quote[quote] There is no need for each letter or groupd letters to correspond artifically to one sound. [/quote]Yes there is. That’s what phoneticisation does. If choosing between pinyin and tongyong, the symbols are already there and are the same - it’s the Latin alphabet. The only difference is the sounds that these letters have been assigned to represent. If you argue that there’s no need for one letter (or group of letters like the zh in pinyin) to correspond to one sound, then you’re not using tongyong for all the different languages - as Tongyong is a system of corresponding the Roman letters to various sounds - you’re just using Roman letters to create different systems and then calling several different systems Tongyong.
I completely agree that Ma probably favours pinyin, becuase it has (incorrectly) been associated with unification, but that doesn’t make it the wrong choice. I think that even if you are a supporter of independence or indefinite satus quo, there are very good purely political reasons for favouring pinyin over tongyong.
I was criticized about my beautiful looks by some one with out even an
image file to their name. To reexamine just how wonderful I do or
don’t look, one may flip on Public TV [Gongshi, ]www.pts.org.tw]
Sun May 5 2002 21:00, rebroadcast May 6 10:00 AM Hakka news, where I
act like an expert about Chinese dialects, for perhaps 10 whole
excruciating minutes. See me in several real life time action exciting
outdoor situations too.
Feiren feels bad about complimenting Ma Yingjiu about finally giving
us hanyu pinyin, mainly apparently because Ma Yingjiu also likes China
or something. And also: China is bad. China uses hanyu pinyin.
Therefore hanyu pinyin is bad.
I say one who grasps Taiwan independence [at least the way I grasp it]
would say true Taiwan independence means not having to check each time
to make sure the neighbor’s kid Larry doesn’t like something before it
is OK for us to like it. Aren’t you still being controlled by Larry
that way?
Do I not take the Subway just because [shudder] you happen to work there?
For all I know Ma Yingjiu might also like classical music whereas I
prefer rap’s EPMD. By the way sorry, I don’t have the patience to
look up how he actually likes to spell his name. Hmmm, not hanyu
pinyin, whoopie.
Anyway, I can’t hold a press conference to praise Ma Yingjiu’s pinyin
policy because he belongs to the set of people who like unification.
So anything any of those people do should never be complimented. And
I suppose on the other hand anything the opposite set of people do
should be complimented.
How about Zhao Shaokang’s UFO radio program. [Sorry, again I remember he spells
it “Jaw” but I’m not on line as I write this so I’m not going to go
looking it up.] Though he has some wacko unification underfeelings, his
program is still positive in many respects. I suppose it wouldn’t be
politically correct to say any good words about him.
Feiren says:
There is no need for each letter or groupd letters to correspond
artifically to one sound. We use more or less the same letters to
represent French and English sounds without to much confusion
OK, then why isn’t it OK for us to use hanyu pinyin to spell mandarin,
and let what ever the Tongyong dudes finally cook up be used for
Taiwanese [Minnanyu]?
Feiren then says: By the same token, there is no reason we can’t use
one set of symbols to represent Mandarin, Hakka, and Minnan. Of
course, the symbols will represent different sounds and some
extensions will have to be added for sounds like the liquid ‘b’ in
Minnan that doesn’t exist in Mandarin.
Can you please show me how this is done? Can you please gather all
the Tongyong stuff you can and tell us if they actually have done
this? Can you please check under the hood or at least turn the keys
before recommending the car to your friends, p-l-e-a-s-e?
Did you know that in contrast to most scholars, the Tongyong fellows
have credibility questions?
http://jidanni.org/home/jidanni/website/lang/pinyin/19990420hongweiren.html
Does what his classmates say http://mail.scu.edu.tw/~t0812345/ matter?
By the way, the above two authors were in no way supporters of hanyu
pinyin, at least at that time.
P.S. I thought the Tongyong idea was same symbols for same sounds,
different symbols for different sounds. If I can use the same symbols
for different sounds then where is the supposed big bonus for the
school kids forced to study this stuff? Why can’t I just use hanyu
pinyin for mandarin, and let the rabble rousers go wild designing
Taiwanese pinyin. P.S. did you know that they are still arguing
about that B? Some of them want to use V. If they use V then isn’t
that a slap in the face of the Hakka? Mr. Yu told me “Mandarin must
yield to Taiwanese”: first design Taiwanese. then look at mandarin.
if any letter is found to be already used differently in mandarin, it
must be changed in order not to conflict with taiwanese. of course
such strict rules needed be imposed then also on hakka. because our
goal is to mess up mandarin pinyin, not hakka.
