Chinese Characters vs. Latin Alphabet: Which reigns supreme?

In my recent travels in Vietnam, I was surprised to learn that the Vietnamese language employs the Latin alphabet rather than traditional characters.

Yes, that’s right. Stop the presses. We have an ignoramus here.

I’m sorry for my apparent previous short-comings of knowledge in that department, but I had always assumed that the Vietnamese writings like “Khỏe không?” (which, FYI, means “how are you?”) were simply transliterations from Vietnamese characters into something that speakers of Latin-alphabet-using-languages could understand.

But before you laugh too hard, let it be known that my assumptions were not all that ridiculous. In fact, the modern writing system of Vietnamese only became the modern writing method in the 1920s. Before that, Chinese characters were used in Vietnam.

The reason for the switch? Apparently, the French rule in Vietnam discouraged and/or banned the use of traditional characters because the Latin alphabet method was seen as beneficial to the learning of French. Ultimately, the Vietnamese preferred the alphabetic version because it was deemed easier to learn, thereby reducing illiteracy rates.

The Vietnamese example is not unique. Similar examples can be seen in Korea and Japan, where Chinese characters have been dropped (either wholly or partially) in favour of an alphabet (albeit not a Latin-based one). 

(An aside: Korean sounds like the world's perfect written language. Apparently, it was invented by scholars upon request of the king, and each 'character' is comprised of vowel and consonant sounds. This means that it only takes a morning to be able to read all Korean out loud (of course, the meaning is another matter), and there are no stupid exceptions and silent letters like in English). 

Which begs the question, is an alphabetic-based system of language inherently better than a character-based one? Although characters are indeed (in my opinion) far more beautiful than the Latin alphabet, I would argue that overall, an alphabetic method of writing is superior to characters, and I’ll explain why.

Why an alphabetic system is better

1. The printing press

Printing is often touted as one of the “Four Great Inventions” of China (along with gunpowder, paper and the compass). Indeed, printing has revolutionized the world in unfathomable ways: knowledge is able to spread to far more minds when printed rather than written by hand. Great leaps in knowledge in fields like science can be attributed to the wide-spread uptake of the printing press.  

But despite it’s origin, the printing press didn’t really spread like wildfire in China like it did throughout Europe. The reason? For most of it’s history, printing in China was limited to moveable wooden blocks carved with individual characters; and so, as you might imagine, even an average piece of writing may require thousands of wooden blocks to express an idea; whereas European languages had much greater flexibility because they had only approximately 26 letters (give or take a few, depending on when and where you’re talking about).

2. Computers

Fast-forward to the modern day, where the average person in the developed world writes hundreds, if not thousands, of words each day on their computer or smart phone.

For many people in China, computers and phones represent a serious barrier to interpersonal communication. This is, not surprisingly, because computers and phones use the Latin alphabet, and for many people, they simply do not know the Latin-alphabet transliterations of Chinese, known as pin-yin.

Even if you do know pin-yin, another issue arises: for each pin-yin pronunciation of a character, there will likely be several different characters representing that sound. A good example is the saying: “妈妈骂马吗？”which is pronounced “ma ma ma ma ma?” and means “did mother scold the horse?” Consequently, when you type pinyin into a computer, you must also select which character you want to write. This can make typing burdensome, and may lead to errors.

3. Literacy

Because written Chinese characters (usually) give no clue as to their pronunciation, until you are taught how those characters are pronounced, you will not know. This means when you read something for the first time, you can’t simply attempt to “sound it out” and get the meaning as a word you already know.

On the other hand, an alphabet system of corresponding sounds makes it possible for anyone to read anything aloud after simply learning the alphabet, such as Dory was able to do in Finding Nemo.

High illiteracy rates in China are often attributed to this very issue (although personally I feel that poverty and a lack of access to education is far more to blame). But it’s important to point out here that English is most certainly not the best language in this regard. Letters of the alphabet are not used consistently in English, so “sounding out” a word is often easier said than done. 

