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	<title>Chinese languages</title>
	<subtitle>Chinese languages</subtitle>
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	<updated>2009-10-10T14:46:17+00:00</updated>

	<author><name><![CDATA[Chinese languages]]></name></author>
	<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/app.php/feed/topic/821</id>

		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[simplyolaf]]></name></author>
		<updated>2009-10-10T14:46:17+00:00</updated>

		<published>2009-10-10T14:46:17+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=26652#p26652</id>
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		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Learning how to write chinese characters is the easiest way in which you can <a href="http://ww.visualmandarin.com" class="postlink">memorize chinese characters</a>. Try visualmandarin's <a href="http://www.visualmandarin.com/tools/chinese-stroke-order/" class="postlink">Chinese stroke order dictionary</a> where you will see the basic chinese strokes for many chinese characters.<p>Statistics: Posted by <a href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&amp;u=6235">simplyolaf</a> — Sat Oct 10, 2009 2:46 pm</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[haton]]></name></author>
		<updated>2009-09-19T20:57:41+00:00</updated>

		<published>2009-09-19T20:57:41+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=26286#p26286</id>
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		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Hello,<br><br>memorizing character is in my view a hellish part of learning Chinese. Sometimes I read that the radical + phonetic structure should help to recognize/memorize words but for the most part, I find that you just have to take Chinese the way it is and just put the effort to learnby heart.<br><br>Anyway the lack of easy correspondence between the character - the sound - the meaning makes it quite difficult (for me and I guess for other students).<br><br>To use my learning time efficiently, I developed (initially for myself) a memory game called <span style="color:#0000FF"><strong class="text-strong">Pingrid</strong></span>. It uses a spaced repetition scheme to focus on the more difficult words. And unlike other memorization programs, it is designed from the start to learn Chinese vocabulary.<br><br>In case it could interest other members: check out the web site at<br><a href="http://ehaton.blogspot.com" class="postlink">http://ehaton.blogspot.com</a><br><br> <img class="smilies" src="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/images/smilies/icon_razz.gif" width="15" height="15" alt=":P" title="Razz"> Pingrid is free, donations welcome to support me in this solitary effort!<br><br>Emmanuel<p>Statistics: Posted by <a href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&amp;u=6253">haton</a> — Sat Sep 19, 2009 8:57 pm</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[jipasa]]></name></author>
		<updated>2009-07-24T08:15:50+00:00</updated>

		<published>2009-07-24T08:15:50+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=24642#p24642</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=24642#p24642"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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I have had good success so far. When I showed the book to a Chinese friend, she was shocked to see that I was learning the "traditional" characters and not the "simplified" which are much easier. Anyway, and interesting conversation here .<p>Statistics: Posted by <a href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&amp;u=5983">jipasa</a> — Fri Jul 24, 2009 8:15 am</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-07-18T00:26:21+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-07-18T00:26:21+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4306#p4306</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4306#p4306"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Dear all, <br><br>I originally posted this at another forum but since it applies to this thread as well I'm reposting it here:<br><br><br>I use a word processing program to make sheets of characters to study, usually about 10 characters per sheet. I include copious notes about the characters to help me remember them. Usually etymological stuff gleaned from books and web sites. A good web site for such stuff would be <a href="http://www.zhongwen.com/" class="postlink">http://www.zhongwen.com/</a> <br><br>Sometimes I just make up something about a character to use as a mnemonic to remember how it’s written. <br><br>For instance, when I was learning the character 嬾, a variant form for the character 懶 (Mand: lan3, Cant: laan5) meaning “lazy” which I already knew, I remembered it by thinking if you remove the heart what are you left with. A girl. And girls are lazy. Okay bad example. I was going through a misogynistic period. But, I was able to remember this alternate way for writing “lazy”. <br><br>You can find characters to learn from many places. On-line forums, names of places you