Depending what you mean by “basic” chinese (:
Here is another strong argument in favor of zhuyin over pinyin:
[quote=“robert”]So I have just basically started learning Chinese. My teacher has told me I am not to use any form of pinyin at ALL because she told me its not the ‘right’ way to learn Chinese. For example, many Asians who learn English and try to spell out English words in their native language never end up speaking fluently or pronouncing it correctly. Instead shes got me going basics, like reading and writing out my bur pur mur fur’s.
The thing is I don’t have the option of doing it differently with her as she sets the rules. I just want some other opinions on her teaching methods. Is this a good way to start off learning?[/quote]
Yes it’s good. I learnt this way. Also many keyboards have the ㄅㄆㄇㄈ ㄉㄊㄋ and if you learn your phonics this way it’s also easy to type in Chinese characters. I have not learnt pinyin and I don’t know any local Taiwanese who use it. Doesnt mean Pinyin is perhaps equal, but the local teaching standard of ㄅㄆㄇㄈ is really quick and easy to learn.
Ironlady has the lazy eye which goes right to the Pinyin, as I cant read Pinyin my lazy eye just goes right to the Chinese characters.
:roflmao: Come to Jiayi and show me ONE sign that uses Hanyu Pinyin…[/quote]
Even this stupid website changes the name to chiayi instead of C h i a y i which is on all the signposts
[quote=“Satellite TV”]
Yes it’s good. I learnt this way. Also many keyboards have the ㄅㄆㄇㄈ and if you learn your phonics this way it’s also easy to type in Chinese characters rather than Pinyin. I have not learnt pinyin and I don’t know any Chinese who use it.[/quote]
Er, do you mean you don’t know any TAIWANESE who use it? The few mainlanders [aka “Chinese”]I have met know pinyin, and just last week I was explaining zhuyin to one of them.
[quote=“Satellite TV”][quote=“robert”]So I have just basically started learning Chinese. My teacher has told me I am not to use any form of pinyin at ALL because she told me its not the ‘right’ way to learn Chinese. For example, many Asians who learn English and try to spell out English words in their native language never end up speaking fluently or pronouncing it correctly. Instead shes got me going basics, like reading and writing out my bur pur mur fur’s.
The thing is I don’t have the option of doing it differently with her as she sets the rules. I just want some other opinions on her teaching methods. Is this a good way to start off learning?[/quote]
Yes it’s good. I learnt this way. Also many keyboards have the ㄅㄆㄇㄈ and if you learn your phonics this way it’s also easy to type in Chinese characters rather than Pinyin. I have not learnt pinyin and I don’t know any Chinese who use it.[/quote]
It’s an OK way, at best. No Chinese, Jim? Virtually every Chinese who doesn’t live here uses pinyin. And every expat Taiwanese I knew back home adapted to pinyin so they wouldn’t need to buy special keyboards to input Chinese abroad. Ideally, an expat living in Taiwan should familiarize themself with both systems (and maybe even Tongyong and Wade-Giles as well), so you can get the best of both worlds. Pinyin is far better for inputting Chinese on any English keyboard and most learning resources directed at the western learner utilize pinyin. On the other hand, when locals try to teach you words they will use zhuyin. It really isn’t hard to learn both. There are comparison charts online you can download and study.
:roflmao: Come to Jiayi and show me ONE sign that uses Hanyu Pinyin…[/quote]
Even this stupid website changes the name to Jiayi instead of C h i a y i which is on all the signposts[/quote]
Yeah, the pinyinizer is annoying, especially when it involves official spellings of place names.
[quote=“Rice_Eater”][quote=“Satellite TV”]
Yes it’s good. I learnt this way. Also many keyboards have the ㄅㄆㄇㄈ and if you learn your phonics this way it’s also easy to type in Chinese characters rather than Pinyin. I have not learnt pinyin and I don’t know any Chinese who use it.[/quote]
Er, do you mean you don’t know any TAIWANESE who use it? The few mainlanders [aka “Chinese”]I have met know pinyin, and just last week I was explaining zhuyin to one of them.[/quote]
Yes I meant people here… where I learnt Chinese. Even my classes at university the teachers used ㄅㄆㄇㄈ
Now as I am trained in Malay, which just used the roman alphabet, I can sure attest that learning another set of characters for Mandarin was a bit perplexing in the beginning but did prove very useful.
[quote=“Rice_Eater”]Here is another strong argument in favor of zhuyin over pinyin:
chinesehacks.com/study/learning- … or-zhuyin/[/quote]
Interesting post and site. Thanks for the link!
It seems to me that all those who argue in favor of Pinyin have never bothered to learn zhuyin.
Those who champion zhuyin over pinyin usually know both systems, and being able to truly understand the differences feel zhuyin is the better system.
Are there any out there any of the pinyin supporters on this thread who actually took the time to learn zhuyin well and still feel pinyin is better?
I’ve learned both and believe Pinyin is “better,” as you put it.
[quote=“Rice_Eater”]It seems to me that all those who argue in favor of Pinyin have never bothered to learn zhuyin.
