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From: deb5@midway.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff)
Subject: Re: Transliteration [was: Re: Pinyin
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References: <7fybe9ur4n.fsf@phoenix.cs.hku.hk> <7fohf359nc.fsf@phoenix.cs.hku.hk> <E3LIoB.CAM@midway.uchicago.edu> <7fzpymb1mn.fsf@phoenix.cs.hku.hk>
Date: Tue, 7 Jan 1997 06:17:53 GMT
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In article <7fzpymb1mn.fsf@phoenix.cs.hku.hk>,
Lee Sau Dan ~{@nJX6X~} <sdlee@cs.hku.hk> wrote:
>>>>>> "Daniel" == Daniel von Brighoff <deb5@midway.uchicago.edu> writes:
>
>    Daniel> 	That's not true.  Bopomofo are *not* like characters;
>    Daniel> people don't automatically associate certain
>    Daniel> pronunciations with them.  All you would need do is teach
>    Daniel> them the nearest equivalents in their speech.  Take a name
>    Daniel> like Nixon which, IIRC, is Nikesen in Mandarin, making it
>    Daniel> Neihaksam in Cantonese.  In Bopomofo, it is
>    Daniel> <n><i><k><e><s><en>.  If you teach a Cantonese equivalents
>    Daniel> in his language for Bopomofo, he will be able to come out
>    Daniel> with the pronunciation [ni:kh@s@n], which is a
>    Daniel> considerable improvement over [nejh@ks@m].
>
>This doesn't always  work.   For example, the   Cantonese "h" can   be
>mapped to the Pinyin "x", "k" and "h".   Then Pinyin "x" can be mapped
>to Cantonese "s" or "h".  

What do you mean "mapped"?  Do you mean that where a Cantonese word has
[h], a Mandarin cognate might have <x>, <k>, or <h>?  This is the problem
I'm trying to get around.  Right now, characters are used for trans-
literation, resulting in monstrosities like 'Neihaksam'.  If Bopomofo were
used, some (obviously not all) of these difficulties could be avoided.

Teach a Cantonese speaker that the bopomofo symbol that looks like the
radical han3 (the radical in yuan2 "source, plain") has the value of the
first sound in 'ha\' "shrimp".  Teach him that the symbol that looks like
a letter 'x' has the value of of the final/rhyme in 'gu/' "aunt".  And so
forth.  When he sees them together, he might still say [fu] despite his
best efforts not to, but at least he won't say  [wU].  And he'll say
[h:i] or [Ci:] instead of [hEj] or [s@j] where Pinyin has <xi>, [kh@]
or [kha:] instead of [hak], [ha:], or [fO] where it has <ke>, and so
forth.

>Similarly, the mapping between finals is not
>simple, either.  How about tones? 

Tones are shown in bopomofo by means of diacritics.  You could just leave
them out and let speakers choose the most natural tone contour for each
word.  Or add extra symbols for Cantonese tones and let Mandarin speakers
ignore them.

>The loss of the 4th ancient tone in
>Mandarin  makes the matter worse.   There is no simple one-one mapping
>between Cantonese phonemes and Mandarin phonemes.  Similarly, both the
>Pinyin "h" and "f" are mapped to "h" in Minnan.  The Pinyin "x" can be
>mapped to the Minnan "s" and ZERO initial.  The mappings between sound
>systems in different Chinese dialects is quite complicated.

When there is no equivalent sound in a dialect, speakers will just have to
substitute whatever is closest.  So the bopomofo symbols for <s>, <sh>,
and <x> might be pronounced alike is many dialects; it's still better than
having them end up as [h] or [t] or [th] or whatever depending on which
cognate character was used to transliterate.

>    Daniel> 	Besides, don't all countries with Chinese as an
>    Daniel> official language have the goal of making all citizens
>    Daniel> Mandarin speakers anyway?
>
>How many such  countries are there?  I  know only China  and Singapore
>(and Taiwan, if you dare  to claim it as  an independent country).  
	
	Only two or three, true, but high in population and influence.
And what else do these three governments agree on?

>In Singapore, although the government is promoting Mandarin within the
>Chinese population,  Minnan is still   the  major dialect there.   

Now it is.  In two or three generations...?

>For Taiwan,  yes the  people  have been encouraged  to speak Mandarin.
>However, the people in Taiwan  speaks a dialect  in which "zh" is  not
>distinguished from "z", "sh"  is not distinguished  from "s"  and "ch"
>not from "c".  Moreover, Taiwan people are now becoming aware of their
>own vernacular -- Taiwanese (a variant of Minnan).  These years, radio
>channels broadcasting in Minnan are being established.  There are more
>and more Minnan ads on the TV.

Taiwanese Mandarin is less different from Beijing Mandarin than dialects
spoken 150 miles from Beijing.  More Taiwanese may be using Hoklo, but
almost all of these speak Mandarin as well.

>In  Hong Kong, which is  going to be returned to  China  in the coming
>July, Cantonese is still the dominating dialect.  Similarly, in Macau,
>which  is  going to be  returned  to China in  1999,  Cantonese is the
>lingua franca.

Cantonese is the "dominating dialect" in Canton, for that matter, but what
do people speak in official capacities?  In the army?

>In mainland China?   Most  people there  speak some Mandarin,  because
>this it the medium of  instruction of all  schools.  However, not  all
>people can speak Mandarin well.  Very often,  they speak Mandarin with
>a strong  local accent,  which can  be  strong  enough  to make  it  a
>different dialect of Mandarin.

These are all just cavils.  The point is that the vast majority of the
Chinese-speaking public has at least a rudimentary acquaintance with
Mandarin pronunciation and chances are very good that this acquaintance
will grow with time.  This means it's not unreasonable to base the
official transliteration system on Mandarin.  After all, that's the basis
for all standard written communication.

>    Daniel> 	I don't see that I implied this; I certainly didn't
>    Daniel> mean to. I think it's best to be familiar with all kinds
>    Daniel> of scripts.  English speakers would benefit as much from
>    Daniel> learning Bopomofo or some characters as Chinese speakers
>    Daniel> would from learning Bopomofo or the Latin alphabet.
>
>Theoretically, this is true.  However, in reality, what's the attitude
>of English speakers to Chinese characters and Bopomofo?

I did my best to sum up the views of the English-speaking majority in
another post:  Chinese characters are little pictures that represent whole
words.  Bopomofo doesn't exist.  Ignorant views, to be sure, but what do
you expect from hoi polloi?  If you want your system to be practical, you
have to anticipate the reactions of the lowest common denominator.

-- 
	 Daniel "Da" von Brighoff    /\          Dilettanten
	(deb5@midway.uchicago.edu)  /__\         erhebt Euch
				   /____\      gegen die Kunst!
