User Comments - changye

Posted on: Introducing a Friend

“介绍” (jie4 shao4, introduce) is a little confusing word (for me) since Korean and Japanese people use “绍介” (shao4 jie4, introduce), but not 介绍, in their languages. Of course, 绍介 is also one of those words imported from China in the past, but strangely enough, the branch houses use a back-to-front word of one used in the home house of Chinese characters. Interestingly, 现代汉语词典 lists “绍介” too and defines it as “介绍”. Why?

I hear that even 鲁迅 (lu3 xun4, 1881 - 1936) used both 介绍 and 绍介 in the same sense “introduce” in his writings. According to the information I’ve found on the Internet, the original meaning of “介绍” was “pass a message”, and it later changed into “mediate”, and again changed into “introduce” perhaps after the 10th century. On the other hand, 绍介 has been used in the sense of “introduce” since more than 2,000 years ago.

It went like this. The word “绍介” (introduce) was imported to Korea and Japan perhaps sometime during the fourth and ninth centuries, and the word took root in both Korean and Japanese languages. But after the 10th century, 介绍 also obtained the new meaning “introduce” and it gradually replaced 绍介 in China. This kind of word is not uncommon in the history of cultural transmission among East Asian countries.

China/Japan (all in Chinese simplified characters)

和平/平和，祖先/先祖，买卖/卖买，命运/运命，语言/言语，界限/限界，灭绝/绝灭，日期/期日，士兵/兵士，限制/制限，半夜/夜半，日后/后日，痛苦/苦痛

Posted on: Introducing a Friend

Hi everett and joannah,

I thought that the expansion sentence was grammatically wrong when I read it for the first time this morning. I've been thinking about it since then, but I'm still not sure whether it's wrong or correct.

Probably you can't get the meaning of the "你给你们介绍一下" if you think the "给" means "give" or "toward". Instead, you need to define the "给" as "for" in this case to translate the sentence correctly.

你给(for, on behalf of)你们(yourselves)介绍一下
Would you please introduce yourselves on behalf of all of you!

I look forward to other guy's advice.

Posted on: Chinglish in Reverse and University Culture

Hi aoda,

Thanks for the hilarious stories. As far as I know, the situation seems to be slightly better in Japan than in Taiwan, but I must say that, in general, universities in East Asian countries (China, Korea, Taiwan, Japan) have more or less similar problems, and that is one of the reasons why there are only a few East Asian universities listed on so-called “Top 100 World Universities” and a lot of bright Asian students go to western countries for study and work every year.

Posted on: I'm pregnant!

It’s a nice picture (and a lesson) to start a new week. Thankfully, I didn’t drink so much last evening. 我不想一边吐一边学”吐”字!

“吐” is a multi-reading character (多音字), which has two pronunciations, 吐 (tu4, vomit, throw up) and 吐 (tu3, spit). So, notorious Chinese spitting is “吐痰 (tu3 tan2)”, but not “tu4 tan2”.

Here are some examples; 呕吐 (ou3 tu4, vomit), 吐血 (tu4 xie3, vomit blood), 吐露 (tu3 lu4, confide), 吐核 (tu3 he2, spit out a stone). In short, 吐 (tu3) connotes a “voluntary” action.

Posted on: The New News and Features Jingle Contest Winner!

牛津英汉词典 says "短歌，短曲" (jingle, a short song or tune that is easy to remember and is used in advertising on radio or television).

Posted on: Lesson Preview, New Team Member

Hi lostinasia,

Thanks for the interesting articles. Romanizations of Japanese are rather messed up in Japan too. There are a few romanization systems for Japanese, and people don't care much about them. Anyway, romanizations are NOT for Japanese people, but basically for foreign people! Thankfully, unlike Hanyu pinyin imput method, Japanese IME (in roman-letters) has great tolerance, which is also the reason people don't pay attention to "authentic" romanization.

Posted on: Lesson Preview, New Team Member

Hi dariath,

As you said, Japanese pronunciations are much easier than Chinese ones, but conversely, it might be rather difficult for learners to speak Japanese with natural intonation, paradoxically enough, for the very reason that my mother tongue is not a tone language.

Actually, pitch tones are very important in Japanese, but learners usually don’t care much about them. You will probably find the following web pages intriguing. They are very insightful articles about Chinese and Japanese from the blog “Sinosplice” by our John.     

http://www.sinosplice.com/life/archives/2008/06/25/learning-curves-chinese-vs-japanese
http://www.sinosplice.com/life/archives/2005/02/01/pronunciation-chinese-and-japanese

Posted on: Riding the Subway

Hi sebire,

上车，下车，are 车门 are all used for cars, buses and trains. Probably, the "车" is the counterpart of "car" in English. When you get on a plane/a ship, you say "上飞机，上船". Please don't mispronounce 上船 (shang4 chuan2). If you pronounce it as "上床" (shang4 chuang2), your Chinese friends would blush, hehe.

Posted on: Riding the Subway

Hi waxgcathy,

As you said, most Chinese people use the word "电梯" to mean both elevators and escalators. As far as I can judge from your comment, 滚梯 is not used in Shanghai either, but interestingly 现代汉语词典 lists "滚梯" and defines it as 自动扶梯的通称.

So it IS an authentic Chinese word, but, alas, it  seems to be on the verge of "extinction" in Chinese. I groundlessly guess that 滚梯 might perhaps be relatively often used in some regions, such as Taiwan, Hong Kong. Do you have any idea about this?

Posted on: Riding the Subway

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