Those who champion zhuyin over pinyin usually know both systems, and being able to truly understand the differences feel zhuyin is the better system.
Are there any out there any of the pinyin supporters on this thread who actually took the time to learn zhuyin well and still feel pinyin is better?[/quote]
Me, for another one. I learned Pinyin properly only after two years of learning through Zhuyin. I got to the stage where I could sight read blocks of Zhuyin as complete syllables, and could read it faster than most Taiwanese people I know. I have no problem using it, and it will always stick with me, but it’s far short of being superior to Pinyin in my opinion, and the only time I use it now is to write down the occasional pronunciation when discussing the language with a Taiwanese person (who generally will not know Pinyin).
You’ve had two refutations, and I’m sure there are a lot of others out there who believe the same, having had experience of both. My preference for Pinyin over Zhuyin is rooted in knowing them both, and finding Pinyin more suitable for my needs. I think your supposition that supporters of Pinyin would see the light if only they opened their eyes is more than a little myopic itself.
[quote=“Taffy”][quote=“Rice_Eater”]It seems to me that all those who argue in favor of Pinyin have never bothered to learn zhuyin.
Those who champion zhuyin over pinyin usually know both systems, and being able to truly understand the differences feel zhuyin is the better system.
Are there any out there any of the pinyin supporters on this thread who actually took the time to learn zhuyin well and still feel pinyin is better?[/quote]
Me, for another one. I learned Pinyin properly only after two years of learning through Zhuyin. I got to the stage where I could sight read blocks of Zhuyin as complete syllables, and could read it faster than most Taiwanese people I know. I have no problem using it, and it will always stick with me, but it’s far short of being superior to Pinyin in my opinion, and the only time I use it now is to write down the occasional pronunciation when discussing the language with a Taiwanese person (who generally will not know Pinyin).
You’ve had two refutations, and I’m sure there are a lot of others out there who believe the same, having had experience of both. My preference for Pinyin over Zhuyin is rooted in knowing them both, and finding Pinyin more suitable for my needs. I think your supposition that supporters of Pinyin would see the light if only they opened their eyes is more than a little myopic itself.[/quote]
Taffy, I looked for early comments by you on this thread and couldn’t find any. I looked through your previous posts and came across those you posted on the glottal stop. I take it you have a background in linguistics. Knowing zhuyin well, what do you prefer about pinyin?
For me it mainly comes down to speed. I can read faster, write faster, and most certainly type faster with Pinyin. This is likely due in bulk to my cultural background and early acquaintance with the Latin alphabet. I’ll leave others to argue which is faster in a vacuum. The other salient point is ubiquity: Pinyin is used in all sorts of areas, for transliteration of place and personal names, for dictionary entries, for textbooks, in academia and beyond—in short, far more widely than Zhuyin.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not anti-Zhuyin. Anyone seriously studying Mandarin in Taiwan should learn both systems. Once you have one, the effort involved in learning the other is minimal. Zhuyin is elegant and interesting, though not as efficient as it might be nor as logical as its proponents often make out, and it is inherently limited in utility. I have never been convinced by the pronunciation argument, i.e. that people who learn via Pinyin end up speaking Mandarin with a heavy first-language accent. I speak German without an English accent, and yet it uses (almost) the same alphabet as English, my mother tongue. Accent is down to application on the part of the pupil, and competence on the part of the teacher, probably with a healthy dose of “talent” for hearing and reproducing the right sounds (though I remain to be convinced that this talent cannot be learned by most people).
I don’t read books in Chinese characters with Zhuyin ruby characters, though I did read a few years ago. I found reading blocks of Pinyin to be easier, and a quicker path to language acquisition. My target was to listen and speak first, and read and write later, so by the time I began to seriously tackle writing I could already speak the language reasonably well. If you’re aiming for simultaneous written/spoken language acquisition, Zhuyin might have some advantages, but I don’t think this is an effective way to learn.
So, why do I prefer Pinyin? Speed, ease of use, and ubiquity.
P.S. I posted on page 3 of this thread, though I didn’t express a preference for one system or the other.
[quote=“Rice_Eater”]It seems to me that all those who argue in favor of Pinyin have never bothered to learn zhuyin.
Those who champion zhuyin over pinyin usually know both systems, and being able to truly understand the differences feel zhuyin is the better system.
Are there any out there any of the pinyin supporters on this thread who actually took the time to learn zhuyin well and still feel pinyin is better?[/quote]
I know both, I can read zhuyin easily enough.
First, let me say that both systems are perfectly functional and basically identical in their approach. They simply use a different set of symbols to achieve that end.
Pinyin is “better” for one reason. For anyone familiar with the Roman alphabet, the learning curve is very low. A great number of people are familiar with the Roman alphabet, while no new learner of Chinese is already familiar with zhuyin. I don’t buy the argument that that familiarity will influence pronunciation in a negative way. You don’t hear progressing learners of Chinese making the kind of pronunciation errors that non-learners make when casually reading names of people or places written in pinyin. Learning zhuyin is not going to be a miracle tool that helps achieve perfect pronunciation. I doubt that learners in mainland China wind up having inferior pronunciation because of pinyin usage. Going out of your way to learn it for some very minor, uncertain benefit doesn’t make sense. The only reason to learn it is that it simply is used here. It’s not very difficult and it helps to know it in a variety of more-or-less minor situations that come up. As a tool for Chinese learning for the average person it doesn’t make much sense.
