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Introduction -

Chinese Writing System

IC Introduction (Character)

Chinese writing system• Civilization• Videos about 甲骨文 and 汉字Evolution

• Basic Strokes• Stroke OrdersStroke

• Six Categories• 象形、指事、会意、形声、专注、假借• Radicals

• Writing Styles

Writing System

Chinese characters = English alphabets

There are 26 Alphabets in EnglishThere are over 50,000 characters in ChineseEnglish alphabets contain no meaning (except for “I,” “a”) Each Chinese character has meanings

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Chinese vs. English

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3,000 of these are frequently used (99.15% frequency rate)

Only 500 – 600 are most frequently used in daily life!

Written Chinese – Unifies the varied Chinese people and dialects

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There are two types of written Chinese characters in use today: Traditional characters (fán tǐ zì) and Simplified characters (jiǎn tǐ zì).

Traditional characters, stemming from the Qin Dynasty (221-207 B.C.) have a history of roughly 2,000 years. Simplified characters evolved later from the People's Republic of China (PRC) government's wish to reduce illiteracy; they simplified the strokes used in Traditional Chinese to achieve this goal. Thus, Simplified characters are derived from the Traditional characters.

繁体字 vs. 简体字

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Example:

車 - 车 (chē), automobile

鐘 - 钟 (zhōng), clock

Discuss: What are the benefits of learning fán tǐ zì and jiǎn tǐ zì? Are you learning fán tǐ zì or jiǎn tǐ zì right now?

繁体字 vs. 简体字

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Evolution of Chinese Characters

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Evolution of Characters 汉字的演变

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video from 孔府学院

Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5mDCXVaDLk

Video - 甲骨文

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Video from 孔府学院Video – 汉字

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A very nice intro video from

Dikk Kelly

Introduction of Chinese characters

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Some Chinese characters (pictgraphs) evolved from pictures.

Many people describe writing Chinese characters as similar in feeling to drawing.

The Basic Strokes of Characters

Question: When we write Chinese characters, are we actually painting?

Of course not!

When we paint a painting, it doesn’t matter whether the lines are straight or curvy, nor does it matter which strokes we paint first and which ones we paint later as the final painting resembles the objects that we seek to depict.

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The Basic Strokes of characters

When writing Chinese characters, we must carefully follow the prescribed stroke order.

《汉字 的智慧》

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Question: How should we write Chinese characters?

The Basic Strokes of Characters

Answer: As you learn to write Chinese characters, the first thing to know is how to make the strokes. Strokes are important because they show how the characters are composed and enable you to write the characters more easily. There are six basic strokes that are commonly used.

It is very important to recognize the strokes and follow the writing rules. Learning the fundamental strokes of Chinese writing and the correct order also helps memorize characters and is an essential basis to learn written Chinese.

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A stroke is a single unbroken line drawn from the time you set your pen to paper and move it till the time you lift it off the paper.

The Basic Strokes of Characters

Question: How many strokes ( 笔画 ) are there in the writing?

http://www.hwjyw.com/textbook/dzjc/zh/cd1/cyb.htmI C Introduction (Character)

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Disciplines in Character writing

Can’t remove strokes from

刀 (knife)刃 (blade)

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1. Horizontal first, then vertical　十、干2. Top first, then bottom　二、古3. Left-slanted first, then right-slanted　八、人4. Left first, then right 　川、仁5. Center first, then both sides 　小、木6. When making a dot, write it first if it is positioned on the top or upper-left. When it appears on the upper right or in the middle, write it last.　文、斗；犬、叉

Rules of Stroke Order

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7. With “closed” characters, make the outside strokes (left, top, right), then the strokes in the middle, then the bottom stroke that “clothes” the character. 　回、因8. With semi-closed characters, there are three different stroke orders:

o strokes in the middle before surrounding strokes 凶、言 ;o surrounding strokes before strokes in the middle 　同、司 ;o top before middle before lower-left 　匹、匠

Rules of Stroke Order

http://www.hwjyw.com/textbook/dzjc/zh/cd1/cyb.htm IC Introduction (Character)

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 Writing Styles

Cǎo

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Six categories1. 象形 (xiàngxíng) Pictographs

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Radicals are pictographs which represent objects in the real world.

