How useful is zhuyin / 'bopomofo'? How to use it?

[renzhe]

How is the letter J useful to people learning English if they're, say, Swedish?

Not very. It might even be a nuissance.

On the other hand, they will find other things useful: m, n, o, t, p, b, h, d, f, k, etc. In fact, most of it will be useful.

And they will have all the advantages that 20+ years of active use of a script brings with it, like the speed of processing and visual cues. Here's an example: I can read Croatian and Serbian texts far more easily using the Latin alphabet than in Cyrillic, although I'm familiar with both scripts. I've spent far more than a week learning Cyrillic (think years), and I've read a number of books in the script over the years, ever since early childhood. Cyrillic also has a perfect 1-1 phonetic mapping to Croatian and Serbian, one character per sound.

It still doesn't matter. I'm 10x faster when reading the same text in Latin characters. And I'm pretty sure that I'll always be 10x faster when processing pinyin as compared to zhuyin, for the same reasons. And a "j" or an "x" don't really bother me, just like they didn't bother be when I was learning German, Spanish, Latin or Turkish.

[Lu]

Well, I kind of did, yes, and this is my point. I cant speak or learn German or French to any reasonable level, because my own head for what these sounds should sound like gets in the way. Is this a disadvantage for me? Yes. What system should I overcome this problem with? Zhuyin for Chinese is the answer.

If you have trouble computing that different languages pronounce those 26 letters in different ways, then I guess I can see why you like zhuyin.

To be honest it's a problem I've never run into. With any foreign language I've learned, it was explained early on how various words were pronounced in said language. And like renzhe, I could use the familiar letters as a crutch: those I already mostly knew, now I only needed to learn the unfamiliar ones. (And despite the fact that I like foreign alphabets [i have no problem reading Greek and Cyrillic letters, and it took me very little time to learn them], I read pinyin a lot faster than zhuyin.)

You argue that zhuyin is a better system, but your arguments seem to boil down to: because I prefer it, and because I find pinyin confusing. You're free to prefer any system you want, but that by itself doesn't make it a better system.

[chrix]

Shi Tong:

As I said, I chiefly learnt zhuyin through “osmosis”, that is by years of typing fantizi on IME and having the letters reinforced every time I typed them. I never sat down and specifically tried to memorise the letters as there was no need to.

Now, generally speaking, learning an alphabet is not that difficult (though there are some mighty confusing ones around like Armenian or Thai, though the latter isn't an alphabet in the strictest sense of the word). But, as many others have rightly said, you will still process an alphabet you're intimately familiar with infinitely faster than an alphabet you just learnt (and it will take you a lot of time and exposure to get your zhuyin processing up to speed, and I think this fact alone in a way defeats the purpose of language learning, but it might just be me). I think this factor beats out the potential confusion caused by letters assigned different sound values in different languages.

[buzhongren]

lu: You argue that zhuyin is a better system, but your arguments seem to boil down to: because I prefer it, and because I find pinyin confusing. You're free to prefer any system you want, but that by itself doesn't make it a better system.

I do find it interesting for example that the pinyin final iao suggesting one sound is written in zhuyin as ㄧㄠ suggesting two. Depending on who I listen too I hear one or two sounds. Also there is no ambiguity when we use these two zhuyin symbols compared to pinyin replacing the i with y giving yao to demarcate sound in speech and grammar. There are other but ifs in pinyin like writing ju for jü. I prefer pinyin because my language is based on an alphabet. I do appreciate zhuyin for the purity and no ambiguity.

xiele,

Jim

[imron]

I know this, and it's exactly the same way as they pronounce Zhuyin when they're explaining how to pronounce a word.

Yep, that's because it's not a Zhuyin or a Pinyin thing, but rather a Chinese thing

I think you might also be wrong here- zhi wu ang is three sounds, like in zhuyin, and should be explained in such a way.

I'm not going to disagree that there are three sounds, for example if you ask someone to split wang, they will say "wu, -ang wang", so if zhuang is "zhi, wang, zhuang" then through substitution you could go further and say that zhuang is "zhi, wu, ang, zhuang", but typically when describing syllables, a Chinese person would just say the initial then the final, then the complete sound.

