Tag: Writing Systems

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Jìniàn Jùhuì

Jìniàn Jùhuì ((Jì·niàn Remembering · {Thinking Of} → [Commemorating] 记/纪念 記/紀念) (Jùhuì Meeting 聚会 聚會) → [[the] Memorial]) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

The page on jw.org entitled “Memorial of Jesus’ Death” invites people to this year’s Memorial, which as of this writing is fast approaching.

Appearing in the title of the Mandarin version of that page is this week’s MEotW, “Jìniàn Jùhuì ((Jì·niàn Remembering · {Thinking Of} → [Commemorating] 记/纪念 記/紀念) (Jùhuì Meeting 聚会 聚會) → [[the] Memorial])”, which corresponds to “Memorial”, or “the Memorial”.

Note that in this post, “Jìniàn Jùhuì ((Jì·niàn Remembering · {Thinking Of} → [Commemorating] 记/纪念 記/紀念) (Jùhuì Meeting 聚会 聚會) → [[the] Memorial])” is capitalized, rather than being rendered in all lowercase letters. Why has this been done? The answer involves another question: Is Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) just a pronunciation aid or actually a full writing system?

To Be or Not to Be…a Full Writing System?

汉字 / 漢字? Pīnyīn?

The article “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Was Plan A” explains that Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) was originally meant by Máo Zédōng ((Máo Hair (surname) 毛) (Zé·dōng Marsh · East 泽东 澤東) (the founder of the People’s Republic of China)) and some of the other early movers and shakers of the People’s Republic of China to eventually replace Chinese characters. (Yes, seriously—it’s April, but we Jehovah’s Witnesses don’t make April Fools’ jokes!) Even though in this case cultural pride, tradition, and inertia have been allowed in the Mandarin-speaking part of the world to leave no room for innovation and progress, the fact remains that Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) was intended by design to work as a full writing system. That it actually does so is shown in the scholarly paper “Two Steps Toward Digraphia in China”, and in the article “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Is a Good, Workable Writing System on Its Own”.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Since Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is a full writing system like English is, there is good reason to consider it appropriate to capitalize Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) words similarly to how English words are capitalized. Of course, there are different style guides with different rules regarding how and what to capitalize in English, especially when it comes to titles, but at the very least, any particular piece of writing should generally stick to whatever capitalization style has been chosen for it. (Hopefully it’s a good one.)

Unfortunately, in the part of the world that uses written Mandarin, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is generally relegated to being just a pronunciation aid—it is not given the respect and dignity of being recognized as a full writing system, even though, as discussed above, it linguistically qualifies as one. Thus, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is generally not capitalized in the world, if it is used at all. In contrast, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus material gives Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) the respect it has earned—it uses Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) as its default main writing system and carefully follows the capitalization example of the official English version of the Mandarin material it is based on. E.g., since “God’s Kingdom” is rendered in the official English material with capital letters at the beginnings of its words, the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus material follows suit with “Shàngdì (Shàng·dì Above’s · {Emperor → [God]} → [God] 上帝) de (’s 的) Wángguó (Wáng·guó King’s · Nation → [Kingdom] 王国 王國)”.

So, since “the Memorial” is capitalized in the organization’s official English material, such as the English version of the article “Memorial of Jesus’ Death” on jw.org, “Jìniàn Jùhuì ((Jì·niàn Remembering · {Thinking Of} → [Commemorating] 记/纪念 記/紀念) (Jùhuì Meeting 聚会 聚會) → [[the] Memorial])” is capitalized in this post and in other material containing Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Plus material.

The Precedent of Punctuation

Is it “beneath” the Chinese world to follow the example of English when it comes to the capitalization of the alphabet it uses? Well, the Chinese world has followed Western writing style examples before, with punctuation. As the MEotW post on “diǎnliàng (diǎn·liàng {dot → [light (v); ignite]} · {to be bright} [→ [illuminate; shine light on]] 点亮 點亮)” pointed out:

Chinese writing in the past didn’t have punctuation, and now it has punctuation largely modeled after European punctuation. (For reference: Chinese punctuation – Wikipedia, Q&A: When were punctuation marks first used? – HistoryExtra, history – When was punctuation introduced into Chinese? – Chinese Language Stack Exchange)

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Culture Language Learning Languages

ài

ài (love 爱 愛) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

The Mandarin word for “love”, “ài (love 爱 愛)”, is undoubtedly one of the first Mandarin words learned by Mandarin field language-learners.

One noteworthy thing about the Mandarin word “ài (love 爱 愛)” is that just like the English word “love” can be used as either a verb, as in “to love and be loved”, or a noun, as in “a crazy little thing called love”, “ài (love 爱 愛)” can also be used as either a verb or a noun.

