Re: Writing as a Conservitizing Agent in Language

In a message dated 3/5/2007 8:49:42 PM Central Standard Time,
leon_math@YAHOO.COM writes:


> Funny  how people always say that... according to zhongwen.com, 82% of
> characters are "phonetic complexes" (a part for meaning help, a part  for sound
> help)
>
>
The phonetic component is only a clue though, it's not meant to be an actual
pronunciation.  In many cases, yes, the pronunciation clue is quite sufficient
to accurately pronounce the character.  In many other cases, though, at least
the tone will be different, and in quite a few cases the initial consonant
will be different, although typically only in aspiration (the pinyin difference
between "b" and "p" for example).
The pronunciation clues are pretty specific to Mandarin and Cantonese and
other closely related 'dialects'.
None of this changes the fact that the characters are still used as if they
conveyed only semantic information and the phonetic component is pretty much
ignored as irrelevant.

stevo

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