A straw poll of 6 Chinese friends just now for zhuang revealed 4 in favour of 2 sounds and 2 in favour of 3 so I guess it's not something so fixed. But either way, my point is still the same, that is, when learning pinyin don't look at letters individually, but rather split sounds into initial + final and you can't really go wrong (assuming you know your initials and finals that is, and simple rules like wang = -uang etc).

[in_lab]

but typically when describing syllables, a Chinese person would just say the initial then the final, then the complete sound.

Depends whether they learned using pinyin or zhuyin. If they learned in zhuyin, they are more likely to "spell it out" as zhi wu ang. If they didn't learn zhuyin, I would guess that would be unlikely. Of the six people polled, which were pinyin learners and which zhuyin learners?

Edit: On the other hand, if you interpret "Chinese person" as referring to nationality, then I agree.

[imron]

All mainland based.

[Shi Tong]

Not very. It might even be a nuissance.

On the other hand, they will find other things useful: m, n, o, t, p, b, h, d, f, k, etc. In fact, most of it will be useful.

Or.. how about a phonetic system with the right amount of sounds for the right amount of characters??!

I'm not denying that a lot of people who are used to a Roman alphabet will find it easier to read pinyin, and the reason is that it gives the reader an indication of pronunciation because these people would have been immersed in a Roman alphabet from (almost) birth.

Have you ever considered that zhuyin is like shorthand? Shorthand lived for many years being an immensely useful system to people taking notes, and that was entirely a phonetic system based not one jot on the Roman alphabet.

The thing is this:

Pinyin offers a weaker phonetic system than Zhuyin, and IMO, if you need an explaination on paper for a pronunciation, zhuyin is clearer to me. This doesn't mean to say that you cant apply the pinyin rules, it means that I wont suffer from missing unlouts over u's or combinations of w's and u's in the middle of words etc.

Pinyin does offer more learning materials and is pretty fast to type (if you haven't learned to type zhuyin).

If you have trouble computing that different languages pronounce those 26 letters in different ways, then I guess I can see why you like zhuyin.

Not too much trouble, but things like uo and ou are annoying to me, because they're the same two letters with a different sound applied to each. I even met a person on a forum about Three Kingdoms whose name was "Dong Zhou", and I'm pretty sure he meant "Dong Zhuo". It took me ages to realise because I was looking at the words and guessing that he meant that character.

It's also why I'm useless at French but very good at Mandarin.

You argue that zhuyin is a better system, but your arguments seem to boil down to: because I prefer it, and because I find pinyin confusing. You're free to prefer any system you want, but that by itself doesn't make it a better system.

That's nonsense.

My arguments put forward many reasons why I prefer Zhuyin, I dont just say "pinyin is worse and zhuyin is better", I give good reasons why.

Just because those reasons why dont add up to much with other people, doesn't mean to say they're important factors for me, any why do I count less than other people in the same shoes?

Oh, and if you're entitled to the opinion that pinyin is "better", then why aren't I allowed the opinion that zhuyin is?

Seems to me that the arguments why pinyin is "better" is because it can be written in a German driving licence, you can get more learning materials for it, you can type it faster and read it faster (if you're more used to it).

My arguments against these points is that: It doesn't matter if you write chung or zhang, Harry X from the BBC will still pronounce it wrong. Just because you can get more learning materials for it doesn't mean it's a better system, it means it's more widespread. You can type it faster if you're English (or whatever) because you've been using it from the start, and you can read it faster for the same reason.

Zhuyin offers something unique which pinyin can't, the right amount of letters to pronounce from to be completely clear about a pronunciation.

This (TO ME), means it's a better system.

I chiefly learnt zhuyin through “osmosis”

As I did with pinyin, which I still find occasionally confusing.