Anyway, I don’t see why hanyu pinyin would hinder Taiwan independence
any more than using English hinders American independence. I see
hanyu pinyin as a handy tool that really hits the spot here.
P.S. to the Tongyong folks: why are q and x bad and c good?
Dan Bloom sent me his book. He read Qing Fu street on my website, but
wrote Quing fu St. on the envelope. The Jiayi post office’s first
guess apparently was Guang Fu St. Luckily my local post office is
already hip to the scheme.
If lost mail, lost friends, lost potential soulmates, lost business
contacts, etc. etc. are cool and ok, then I suppose “any old” pinyin
will do. However if you feel this is unacceptable, then you will feel
like me, that only many years of using a world standard, available
inside and outside taiwan, is the only way to slowly clean up the
mess. [nothing to do with simplified chinese here, don’t bring that
up].
Blasters! I can’t seem to edit the hong URL to
http://jidanni.org/lang/pinyin/19990420hongweiren.html
quote[quote] I say one who grasps Taiwan independence (at least the way I grasp it) would say true Taiwan independence means not having to check each time to make sure the neighbor's kid Larry doesn't like something before it is OK for us to like it. Aren't you still being controlled by Larry that way? [/quote]Yes, this is a very good point. I think this is just one of the POLITICAL reasons why Taiwan should choose Pinyin. Why act like we care what China says about it?
Originally posted by Dan Jacobson:
quote[quote]I say one who grasps Taiwan independence [at least the way I grasp it] would say true Taiwan ndependence means not having to check each time to make sure the neighbor’s kid Larry doesn’t like something before it is OK for us to like it. Aren’t you still being controlled by Larry that way?[/quote]Whatever. I think Taiwan duli and Hanyu Pinyin are two separate issues. With your vehement denials, you link the two and give them a legitimacy that they wouldn’t normally have. It’s like saying “Hi I’m Dan and my parents aren’t blood relations! Really!” Or possibly “What a beautiful day - not a cloud in the sky and thank God for Taiwan Independence!” Anybody remember “subliminal message man” from Saturday Night Live many moons back? Well, you’re about as subtle as that guy.Everybody who reads your stuff knows you’re an intelligent guy, but you need to polish up your act a little or you’ll be treated like the (village) idiot savant. I know, I know… “ren bu ke mao xiang” Well, that’s a perfect world. In the real world, people have to look well-groomed, speak clearly, and stay focused if they want others to listen without smirking.
Originally posted by Feiren:
quote[quote]I would like to know whose version of this "standard" Taiwan should adopt? The LC version or China's version (where ci2 are to be written solid)? I'm simply observing that this supposedly universal standard has more than one version.[/quote] I've already explained this twice: This is not an issue that specifically concerns hanyu pinyin. This is a matter of style, not system. (Are the rest of you reading this thread similarly confused about this point? I thought I was clear.) Let me try one more time.There is not more than one version of hanyu pinyin here. What the U.S. Library of Congress has done is break up the syllables of Mandarin (note: not of hanyu pinyin, although that is what is used to represent Mandarin). If the Library of Congress were following the same principles but a different romanization system, the situation would be exactly the same. “Words” (ci2) would be divided in Yale, gwoyeu romatzyh, hanyu pinyin, tongyong pinyin, MPS II, whatever.
Style, not system. Although I think this is an important style point, it has nothing to do with the choice among various romanization systems.
quote[quote]In my reading of the LC's introduction, they are dancing around the issue of whether Hanyu Pinyin is an international standard.[/quote]I don’t see that at all.
quote[quote]As you are probably aware, the decision to adopt Hanyu Pinyin was very controversial, and a certain amount of reading between the lines is justified for a statement that was crafted to smooth over differences of opinion. [/quote]Back in 1980, when the changeover was first proposed, the conversion might have been controversial. But it is controversial no longer, not to the vast majority of people in the field. Librarians, catalogers especially, are deeply conservative (in the best sense of the word); they do not make changes quickly, lightly, without deep study, or without good reason.
quote[quote]Taiwan is not a member of the ISO, and ISO standards are largely for quality management anyway. The point is that most people feel that standards should be developed through a process something like the one that the ISO describes.[/quote]You’re the one who brought up the ISO.
quote[quote]Hanyu Pinyin has become the defacto standard simply because of China's size.[/quote]Although China’s size is a factor, hanyu pinyin is a clear improvement over Wade-Giles and the mess of various other systems and sloppiness that still plague Taiwan but not the rest of the world now. It is a good system that came at a time when it was clear that the old system was inadequate. It works. Foreigners like it. It’s well supported. That is why it became the international standard.
