Yesterday in Yangmingshan Park I saw some signs that seemed to be a mix of what I consider to be the two worst romanization systems ever invented (Tongyong and Gwoyeu Romatzyh): words like “jhwu” and “ciing” graced the signs.
yah i’ve seen them…i feel physically sick when i see that kind of shit…
I dunno about u, but for me is much easier to use just hanyu pinyin… systematically. Its not just about gaoxiong (yup, its easy to know what we r talking about if we write kaoxiong). Besides, don’t taiwanese workers (the ones who r in contact with romanization systems) get confused, using so many diferent romanization systems, and bastardizations?
Nobody answered to my question about teaching hanyu pinyin together with zhuyin fuhao in schools, so that means the MOE isnt’t considering that, correct?
It’s not a big deal compared to other issues, but it makes sense to have a standard romanization system. I agree that it won’t make much of a difference for someone with no knowledge of Chinese, but as long as someone knows Hanyu Pinyin, which doesn’t take long to learn, he/she would be able to pronounce street signs, locations, and names without having to first figure out which romanization system is being used.
Most of those examples are not analogous. The change from Burma to Myanmar was a political rather than transliteration issue. And Munich is the English name for the city while München is the German name.
Peking was used for decades, but now everyone is used to Beijing. Why can’t they get used to Taibei, Gaoxiong, etc.?
Yup, its just more practical
Yup, its just more practical[/quote]
That makes no sense. If you already read hanyu pinyin, the amount of non similar graphemes in other systems would be minimal. All systems are just representations of the same sounds and the amount of ‘complicated’, or sounds completely unrelated to other languages in Chinese is fairly small. Once you have learned those, it’s really not a leap to figure out any non-hanyu pinyin ones.
The only solid argument for using one over any other is that one system is more ‘intuitive’ to non Chinese speakers than others which in the case of hanyu pinyin would be an odd assertation; it’s far from intuitive.
Anyway, I might be arguing about something I don’t really care about, so I’ll bow out now. I concede that consistency and lack of ambiguity is important in a few scenarios.
OK, so without looking it up, how do you pronounce the “Tso” in “General Tso’s Chicken?” (This is where those years of study really pay off).
There’s General Tso’s Chicken, but then, there’s also General Tau’s Chicken, General Tsao’s Chicken, General Tsuo’s Chicken, Genertal Tao’s Chicken, General Zuo’s Chicken, General Cho’s Chicken, General Gao’s Chicken (a relative of yours GBH?), etc.
A chicken with many names.
No, they’re one in the same. Tso looks nothing like Zuo, and yet “Tso” is the Wade-Giles and “Zuo” is the Hanyu Pinyin romanization of 左. General Tso’s chicken is named after 左宗棠 (Wade-Giles: Tso Tsung-t’ang, Hanyu Pinyin: Zuo Zongtang).
Possibly. Was he deliriously good-looking, with a rapier wit and debonair charm? Note that I’m not indicating whether this is evidence for or against.
[quote=“Gao Bohan”]
Possibly. Was he deliriously good-looking…[/quote]
Well, he was delirious… Note that I’m not indicating whether this is evidence for or against.
[quote=“sjcma”][quote=“Gao Bohan”]
Possibly. Was he deliriously good-looking…[/quote]
Well, he was delirious…[/quote]
Tremensously so?
That’s different. It happened before I was born! So it was already “the way things are” in my lifetime! 
It’s not a big deal compared to other issues, but it makes sense to have a standard romanization system. I agree that it won’t make much of a difference for someone with no knowledge of Chinese, but as long as someone knows Hanyu Pinyin, which doesn’t take long to learn, he/she would be able to pronounce street signs, locations, and names without having to first figure out which romanization system is being used.[/quote]
I had an idea which might explain why Tong yong was a bad idea to begin with. You localize maps to languages, not to pronunciation.
What I mean by this is, when you come up with one system for English, you keep it as consistent as possible across maps of the world. Yes Rome isn’t as accurate as Roma, but it would be a closest approximation to the sound for English. On an Italian made map it can say “Roma” but would also need to be consistent for Italian for all the other place names too.
Example 1: New York. You know the city name and you know how it sounds, to you are a speaker of English. It isn’t written New Yaaaaawwwwk just because that’s how the locals pronounce it. Otherwise you would have to change every city name to represent the local taste and it becomes impossible to guess what it would be by looking at it, given the number of different pronunciation systems in English.
Example 2: Tong Yong abomination. From what I understand it wasn’t ever supposed to represent Taiwanese but be some kind of catch all system for Mandarin, Taiwanese, Aboriginal languages, etc etc. If they wanted to make Tong Yong a localization, they should have used it only for Taiwanese and forgone the attempt to map it to Mandarin as a political alternative to HY Pinyin. Rather than try and fight HY Pinyin, they should have used their energy to try and get the Mandarin, HY Pinyin and Taiwanese on the street signs.
The usual argument against HY Pinyin is that it isn’t intuitive for a native English speaker. The problem is, there are so many varieties of pronunciation in the English speaking world that the argument tends to quickly fall apart. Standards are there so that everyone can communicate on the same level, even if you personally may find that a different system is more accurate.
Does that make sense to anyone else?
I dunno about u, but for me is much easier to use just hanyu Pinyin… systematically. Its not just about gaoxiong (yup, its easy to know what we r talking about if we write kaoxiong). Besides, don’t taiwanese workers (the ones who r in contact with romanization systems) get confused, using so many diferent romanization systems, and bastardizations?
Nobody answered to my question about teaching hanyu Pinyin together with zhuyin fuhao in schools, so that means the MOE isnt’t considering that, correct?[/quote]
The MOE is not considering teaching Hanyu pinyin in the schools. It may be easier for you to use Hanyu Pinyin systematically, but keep in mind that many Taiwanese also use romanization for their names and place names. People have grown up with Ma Ying-jeou and Taipei. It is very unlikely that these names will be changed for the sake of consistency with some system. That’s just not the way Taiwan works.
Also, Hanyu Pinyin isn’t supposed to be geared just toward English speakers.
A Portuguese speaker would have no problem with “x” representing an “sh”-like sound.
Why is everything outside Taipei city still in Tongyong pinyin? The TRA is still using Tongyong, all the place names in Taipei county also still seem to be using it. Is there going to be any serious effort to change to Hanyu pinyin, or is the government going to accept the continuing muddle.
I think the government has some more pressing priorities to focus on at this moment.
That said, I did see some HYPY on signs on the No. 3 Freeway down south: for example, Zengwen Reservoir was spelled Zengwen, not Zengwun.
I wish they’d rename “Alian” back to “Alien”, though, just because it’s a funny name.