Now, generally speaking, learning an alphabet is not that difficult (though there are some mighty confusing ones around like Armenian or Thai, though the latter isn't an alphabet in the strictest sense of the word). But, as many others have rightly said, you will still process an alphabet you're intimately familiar with infinitely faster than an alphabet you just learnt (and it will take you a lot of time and exposure to get your zhuyin processing up to speed, and I think this fact alone in a way defeats the purpose of language learning, but it might just be me). I think this factor beats out the potential confusion caused by letters assigned different sound values in different languages.

Which is why I've suggested from the start that people who stuggle with pinyin may do well to be given an alternative which may help, and I think a good alternative to that system is zhuyin.

Does that sound unreasonable?

Children in the UK and US have had trouble for years with the use of the same letter producing two sounds, which is why they're now being taught phonetic sounds to every letter assigned too.

Do you not think this is a valid point?

Do you think there will be a stage where phonetic symbols for other sounds are intorduced alongside normal Roman script to aid children readers?

It's probably unlikely, but then zhuyin is in all the children's books in Taiwan to aid with Chinese characters because it's shorter than pinyin, and IMO, leaves less alternatives than pinyin.

Actually, I think it would be confusing for a Chinese/ Taiwanese child to be offered pinyin because they'd have to learn the Roman alphabet first and then all the strange rules that go with it, do you think this is possible too?

To go back to your point, I agree that writing pinyin is easier for most western people, but IMO, when being taught how to say zhuang, hearing the sounds zhi- wu- ang in three simple symbols and pronounced clearly to you, beats pinyin's idea that you can get rid of the w and put in a u, and pronounce it as an "ooo" sound.

I do find it interesting for example that the pinyin final iao suggesting one sound is written in zhuyin as ㄧㄠ suggesting two.

Thanks buzhongren, and it's another reason why I think pinyin is annoying (in that way). Realising every little movement your tongue makes, IMO is a really useful thing-

ㄧㄠ is definately two sounds-- ee and ow, you cant make iao without starting with an e and ending in an ow.

It took me ages to explain to my mum that a "w" is two sounds, not one. When you say "w" in English at the start of the word, or explain it's pronunciation to children, it's always said as "oouh". Saying Wu when you mean "ooo" in Chinese is another one of those confusing annoying things.

Give you another example:

To write "yong4" in pinyin, means "use" (like "wo hui yong4"). If you actually look at the sounds made, it's ㄩㄥ4.

How many clues are there in the pinyin writing that there is an ㄩin there, and why is this not "ㄧㄥ"? You can almost make the same sound with ㄧㄥ, but not quite.

Yep, that's because it's not a Zhuyin or a Pinyin thing, but rather a Chinese thing

I beg to differ, zhuyin is a "Chinese" thing, and all kids in Taiwan learn and use it.

A straw poll of 6 Chinese friends just now for zhuang revealed 4 in favour of 2 sounds and 2 in favour of 3 so I guess it's not something so fixed

I'm not suggesting that you're biased, but ask some Taiwanese people if you're going to make a straw poll of something like this, I would think the results would be the other way around. Actually, I cant think of anyone in Taiwan, if I asked them who would explain it's zhi- wang zhuang.

But either way, my point is still the same, that is, when learning pinyin don't look at letters individually, but rather split sounds into initial + final and you can't really go wrong (assuming you know your initials and finals that is, and simple rules like wang = -uang etc).

I agree. You need to break down pinyin to read it's pronunciation, but how do you break down "yong4" and get ㄩㄥ4?

[renzhe]

Pinyin offers a weaker phonetic system than Zhuyin

Using digraphs does NOT make a system less phonetic.

I beg to differ, zhuyin is a "Chinese" thing, and all kids in Taiwan learn and use it.

Seriously, do you even READ the things that you are replying to? Your answer has absolutely no relation to what imron wrote. I cannot comprehend what you are trying to say or what you thought he said.

He said that a Mandarin syllable consists of an initial and a final. He never said that Zhuyin is not Chinese, anywhere.

but how do you break down "yong4"

No initial + iong final.

It doesn't matter if you write chung or zhang, Harry X from the BBC will still pronounce it wrong.