I’m pleased to note that you at least acknowledge hanyu pinyin as “the defacto standard.”
quote[quote]Your examples of alternative traffic light systems and underwear worn outside are off the mark. Traffic lights are non-ideological. People don't feel that the color of traffic lights has much to do with their identity. Language issues, however, are very different.[/quote]I’m sticking with my analogy. If this has become politicized, it’s because some people have chosen to make it so, not because of anything inherent in the issue.
quote[quote]The success of any romanization scheme in Taiwan will depend on whether it is taught in the schools as it is (more or less) in China. Otherwise, Taiwanese will never use pinyin themselves correctly and we will continue to have the confusion that we see now on street signs and name cards. [/quote]This is an interesting issue, but a separate one.
quote[quote]I'm not suggesting that it supplant Bopomofo by the way.[/quote] Neither am I.And in a different entry Feiren wrote:
quote[quote]Of course, the symbols will represent different sounds[/quote] Of course? But tongyong's whole raison d'etre is that it can supposedly present [i]one[/i] system that is [i]consistent[/i] across all the languages of Taiwan.Represent different sounds? Sheesh. This reminds me of the old Monty Python line, “No, it’s spelled ‘Raymond Luxury-Yacht’ but it’s pronounced ‘Throatwarbler Mangrove.’”
I can’t believe that the DPP might choose Li Yingyuan, current secretary of the Executive Yuan, to possibly be Mayor Ma’s opponent.
I mean isn’t this just playing into my hands, which are armed with evidence like http://jidanni.org/lang/pinyin/images/19990729xuanxia.jpg
where he holds a news conference against the use of China’s X, little aware of the X that his team hung on XuChang St., steps away from Taibei Main Station [can somebody please take a photo for our web presentation?] this and other backtracking of their Laurel and Hardy team means that almost one third of the 600 Taibei street names must be changed from the ones they themselves originally hung back when mayor A-bian let them go wild. E.g. “ZhongSiao” now must become “JhongSiao” because “ZhongSiao” apparently wasn’t far enough from communist “ZhongXiao” in retrospect for them, even after they hung kilometer after kilometer of signs. But wait, why no X in Siao, but yes X in Xu? Well, as their mastermind Mr. Yu was busy getting his signs hung, his scheme was evolving, as I am sure it is still today.
Unlike my stale hanyu pinyin, which just stays the same.
Their same team brought you “HerPing Rd.”, which also please somebody find a sign if any are left, and take a digital picture or scan it in, as it is great for “Is this how you want to spell Heping Rd.?” “No”
“OK, then why is it hanging there? Who hung it?” “I don’t know”
“Your team hung it, Sir. See, right there in your documents… do you think it is environmentally sound to hang signs and then later change how you want to spell them? One third of them?”
Anyway, this Li Yingyuan must be stopped at any price. We must not let Taibei street signs “get all messed up on drugs” again.
Oh, by the way, Jeff Geer offered these comments: Perhaps the street sign debacle is just evidence of the ROC inability to conform to any standards of rule of law. It is not so much the final form of romanized pinyin, but the fact that these official signs are legal guideposts to the driver.
These drivers are the ones whom care if the politicians do or don’t follow any uniform standards when they’re establishing rules of the road.
I get a little less responsive about supporting someone who might support my ideas - but obviously has neither the power nor the will to make things happen - like clean up sex - knocking on hotel doors in the middle of the night while several hundred “Barber Shops” remain in business.
Just a quick reminder. If you go with Tongyong pinyin, “Jingle bells”
will become “Zingle bells”: NanJing East Road will become NanZing East
Road. “Hi there. Is that lisp real or are you just trying to sound
kinky?”
