User Comments - BillJefferys

Posted on: The Surname Code

@pchenery

There's no rule that will tell you which part of the character is the radical.

Most commonly, it's the part on the left. But it can be the part on the right, on the top (more commonly), on the bottom (more rarely), it can surround the character (e.g., the box around 国 is the radical, but this is quite rare), it can even be buried in the middle of the character (also quite rare, but for example, the traditional form of ai4, '愛' has the  xin1 '心' radical (the simplified character '爱' doesn't have a '心' in it, the radical there is the top four strokes '爪'). Some dictionaries will have lists of characters with difficult to recognize radicals.

['爪' means 'claw', so it seems that Chinese beasts, like Disney characters, have three fingers :-) ]

Of course, if a character is itself a radical, then the whole character is usually its radical. (I can't think of an exception offhand, but maybe someone can come up with one).

There are other ways to look up a character. A popular alternative method is the "four corners" method, and there are dictionaries arranged by that method. I wasn't able to figure it out myself.

I find the MDBG Online Chinese Dictionary a great help. Check it out.

Posted on: The Surname Code

Question 1: I was taught to describe the surname Chen '陈' as '耳东的陈'. In this lesson, the '的' is absent. Is the use of '的' optional?

Question 2: My Chinese surname (given to me by wonderful friends in China) is Zhu '朱', the same as Jenny's. I've been taught to describe it verbally as '红色的朱‘ (the red-colored 'zhu', referring to the fact that the primary meaning of '朱' is 'vermilion' -- a kind of deep red). In Jenny's comment (above) she's describing it with the shape of the character: "我姓朱，撇未朱". So, is there a reason to prefer one description over the other? Is one wrong and the other correct? Has Chinese society or language usage changed over the last 30 years so much as to make one of these usages preferable to the other?

Bill (朱勇谋）

Posted on: Chinese Characters and the History of Sex in China

Speaking of restaurant menus, there is a very nice book on reading Chinese menus: James McCawley's The Eater's Guide to Chinese Characters. It's entirely written in traditional characters.

And for those interested in cursive Chinese, there's Fangyu Wang's Chinese Cursive Script: An Introduction to Handwriting in Chinese. Also traditional, but as one of the amazon.com reviewers points out, a significant fraction of cursive forms found their way into modern simplified forms.

Posted on: Chinese Characters and the History of Sex in China

One thing about the simplified characters: A number of them are based on cursive forms, and so they can help if you are learning cursive.

Posted on: Chinese Characters and the History of Sex in China

Why did the discussion of the oracle bones talk about the "Chao Dynasty?" It should be the "Zhou Dynasty," (周朝), I think. Perhaps the person saying that got mixed up because 朝 (dynasty) is pronounced 'Chao'.

My two cents: I must be amongst the first Americans to have been taught Chinese from a book that used the simplified characters. That was in 1961, long before the U.S. recognized the mainland government. Our teacher obtained some introductory books published on the mainland, which we used. However, he also gave us the traditional forms, which I wrote in the books next to the simplified form. As a result, I ended up learning both. I think it's an advantage to learn both simultaneously. One reason is that you begin to get a better sense of the structure of the characters if you learn both. You become more skilled at recognizing radicals and making connections amongst the phonetic part of the characters as the same phonetic part appears in different characters. You begin to appreciate how the same phonetic part has sometimes the same, sometimes different but similar pronounciations in different characters. Anyway, I am glad that I learned both at the same time.

Of course, if you ever wanted to learn Classical Chinese, you would have to learn the traditional forms.

Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Beijing

By pure coincidence, this week's "Simply Ming" with Chef Ming Tsai cooking show on PBS has a recipe for 炸酱面. It's kind of an Americanized version, using cranberries, however, his father appears on the show and vouchsafed its authenticity as to intent. The recipe hasn't been posted yet, but will probably appear here in a week or two.

Posted on: Introducing a Friend

@changye,

Thanks for the etymological lesson. Very interesting, that!

Posted on: I'm pregnant!

Our baby-producing days are long past, but for those who haven't gone through this experience, I assure you (from my wife's experience) that the nausea of early pregnancy does not only strike in the morning.

Posted on: Transliteration into Chinese and the Long Pinky Fingernail

darylk correctly remarks that Texans in the know call "W" "shrub."

This usage was (as far as I know) first used and popularized by the late Molly Ivins, an unreconstructed liberal columnist whom I knew personally and admired.

She did not mean it as a compliment

It's ironic that "shrub" is actually a "small bush." I'm wondering if the person who coined this term in Chinese knew of Ivins' left-handed "compliment."

Posted on: Come on up!

Listening to this carefully, I noticed that Jenny (as well as the actor) prounounced the 'ti' in 'dianti' in a slightly palatalized way. That is, it isn't exactly the rather clear 't' in English, which is pronounced against the front teeth, but instead is a little fuzzy because the tip of the tongue is touching the hard palate just behind the front teeth.

I wonder if this is just a regional thing, or is more generally true for 'ti'? (May not occur before other vowels).