中文沒有太難!
Basics
Introduction to Chinese Characters
- Word Etymologies
- Why should you learn etymology? By understanding the basis of where the word came from, it is a lot easier to understand the meaning and remember how to write it. For the intents and purposes of this lesson, the words will be written in Traditional form.
- Pictographs (象形 xiàng xíng: literally "similar shape")
- Drawings of objects they represent (use your imagination)
- Examples: 馬, 木, 火 (horse, wood, fire)
- Drawings of objects they represent (use your imagination)
- Ideographs (指事 zhǐ shì)
- Abstract characters expressed as a character
- Examples: 上, 下 (Up, Down)
- Compound Ideographs (會意 huì yì:)
- A character composed of 2 or more pictographs or ideographs
- Example: 看- to look, to see (Combines the pictographs of a hand over an eye)
- A character composed of 2 or more pictographs or ideographs
- Phono-semantic Compounds (形聲 xíng shēng: literally "Shape sound")
- The most common type of word. It combines a character that provides pronunciation with a "radical", a kind fo word 'root' to give it meaning
- Example: 麵- flour (Combines the meaning of 麥, wheat, with the sound of 面 to form the word)
- Phonetic loan (假借 jiǎ jiè)
- A character that borrows its sound from one word and meaning from another
- Example: 沙- sand (Borrows sound from 少, "little", and derives its meaning from the 氵radical that indicates water)
- Derivative Cognates (轉注 zhuǎn zhù )
- Words that have the same roots but have been changed to have different meanings.
- Example: 考- to test and 老- old, both have the same roots as meaning "old" in ancient Chinese, but have been changed to mean different things now.
- Words that have the same roots but have been changed to have different meanings.
- Pictographs (象形 xiàng xíng: literally "similar shape")
- Resources: http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/character-dictionary.php is great for explaining words and discovering how each word was formed.