Originally Dr. Yu was only going to “fix” Q and X, but I told him real
linguists would laugh if he didn’t work with whole sets, so “fix” all
of them. or better yet, fix non of them. Anyway, sure enough, not
long afterwards, J got “fixed” too, and we also see “Jh” appearing,
which indeed shows much creativity for him. That must have cost him
several kilowatts of brain power.
quote[quote]Dan Jacobson wrote of some changes to tongyong.[/quote] He changed it [i]again[/i]?! [i]Nanjing[/i] would become [i]Nanzing[/i]? Are you serious? When did this happen? If j has shifted to z, then what became of the old z? Could you post a link to this?
He changed it again?! Nanjing would become Nanzing? Are you serious?
When did this happen?
well, at least before the mid Oct. 2000 events. Wait a second, if he
wants to be uniform, and Jh is now in there, that means that he is
using
jh ch sh rh [Hanyu: zh ch sh rh]
ji ci si [Hanyu: Ji qi xi ]
z c s [Hanyu: z c s ]
I now seem to recall a “J has returned” article I wrote, maybe that
explains it. It must have been with that flash of light that he can
appear to be more logical and regular than hanyu pinyin for those that
still listen to him.
Well. I suppose I have stepped on a landmine just like Hong Weiren
did, slandering and misrepresenting poor Yu. (Because we don’t happen
to have his latest masterpiece update in our hands, or the last
version left too deep an impression.) Just like when I was scolded
for spelling Yu’s name wrong (because I gave up on trying to track it
metamorphisms).
Can you do me a favor. Since you are Mr. www.romanization.com, can
you call or better yet visit Yu at Academia Sinica’s Ethnology
Dept. and find out just what his “final” schemes are?
Be sure to get all his plans, Kejia A B (and C?), Minnan A B (and C?
or is B even ready?), and Mandarin (only one plan, no choices
allowed). Ask him if Ji is OK for hakka if it is OK for Mandarin.
Ask him if he has any particular country in mind to flee too if even
the DPP one day realize that he is less of an asset than a source of
endless confusion.
If j has shifted to z, then what became of the old z? Could you post a link to this?
Anyways, so perhaps Nanzing was even too ridiculous for Yu. Well,
still I think it is bad for the eyes and brain to ask us to call
money “cian2”. As proof of how he destroys minority languages, what
am I to do with Taizhong’s Dongshi hakka, which has both cien, and
qien.
I would post a link, but I don’t trust his links.
This month the Mandarin board will have its members rechosen. I think
the turkey content will increase. The only certain non-turkey is Luo
Zhaojin.
Anyways, being Mr. www.romanization.com I’d say it is high time with a
personal interview with Yu. Appear to “maintain an open mind” or else
he might realize that this friendship might turn out like with
Jacobson, who travels hundreds of km. just for the 2 minute
opportunity to make him look silly at conferences.
It’s amazing that this debate is still going on. I’m of mixed feeling about the whole thing. Most of all, I have to say that as far as I’m concerned making a consistent, 100% clear, easy-to-use system of romanization for Chinese isn’t on the level of rocket science. that Taiwan has been unable to do it until now is mind-boggling. deciding on ONE such system should have been done years ago and should certainly be done now.
Certainly hanyu pinyin IS such a system, only very minor complaints could possibly be made against it. I don’t think it’s the only possible good system, and I am willing to accept that there could be overriding political reasons weighing against it’s adoption. the system used will not be solely for the convenience of foreigners. taiwan exists in a complicated political environment in which such issues do have a deeper context. i accept this and so basically will take no issue with a government decision not to use hanyu pinyin. perhaps my experience here has colored my opinion, as my wife comes from a Taiwanese-speaking family, and I can speak well enough, my 6-year-old daughter is fluent. I am disgusted when i find out students of mine cannot communicate directly with their own grandparents because they have not been taught their mother tongue. the efforts that are being made towards taiwanese education are great and if students can learn a single romanization system to cover all dialects, I find that to be of inestimable value. furthermore it is not in any way impossible as has been suggested above. believe me this is not rocket science we’re talking about here. I’m sure this is true for the hakka tongue as well.
unfortunately tongyong pinyin is not the right system. this thread has forced me to look into it further and i have to say that it sucks. what a shame.