frequent, newspapers, etc. But a really good source for characters to learn would be the CEDICT dictionary. <br><br>The CEDICT is a freely downloadable text file available at the <a href="http://www.mandarintools.com/cedict.html" class="postlink">http://www.mandarintools.com/cedict.html</a> web page. I cut and paste entire entries into my word processing program. I then change the font to a comfortable reading size. (Hint: When choosing a Chinese dictionary always get the largest edition available. A condensed edition with its small font size is murder on the eyes.) <br><br>I usually print out a sheet a week for study and if I lose it I can always print out another copy. I go over the sheet whenever there is free time; breaks, lunches, sitting in waiting rooms, etc. <br><br>I don’t have a palm, but I do use a flashcard program on my laptop. Unfortunately my operating system is Windows 95 so there aren’t many flashcard programs that support it. <br><br>The one I use supports Unicode fonts so I can enter zhuyin symbols, pinyin with tone marks, simplified characters, etc. <br><br>I usually have the flashcard program running in a separate window when surfing and during downtimes (waiting for downloads to finish, etc.) I go through the cards. <br><br>Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Fri Jul 18, 2003 12:26 am</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-27T09:14:10+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-27T09:14:10+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4305#p4305</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4305#p4305"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Dear Rathpy,<br><br>&gt;Have you ever thought about it though?<br><br>Yeah, I’ve thought about it. And I do have a little Taishanese glossary that I’ve made for my personal use. I guess that a lot of overseas Chinese that speak a dialect other than Mandarin have their personal glossaries. But I don’t really see the point of putting it out for public consumption especially when there are so few people that speak or are interested in the dialect.<br><br>&gt;But I'm still am amazed that there is so little info on <br>&gt;such a widely spoken language (in the number of <br>&gt;people that speak it in the number of places <br>&gt;around the world).<br><br>In my 1987 copy of “The Languages of China” by S. Robert Ramsey, the Chinese dialect group breakdown is as follows:<br><br>1. Mandarin-----------679,250,000<br>2. Wu------------------80,750,000<br>3. Gan-----------------22,800,000<br>4. Xiang---------------45,600,000<br>5. Hakka---------------35,150,000<br>6. Yue-----------------47,500,000<br>7. Min-----------------38,950,000<br><br>I’ve read that there are only about 1-1.2 million Taishanese speakers in China and 1-1.2 million Taishanese speakers outside of China. <br><br>So, I don’t really think there would be much of an audience for material on Taishanese.<br><br>Just look at the Hakka forum. According to the above statistic there are 35,150,000 speakers of Hakka in China, yet hardly anyone ever goes to the Hakka forum. Maybe they’re all at the asiawind.com Hakka forum. But a lot of the posts there are just posts lamenting the loss of their dialect.<br><br>&gt;One could wait another millennia for some 'qualified' person to do it.<br><br>A millennium? In a millennium, Taishanese will probably be extinct as most of the other Chinese dialects except possibly Mandarin.<br><br>Let the guy at UCLA do it he’s a linguistics major after all.<br><br>Though I could probably recreate a rhyme dictionary from information gathered off the Internet. Well not the definitions but probably the pronunciation information. Oh well.<br><br>Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Fri Jun 27, 2003 9:14 am</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-18T03:03:11+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-18T03:03:11+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4304#p4304</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4304#p4304"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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I haven't gone through all the previous messages, I just wanted to tell you how I memorize them as a Westener. It may well be that this has been sad over and over again.<br><br>When learning them, you start noticing how certain parts constantly return. You have the radicals, but even minor aspects seem to return. I usually name each of these compounds or parts. Some names are not correct: I choose whatever name I feel fits with a compound. Or you name them after words you know that character is also used with.