He might, if he is not familiar with pinyin. But it is still POSSIBLE to pronounce Zhang correctly, because it contains all the information you need to do so.

On the other hand, it is IMPOSSIBLE to pronounce Chen Chi Chen correctly. It will always be pronounced wrong. Because it doesn't contain all the information you need to pronounce it.

This is why pinyin is superior to randomly invented romanisations.

[Lu]

My arguments put forward many reasons why I prefer Zhuyin, I dont just say "pinyin is worse and zhuyin is better", I give good reasons why.

Yes, your 'good reason why' being 'pinyin doesn't work for me'. If I missed a different argument that you mentioned somewhere, do let me know. Like I said, of course you're allowed to prefer one system over the other, and it's clear that zhuyin works better for you personally, but simply it working for you is not enough reason to proclaim it superior.

Zhuyin offers something unique which pinyin can't, the right amount of letters to pronounce from to be completely clear about a pronunciation.

This (TO ME), means it's a better system.

This doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I'm as completely clear about the pronounciation of a word written in pinyin as I am about one written in zhuyin. Zhuyin has initials and finals, so has pinyin. The number of letters used doesn't change that, or pronounciation. And there's no inherent reason why ㄓ is pronounced /zh/ except that it has been decided that it does, much as for pinyin zh.

[renzhe]

It took me ages to explain to my mum that a "w" is two sounds, not one. When you say "w" in English at the start of the word, or explain it's pronunciation to children, it's always said as "oouh". Saying Wu when you mean "ooo" in Chinese is another one of those confusing annoying things.

Pinyin "w" is always pronounced like "u". wang = uang, wu = u, wei = uei.

This doesn't take ages to explain

[buzhongren]

shi_tong: Pinyin does offer more learning materials and is pretty fast to type (if you haven't learned to type zhuyin).

On my Bopomofo input keyboard when I type ㄔㄚˊ I get a drop down list of cha2 characters. On my PinYin keyboard I only get to type cha which gives me a down list of all cha1-4 characters sorted by some frequency. Is it the way the PinYin keyboard works or do some keyboards allow you to enter cha2 to get a dropdown list of only those characters.

xiele,

Jim

[chrix]

Now, generally speaking, learning an alphabet is not that difficult (though there are some mighty confusing ones around like Armenian or Thai, though the latter isn't an alphabet in the strictest sense of the word). But, as many others have rightly said, you will still process an alphabet you're intimately familiar with infinitely faster than an alphabet you just learnt (and it will take you a lot of time and exposure to get your zhuyin processing up to speed, and I think this fact alone in a way defeats the purpose of language learning, but it might just be me). I think this factor beats out the potential confusion caused by letters assigned different sound values in different languages.

Which is why I've suggested from the start that people who stuggle with pinyin may do well to be given an alternative which may help, and I think a good alternative to that system is zhuyin.

Does that sound unreasonable?

Don't twists my words please. I argued all of this to say that familiarity of script beats potential confusion, so your use of "which is why" is a bit confusing here.

As for the rest of your post:

- we don't have any studies (AFAIK) that compare the two systems, so many of the arguments just will be going around in circles. But if we are to argue by anecdotes, I don't know any people who were confused by pinyin. People are used to varying sound values from other foreign languages, and if studied carefully, it won't be a problem. And since in a good Chinese course, the first weeks are spent on pronunciation drills anyways, you can introduce pinyin at the same time, with the sounds.

- Differentiate between adult learners and native children . Adult learners in the West are usually foreign-language experienced and are intimately familiar with the Latin script.

- Pinyin, zhuyin are only aids. Together with the intimacy argument, why should adult learners spend so much time to familarise themselves with a script that is only used in a very limited context?

A straw poll of 6 Chinese friends just now for zhuang revealed 4 in favour of 2 sounds and 2 in favour of 3 so I guess it's not something so fixed. But either way, my point is still the same, that is, when learning pinyin don't look at letters individually, but rather split sounds into initial + final and you can't really go wrong (assuming you know your initials and finals that is, and simple rules like wang = -uang etc).