4. Self-learning

Because of the pronunciation problem as above, self-learning of words in Chinese is more difficult. If an English speaker encounters an unknown word, it is simple to look the word up in the dictionary because dictionaries are ordered using the alphabet. On the other hand, when a Chinese speaker encounters an unknown word, it is more troublesome to look up.

On a computer, for example, this might involve a trial-and-error process of typing in pin-yin until the character pops up. In a paper dictionary, one must work out which part of the character is the “radical”, and then count the strokes to find the character.

Why characters are better

1. More efficient when written by hand

Let it be known that this particular portion of my argument bears little, to any, scientific backing. Rather, it is simply my own experience and perceptions. Furthermore, this argument really only applies to simplified Chinese characters, because traditional characters are, to be blunt, extremely complicated.

BUT, all that aside, in my experience, words and sentences can be written much more efficiently in Chinese than in English. The characters take up less room, and Chinese can skip words like ‘the’, and sometimes ‘of’, altogether, conveying the meaning quickly.

(An aside: I also believe that spoken Chinese is more efficient, using fewer syllables to convey what would take us far more syllables in English. I suppose that is a factor of having tones, and is not relevant to a conversation about characters vs. alphabet).

2. More beautiful

This, again, is completely based on my own opinion, although I’d be interested to find anyone who disagrees that characters are more beautiful than a written alphabet.

Is it because they are all unique? It is because they all fill squares, rather than words of differing lengths? Is it because I am less familiar with them and still find them “exotic”? Who knows. All I know is that it is far less acceptable to hang calligraphy of English words in galleries and museums than it is to hang Chinese calligraphy.

Conclusion

This question is not at all original. In fact, I’m sure that the character/alphabet dichotomy is the subject of very deep analysis amongst professionals. This article is simply a summary of my own opinions, experiences and arguments. I’d be interested to hear anyone else’s opinion!

the reckless philosopher

Bible (mis)tranlsations?

As I have mentioned previously in my blog, I have a bit of a penchant for etymology and linguistics. There’s nothing that gives me a childish thrill quite like making connections between words both within English and between languages, as well as observing the subtle differences between the meanings of words in different languages (alert nerd).

When we read translated works, it is impossible to extract the complete meaning intended by the author. This is because words have more than their denotation (the definition), but also the connotation, and the connotation is often different through space and time.

Furthermore, words often have a broad meaning, which is ambiguous when attempting to translate between languages, or vice versa. This often results in a subtle, or remarkable, difference in meaning.

So I have always wondered (well, let’s be honest here, not always, but for a substantial amount of time considering how recently I actually bothered to research this) about what kind of meaning is lost when literature is translated, and in particular, one of the most influential AND most translated books in all of history: The Bible.

A Brief History of the New Testament in English

As you may be aware, the bible was not originally written in English. Most people are aware that the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, but fewer people are aware that the New Testament (capitalized upon request of Microsoft Word) was first written in Greek. Both testaments have been chopped and changed over many hundreds of years, and the original versions have both been lost.

The New Testament was translated into Latin, where it remained for a long time, and made its first debut in English in 1383 as the Wycliffe version, translated by followers of John Wycliffe, the Oxford scholar. However, this version was banned, and the first official version was the Great Bible, authorized by Henry VIII, and later into the King James Bible, which is well known today.

(Mis)translations

Clearly, both testaments have had a whirlwind journey of changes and translations, which of course begs the question: how have the translations affected the meaning of the Bible? I want to share with you some important ways the modern English translations may have altered the true meaning of the Bible.

I’m no scholar in theology, and of course there are many learned people with in-depth views on these translations. However, I think it’s both important and interesting to consider the importance of these issues.

The 10^th commandment

The Ten Commandments first appeared in the New Testament, and in most versions of the Bible the 10th one reads “thou shalt not covet”. To many, this is interpreted to mean thou shalt not desire.

However, some commentators, such as Bible scholar Joel Hoffman, have argued that the original Hebrew version of the 10^th commandment reads “thou shalt not take”. He argues that “take” and “desire” share a common root in Hebrew, and that “covet” is indeed a mistranslation. The Hebrew word in the Old Testament is “chamad”, which a quick Google search tells me means enjoy, or take pleasure in. I can already see how the confusion may have arisen: for me to “enjoy”, for example, my neighbour’s oxen, would probably imply that I have taken the oxen for my own purposes.

