It’s quite interesting to discuss logographic writing like Chinese characters, which is my native language, during the small group discussion. After moving back to the main discussion room, we’re talking about a matter, is it difficult for Chinese people to learn alphabetic writing like English letters? In Chinese, several phonetic systems are designed to indicate Mandarin pronunciation such as the Wade-Giles spelling system, Postal spelling system, Gwoyeu Romatzyh, Yale spelling system, Chu-Yin Fu-Hao system, and is gradually being placed by Hanyu Pinyin in mainland China. But you can still find some primary school textbooks, dictionaries, and newspapers annotated in Chu-Yin Fu-Hao in Taiwan. So what I was learning is the system of Chu-Yin Fu-Hao. For me myself learning alphabetic experience, it wasn’t that hard at all but it took me a while to memorize those 26 letters. They are just different ways to write. I remember that my teacher used the picture as shown on Figure 1 to teach us the English vowel letters “a, e, i, o, u” and helped our memory. As a result of drawing the five vowels, it looks like a girl's face. Isn't it interesting? I'm sure I will never forget it. As for another question arose during the discussion, what does the Chinese keyboard look like? Figure 2 gives the answer.
[Figure 1]
[Figure 2]
Ha ha! I love your vowel girl. What a good idea! I am amazed by how many Chinese phonetic systems of writing there are. Are they very similar to one another? Is it confusing to have so many being used?
ReplyDeleteI am curious... on the Chinese keyboard, does each symbol represent one word, with three words per key? What happens if you need a word that is not there? Or maybe I am not quite understanding the Chinese writing system. :)
It's a good question. Some of Chinese phonetic systems are similar to each other because they share most the same roman alphabetic letters, such as Wade-Giles spelling system, Postal spelling system, Gwoyeu Romatzyh, Yale spelling system, and Hanyu Pinyin. So it's kind of confusing to me sometimes. But most people learn only Hanyu Pinyin, so it won't be too much confusion. However, Chu-Yin Fu-Hao is the one different from alphabets, which I'm used to it. For example, my last name, Chang, it is spelled like "zhang" in Hanyu Pinyin but it is “ㄓㄤ”in Chuyin Fuhao. Each segment has its specific sound, and especially most of them are part of Chinese characters. I meant when we practice writing of Chuyin Fuhao, we’re already learning the basic stroke writing of Chinese characters.
ReplyDeleteAs for the 2nd question, the figure 2 is the keyboard that Taiwanese people use to spell/type Chinese characters. I don’t know what the mainland Chinese keyboard look like. They probably don’t have these three symbols on each key….this is my guess. I should check Leping’s next time…=D Three words per key other than English letters means that we have three different ways to spell/type characters. It really depends on which spelling system you learn. Nope!! The keyboard is designed to include all possible typing segments, so you could type pretty much Chinese characters.
Hey Lilian, I have never seen that kind of keyboard before! I didn't know that you were using the different keyboard with ours. Ours just like the English ones, no difference though. I also liked your vowel girl face, very cute.
ReplyDeleteBut how do you type Chinese in the US then? I suspect that you use some special rules. The Chinese keyboard reminds me of the James Bond movie starring Pierce Brosnan and Michelle Yeoh :)
ReplyDeleteTo Leping, so that's less troblesome for you people.
ReplyDeleteTo Esther, I think they've Pinyin typing system in their computer, which means by typing Pinyin, Chinese characters will appear. For example, if you insert pinyin "zhang" (English letters), then it shows up many homophone choices like "章,張,章,漳,彰,蟑" for examples. Then you can choose one which is you wnat. Am I right, Leping?
Wow, does that take a long time to type? I'm sure you get used to it, but having to type a word and THEN choose the correct character seems like it would slow down communication. Thanks for the explanations! :)
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