The number of segments is nothing decided by majority vote, but by phonological segmentation. Linguistically speaking "zhuang" has four "sounds". It's a different thing to argue about the best way of segmenting a syllable into initial, medial and final etc, but let's get the terminology right.

On my Bopomofo input keyboard when I type ㄔㄚˊ I get a drop down list of cha2 characters. On my PinYin keyboard I only get to type cha which gives me a down list of all cha1-4 characters sorted by some frequency. Is it the way the PinYin keyboard works or do some keyboards allow you to enter cha2 to get a dropdown list of only those characters.

You should look at it from the native speaker's perspective. It's quite rare that they will type only one syllable like you describe, usually they type sentences and words in context. So most pinyin input methods have parsers that have become quite good, and for that you simply don't need tones. In many pinyin methods, however, you can turn on tone marks...

[renzhe]

SCIM (on Unix/Linux) lets you enter tone numbers, but this is off by default, as it gets in the way when entering longer words.

I don't know if every input method has this, but I think that many do.

[buzhongren]

renzhe: SCIM (on Unix/Linux) lets you enter tone numbers, but this is off by default, as it gets in the way when entering longer words.

My Linux from Taiwan comes with GCIN installed. You would think they would provide something more industrial like SCIM. It handles compounds like wode and characters like shi okay. I still would like the option that the distribution frequency be based on cha2 instead of cha as example. MDBG has an applet based on pinyin with no tone marks which works just as well as what came installed on my Linux. Is there one somewhere that works with tone marks similar to MDBG.

I bring this up here because no matter what we say about PinYin for teaching it really sucks as an IME .

xiele,

Jim

[imron]

I'm not suggesting that you're biased, but ask some Taiwanese people if you're going to make a straw poll of something like this, I would think the results would be the other way around. Actually, I cant think of anyone in Taiwan, if I asked them who would explain it's zhi- wang zhuang.

If there had been Taiwanese people around I would have asked them, but as it was, no-one I was with was Taiwanese. What is interesting however is that some of the people I asked don't know pinyin (they are of the generation that never learned it) but they still split the sound in two - initial + final.

This is what I meant by my comment above about how separating a sound into initial + final like this is not something that is an attribute of pinyin, but rather of the Chinese language (or at least the Chinese language that I've always heard spoken), and pinyin merely represents that rather than causes it.

If this is significantly different in Taiwan compared to the Mainland then I guess this is just another area where the language has diverged between the two places. That being the case, it doesn't seem to harm the pronunciation of native speakers on the mainland to think of sounds like this. Neither does pinyin seem to be a detriment to people learning the language, or at least I never found it to be the case for me. Still waiting for you to post an example of your pronunciation though.

[Shi Tong]

No initial + iong final.

Sorry Renzhe, I think you're wrong there. Yong (as in "use") is pronounced ㄩㄥ, not ㄧㄥ.

it is IMPOSSIBLE to pronounce Chen Chi Chen correctly. It will always be pronounced wrong. Because it doesn't contain all the information you need to pronounce it.

This is why pinyin is superior to randomly invented romanisations.

Your argument for this is pointless, I already know that pinyin is better than the random Taiwanese way of Romanising Chinese characters.

My point is that pinyin is only a tool which is useful for learning Chinese, not really for anything else, just like zhuyin. You may be able to write your name on a passport, but it doesn't do anything for anyone, except those who have learned Chinese before.

Yes, your 'good reason why' being 'pinyin doesn't work for me'. If I missed a different argument that you mentioned somewhere, do let me know.

Try reading my posts.

I'm as completely clear about the pronounciation of a word written in pinyin as I am about one written in zhuyin.

Good for you, I find it confusing.

Pinyin "w" is always pronounced like "u". wang = uang, wu = u, wei = uei.

This doesn't take ages to explain

IMO, this explaination is just a good example of why pinyin is a pain- the question is immediately raised as to how is u pronounced under these circumstances?

Is it U for under, is it U for urine, is it U for any of the other u's which appear in English?

ㄨjust gives you an explaination that it sounds like an "oooo".