Some of them can stand alone as independent, one-semantic-unit characters. Examples include 人 , 口 , 雨 .

Radicals may also be combined with other components to form a new character for which the radial serves as a clue to its meaning. Example include 吹 and 妹

All Radicals are Pictographs

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Some radicals cannot be used as independent characters but only serve as a part of another character. Their function is to provide a semantic clue to the character, such as 宀 in 家 , 囗 in 国 , and 辶 in 逛 . According to most dictionaries, there are 214 commonly used radicals in Chinese.

All Radicals are Pictographs

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Basic Radicals (Matching)

人 口 山 水 日 月rén kǒu shān shuǐ rì yuè( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( )

土 木 雨 火 女 门tǔ mù yǚ huǒ nǚ mén ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( )

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2. 指事 (zhǐshì) Self-explanatory characters

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Sun moon bright 日 rì 月 yuè 明 míng

People tree rest人 rén 木 mù 休 xiū

3. 会意 (huìyì) Associative compounds

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木 (mù

)木

(mù)林

(lín)

Combinations of Pictographs and Ideographs

人(rén)

言 (yán

)

信 (xìn)

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人 (rén)

囗 (wéi

) 囚

(qiú)

Guess Meanings: Combinations of Pictographs and Ideographs

田 (tián

)心

(xīn) 思 (sī)

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手 (shǒu)

目 (mù

)

看 (kàn

)

Guess Meanings: Combinations of Pictographs and Ideographs

女 (nǚ)

子 (zǐ)

好 (hǎo

)

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4. 形声 (xíngshēng) Pictophonetic characters

Question ： The majority of Chinese characters fall under which category?

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女(woma

n)

马 (mǎ

) 妈

mother

Guess the Pronunciation: Combinations of Radicals and Phonetics

木 (wood

)

才 (cái)

材 buildin

g materi

al

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5. 转注 (zhuǎnzhù) Mutually explanatory characters e.g. 老 lǎo 考 kǎo

‘elder’ ‘to test’

6. 假借 (jiǎjiè) Phonetic loan characters e.g. 来 lái 花 huā

‘to come’ ‘flower/to spend’

转注 & 假借

Chinese characters are called "square" characters, meaning no matter how simple or complex, each character fits inside a square.

These structures will not only help you memorize characters, but also reduce problems with missing dots or strokes when writing. Understanding these structures will make even complex characters easy to remember.

characters should be written with a sense of symmetry and proportion. Understanding how to mentally plot out a character within a square will give you one of the fundamentals needed for effective written communication in Chinese.

Disciplines in Character writing- Proportion & Structure

Wong, M., Fang, T., Chen, S.-h., & Chien, L.-t. (2011). 真棒 . (A. M. Vargas, Ed.) St. Paul, MN: EMC Publishing, LLC and LiveABC Interactive Corporation.

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One-semantic-unit characters (one part)

Structure of Chinese Characters-Identify the radicals

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Two-semantic-unit characters (two parts)-Identify the radicals

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Three-semantic-unit characters (three parts)Identify the Radicals

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Review the Basic Strokes diǎn

shù

piě gōu

tí

nà

piě

héng

A strokeis a single unbroken line drawn from the time you set your pen to paper and move it till the time you lift it off the paper.

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yī èr sān sì wǔ 一 二 三 四 五

Let’s write

Liù qī bā jiǔ shí六 七 八 九 十

Keep these question in mind:1. What is a radical?2. Why do we have to learn

radicals before learning any complicated characters?

3. What is a stroke?4. What are the basic strokes?5. Why is it important to

follow the stroke order?6. What are the rules of stroke

order?

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Let’s write

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Let’s write

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Let’s write

点 横 竖 撇 捺 提 横钩 竖钩 斜钩 横折 竖折

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More Practice 1. Mark tone marks for the

following pinyin. Match them with the basic strokes.

dian pie shu gou

na heng gou ti

xiegou heng shugou

heng zhe shu

shuzhe

2. Pronounce the name of each stoke in the following two characters

永我

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Character Stories Character Strokes Confucius Institute Character Book http://

edu.chinese.cn/zh-CN/onlinelearning/node_37311.htm

Other Useful Links