<br><br>When I learn a new character, I unconsiously break it down into small pieces. I notice that when I am about to forget a character, I can still recall it by naming the compounds. <img class="smilies" src="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif" width="15" height="15" alt=":)" title="Smile"><br><br>For example:<br><br>mao2 &amp;#29483;  (cat)<br>animal-radical + grass + field<br><br>meng4 &amp;#26790; (dream)<br>two trees + moon<br><br>song1 shu3<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Wed Jun 18, 2003 3:03 am</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-15T22:05:50+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-15T22:05:50+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4303#p4303</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4303#p4303"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Kobo-Daishi,<br><br>&gt; &gt;When are you going to write your Taishanese dictionary and grammar <br>&gt; &gt; books?<br>&gt;<br>&gt; Since Chinese is just a hobby of mine I don’t feel qualified to write a <br>&gt; dictionary or a book on grammar. <br><br>Have you ever thought about it though? When I first started wanting to learn Cantonese I was surprised at its status and its lack of documentation, compared to English for example. I can only imagine and empathise for how much worse it must be for Taishanese. These are my perceptions of the situation only, and It's not my intention to offend anyone. But I'm still am amazed that there is so little info on such a widely spoken language (in the number of people that speak it in the number of places around the world).<br><br>You don't need to be 'qualified' to provide a resource. One could wait another millennia for some 'qualified' person to do it. If no interest in publishing, then it could be posted on a web site. You seem to have a love for your language. It's a hobby; You could make it available like that.<br><br>I say all this partially tongue in cheek of course. It would be a big, tedious job. And maybe you'd regret it.<br><br>Regards,<br>rathpy<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Sun Jun 15, 2003 10:05 pm</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-13T08:44:24+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-13T08:44:24+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4302#p4302</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4302#p4302"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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I should have said fish in my dialect was /N11/.<br><br>Dyl.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Fri Jun 13, 2003 8:44 am</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-13T08:42:37+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-13T08:42:37+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4301#p4301</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4301#p4301"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Kobo Daishi wrote<br><br>: 耳 (Mand: er3, Cant: yi5) ear-----------------NGEIH <br>: 二 (Mand: er4, Cant: yi6) two-----------------NGEIH<br>: 軟 (Mand: ruan3, Cant: yun5) soft-------------NGEUHN<br>: 日 (Mand: ri4, Cant: yat6) sun----------------NGEET<br>: 玉 (Mand: yu4, Cant: yuk6) jade---------------NGUHK<br>: 肉 (Mand: rou4, Cant: yuk6) meat--------------NGUHK<br>: 魚 (Mand: yu2, Cant: yu4) fish----------------NGEUIH<br>: 語 (Mand: yu3, Cant: yu5) language------------NGEUIH<br>: 人 (Mand: ren2, Cant: yan4) people------------NGEEN<br>: 忍 (Mand: ren3, Cant: yan2) endure------------NGEEN<br>: 認 (Mand: ren4, Cant: ying6) recognize--------NGEEN<br><br>: Sorry for my weird Taishanese romanization. I think the Taishanese pronunciations for some of these characters <br>: would have more in common with the Hakka dialect, but I’m not certain.<br><br><br>Yes. All these have /N/ (ng) initials in Hakka. For fish, my wife's Longchuan dialect of north east Guangdong is /Niu51/ but I say /N/ a syllable velar nasal.<br><br>The above list in ASCII IPA except for fish as I say it in Hong Kong Hakka are as follows:<br><br>/Ni31/, /Ni53/, /NiOn33/, /Nit3/, /Niuk5/, /Niuk3/, fish, /Ni33/, /Nin11/, /Niun33/, /Nin53/<br><br><br>Dyl.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Fri Jun 13, 2003 8:42 am</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-12T22:57:44+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-12T22:57:44+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4300#p4300</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4300#p4300"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Dear Rathpy,<br><br>&gt;Well, probably not by itself, {unless you can find a <br>&gt;Taishanese rhyming dictionary <img class="smilies" src="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif" width="15" height="15" alt=":)" title="Smile">}. <br><br>Rhyme dictionaries were used to aid in the correct recitation of Literary Chinese by establishing a standard for pronunciation of Chinese characters. The standard was culled from a mix of Middle Chinese dialects, so, there wouldn’t be any rhyme dictionaries based upon any of the modern Chinese dialects (Mandarin, Cantonese, Hakka, Minnan, Taishanese, etc.) <br><br>&gt;I imagine that rhymes might well have diverged since those times.