I asked the above-captioned question on Quora.
Paul Denlinger, who has been speaking, reading, and writing Chinese since 1958 with an
M.A. in Linguistics (Uni Master's), University of St Andrews Graduated 1980 said:
‘I have no idea.’
A Chinese woman, on the other hand, answered differently. Before reading extracts of my discussion with the Chinese woman read the following Facebook post by Benedict Morais which is relevant.
Here are extracts from a video I watched and my comments. LINK
From the video:
Since the collapse of the former Soviet Union in the early 1990s the United States has become the only superpower militarily, technologically, and economically until the rise of China.
China’s 2025 strategy includes government support for research and development investment in promoting the development of indigenous Innovation.
向下滚动查看中文翻译Here is a discussion on Quora that confirms my findings that Pinyin is taught wrongly. This explains why many kids in China and Malaysia today can’t read in Pinyin. Anyone who disagrees is welcome to comment.
Luqman Michel · Nov 3
Unfortunately, too many Chinese teachers from China are messing up Pinyin by teaching it wrongly. Here are two of many examples. Teachers from China screwing up Pinyin. LINK, LINK
Education remains a priority of nations. The development of any society is based on its education system.
In my recent post, Maggie Chiang asked: ‘Is there a fundamental issue of Education?’
In my post about the above on Facebook, a friend said that China is too busy stealing and copying and that it has no time for its research and development.
I would agree with him. I have done research on the fundamental issue of education in China. Pinyin is taught wrongly not only in China but the Chinese have corrupted the teachers in Sabah too. I have reported this to authorities in China and they have not responded. LINK
Here is a discussion on Quora that confirms my findings that Pinyin is taught wrongly. This explains why many kids in China and Malaysia today can’t read in Pinyin. Anyone who disagrees is welcome to comment.
Luqman Michel · Nov 3
Unfortunately, too many Chinese teachers from China are messing up Pinyin by teaching it wrongly. Here is one of many examples. Teachers from China screwing up Pinyin. LINK
I was thinking about the answer given by Robert Matthews (馬學進) from Taipei who said that there is no reason to change Bopomofo as it has worked for decades. This reminded me of the story I read on the Internet several years ago.
In case you haven’t heard of it, here’s a quick synopsis of it:
The following is from Quora, posted one year ago.
What are the disadvantages of teaching Chinese using Pinyin instead of learning all those Chinese characters?
Somnath Mukherjee answered: MSc. from Dr. C V Raman University
There are a few disadvantages to teaching Chinese using Pinyin instead of learning all those Chinese characters.
Pinyin is not a perfect representation of Chinese pronunciation. Some sounds in Chinese cannot be represented by Pinyin and some sounds in Pinyin can be pronounced in different ways depending on the context. This can make it difficult for learners to develop accurate pronunciation.
What are some reasons why some people believe that pinyin in Mandarin is not useful?
The above was a question on Quora.
Jojo Dennis Lee answered as below:
Pinyin is hard to read and write specially for English and Spanish speaking people. This is because the letters that are used are pronounced differently. For example, 北京 which was originally named in English as Peking and later changed to Beijing to adopt to Pinyin. But the pronunciation is actually “Pei Ching” or “Pay Tsing”. Another example is 道 (Dào in Pinyin) which means road but is actually pronounced as Tao. There are no B, D, G, J, V, X, Z sounds in Mandarin.
Pinyin was designed for people in China who don’t speak English. But for people who already know English, it is confusing and will mispronounce it.
Robert Matthews LinkedIn Profile says the following:
My eclectic background (linguistics/biology/humanities+Chi/Fre/Span/Russ), teaching experience, and grasp of technology, make me suited for challenging jobs requiring advanced language skills, especially technical translation, indexing and language training.
Robert Matthews (馬學進) who lives in Taipei wrote the following on Quora in response to my answer.
Robert Matthews:
This addendum is an extended response to a comment by Luqman Michel, who is very upset that Bopomofo (which he seems to regard as backward and harmful), is somehow harming the teaching of Pinyin in Malaysia.
There are teachers from Tianjin, China who are teaching Pinyin using Bopomofo sounds. This is why I asked this question. We in Malaysia did away with Bopomofo in the 70’s and introduced Hanyu Pinyin. Why can’t China get rid of Bopomofo in China?
My response:
This guy Yong Wen San, who commented on Quora, is a highly educated guy. I walked away from his questions on Quora simply because I did not want to embarrass him but he insists on continuing and I thought it best to answer him. I have high respect for him.
The problem for many of us is that we quite often wear blinkers and do
not want to see different perspectives. (Different perspective is the motto for
my blog which was suggested by one of my sons.)
6 years ago, someone on Quora had asked: Which is better when learning Chinese: characters without Pinyin or Pinyin without characters?
Yong Wen San replied as follows.
If you are serious about learning the Chinese language, then you should aim to shed pinyin from your system as soon as possible.
For the beginner learner, especially one who is not immersed in a Chinese-speaking environment, pinyin does serve as a useful tool for learning the pronunciation of characters and words in Modern Standard Chinese. But that is all it should be seen as - a tool to aid learning pronunciation. I take issue with anyone who makes the sweeping statement that you can “learn Chinese using pinyin”. That will only help you with the spoken modern Chinese language, and even then, it will only take you as far as some basic phrases - ordering food at an eatery, buying something from a grocery store, asking for directions, etc. If your ambitions in “learning Chinese” only go that far, then fine, you can stop reading here.
