not as well-known as “dialect”, the word “topolect” has gained a certain amount of recognition, and it can now be found in several dictionaries, e.g., The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Wordnik, and Wiktionary.