<br><br>Yes, pronunciation does change with time but the Yue dialects (Cantonese and Taishanese) are more conservative than some of the other dialects and retain more of their final consonants than some of the other dialects. <br><br>&gt;... Say I wanted know how a character is pronounced in <br>&gt;Cantonese, my Cantonese dictionary doesn't have it, and <br>&gt;all my speaking friends are either illiterate or absent. <br>&gt;I might start with looking it up in a Mandarin dictionary <br>&gt;and list all characters that had the same Mandarin <br>&gt;pronunciation. If I then consulted my Cantonese dictionary <br>&gt;and found that the list of characters had a common <br>&gt;Cantonese pronunciation, I would think it a good guess for <br>&gt;the original character. Chances are, however, that you <br>&gt;wouldn't just get a lone pronunciation from that list... <br>&gt;but it's a start. <br><br>That would be a good way to start. <br><br>I would check with the other modern dialects of Chinese starting with Mandarin and Cantonese because they are standardized more or less. <br><br>Disregarding tone, in the Taishanese that I speak some characters, are pronounced as they are in Mandarin and some are pronounced as they are in Cantonese.<br><br>We pronounce the following characters as they do in Mandarin:<br><br>好 (Mand: hao3, Cant: hou2) good<br>保 (Mand: bao3, Cant: bou2) protect<br>報 (Mand: bao4, Cant: bou3) newspaper<br>毛 (Mand: mao2, Cant: mou4) hair<br><br>料 (Mand: liao4, Cant: liu2) materials<br>票 (Mand: piao4, Cant: piu3) ticket<br>表 (Mand: biao3, Cant: biu2) show, display<br>錶 (Mand: biao3, Cant: biu1) watch<br><br>The following characters we pronounce like in Cantonese:<br><br>� (Mand: qu2 Cant: keui5) he/she (Yue)<br>企 (Mand: qi3, Cant: kei5) stand on tiptoe<br>你 (Mand: ni3, Cant: nei5) you<br><br>But some characters sound neither like Mandarin nor Cantonese in Taishanese.<br><br>For instance:<br><br>耳 (Mand: er3, Cant: yi5) ear-----------------NGEIH <br>二 (Mand: er4, Cant: yi6) two-----------------NGEIH<br><br><br>軟 (Mand: ruan3, Cant: yun5) soft-------------NGEUHN<br>日 (Mand: ri4, Cant: yat6) sun----------------NGEET<br>玉 (Mand: yu4, Cant: yuk6) jade---------------NGUHK<br>肉 (Mand: rou4, Cant: yuk6) meat--------------NGUHK<br>魚 (Mand: yu2, Cant: yu4) fish----------------NGEUIH<br>語 (Mand: yu3, Cant: yu5) language------------NGEUIH<br>人 (Mand: ren2, Cant: yan4) people------------NGEEN<br>忍 (Mand: ren3, Cant: yan2) endure------------NGEEN<br>認 (Mand: ren4, Cant: ying6) recognize--------NGEEN<br><br>Sorry for my weird Taishanese romanization. I think the Taishanese pronunciations for some of these characters would have more in common with the Hakka dialect, but I’m not certain.<br><br>As you can see here, Taishanese is more conservative in retaining the initial ng- sound that has been lost in Mandarin and Cantonese for these characters.<br><br>If I was making a Taishanese dictionary I think a combination of a rhyme dictionary and the modern dialects would be a great help.<br><br>A rhyme dictionary indicates a character’s pronunciation by using 2 other characters. One character would indicate the initial sound of the character because they would share the initial sound. The second character would indicate the final sound of the character because they would share the final sound.<br><br>For instance, based on the rhyme dictionaries the following characters should have the same initial sound as 胡 (Mand: hu2, Cant: wu4; to blunder; reckless) and the same final sound as 光 (Mand: guang1, Cant: gwong1; light, brilliant):<br><br>皇 emperor<br>偟 agitated<br>凰 phoenix<br>喤 sobbing, sound of bell<br>堭 a dry moat outside a city wall; a dry ditch<br>媓 name of a concubine of the Emperor Yao<br>徨 irresolute<br>湟 name of a river<br>煌 brilliant<br>篁 bamboo, bamboo grove<br>艎 fast-sailing boat<br>蝗 locust<br>遑 leisure<br>鍠 sounds of drums and bells<br>隍 dry moat<br>餭 pastry<br>鰉 sturgeon<br><br>and they do; huang in Mandarin and wong in Cantonese. <br><br>In Taishanese 胡 is pronounced “WU” and 光 is pronounced “GOHNG” so all the above characters should be pronounced “WOHNG”. <br><br>Now, I know 皇 (emperor) in Taishanese is WOHNG I can assume that the other characters, many that I have never heard in my life are probably also pronounced WOHNG.<br><br>&gt;When are you going to write your Taishanese dictionary and grammar books?<br><br>Since Chinese is just a hobby of mine I don’t feel qualified to write a dictionary or a book on grammar. <br><br>Anyway, I don’t have a copy of any of the rhyme dictionaries even though I see reprints of old Song dynasty copies at the on-line Chinese bookstores all the time.<br><br>&gt;always willing to embarrass himself, in the pursuit of knowledge<br><br>Don’t feel embarrassed. How else does one learn if they don’t ask?<br><br>Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Thu Jun 12, 2003 10:57 pm</p><hr />
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		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-01T22:04:46+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-01T22:04:46+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4299#p4299</id>
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		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
