The University of Hawaii Press has chosen J. Marshall Unger’s recent release Ideogram: Chinese Characters and the Myth of Disembodied Meaning as its book of the month, which means that the book comes at a 20 percent discount (better than Amazon, etc.)!
Read it as an antidote to a lot of the nonsense that is still being spread about Chinese characters.
The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy by DeFrancis took care of this 20 years ago. Or is Unger on to something different?
Yeah, DeFrancis did a great job arguing this point, but the myth is still rampant. Last I checked, the website www.chinavoc.com writes:
What is it about this claim that makes people come out in a rash? It’s a similar reaction to the ‘5000 years of history remark’. I mean they may both be wrong to a large extent… but come on
I’ll be happy to supply my own once my copy of the book arrives. (Most of what I already know about it comes from conversations with the author.) The University of Hawaii Press seems to have sent me my copy by affixing it to a sea turtle rather than shelling out for airmail. But the publisher is comping me, so I can’t complain.
DeFrancis, to his credit, notes the contributions of both Du Ponceau and Boodberg. Some of his discussion of them is in his chapter titled “The Ideographic Myth.”
Alas, I have not been able to read either the Boodberg collection or Du Ponceau’s book, both of which are outside my budget. Someone really should reprint them. If Du Ponceau’s book had received its due when it came out, perhaps there wouldn’t be so much nonsense in circulation about characters.
If the scholarly world were howling again and again with one voice against the ideographic myth, which was held by only a small crowd of people who also placed faith in the healing power of crystals and the like, I might see your point. But that’s not the situation at all.
For more on how the ideographic myth has done damage in academic work, see Mary Erbaugh’s two essays in Difficult Characters: Interdisciplinary Studies of Chinese and Japanese Writing. Damage outside academe is perhaps worse; I would even say that it has political implications for Taiwan’s international situation.
“The Ideographic Myth.”
What an atrocious conflation of the development of a writing system with how the writing system is used.
What a disservice to the reader to make assertions like “can’t be done” with no reason or experimental evidence except hand-waving and appealing to supposed “common sense,” a point of reference that it trashes (as it should) in the same article.
What a foolish thing it is to create a strict separation between the various ways to derive meaning from the written word and assume each writing system must have one or the other; or that if two have both, they must be “the same.”
All in all, a badly composed article that doesn’t say anything at all except that the author detests the word “ideogram.”
[quote=“zeugmite”]“The Ideographic Myth.”
What an atrocious conflation of the development of a writing system with how the writing system is used.
What a disservice to the reader to make assertions like “can’t be done” with no reason or experimental evidence except hand-waving and appealing to supposed “common sense,” a point of reference that it trashes (as it should) in the same article.
What a foolish thing it is to create a strict separation between the various ways to derive meaning from the written word and assume each writing system must have one or the other; or that if two have both, they must be “the same.”
All in all, a badly composed article that doesn’t say anything at all except that the author detests the word “ideogram.”[/quote]
What a vague critique. Care to be more specific?
Come again? I’m interested in your opinion, but you’ll have to be a lot clearer. What article? What assertions? If this is a discussion of the book contents, page numbers and quotations might be useful.
Come again? I’m interested in your opinion, but you’ll have to be a lot clearer. What article? What assertions? If this is a discussion of the book contents, page numbers and quotations might be useful.[/quote]
I’m assuming he’s critiquing Defrancis’ chapter in …Fact and Fantasy…
edited for spelling
Um, I thing he meant Unger.
:eh: I’m so confused !!! :eh:
Um, I thing he meant Unger.[/quote]
Well, the “Ideographic Myth” is the title of the chapter in Defrancis and was mentioned earlier. I’ve also heard similar criticisms of Defrancis from a couple tenured Chinese professors. If he meant Unger I would be surprised.
Ok, so what are these criticisms?
They aren’t my criticisms, I’m just hoping people don’t mistake his remarks for the upcoming book and get all riled up about the wrong thing. I have the Defrancis book, but I don’t have such strong criticism for that chapter personally.
I’ll let him clarify his criticisms if he chooses to do so. I was just hoping to avoid this misundertanding before the real misunderstandings can take place 
Oh yeah, sorry. I thought it would be clear from context. Thanks. This is indeed referring to Defrancis’ chapter in …Fact and Fantasy… (linked above in 'cranky laowai’s post) titled “The Ideographic Myth.”
I think, both the creators of the ideographic “myth” and those who make too much effort to debunk it make the mistake of assuming the Chinese script is somehow “different” in an “aberrant” way. Now wait a sec, you say, surely those who debunk it see the Chinese script as “not so different” from phonetic writing. But you see, they (for example DeFrancis, a radical proponent of alphabetization) do implicitly see the Chinese script as different – they just put it subordinate to the “phonetic scripts” which he claims (giving no good reason) all scripts must be. True, DeFrancis proposes that Chinese script like all scripts start out on the same path, but it is the later path that the Chinese script takes that DeFrancis fails to admit as legitimate. He also therefore fails to acknowledge that the actual use of a writing system such as Chinese characters in non-purely-phonetic ways could be legitimate or even possible. In doing so, he implicitly assumes that the historical development of alphabet writing systems, one of several writing systems in the world, is the one true path, that any other path in writing system development must be following the same. I think this is the kind of thinking that gets people in trouble. If I were a Martian studying “writing” (or any form of semi permanent communication) on Earth, I would see all writings as legitimate developments and I would never presume the differences in the Chinese script, of whatever proportions (including of huge proportions), compared to other writings, to be “mythical,” but simply the way it is. This is the mistake DeFrancis makes: that if it is not “mythical,” then the differences have to be small, illegitimate, abberational, or subordinate compared to something he grew up with.
While some people who have always seen “apples” will believe “oranges” to be mythical, DeFrancis is instead trying hard to say “oranges” are just a kind of “apples.” Both fail to recognize that “apples” and “oranges” are equally “fruits.”
[quote=“zeugmite”]Oh yeah, sorry. I thought it would be clear from context. Thanks. This is indeed referring to Defrancis’ chapter in …Fact and Fantasy… (linked above in 'cranky laowai’s post) titled “The Ideographic Myth.”
[/quote]
DeFrancis is a linguist making an argument that characters are inferior. It is obvious that character-based writing is not the same as alphabetic writing. It is surely true that both systems have diferent advantages and faults. DeFrancis states his belief in this regard in his book, and does back it up with solid arguments. You blithely assume his beliefs are some kind of prejudice. Honesty is the best form of respect.
We know what you think, Tempo Gain. Don’t mix it up with what DeFrancis thinks or what I am criticizing in his book.
oh, i’m not. just pointing out that your criticism is based on an assumption that DeFrancis is being intellectually dishonest or displaying prejudice.
Nothing of the sort. I just said that he made mistake(s) in analysis; never said it was intentional or that he was even aware of it.