Well, I did it. I telephoned the KMT Taibei bureau [www.kmttp.org.tw]
and they put my site on their message board… I am particularly
drawing their attention to
http://jidanni.org/lang/pinyin/images/19990729xuanxia.jpg
which shows mayoral campaign opponent Li Yingyuan’s role as proponent of street sign confusion. [Even their XuChang St. sign is still hanging to this day as they campaigned against “X”.]
Actually this is my scheme to end the KMT. [They would become the GMD under all leading brand pinyins 
].
Forget the romanization problems and perhaps just push to institute English as the second language of Taiwan gov’t. Thus the English translation of Roosevelt Road is very accurate and the issue is of a second “national language” as contrasted against follies of the first national language.
Just translate the Chinese into English, and thus everyone is then learning to drive by English and Chinese rules of the road.
Technically inproficient and no adherance to the rule of law makes Mandarin romanization debates look like the Legislative Yuan…as nothing is ever done right in Chinese (eg. traditional vs. simple characters).
quote:
Originally posted by Dan Jacobson: ...mayoral campaign opponent Li Yingyuan's role as proponent of street sign confusion...
Ah…Li Yingyuan. I think I have somewhere a picture of Li posing under a Japanese war flag - proudly used by Li on his own leaflet when standing for election in Taibei County. If I can find it I’ll scan it and send it to you.
cannot communicate directly with their own grandparents because
And what if we ask them how do I spell their name… gee, Taiwan
students can’t spell their own name and because it is a “landmine” to
the education minister, they apparently will never know until they
make some wild guess on a credit card application at some market, and
that sticks for the rest of their life.
they have not been taught their mother tongue. the efforts that are
being made towards taiwanese education are great and if students can
learn a single romanization system to cover all dialects, I find that
Bet you 1000 NT’s that you can’t make one without some compromises, or
otherwise you’ll need the full Intentional Phonetic Alphabet.
to be of inestimable value. furthermore it is not in any way
impossible as has been suggested above. believe me this is not rocket
That’s what they all say. Then when I ask to see their plan they
realize the impossibility. You won’t get much closer than some of my
abandoned plans on my webpages.
science we’re talking about here. I’m sure this is true for the hakka
tongue as well. unfortunately tongyong pinyin is not the right
system. this thread has forced me to look into it further and i have
to say that it sucks. what a shame
can you continue to look even further and do the exercise of trying to
come up with your own system. You will probably want to chose a well
known system as a basis. You will probably start with Hanyu Pinyin,
like even Yu did [else where did he get ZCS?] then you will say "can
we regularize the i vs. ii thingy, uei vs. ui, etc… OK, then we hit
Minnanyu. What do we do with the BB/B/P delemma? Do we accept BB or
do we force a P, Ph into mandarin? or is it somehow fair to borrow
Hakka’s V? etc. etc.
Wait, isn’t English spelling reform much more in need of our services?
Or how about fixing up all those Chinese chars. whose phonetic part
has “drifted”. Wait, why is it OK to make bold revisions to Hanyu
Pinyin? Must because nobody really uses it, at least nobody we know.
I hear that there are a lot of users, but that might just be communist
propaganda. Good thing the government is still blocking their books
and tourist visits. If there really were a lot of people using it,
then wouldn’t we get laughed at, just like if we were to declare that
“7” is called “six”.
Anyway, give it a spin. Can you justify why one would fix hanyu
pinyin before English spelling? It could only be that hanyu pinyin
users are so few that it wouldn’t inconvenience them if we adjusted
their system… ok, they don’t have to use our revisions … that’s
funny, a lot of work to make some changes to the symbols to represent
the same language… it is so much more same than the various
Englishs, also the whole definition of Guoyu was an effort to be the
same. Same same same no matter what little quibbles Yu makes.
Anyways, I’m 100% for Taiwan Independence, Republic of Taiwan,
etc. but I think the whole “figure out some way to be different”
pinyin exercise is stOOpid. Anyways, my man, where’s your pinyin
plan?
It’s like the USA, still can speak “English” and not be England.
There, that’s not rocket science.
So why don’t they ban Mandarin instead of playing some spelling jokes?
Why don’t they rid Taibei of all the streets with China place names
instead of arguing how to spell them?
Anyways, in your exercise you will be faced with several choices,
shall I use letter 1 or letter 2. Letter 1 will be the hany pinyin
usage. To support letter 2 one would need to lean back on supposed
“uniform western spelling habits”… anyways, you will slowly see why
one ended up with hanyu pinyin, and why it is better than a
“compromised system not to offend tourists”.
