Question re: hanzi meaning of 生

xiang sheng for 'mister' means "the first one born" (which refers to a boy, as in China it was better to have a boy first). For "doctor" I don't know. Does anyone can explain? Evelyne

生 (shēng) fundamentally means life and by extension, to give birth to. It comes from an ideograph for a growing plant. Thus, in a few words, it has some connected meaning. It also is used as a suffix for certain occupations, as you pointed out. Here it is used for sound, as Chinese is first and foremost a sound-based language. This is not unlike the ubiquitous 子 added to so many nouns. Thus you have 先生: teacher (gentleman, Mr.); 学生: student; 医生: doctor; 书生: scholar. Characters can often lead one astray if one searches for meaning where there is none. More often than not, a character was simply borrowed for it's sound and applied to something totally unrelated to the original meaning.

Also 生 has these meanings(opposite to 熟): not ripe, uncooked, unfamiliar, etc.

Thanks everyone. That's great! AY