Wang could have an a which sounds like an apple, and wei could sound like wee as in what you do down the toilet.

I do understand that you can explain this, but I find it easier to see an ㄨ

Don't twists my words please. I argued all of this to say that familiarity of script beats potential confusion, so your use of "which is why" is a bit confusing here.

I'm not trying to twist your words. I understand that for a lot of people, using their own script would help them in learning a new language.

My point was that in cases where it does not, or it confuses, it's why I suggest that people might want to be given an alternative.

I don't know any people who were confused by pinyin

You do- me.

Pinyin, zhuyin are only aids. Together with the intimacy argument, why should adult learners spend so much time to familarise themselves with a script that is only used in a very limited context?

I know, I suggest people use the system which will be more intimately useful for themselves, and as I said before, zhuyin is easy to learn, why is asking for less than a week's learning being too time consuming?

How will pinyin, once learned, be useful in anything other than a limited context? Pinyin will be used for them to learn Chinese, nothing more.

The number of segments is nothing decided by majority vote, but by phonological segmentation. Linguistically speaking "zhuang" has four "sounds". It's a different thing to argue about the best way of segmenting a syllable into initial, medial and final etc, but let's get the terminology right.

Zhuang does have four sounds, I agree.

The argument to make this into three sounds, however, still stands as a more legitimate way of spelling this sound, IMO.

We all know that in Chinese words can end in ang, so the clearing up is to be done in the middle where there should be a seperation where the ooo and ang sounds occur, otherwise people might think that wang is a ligitimate sound on it's own instead of a combination of oo and ang.

On another note, I just found this online. I thought you said that Taiwan was only supposed to officially teach pinyin?

This is what I meant by my comment above about how separating a sound into initial + final like this is not something that is an attribute of pinyin, but rather of the Chinese language (or at least the Chinese language that I've always heard spoken), and pinyin merely represents that rather than causes it.

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but because most people in Taiwan know zhuyin intimately, they use it to spell out Chinese words, and this is why I was trying to point out that Taiwanese people like to spell things using the zhuyin alphabet, instead of seperating chinese characters how they "think" of them, if you get my drift.

it doesn't seem to harm the pronunciation of native speakers on the mainland to think of sounds like this.

I wouldn't have thought it makes a jot of difference to native speakers as you suggest, reason being is that they're brought up with whatever system they're used to.

I've heard the "initial+final" method of spelling where they still stick sounds like oo and ang together in one go, so it's not that strange!

Still waiting for you to post an example of your pronunciation though.

:lol:It took me all lunch to write this, since I'm at work, and I also had customers in the interim. I'll see if I can find time to post something, but I'd also have to refind the thread.

I'd also have to sneak it onto my work computer!

I do tend to just dip in and out of here, and since most of the time, people completely disagree with me, I find it hard to find time to do other things on the site, since I'm trying to argue my corner!

[chrix]

Sorry Renzhe, I think you're wrong there. Yong (as in "use") is pronounced ㄩㄥ, not ㄧㄥ.

this doesn't make any sense to me. Could you use IPA notation to indicate what sounds you actually mean by that?

Zhuang does have four sounds, I agree.

The argument to make this into three sounds, however, still stands as a more legitimate way of spelling this sound, IMO.

We all know that in Chinese words can end in ang, so the clearing up is to be done in the middle where there should be a seperation where the ooo and ang sounds occur, otherwise people might think that wang is a ligitimate sound on it's own instead of a combination of oo and ang.

On another note, I just found this online. I thought you said that Taiwan was only supposed to officially teach pinyin?

This doesn't make any sense to me. Linguistically speaking, it either has four sounds or it has three. You can make a case for using three letters instead of four or five, but please don't confuse sounds and letters here.

I'm not trying to twist your words. I understand that for a lot of people, using their own script would help them in learning a new language.

My point was that in cases where it does not, or it confuses, it's why I suggest that people might want to be given an alternative.

I think it would confuse most newbies if you gave them half a dozen systems to choose from, it's bad enough that Sinology students have to familiarise themselves with all of them...

