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The article points out that, because Chinese is not a phonetic language, if you don't know how to write something, you might not be able to write it at all, whi
by cubefox 2y ago
The article points out that, because Chinese is not a phonetic language, if you don't know how to write something, you might not be able to write it at all, while in phonetic languages you can always spell something that sounds the same. E.g. "snees" for "sneeze".
- almaight 2y agoThis is true in mainland China, but not in Taiwan. There, katakana is used as pinyin, and words can be composed by katakana.
- vunderba 2y agoI'm not sure where you've got this from, but I lived in Taiwan for years - you might be thinking of 注音 which does look similar to kana but is distinct and unrelated. And the authors article is referring to the writing of the logograph - 注音 is strictly for pronunciation.
- cubefox 2y agoSo the question is then whether writing "snees" instead of "sneeze" is like writing sneeze in pinyin (or in "注音"), or not.