Anyways, give it a whirl.
P.S. pinyin or A or B will have little effect on kids learning the
mother tounge. I help do the pinyin for retired teacher Xu’s local
Hakka textbooks and we know very well that pinyin or zhuyin is the
last thing the kids would ever actually look at.
taiwan exists in a complicated political environment in which such
issues do have a deeper context
I think we could get farther along the road to Taiwan Independence if
those in charge would realize what China things are good and what
China things are bad. Hanyu pinyin is good. It comes in very handy
when one uses Mandarin. There is no good reason to not use it if one
insists on talking Mandarin.
You see, they [DPP] haven’t lived anywhere else, and still think that
language==nationality. Well, in that case, we’ll never fit in, and
even if we do, we won’t have black hair still then. Why don’t we
instead educate them that where we come from, they already found out
that language and passport are independent…
Ah…Li Yingyuan. I think I have somewhere a picture of Li posing
under a Japanese war flag - proudly used by Li on his own leaflet
when standing for election in Taibei County. If I can find it I’ll
scan it and send it to you.
No my man, you want to submit it to City KMT Headquaters. As you can
see after I posted Li’s damaging “Xuan Xia” war on the letter X (that
Li’s team hung on Taibei streets in the first place, duh) to
http://www.kmttp.org.tw/kmttp/message.asp , it now has gotten copied
to http://www.kmttp.org.tw/images/19990729xuanxia.jpg . Ah, so nice
to have the Party working for me.
cannot communicate directly with their own grandparents because
And what if we ask them how do I spell their name… gee, Taiwan
students can’t spell their own name, they apparently will never know until they
make some wild guess on a credit card application
You seem to miss my point… as I said above, Taiwan definitely needs a 100% consistent system of Mandarin Romanization. I’m not sure why you bring this up above, but for the record I don’t think signing one’s name on a @#$!%^ credit card in any way compares with the importance of communicating with one’s grandparents. in any way.
they have not been taught their mother tongue. the efforts that are
being made towards taiwanese education are great and if students can
learn a single romanization system to cover all dialects, I find that
Bet you 1000 NT’s that you can’t make one without some compromises, or
otherwise you’ll need the full Intentional Phonetic Alphabet.
You’re on! Challenge accepted. It will give me something to do besides trying to hit exactas at the Meadowlands
I reserve the right to dispute the definition of “compromise”
but I will accept no less than 100% consistency in a Romanization even if I have to start using the Martian alphabet
to be of inestimable value. furthermore it is not in any way
impossible as has been suggested above. believe me this is not rocket
can you continue to look even further and do the exercise of trying to
come up with your own system. You will probably want to chose a well
known system as a basis. You will probably start with Hanyu Pinyin,
like even Yu did [else where did he get ZCS?] then you will say "can
we regularize the i vs. ii thingy, uei vs. ui, etc… OK, then we hit
Minnanyu. What do we do with the BB/B/P delemma? Do we accept BB or
do we force a P, Ph into mandarin? or is it somehow fair to borrow
Hakka’s V? etc. etc.
I personally find it 100% unnecessary to modify HAnyu Pinyin as a MAndarin Rominization, as I said above it is a perfect system in this regard. I will not modify it for this purpose in any way, I will attempt to use it as a basis for a Minnanyu Rominization. I am considering using Bh for the soft B, gee that took me 5 seconds to think of, and I won’t have to use Hakka’s V whatever that is
sorry you’re on your own with Hakka
Wait, isn’t English spelling reform much more in need of our services?
Or how about fixing up all those Chinese chars. whose phonetic part
has “drifted”. Wait, why is it OK to make bold revisions to Hanyu
Pinyin? Must because nobody really uses it, at least nobody we know.
I hear that there are a lot of users, but that might just be communist
propaganda. Good thing the government is still blocking their books
and tourist visits. If there really were a lot of people using it,
then wouldn’t we get laughed at, just like if we were to declare that
“7” is called “six”.
Speaking of stoopid dude. In any case, as I said above I see no need to modify Hanyu Pinyin as a Mandarin rominization, wish I could say the same for the Romanization of English though! (tho)
Anyways, I’m 100% for Taiwan Independence, Republic of Taiwan,
etc. but I think the whole “figure out some way to be different”
pinyin exercise is stOOpid. Anyways, my man, where’s your pinyin
plan?