You do- me.

Again, you're twisting my words, or rather quoting me out of context, I was talking about anectodal evidence, and I don't know anyone personally who's had trouble with pinyin. (I'm not talking about people I only know virtually from an internet forum).

I know, I suggest people use the system which will be more intimately useful for themselves, and as I said before, zhuyin is easy to learn, why is asking for less than a week's learning being too time consuming?

How will pinyin, once learned, be useful in anything other than a limited context? Pinyin will be used for them to learn Chinese, nothing more.

Look, I've repeated the argument about processing speed a couple of times now and won't do so again. Pinyin will also be acquired faster than zhuyin since it is based on the Latin script, another argument I've made several times.

I do tend to just dip in and out of here, and since most of the time, people completely disagree with me, I find it hard to find time to do other things on the site, since I'm trying to argue my corner!

Nobody forces you to spend so much time arguing your case for zhuyin. You're welcome to spend more time on other threads....

[Lu]

Yes' date=' your 'good reason why' being 'pinyin doesn't work for me'. If I missed a different argument that you mentioned somewhere, do let me know.[/quote'']Try reading my posts.

Yeah, I actually did that. I went through the entire thread to find your arguments, thinking that I probably had just overlooked them. But no luck. On the first page you name three reasons that are debunked in a few posts after it, and after that it's just a repeat of your argument: pinyin confused me. Zhuyin works for me. Why are you calling me a bad student.

The posts have numbers, perhaps you can name me one where you make another argument.

I'm as completely clear about the pronounciation of a word written in pinyin as I am about one written in zhuyin.[/quote']Good for you' date=' I find it confusing.[/quote']Which you have been saying for about five pages now. It's still not an argument.

IMO, this explaination is just a good example of why pinyin is a pain- the question is immediately raised as to how is u pronounced under these circumstances?

Is it U for under, is it U for urine, is it U for any of the other u's which appear in English?

ㄨjust gives you an explaination that it sounds like an "oooo".

If you see the letter u in pinyin, you know what it should sound like once the teacher has explained it to you. If you see ㄨ in zhuyin, you know what it sounds like once the teacher has explained it to you. There's nothing about ㄨ by itself that tells you how to pronounce it. Just like with pinyin, it has to be explained first.

My point is that pinyin is only a tool which is useful for learning Chinese, not really for anything else, just like zhuyin. You may be able to write your name on a passport, but it doesn't do anything for anyone, except those who have learned Chinese before.

Well, it does. It gets your name in your passport. Zhuyin can't do that. It can also spell street and place names, for example.

[renzhe]

Sorry Renzhe, I think you're wrong there. Yong (as in "use") is pronounced ㄩㄥ, not ㄧㄥ.

No, I'm right

Check this table here: http://www.quickmandarin.com/chinesepinyintable/.

Also check here. The final in "yong" is pronounced exactly the same as the final in "qiong", "xiong" and "jiong".

If there is no initial, then i -> y, u -> w and ü -> yu.

This might be a bit confusing in the beginning, but less confusing than reading things like "xüiao"

You may be able to write your name on a passport, but it doesn't do anything for anyone, except those who have learned Chinese before.

It does do something -- it gives Chinese the same ability to write their names using the Roman alphabet that most European languages do.

Your argument can be extended to say that the German script doesn't do anything for anyone, except for those who have learned German before, and you'd be right. And this is true for every language on this planet.

But you can learn to pronounce it in about 15 minutes, just like pinyin. So Germans don't see a problem with this, and neither do most Chinese.

The difference is that you can use, print and enter a pinyinized name anywhere where you can use the Latin alphabet, and you can't enter zhuyin almost anywhere, and it is even less useful to somebody who doesn't speak Chinese. And most people who DO speak it.

IMO, this explaination is just a good example of why pinyin is a pain- the question is immediately raised as to how is u pronounced under these circumstances?

Is it U for under, is it U for urine, is it U for any of the other u's which appear in English?

Since it's a Latin character, it would be the Latin pronunciation.

Which sounds like an "oooo".

Simple, eh?