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Kobo-Daishi,<br><br>&gt; &gt;Is it possible to use etymological means to get a very likely<br>&gt; &gt;guess on how a character should be pronounced in Taishanese?<br>&gt; <br>&gt; You mean by using an old rhyme dictionary?<br><br>Well, probably not by itself, {unless you can find a Taishanese rhyming dictionary <img class="smilies" src="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif" width="15" height="15" alt=":)" title="Smile">}. I imagine that rhymes might well have diverged since those times.<br><br>Having no background in linguistics, and as a beginning learner of Cantonese, it would be foolish of me to state *how* to use etymological means to determine pronunciation of characters, so I'll just explain *why* this novice *thought* such a process *might be possible*.<br><br>... Say I wanted know how a character is pronounced in Cantonese, my Cantonese dictionary doesn't have it, and all my speaking friends are either illiterate or absent. I might start with looking it up in a Mandarin dictionary and list all characters that had the same Mandarin pronunciation. If I then consulted my Cantonese dictionary and found that the list of characters had a common Cantonese pronunciation, I would think it a good guess for the original character. Chances are, however, that you wouldn't just get a lone pronunciation from that list... but it's a start. Someone with skill might use etymology to help them narrow down the choices. They might have knowledge of how Mandarin and Cantonese diverged from Middle Chinese and evolved. They could work out the resulting correlations between the tones, initials and finals of the modern languages, and be able to reliably cite when one-to-one pronunciation correlations can be relied upon, and when alternatives may exist.<br><br>I'm not sure how much is written about the evolution of Taishanese (maybe nothing), but standard Cantonese is well-documented, I believe; and they are closer cousins to each other than to Mandarin. You are a native speaker of Taishanese, and you know Cantonese. Have you ever tried to tie down the similarities between the two?<br><br><br>Regards,<br>rathpy <br>(always willing to embarrass himself, in the pursuit of knowledge) <br><br>P.S. <br>When are you going to write your Taishanese dictionary and grammar books?<br><br>[%sig%]<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Sun Jun 01, 2003 10:04 pm</p><hr />
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		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-01T16:54:23+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-01T16:54:23+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4298#p4298</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4298#p4298"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
		<content type="html" xml:base="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4298#p4298"><![CDATA[
Kobo-Daishi wrote:<br><br>&gt; &gt;Some people can remember up to 10 or 20 chars a day, but<br>&gt; &gt;then what, they aren't persistent enough and got nothing<br>&gt; &gt;at all after a year.<br>&gt; <br>&gt; 20 characters a day? I might as well go to Jilin and take their<br>&gt; free intensive 100-day course in 2500 characters which would<br>&gt; work out to 25 characters a day. <img class="smilies" src="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif" width="15" height="15" alt=":)" title="Smile"><br><br><br>LOL!<br><br>Dyl.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Sun Jun 01, 2003 4:54 pm</p><hr />
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	</entry>
		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-01T12:01:03+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-01T12:01:03+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4297#p4297</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4297#p4297"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
		<content type="html" xml:base="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4297#p4297"><![CDATA[
Dear Pazu,<br><br>&gt;Well, I think the best way to learn Chinese characters<br>&gt;is to make sure you study them every night. You can just<br>&gt;learn one character a day, or 3 or 4 or even more<br>&gt;(at least 3 a day makes more sense IMHO). <br><br>In Jerry Norman’s “Chinese”, the author cites a study conducted in the 1960s that concluded ‘that the average college-educated Chinese person who is not an expert in the fields of Chinese literature or Chinese history knew between 3,500 and 4,000 characters”.<br><br>At the rate of learning a character a day it would take about 10 years to become ‘literate’ in Chinese. <br><br>At 3 characters a day it would take a little more than 3 years, which seems doable.<br><br>&gt;Some people can remember up to 10 or 20 chars a day, but<br>&gt;then what, they aren't persistent enough and got nothing<br>&gt;at all after a year.<br><br>20 characters a day? I might as well go to Jilin and take their free intensive 100-day course in 2500 characters which would work out to 25 characters a day. <img class="smilies" src="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif" width="15" height="15" alt=":)" title="Smile"><br><br>Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Sun Jun 01, 2003 12:01 pm</p><hr />
