User Comments - tingyun

Posted on: Insect Market and Having a Baby

嗡嗡weng1weng1

Posted on: English Letters Make Chinese Words

A quick internet search seems to indicate 3 years prescribed, but usually 4 or 5 in practice, for phds in China.

Hmm, people entering here usually come with 4-5 years modern chinese and a couple of years of ancient chines...it's generally picking up the 3 yers of japanese and the additional things (manchu, mongolian, tibetan etc) that takes more time. I have a comparitivly light load, since my research interest doesn't involve border peoples, I just have to worry about japanese.

Either way, always interesting to talk to people in the same field, feel free to put her in touch via pm.

And always good chatting with you!

Tim

Posted on: The Better Man

It was chosen by Lin Yutang 林语堂, one of the great figures in early 20th century literature. It may be a bit distant in sound, but it managed to beat out something much closer proposed by Wang Guowei 王国维, The pronounciation 欧穆亚. Maybe it feels more fitting and succint? Anyway, complete story below, taken from 百度百科.

幽默并不是自从汉字诞生就有的词汇。大多数人认为该词为国学大师林语堂先生于1924年最先介绍入中国，对此，中国地域文化研究会委员、山东省民间文艺家协会理事张继平认为并不确切，张继平向记者介绍说，第一个将英语单词“humor”译成中文的应该是国学大师王国维，时间比林语堂首次使用“幽默”的译法早18年。

王国维在1906年出版了《屈子文学之精神》一书，书中普议及“humor”一词，并将其音译成“欧穆亚”，认为“欧穆亚”是一种达观的人生态度，但并未展开论述，以后也未再议。1924年，林语堂在《晨报》副刊上连续撰文，定“幽默”为“humor”的汉译名。因此，从严格意义上讲，“humor”一词的中文翻译第一人应该是王国维，“humor”进入中国已整整100年。

据了解，“幽默”一词在我国最早出现于屈原的《九章·怀沙》：“煦兮杳杳，

屈原

孔静幽默。”此处的“幽默”意为“幽默无声”。然而，“幽默”一词作为音译的外来词，与古汉语词语“幽默”并无关系。只是随着“幽默”一词新义的淬，“幽默”作为古汉语词语的本义逐渐被新义所取代。林语堂解释道：“凡善于幽默的人，其谐趣必愈幽隐；而善于鉴赏幽默的人，其欣赏尤在于内心静默的理会，大有不可与外人道之滋味。与粗鄙的笑话不同，幽默愈幽愈默而愈妙。”

林语堂把“humor” 译为“幽默”，当时许多文化名人也持有异议。鲁迅曾认为它容易被误解为“静默”或“幽静”，而觉该译法不妥。翻译家李青崖主张译为“语妙”、但“语妙天下 ”是句成语，有“光说不做”含义。语言学家陈望道拟将其译成“油滑”，又觉不够确切，且有轻浮之嫌。后来，语言学家唐栩侯又将其译作“谐穆”，认为一“谐 ”一“穆”构成“humor”整体。最终，林语堂的翻译方法被世人所认可，一直沿用至今。

Posted on: English Letters Make Chinese Words

Hi bodawei,

Nice to see you too - I really only have insight into the US system for humanities (especially history, since that is my field), but happy to share what I know.

First, there is a relevant difference between top phd programs and the lower tiers. In the US, the top universities (Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, MIT, Columbia, etc) generally all provide complete funding to their phd students for 5 years or so (full tuition, healthcare, plus 20-30k a year for living expenses). As you go further down, it becomes more spotty, with funding only for top students, or for a few years, or for fewer departments, and likely the funding, even if it exists, becomes more and more tied to working as, say, a teaching assistant (for example, my dept at Harvard only requires TAing one class per semester for three semesters, the other 7 semesters are pure grant with no work attached). Thus, I doubt the time difference is due to working obligations, at least at the top schools.

As for background, admits at top PhD programs here are increasingly coming with previous advanced degrees and work, and if not, they did extensive work in undergrad with impressive research already conducted. For example, I have a law degree and a masters degree studying China. In fact, the master's degree probably does make me able to do it a little faster - without it, I might be looking at 6-7 years instead of 5. So in explaining the jump all the way down to 3, there must be something else goingn on.

As for intensity, not sure things could be much more intense, haha.;)

I'd imagine the explanation has more to do with the expectations for hiring begining professors at Australian Universities. Taking the US example, law school profs are often hired straight out of law school, and a law degree (JD) is only 3 years. The hiring standards as far as I know them tend to be a published article and a 'job talk' about some current research you are conducting. However, for begining profs in Universities here, the requirment usually is more extensive, and in fact the dissertation is often treated as being the draft of your first book, which you are expected to publish very soon after getting your first job. My guess would be the australian dissertations tend to be less developed, and perhaps lie somewhere between what a masters thesis and a phd dissertation is here in the US.

Not to say there s anything better about the US system and more extensive requirments - in fact, there is a good chance I will be applying to law faculties upon graduation rather than history departments (my own research is in Chinese legal history). Instead it is just a different stance on when young academics transition to different stages, and how the development of their research should be timed.

