Why characters

Why characters?

Why Chinese writing has not been replaced by some kind of alphabetic system yet, limiting the use of characters to the art of calligraphy? The reason why Chinese-speakers still use a writing system where one is forced to memorize thousands of symbols is not merely a tribute to their history and traditions, nor to artistic beauty; it's rather the unique nature of Chinese language itself that makes alternative systems unfit.

First of all, Chinese is not alphabetic but syllabic. Hindi is an example of a syllabic language that uses a few tens of symbols - only twice Western alphabets - but while it's still possible to understand an Indian word in Latin letters, one can only try to guess the meaning of a transcribed Chinese word, in spite of the fact that so-called Mandarin Chinese has more than 400 different syllables. The problem is, words are often composed of only one syllable. While classical Chinese was almost completely monosyllabic, polisyllables are becoming more and more common in modern Chinese. The average number of syllables in a word, however, is two; still too low to allow a precise individuation of a word's meaning by its transcription.

In spoken Chinese the problem is overcome by the context and by the use of five different tones, but an isolated syllable can be actually misunderstood in spoken language, too. Characters, on the contrary, are impossible to misunderstood, and that is why they have always been a unifying factor among speakers of different dialects or languages, such as Cantonese, Korean and Japanese.
By now, the difference between writing the character ("middle") and the correspondent transcription zhong should be clear, because while the former is immediately recognizable among 50.000 some symbols, the latter could well be meaning, for instance, "clock" () or "loyal" (), each of them pronounced exactly the same.

Transcribing characters

So is it transcription useless? Actually, it is on of the easiest ways to memorize characters and their pronounciation, because it codifies a huge range of sounds that are only slightly different to a Western ear. The People's Republic of China promotes the diffusion of "pinyin" transcription, an alphabet of 26 letters, the same of the English alphabet, but outside China a different transcription is still widely used, especially for classical Chinese: the so-called "Wade-Giles" system. The latter makes it easier to guess the correct pronounciation of syllables... but once you have learned the few rules of pinyin you will hate it.
A few examples of the differences among these two systems:

There are other systems, such as the one used in France, which is similar to Wade-Giles, and the Chinese Phonetic Script ( zhuyin zimu), which uses special symbols. Of course we will use the pinyin transcription for the characters we'll present.

Traditional and simplified characters

Chinese writing has actually undergone some kind of modernization. You may have noticed that Taiwanese and emigrants use different characters from continental Chinese; the reason why is that people outside China still use traditional characters ( fanti zi). In the Sixties the government of the People's Republic of China, on the contrary, decided to simplify most characters and therefore reduce the number of strokes that compose them. Mathews' Chinese-English Dictionary, published in 1931, contains characters of up to 28 strokes, while the majority of characters can be written nowadays with no more than ten strokes.
Here we are with three examples:

In the following tutorial we will learn simplified characters ( jianti zi)... but who knows? Maybe you'll have the chance to know more on traditional ones in future pages on classical and medieval Chinese...

Far from being complicated drawings, Chinese characters are made out of simple single strokes, all of them variations of only eight basic ones. All strokes have their own name and are written according to a few rules. It's very important to learn to recognize them, since the number of strokes in a character is often the easiest way to find it in an index... but this will become clear after learning radicals and the use of dictionaries.

The following are the first six strokes, the fundamental ones:

The last two strokes have several different variations. The first group is composed by five strokes with a hook:

And the following by two single strokes with a turn:

Combined strokes are made out of basic ones. The following are a few examples:

If a character can be compared to a word in alphabetic languages, then strokes are like letters... learning them is the key to memorize characters. And then, characters don't only need to be correct, they should also be as beautiful and balanced as possible. It is therefore necessary to copy the single strokes many times (be it with a brush or, much easier, with a pen) to memorize their shape and thickness.

The way strokes are combined into characters involves learning a few rules on stroke order; this will be the goal of our next lesson.

Strokes are combined together according to a few fixed rules (and to several exceptions!). Learn these rules, because they're of great help for memorizing characters. They are also fundamental in case you need to recognize the first stroke of a character, but we'll talk about that again.