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	</entry>
		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-06-01T11:39:54+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-06-01T11:39:54+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4296#p4296</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4296#p4296"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
		<content type="html" xml:base="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4296#p4296"><![CDATA[
Dear Rathpy,<br><br>&gt;Is it possible to use etymological means to get a very likely<br>&gt;guess on how a character should be pronounced in Taishanese?<br><br>You mean by using an old rhyme dictionary?<br><br>Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Sun Jun 01, 2003 11:39 am</p><hr />
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	</entry>
		<entry>
		<author><name><![CDATA[Anonymous]]></name></author>
		<updated>2003-05-29T22:13:34+00:00</updated>

		<published>2003-05-29T22:13:34+00:00</published>
		<id>http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4295#p4295</id>
		<link href="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4295#p4295"/>
		<title type="html"><![CDATA[Re: Memorizing Characters]]></title>

		
		<content type="html" xml:base="http://chineselanguage.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4295#p4295"><![CDATA[
To Kobo-Daishi,<br><br>Hi, the convertors handles characters with multiple readings by grouping them within parenthesis, (this is true for the Mandarin, Hakka and Cantonese versions). Here is an example of text after conversion.<br><br><br><br>賀知章 <br>ho6 ( zi1 zi3 ) zoeng1 <br><br><br>回鄉偶書 <br>wui4 ( hoeng1 hoeng3 ) ngau5 syu1 <br><br><br>少小離家老大回 <br>( siu2 siu3 ) siu2 ( lei4 lei6 ) ( gaa1 gu1 ) lou5 daai6 wui4 <br><br>鄉音無改鬢毛衰 <br>( hoeng1 hoeng3 ) jam1 mou4 goi2 ban3 mou4 ( ceoi1 seoi1 ) <br><br>兒童相見不相識 <br>( ji4 ngai4 ) tung4 ( soeng1 soeng3 ) ( gin3 jin6 ) bat7 ( soeng1 soeng3 ) ( sik7 zi3 ) <br><br>笑問客從何處來 <br>siu3 man6 haak8 ( cung4 sung1 zung6 ) ( ho4 ho6 ) ( cyu2 cyu3 syu3 ) ( lai4 loi4 loi6 ) <br><br><br>However, due to my limited programming skills, it cannot detect what is a one byte character and what is a two byte character, and so treats them all as two bytes. Consequently, you have to be careful to use only Big5 code, and insert spaces after one byte characters so that one maintains the correct alignment of text throughout.<br><br>Where my program comes across a character which it either does not have data on, or recognise, it the space it occupies in the line is appended as +++ or three plus signs. If you use the Dos_prompt you will be able to read the progress of the conversion, but if you just click on the program it will run and once it has completed its run, it will disappear. You have to go to the directory to retrieve the outputted .htm file and read it in your browser.<br><br>One source you could extract Cantonese readings from is the Unihan.txt file (which you can download from unicode.org, however be warned, it is 16 MB, and contains lots of mistakes. I can't recall where I downloaded the Cantonese from. It was transferred off my old Win95 machine, which has since siezed up with a Windows registry problem. I think it may have been from the ifcss.org site, (now being updated and not yet online the last time I looked though there is a mirror at one of the Hong Kong universities). <br><br>The Cantonese data was slightly modified by me so that the endings -p, -t and -k instead of being distributed between the six basic tones, was instead extended to tones 7, 8, and 9 so you have the ying, zhong, and yang ru tones. Otherwise it is jyutping as far as I can gather where "j" is "y" in other romanisations etc..<br><br>The sad thing about this way of conversion is that if you have a text in baihua, it will just be converted into baihua not spoken Cantonese or Hakka. So, don't get your hopes up. It is only meant to be an aid to learning, rather than a language convertor. <br><br>The Mandarin list was from a input for Big5 for Win95, but I don't know where or when I downloaded it.  Again, it is possible to extract the same or similar data from Unihan.txt. I notice that there are lots of repeats too in the unihan listed info, so beware. To extract purely Big5 characters, you could run the list of Big5 characters against the list extracted from unihan.<br><br>I had all these files salvaged from the old machine, and was tired of writing out the romanisation for poems and such, so created the program originally for Hakka, which was Lau's list, with some alterations and additions. Then I thought it was a good idea to do the same for Mandarin and Cantonese. <br><br>Since there is the problems associated with formatting your input to get the desired output, and that my programming skills are so poor, the programs are distributed as freeware.<br><br><a href="http://www.sungwh.freeserve.co.uk/misc/dialect.htm" class="postlink">http://www.sungwh.freeserve.co.uk/misc/dialect.htm</a> <br><br>Dyl.<p>Statistics: Posted by Guest — Thu May 29, 2003 10:13 pm</p><hr />
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