Settle down, you’ll get one. Personally, I think the idea of changing Hanyu pinyin just for the sake of changing it is stupid too. But when you think of all the digs that Taiwan gets from China over totally mindless nonsense, just unbelievably petty garbage taken to the 800th degree, I can understand this type of mindset.
So why don’t they ban Mandarin instead of playing some spelling jokes?
Why don’t they rid Taibei of all the streets with China place names
instead of arguing how to spell them?
Anyways, in your exercise you will be faced with several choices,
shall I use letter 1 or letter 2. Letter 1 will be the hany pinyin
usage. To support letter 2 one would need to lean back on supposed
“uniform western spelling habits”… anyways, you will slowly see why
one ended up with hanyu pinyin, and why it is better than a
“compromised system not to offend tourists”.
I don’t know what “uniform Western spelling habits are”, I have often wondered though if the so often criticised x and q–which I have no problem with whatsoever–have some analog in another Western language? these letters are obviously not readily interpretable to English speakers without knowledge of Chinese, but this is not my major concern, they’ll figure it out soon enough
evil compromises seem to be introduced to Chinese Romanizations in this way, but I have no intention of doing any such thing, a. because it would seem to be very arrogant of me to insist on English analogs for all spellings when the entire world does not consist of native English speakers, b. because it is irrelevant to my concern which is a romanization which Taiwanese children can use to learn Chinese and Taiwanese
P.S. pinyin or A or B will have little effect on kids learning the
mother tounge. I help do the pinyin for retired teacher Xu’s local
Hakka textbooks and we know very well that pinyin or zhuyin is the
last thing the kids would ever actually look at.
This may be true but that doesn’t change the fact that a Romanization will be required and that with all the demands on schoolchildren’s time the burden of learning it should be reduced to the absolute minimum degree possible. Also many Taiwanese words have no commonly recognized character (not to mention Japanese/aboriginal loan words) and if you think you’ve seen compromises, try using Mandarin characters for writing Taiwanese!!! that is a minefield you don’t want to get into and shouldn’t. a good romanization will make the whole thing much easier, you apparantly don’t seem to think this is very important though.
I will accept no less than 100% consistency in a Romanization even if
I have to start using the Martian alphabet
The goal is to use the Roman alphabet, ABC… plus say Ch, Zh, etc.
I personally find it 100% unnecessary to modify Hanyu Pinyin as a
Mandarin Romanization, as I said above it is a perfect system in
this regard. I will not modify it for this purpose in any way, I
Yes, this is my thinking. It also has the most users worldwide. One
would think that they should be counted. Unless one were to go out of
one’s way to throw a monkey wrench in, as Yu does.
will attempt to use it as a basis for a Minnanyu Romanization. I am
considering using Bh for the soft B, gee that took me 5 seconds to
think of, and I won’t have to use Hakka’s V whatever that is
You will arrive at
http://jidanni.org/lang/pinyin/19970607tai_ke_doc.zip
or http://jidanni.org/lang/pinyin/19970607tai_ke_htm.zip I used bb.
sorry you’re on your own with Hakka
adding hakka is the simplest part. Yu also claims to cover the
Yuan2zhu4min2 languages, but I opened up the book and saw he was just
using somebody else’s system, inconsistent with his other hodgepodge,
and calling it also tongyong too, one of his favorite habits.
of all the digs that Taiwan gets from China over totally mindless
nonsense, just unbelievably petty garbage taken to the 800th degree, I
can understand this type of mindset.
what if one day China accepts Taiwan independence just like the UK
accepts the US. Won’t it seem silly for Taiwan to have crippled
romanization just because some silly squabble years ago?
Anyways, if you’re like me and don’t wish to change the overloaded “i”
of hanyu pinyin [si vs. xi], then you’ll have to do something very
ugly to Minnanyu, if you want to use s there… but wait, there is a
bigger problem, because of the overloaded i in hanyu pinyin, if you
declare hanyu pinyin to be the mandarin component of your personal
“tongyong” system, you will already have violated the “tongyong”
guiding principle of “one to one sound to symbol” mapping, even
“across different languages”.