On the other hand, it seems strange that the commandment could mean “thou shalt not take” when there already exists the 7^th commandment of “thou shalt not steal”, which would render the meanings almost identical.

The “virgin”

Another popular point of contention is the translation of “virgin”. Most scholars agree that during Biblical times, the term for “virgin” was used interchangeably with “young woman” because most young women were (or assumed to be) virgins. For example, in German, the word for virgin is “Jungfrau”, which literally means “young woman”.

This is obviously troubling, because a large part of the bible focuses on virgin births, and to suggest that the whole “virgin birth” of Jesus thing is just one big mistranslation would be a big deal.  

 It seems unlikely that the virgin birth of Jesus himself is a mistranslation, because in the Gospel of Luke, Mary responds to the angel Gabriel’s news that she is carrying God’s child with “How will this be… since I am a virgin?”. It would be a bit strange to respond to someone telling you that you’re pregnant with “How will this be, I’m a young woman?” now, wouldn’t it?

One “day” in Genesis 1

Some other commentators have noted that the length of time representing a “day” in Genesis 1 may in fact mean a “length of time”. This is due to the ambiguous nature of the Hebrew word “yom”, which can mean both day, and also an indeterminate long period of time.

In fact, some groups have used this mistranslation to provoke discussion on the true age of the world, suggesting that these “days” were in fact very long periods of time, fitting in with the current scientific perspective. Indeed, if this “day” is in fact millions of years, the biblical age of the Earth and the scientific age of the Earth could be similar.

However, the same word is used several times throughout the old testament, and is consistently used to describe a 24-hour period. Furthermore, the six days of creation and one day of rest is used as an analogy for the importance of maintaining the Sabbath, again suggesting that the word for “day” was probably not a mistranslation.

Metaphor

Apart from specific words, there are also symbolic metaphors in the Bible which may have lost their original meaning.

One such important example is the concept of the shepherd. In fact, this metaphor has been so well studied, there are entire books dedicated to this precise question. 

It has been suggested that the modern image of the shepherd – that of the caring, protective figure – is incorrect. Rather, some have noted, that the ancient shepherd was a fierce warrior figure. You can see the impact of “the Lord is my shepherd” rather than “the Lord is my warrior”; it evokes a rather different image.

Conclusion

I hope that these kinds of conversations elucidate the true meaning of the bible without causing offence. Overall, it’s obvious that some subtle meaning from the original biblical texts have been lost over time. That’s to be expected, and would happen with any translation. It seems unlikely to me that any crucial parts of the bible have been incorrectly translated, but rather there are small differences between versions, which would slightly change the meaning, and these subtle differences are interesting and important to note.

What do you think?

"I read the Bible to myself; I'll take any translation, any edition, and read it aloud, just to hear the language, hear the rhythm, and remind myself how beautiful English is." - Maya Angelou 

the reckless philosopher 

Inspiration or imitation?

I was recently listening to an old-school radio station (no shame!) when I was surprised to hear this song:

I quickly found out it’s name on Shazam, and discovered it is ‘Piano in the Dark’ by Brenda Russell, originally recorded in 1987.

What surprised me most were the chorus lines:

“I know, caught up in the middle
I cry just a little
When I think of letting go
Oh no, gave up on the riddle
I cry just a little…”

I mused at how familiar these lines were, when I realised they have been recently brought back to life in 2011 by Dutch duo Bingo Players in their hit ‘Cry (Just a Little)’, and even more recently the Bingo Players version was remixed by Flo Rida in his even bigger hit ‘I Cry’.

Interestingly, comments in the youtube videos seem to constantly lament the lack of originality in the songs. Comments for the Bingo Players version cry ‘The true original is Brenda Russell’s!’, meanwhile comments on the Flo Rida version wail ‘Everybody knows this is just a rip off of the Bingo Players song!’