It is also possible that General Exams and the required prep is adding some of the time - we generally here will have to exhaust the scholarship in 3-4 fields by reviewing some 600 books and then face a panel of scholars testing our knowledge in a several hour oral test, and this prep often consumes years 2- 3 of a PhD program. Language requirements are perhaps also at work - for example, if studying ancient china, the requirement is attaining proficncy in modern Chinese, Japanese, ancient Chinese, and for many depending on research field, additional languages like German, Tibetan, Manchu, Mongolian, etc, tends to add significant time. If the programs are only 3 years, it seems likely the language instruction is less extensive.

But again, not at all familar with the Australian situation, so just wild speculation ;)

Posted on: English Letters Make Chinese Words

Hi anli1520,

Thank you - I really appreciate your kind words.

Still at Harvard (probably another 4 years or so before I finish the phd). Dissertation topic still developing, research involves working with Ming 判词 (judicial opinions). For example, currently writing a paper involving the casebook 折狱新语 (http://baike.baidu.com/view/420472.htm ).

I'm actually just completing the first year of my Phd studies, a few years ago was in a masters program here (and then left for a year inbetween), if it seems like I'm taking forever ;)

Posted on: English Letters Make Chinese Words

Hi bohan,

Given your level, you might benefit from starting to use 百度百科 to find answers to questions like this. Besides the efficiency of being able to look it up yourself, and the added knowledge base over asking any individual speaker, you may also gain new vocabulary and usage just by reading the explanation. For example, here is the article for aa制 http://baike.baidu.com/view/2930.htm , and the first paragraph:

AA制是源于大中华地区的词汇，意思是各人平均分担所需费用，通常用于饮食聚会及旅游等场合。“AA”是“Algebraic Average”的缩写。意思是“代数平均”。意思可以从字面看出，就是按人头平均分担帐单的意思。这个意思首先来自英国人对荷兰人的偏见，因为古荷兰人就是平分帐单的，英国人认为荷兰人没有绅士风度。因为在古英语中与荷兰有关的东西大部分都是贬义的。但AA制还有其他说法，比如香港人把AA作为All Apart的缩写，意为“全部分开”。还有人认为“AA”是英文“Acting Appointment”的缩写。[1]

This opening paragraph quoted above offers a summary of the possible explanations - if you scroll down to the section headed "来源" you can get more details of alternate explanations. You might also want to scan the other section headings and see if something makes for interesting reading to you - perhaps 常见方式, it has some interesting social discussion within it.

百度百科 is a really great tool for answering such questions - I highly recomend it both as good reading practice and to increase your learning independance.

Posted on: New Employee in the Office

All. In wondering about this sort of thing in the future, it might be useful to know that some dictionaries mark such non-standard pronounciations, see for example 现代规范词典

http://www.nciku.com/search/zh/detail/潜/1311919

And notice the entry: 5. 统读ｑｉáｎ，不读ｑｉǎｎ。

Those sort of "always read it ----, don't read it in ----- way" notations are usually a good indication that alot of people read it that second way, and so good information for your listening (if nothing else to confirm you are hearing correctly, and should be alert for this alternate pronounciation).

Though sometimes such alternate pronunciations are confined to only some of the uses (ie, look up 骑 and you will see a notation not to say ji4, that was an older pronunciation used for nouns like "cavalry" not the common verb use), so you are very right to ask that question.

Posted on: New Employee in the Office

"Chinese people" is far too general a concept for this sort of question. Both pronounciations are widespread, and which is used will depend partly on region, partly on quality of education, and partly on concern for adopting standard pronounciation.

You should probably use the 2-4 tones, as it will create no difficulties in being understood and will be recognized as correct by those who care of such things. In that sense it is different from, say, 嫉妒, where using the standard tones of 2-4 would almost certainly lead to people misunderstanding, and so it's best to just pronounce it 4-4 like 忌妒, in line with overwhelmingly common pronounciation.

Posted on: Seeing off an Old Friend 渭城曲

There are obvious problems in using a dictionary focussed on modern chinese to understand ancient poetry. This becomes even worse when using modern chinese-english dictionaries, as they tend to be even more oversimplified in avoiding less common meanings. There is also no good ancient chinese - english dictionary.

So if you want to use a dictionary to aid you in working though these ancient poems, you will need to find a good ancient chinese - modern chinese dictionary.

Handian is a reasonable and free choice, here is the entry for 君- http://www.zdic.net/zd/zi/ZdicE5Zdic90Zdic9B.htm

The meaning you are looking for is "3. 对对方的尊称：张～。诸～。"

Translation: "a respectful way of referring to someone"

It would probably be better glossed as "you (respectful)", though the person referred to as "you" is the poet's "friend".

Posted on: Dublin

A slight correction - 3. Should be bo4 (it is standing in for 檗), and as a surname both bai3 and bo2 are possible and correct. Some will say bo2 is the older pronouciation, with bai3 being more common in the mainland now, but as is always the case with names, it depends on how the person decides their name should be pronounced (陈寅恪que4 would be a good example of this principle, those who study literature still seem to prefer his dialect pronouciation que4 over ke4).

A similar situation is present with the surname 盖 - dictionaries generally list ge3 as the pronouciation, but plenty of people use gai4, and it would be a bit silly to try to dictate to people how to say their names. Mainland China is huge, you will find people with the surname 柏 adhering to the older pronounciation and using bo2.

The real difficulty in knowing how to pronounce names lies in mythological figures - analysis suggests that it should be 夸父kua4fu3 and 共工gong1gong1, but people say kua1fu4 and gong4gong1...always hard to know whether one should go with unthinking modern readings in such cases, though I tend to...