My solution at least now is “tell the user that just like Spanish and
English, you got to remember what language you are reading a specific
symbol in”. With this relaxation it is much more easy to design
things. Of course the tongyong sales pitch is that he doesn’t need
this relaxation. Of course he uses the relaxation anyway, except in
the case of mandarin, where he pulls out his aforementioned
sales pitch as the reason why he must throw in his monkey wrench,
and like he told me “it has come the turn for mandarin to bend
[rang4bu4] in favor of minnanyu.” How about nobody bending for
anybody else, or else you must still make the systems conflicting to a
small extent because you have a limited set of symbols and don’t want
something too ugly.
So, what we are using for local hakka is Luo Zhaojin’s system, where
sii=mandarin si, which frees si and xi to coexist … anyway, all we
said is that no, we don’t need to change hanyu pinyin for mandarin,
and yes, our system conflicts with hanyu pinyin, but only for the
finals [yun4mu3], where apparently it is OK for hanyu pinyin to
conflict with itself. No, we don’t conflict with hanyu pinyin’s
initials [sheng1mu3], which I think is part of the hanyu pinyin
philosophy which seems: sheng1mu3: very strict. yun4mu3: can be
overloaded [i, u], or abbreviated [uei->ui]…
This may be true but that doesn’t change the fact that a
Romanization will be required and that with all the demands on
schoolchildren’s time the burden of learning it should be reduced
to the absolute minimum degree possible.
Which is why the result i think the eduaction ministry ended up with
is zhuyinfuhao extensions to cover minnanyu and hakka, which is a much
more consistent way of doing things that the romanization
exercise… especially when, can you believe this, tongyong was
advertised to be consistent all the way to English too. It was
promoted as being an implementation of one of the mumblings of overall
expert in everything, Li Yuanzhe, President of Academia Sinica.
You see, that’s one of Yu’s problems, once you sign one of his
petitions you never know where your name will end up. In
http://jidanni.org/lang/pinyin/1999letters.html
I ask “It’s 11 PM, Li Yuanzhe, do you know where your signature is?”
Since my goal is to make sure when a romanization system is used for
mandarin, it is hanyu pinyin, one may ask how I feel about
zhuyinfuhao? zhuyinfuhao for mandarin is not a competitor and indeed
buys us more time until the recent phony mandarin other leading brand
systems fade away.
Anyways, “the kids won’t be able to learn Taiwanese unless the
spelling of Mandarin is changed.” Sounds like some pretty weird kids.
And oh what a coincidence, “it has to be changed anyway because it is
China Pinyin”. Can someone please go to Academia Sinica and check on
the mental health of Dr. Yu. It would only be a few km. trip for most
of you.
try using Mandarin characters for writing Taiwanese!!! that is a
minefield you don’t want to get into and shouldn’t. a good
romanization will make the whole thing much easier, you apparently
don’t seem to think this is very important though.
sure, I’m all for it, as long as a “good romanization system for
Taiwanese” isn’t used as an excuse for throwing a monkey wrench into
hanyu pinyin for Mandarin.
I say “you leave my Mandarin alone, and I’ll leave your Taiwanese
alone.” “I won’t come up with any more plans on how to spell
Taiwanese, and you don’t come up with any more plans on how to spell
Mandarin.”
Now is May 2002, the month when the Mandarin board [www.edu.tw/mandr]
will be rechosen. I say appoint Yu as the Taiwanese romanization
czar, as long as he can keep his hands off those Mandarin road signs.
But oh darn, his program not only is to implement his miracle spelling
system [“hard at work working it out” still I bet], but also to get
all those commie ZH’s off the signs [which he used to think were neat
when he hung them up and www.smcbook.com.tw helped him print all those
tiny textbooks.
Anyway, if you don’t figure a way to be different than hanyu pinyin
for your Mandarin part, then the tongyong team will find little use
for your work. “What? Be different just to be different? That
doesn’t seem like something a humane linguist would engage in. More
like an evil scientist.”
P.S. there is a pinyin discussion thread in news:sci.lang , use
groups.google.com to check.
May I enter a brief plea?
Everyone, please use the QUOTE tags when replying. It’s getting more and more difficult to tell who is saying what, with some lines beginning with >, others with nothing (even though they may be part of the same quote), and others with various other amounts of >.
To quote someone else, put [quote] before the relevant section, and [/quote] at the end – but you’ll have to leave out the asterisks for this to work. Repeat as necessary.
Thanks.