I know both thoroughly (as well as a number of other Romanization systems using the Western alphabet) and prefer Pinyin.
Zhuyin is a pain to input, and why bother, when Pinyin is functionally equivalent from a linguistic perspective? Also, of course, there is TOP (Tonally Orthographic Pinyin) which is triple-marked for tones. 
Try THAT with Zhuyin…
For teaching, I have no qualms whatsoever with using Pinyin. It’s faster, a lower learning curve as has been mentioned, and assuming students have HEARD enough language before being forced to sound things out on paper, it doesn’t produce foreign accent in and of itself. For my own use, I can enter Pinyin either with numbers (which feeds into various conversion scripts I have online, depending on what I want to do in the end) or using the caps and small letters of TOP, all very quickly. My hunt-and-peck speed with Zhuyin is embarassing.
I am also interested in producing readable blocks of text for teaching use, and for me, Pinyin provides more features that can be used to help the reader (spacing is more obvious, the tone marks are in the middle rather than an afterthought on the end of the syllable, etc.)
[quote=“Tempo Gain”][quote=“Rice_Eater”]It seems to me that all those who argue in favor of Pinyin have never bothered to learn zhuyin.
Those who champion zhuyin over pinyin usually know both systems, and being able to truly understand the differences feel zhuyin is the better system.
Are there any out there any of the pinyin supporters on this thread who actually took the time to learn zhuyin well and still feel pinyin is better?[/quote]
I know both, I can read zhuyin easily enough.
First, let me say that both systems are perfectly functional and basically identical in their approach. They simply use a different set of symbols to achieve that end.[/quote]
Now, that’s one thing people here have forgot to mention so far - the systems are very similar, and a decently educated Taiwanese whith a good knowledge of Bopomofo can learn HYPY just by using the chart, and then it goes fast. My ex picked it up very fast when she had to start typing Chinese in DK.
I learned HYPY in DK, learned Bopomofo here, and dropped the latter ASAP, as I could not see any upside in using it, when I already knew a perfectly good system.
Zhuyin has one major advantage over pinyin. The fact that it fits so neatly next to the character it represents.
I am reading elementary level chapter books written for Taiwanese students or translated into Chinese from English. For example I recently read the Chinese translation of Al Capone Does My shirts translated from the English. I would not have been able to finish it in Chinese if it weren’t for the zhuyin next to the new characters. I was able to flow through the script relatively smoothly with the help of the zhuyin. My listening and speaking vocabulary is much larger than my Chinese sight reading vocabulary and the zhuyin helped me bridge the gap. I wouldn’t have been able to get through it without it and can’t imagine what those densely packed pages of text would have looked like broken up by lines of Pinyin which would not have matched up with Chinese characters because of size differences. For one thing, the book would have needed twice as many pages.
It is the fact that zhuyin is available in so much besides 2nd language text books that gives it so much appeal to me.
[quote=“Rice_Eater”]It seems to me that all those who argue in favor of Pinyin have never bothered to learn zhuyin.
Those who champion zhuyin over pinyin usually know both systems, and being able to truly understand the differences feel zhuyin is the better system.
Are there any out there any of the pinyin supporters on this thread who actually took the time to learn zhuyin well and still feel pinyin is better?[/quote]
Me too. But everyone already knew that, right?
As for the arguments in the link you provided, um, well:
I don’t think the author quite thought that one through.
Unfortunately, there isn’t presently anything in Hanyu Pinyin to match the frequency and quality of Guoyu Ribao. But that doesn’t have anything to do with the systems themselves.
Yeah, but only in Taiwan and only for traditional characters.
The bulk of the world Chinese teaching/learning market is focused on Simplified characters these days, particularly in the US. Most schools are choosing to teach Simplified characters, probably out of one of two considerations: the idea that China is more important a country than Taiwan on the world stage (maybe) or the idea that simplified characters are “easier to learn” (which I personally believe is incorrect, especially these days where we are focusing on recognition and reading skills over writing-from-memory, which is where the reduced stroke count might have helped.)
Zhuyin is a fine tool to have in one’s toolbox, but for “global” Chinese it is nearly useless except for dealing with Taiwanese people and Taiwanese publications. Anyway, there’s no reason someone who is going to get a bit serious about Chinese should be sticking to just one system. The guy who is going to take only one year of class and never study it again shouldn’t be worrying about which Romanization system to use; he should shut up and concentrate on acquiring what he can in that short time.
It’s sort of like an oboe teacher I had years ago. I asked (having never had private lessons previously – this was in grad school and I was just taking lessons because I had the opportunity for once) whether I would need to learn reed-making. His answer was that given my situation, it was better to concentrate on playing the instrument for the time being.