This got me thinking, is anything actually original anymore? (Yes, I do realise I sound like an old person). When it comes to music, I always used to wonder whether we would ever run out of songs, because isn't there a finite combination of notes to be strung together to make a tune?

This question was well answered in the Vsauce video here. 

So, as the video above explains, we will probably never run out of songs after all. Yet why is it that so many songs seem to recycle the same sounds? This was clearly and hilariously expressed by Melbourne group ‘The Axis of Awesome’ in their video 4 chords. 

Sometimes, similarity can cause legal feuds over who has the intellectual property rights, as was famously seen in the legal battle of Men at Work over their famous hit ‘Down Under’ due to incorporating the well-loved Australian ballad ‘Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree’.

The same question applies to any other kind of creative work, whether it be music, fashion or books. It seems that there is rarely any originality when it comes to novel and movie plotlines. For example, many commentators have noted that the plotline for Avatar was suspiciously similar to that of Pocahontas.

But the last time I checked, Pocahontas did NOT involve a strange species of weirdly hot blue people that ‘bond’ with the animals that the ride by joining pony-tails. On that note, what was up with that?!

At the end of the day, nothing is created from a vacuum. All artists draw inspiration from their life experiences, including others’ art. I suppose that ultimately, similarity is just a spectrum, and we must use our judgement to decide when something is ‘inspired by’ or simply ‘copying’ another work. After all, in the words of Gandhi, imitation is the sincerest flattery.

“Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writes borrowed one from another.” –Voltaire

the reckless philosopher

Book review: Moloka'i

I just finished reading the novel ‘Moloka’i’ by Alan Brennert. Although this blog doesn’t usually involve book reviews, I really couldn’t help myself.

I’d like to say ‘this is one of my favourite books of all time’, however when I stop to think about it, I’d be hard pressed to think of a book I liked more. This book had everything: history, romance, tragedy, comedy and an overall sense of hope and inspiration.

Now see, even when I write that it sounds too hyperbolic, and I’m sure many of you are saying ‘yeah yeah, heard it all before’.  But this is the real McCoy, people! 

The same thing seems to happen in the blurb:

"Rachel is sent to Kalaupapa, the quarantined leprosy settlement on the island of Moloka'i. Here her life is supposed to end - but instead she discovers it is just beginning... Moloka'i is a masterpiece of story telling about a people who embraced life in the face of death."

When I first read this part of the blurb, my initial reaction was 'eh, sounds a bit depressing. She gets sent away to a leper colony, but still does some cool things there. Great.'

But, as you might have guessed, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

The novel follows the life of the protagonist, Rachel Kalama, from 1891 to 1970 in her homeland of Hawai’i, where she “dreams of visiting far-off lands like her father, a merchant seaman”, however at the age of seven she is diagnosed with leprosy, and is quarantined at the Kalaupapa settlement on the island of Moloka’i.

The novel follows all the trials and tribulations she experiences throughout her life, most of which are based on real life experiences of Kalaupapa residents and events that the author meticulously researched.

Although I had known a small amount about the history of Hawai’i, the novel explores events like the annexation of Hawai’i to the United States, WWII and the later commercialization and tourist-takeover, from the perspective of native Hawai’ians. There are other, smaller, considerations which also give the novel realistic qualities, such as the arrival of films, electricity, and aeroplanes.

Of course, this is all occurring as an undercurrent to the main plot: that of Rachel as she grows from a young girl, throughout her teenage years, into adulthood and as an elderly woman.

I don’t want to spoil too much, so I’ll try not to say anymore, however I do want to share with you this quote:

“There’s only one disadvantage, really, to having two mothers… You know twice the love… but you grieve twice as much.”

In her time at Kalaupapa, Rachel found a whole new “ohana”, a family, comprised of mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, friends and lovers. Although almost everyone, even her dogs, seemed to perish before she, the novel allows you to realise that the pain you suffer when those you love leave is a small price to pay for ever having had them.

I highly recommend this book to anyone with or without knowledge about Hawai'i, with or without interest in historical/epic novels, and with or without a heart. 

- the reckless philosopher