Also noteworthy about the Mandarin word “ài (love 爱 愛)” are the contrasting ways in which it is written using a Traditional Chinese character, a Simplified Chinese character, and Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音), and what those contrasting ways of writing tell us about those different writing systems:

 

Besides Traditional Chinese characters, Simplified Chinese characters, and Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音), there is actually also another way in which the Mandarin word for “love” can be written:

Categories
History Language Learning Languages

Pīnyīn

Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) ← Tap/click to show/hide the “flashcard”

“Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音)” is the expression commonly used to refer to the phonetic alphabet introduced by China in 1958. This system is also known by longer, more official names:

  • Hànyǔ (Hàn·yǔ {Han (Chinese)} · Language → [(Modern Standard) Mandarin] 汉语 漢語) Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音)
  • Hànyǔ (Hàn·yǔ {Han (Chinese)} · Language → [(Modern Standard) Mandarin] 汉语 漢語) Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) Fāng’àn (Fāng’·àn {Direction → [Method]} · {Long, Narrow Table or Desk → [Plan]} 方案)

When thinking of Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) and its predecessor Zhùyīn (Zhù·yīn Annotating · Sounds → [Zhuyin] 注音 註/注音) (last week’s MEotW), some focus on the superficial differences between them. However, it’s perhaps even more important to note what they have in common, as indicated by the fact that the names of both systems end in “yīn (sound [→ [musical note/sound; tone; pronunciation | syllable | news; tidings]] 音)”: Both systems focus on representing the sounds of Mandarin, sounds which make up Mandarin speech and thus represent meanings. In fact, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音)’s literal meaning tells us that this system helps people to “piece together sounds” to make up Mandarin speech, and thus convey the meanings that Mandarin speech represents.

In contrast, many people believe that the Hànzì (Hàn·zì {Han (Chinese)} · Characters 汉字 漢字), the Chinese characters, represent meanings more directly through their own visual design, as opposed to primarily being a system that represents Mandarin, Cantonese, etc., speech sounds which represent meaning. This view of Chinese characters, however, is actually a myth, which has been called the ideographic myth–God designed our brains and bodies to primarily represent meaning through speech, some humans in their hubris presumed that it would be better for us humans to represent meaning directly through visual symbols, and of course God was right and these humans were wrong.

There are actually many myths and misconceptions that people believe regarding Chinese characters, and sadly, that is also the case regarding Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音).

Common Myths and Misconceptions

  • “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is just a pronunciation aid. It’s not really a writing system like the characters are.”

    • 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, not just a pronunciation aid.

  • “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is just training wheels. Characters are real wheels.”

    • 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.

  • “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) on its own can’t be understood because there are too many homophones (words that sound the same, but have different meanings) in Mandarin.”

    • When people are just speaking Mandarin, with no characters in sight to help them, do they have problems understanding each other because of all the homophones? Can blind Mandarin-speakers, who cannot see characters, still “see” what people mean when those people speak Mandarin? Native Mandarin-speakers have confirmed to me that no, homophones are not a significant problem in spoken Mandarin—people can use the context and understand each other okay. So, people can use the context and understand each other okay when using Pīnyīn too, since Pīnyīn directly represents the sound of spoken Mandarin.

      • The above quote is from the article “Pīnyīn Was Plan A”. Check it out for more on this subject.

  • “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is less accurate than Zhùyīn (Zhù·yīn Annotating · Sounds → [Zhuyin] 注音 註/注音).”

    • Some people say that Zhuyin is more accurate or correct than Pinyin. Actually, both Zhuyin and Pinyin represent the same Mandarin sounds, just with different symbols. In fact, it’s not difficult to find tables that directly map the corresponding Zhuyin and Pinyin expressions to each other—a simple Google search for “pinyin zhuyin table” turns up many, many results. Pinyin and Zhuyin are just like different codes for encoding the same Mandarin message, so basically, neither is more accurate or correct than the other.

      • The above quote is from the tiandi.info post “Pinyin and Zhuyin”. (If you need login information for the parts of tiandi.info that require it, request it by email, and include information on who referred you and/or what group/cong. you are in.)
  • “Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) makes your Mandarin sound like English.”
    • This is only true if you are using it wrong. For example, if you read a French word and you make it sound like English when you read it out, the problem is not that the French word is written using the Latin alphabet like English is—the problem is that you are thinking of English sounds when you see the French word, when you should be thinking of French sounds. Similarly, you shouldn’t blame Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) if you are thinking of English sounds when you see it, because it’s up to you to understand that Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) represents Mandarin sounds, not English sounds.
    • Don’t worry, it becomes second nature to properly associate Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) with Mandarin sounds after you get familiar with Mandarin sounds and used to the Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) system. However, if you, say, prematurely stop using Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) and instead turn to characters in an effort to avoid the baggage of English sounds, you may actually never really get the hang of Mandarin sounds. Seriously, I’ve seen people who focus on characters remain in this speech Twilight Zone for years and years! That’s because while characters do represent Mandarin speech sounds, they’re just bad at it—it’s just not what characters focus on. In stark contrast, Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is all about the sounds of Mandarin. It literally spells out in a simple way how a Mandarin syllable sounds at the beginning, at the end, and in between. Characters, though, represent the complex sound of a Mandarin syllable as one coarse lump, in a complex and often unrelated way—you either get it or you don’t, and many don’t.
      • Yes, characters are like a conceited jerk who convinces you with grand promises to jump from a high place, doesn’t bother to catch you, and then makes you think it’s your fault that you can’t fly. Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音), though, is like a modest and straightforward person who clearly explains each step for you so that you can dependably and confidently get to where you want to go.

For more information regarding Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) and how we in the Mandarin field should view it, check out these articles:

“Pīnyīn is a Good, Workable Writing System On Its Own”
This article is a brief overview of why it’s important for those of us in the Mandarin field to recognize that Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音) is a full writing system, not just a pronunciation aid.

“Pīnyīn Was Plan A”
This extensively researched in-depth article discusses how we in the Mandarin field should view Pīnyīn (Pīn·yīn {Piecing Together} · Sounds → [Pinyin] 拼音).

(Short link: tiandi.info/articles)