Strokes at the top before those at the bottom

Strokes to the left before those to the right.

Containing strokes before contained ones

But:

• When there aren't enclosing strokes at the top of the character, enclosed strokes are written first:

Vertical stroke in the middle before those on both sides or at the bottom.

But:

• If it crosses other strokes the vertical stroke in the middle should be written last:

The fundamental rules - from top to bottom and from left to right - are easily understandable, since they are used in Western writings, too. The others on the contrary need a few exercise. Be sure to learn from the beginning the correct way each different character should be written; otherwise you may find yourself repeating the same mistakes over and over without realizing it, especially when you'll know hundreds of characters

All characters contain a particular component called "radical" or "side". These elements were once characters themselves, but some are no longer recognizable as such. Learning the radicals helps to categorize and memorize characters; the presence of a certain radical can even suggest the meaning of the whole character, which often relates to the original form of the radical. On the other hand, the non-radical component of the character often suggests its pronounciation, or viceversa.
Chinese dictionaries contain more than 200 radicals, but you will easily memorize the most common ones. In the following lessons we'll present 60 radicals, each of them followed by three characters that contain them, by compounds and notes on their use.
Please note that the shape of a radical changes according to its position in the character, and that the same radical could well be found at the top of a character and on the left side of another: our examples couldn't always show all of the possibilities. As for the pinyin transcription, we didn't put the tones (pronounciation doesn't really concern us by now) nor the umlauts that certain syllables have.

The first radical is called the "two drops of water"; it usually appears in characters that have to do with coldness. It's placed at the left side of characters.

This radical always stays on top of characters.

This radical is called "speech", and it appears at the left side of characters that have to do with language.

The original form of the "knife" is also a radical; it's found at the bottom of characters, as in the first of the following. The second character shows a third form of this radical (placed on top):

The fifth radical is called the "standing person", and is always placed at the left side of characters. The character it comes from can also be used as a radical; in that case it always stays on top, as in the following character:

Radicals Original characters Pinyin er shui xin guang Meaning ear water heart broad Examples yang sun xian limit dui team jiu spirit you oil sha sand guai strange hui to regret kuai quick miao temple chuang bed ting court gong palace ke guest bao treasure Compounds taiyang sun xiandu limit duizhang team leader baijiu white spirit youhua oil painting dousha bean paste qiguai strange huihen to regret kuaile happy simiao temple chuangdan sheet jiating family huanggong imperial palace keqi polite lingbao Nouminous Treasure The first radical is called the "ear", and it can stay at the left side or at the right side of characters. This radical is called "three drops of water", symbolizes flowing water and occurs on the left of characters. Its original form is also a radical; in the following character is placed at the bottom but its position is not fixed: quan spring, fountain The original form of the "heart" is also radical, and is always placed at the bottom, as in the following character: si thought This radical is called "the covering top" and it always occurs on top. Characters with this radical are often related to the idea of house.

The original form of this radical is also a radical, as in the following character:

The original form of the "soil" is also radical, and is always placed at the bottom, as in the following characters:

The original form of the "hand" is also a radical, placed at the bottom or on the left:

The "mouth" is not always placed on the left of characters, as in the following examples:

This radical also stays on top or at the bottom of characters:

The original form of the "dog" is also a radical, as in the following character:

This radical can also be found at the bottom of characters:

The "son" is not always placed on the left of characters, as in the following example:

The "horse" is also found at the bottom of characters, as in the following:

The original form of the "fire" is also a radical, placed on the left of characters, as in the following examples:

This radical also stays at the bottom of characters:

The original form of this radical is also a radical, found at the bottom of characters:

The "tree" also stays on top or at the bottom of characters, as in the following examples:

This radical is not always found on the left side of characters:

Radicals Original characters Pinyin zu yu yu gu gui Meaning foot rain fish bone demon Examples pao to run lu road tiao to jump xue snow lei thunder xu to need lu dull, stupid xian fresh, tasty e crocodile hai skeleton sui marrow du -- kui chief, head hun hun soul mo evil spirit Compounds paoxie running shoes lubiao road sign tiaozao flea xiaxue to snow leiting thunderclap xuyao to need Lu Xun Lu Xun xianhuo fresh goods eyu crocodile haigu human bones jisui spinal cord dulou skull kuishou outstanding hunpo one's souls moli magic power

By alphabetical order
The easiest way to find a character in a dictionary is the Western one: by alphabetical order. Of course, you will need to know the pinyin (or Wade-Giles, depending on the dictionary) transcription for your character, and possibly its tone - take a look at how many characters are there under the syllable ji or shi. In most dictionaries characters are ordered by alphabet and by tone, but not all of them... the notorious Mathew's Chinese-English Dictionary is by alphabet (though a weird alphabet, with, for instance, sung coming before sha), but not by tone.
In the end, the more characters you know, the faster you will find them on a dictionary, also because experience will help you "guess" the pronounciation of characters you've never seen by the elements that compose them - even though this is not a precise method, on the contrary! A couple of examples:

But:

By radical
What you must learn is to find characters by radical (what have we learned them for?). First you need to identify the radical in a character, which is most times easy. Let's try to find a character with a radical we didn't learn in the tutorial:

Don't worry; it's easier than it seems. A little practise and you will immediately understand where the radical is. There are, however, a few difficult radicals; you better learn some characters once for all, because finding them could be really hard. They're usually very common and composed of few strokes. A couple of examples:

By number of strokes
This is a very useful method in case you can't find the radical of a character, but not every dictionary allow you to use it.

The "corners"

And that's all. Hope you had some fun throughout this tutorial!

This page lists the characters used as examples in the 12 lessons on the radicals.

Character Pinyin Meaning ban kind, way bao treasure bei to prepare bi pen bi emerald bian flat bing ice bing sick, disease bu to mend cai wealth cao grass chi wing chuan boat, ship chuang bed ci sequence, next cu thick da to hit dao island dao to arrive de virtue di emperor di earth di enemy dian electricity die butterfly du dui team e hungry e crocodile fan cooked rice fan to turn fang room fang to put fen powder feng peak feng bee fo Buddha fu woman, wife fu symbol, talisman fu to carry, to bear gan liver gong palace gou dog gu aunt gu lonely guai strange guan to watch gui regulation guo country guo pot, pan hai child hai skeleton hang line hang to navigate hen very hua flower huan joyfully hui to regret hun hun soul

Character Pinyin Meaning ji illness, pain ji chicken jian shoulder jian space in between jian sword jiao to teach jiao to shout jin to enter jing capital jiu spirit ju to dwell jue to feel, to awake kan to publish ke guest ku trousers kua to exaggerate kuai quick kuan a sum of money kui chief, head lei thunder leng cold li rite liang classifier for vehicles lie violent lin forest ling mountain ridge lu road lu to travel lu dull, stupid lun wheel mao cat mei beautiful mei eyebrow mi to be lost miao temple ming light mo demon mu herd nai breast, milk pao to run peng friend pian to deceive ping apple qian money qiang wall qing to request qiu ball, globe qiu autumn qu to drive quan circle, to enclose qun crowd, group re hot sha sand sha sand, grit shen deity, spirit shi time shou to receive shui to sleep shuo to talk

Character Pinyin Meaning si private song pine sui marrow sun grandson ta pagoda tai greatest tan to sigh tang sugar tao peach te special teng to ache ti to carry tiao to jump ting to listen ting court tu drawing tui leg tuo camel wan evening, late wang king wei tail wen to ask wen mosquito weng old man wu thing xi to practise xi thin, delicate xian Immortal xian limit xian leisure xian fresh, tasty xian to admire, to envy xiu to stop xiu sleeve xu to need xuan obscure xue snow ya crow ya duck yan eye yang sun yang to raise, to grow ying hard you oil yu language yuan far yuan employee zhan to spread zhao to shine, to reflect zhen needle zhi paper zhong seed, type zhu bead zhu pig zhu to build zhua to seize zhuan to turn zu nationality zu ancestor