Re: NATLANG: Chinese parts of speech (or lack thereof)

On Sunday, August 8, 2004, at 09:22 , Andreas Johansson wrote:

> Quoting Philippe Caquant <herodote92@...>:
>
>> So here are my first, though not final, conclusions
>> and reflexions :
>>
>> 1/ Chinese IS definitely an essentially ideographic,
I seem to recall that on 7th August, Philippe wrote: "Being no sinolog....
  "

Now, in his typical manner, this 'no sinolog' dogmatically tells us all
that Chinese is definitely and essentially ideographic (emphasizing 'is'),
thus contradicting, e.g. the opinions of the Chinese linguist, Yuen Ren
Chao and, indeed, of many other authorities.

But then, Y.R. Chao is both Chinese and a linguist, therefore, I guess,
hopelessly biased and lacks the dogmatic certainty of our 'no sinolog'. I
had better assign his book and those others I have to the dustbin; they're
so definitely and essentially mistaken.

>> and the only reason to refute this is the discussion
>> about the meaning of "ideographic" or "ideogram".
>
> Well, true, we can always _redefine_ the meaning of "ideogram" till it
> fits
> Hanzi writing, but then we could make it fit French spelling too.
Yes, of course, we could.

Indeed, French IS definitely ideographic, the only reason to refute this
is the discussion about the meaning of "ideographic" or "ideogram".

End of discussion (unless Mark comes up with a Chinese recipe   :)

Ray
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