fasheng xue??

[taobenli]

Hi, all-

First of all, I'm sorry I can't type in characters on this computer...it's an older one...

I am reading an anthropology article from the mainland about American adoption of Chinese children, and have come across the term "fasheng xue." "Fasheng" meaning happen/occur, and "xue" as study. Neither I or my Chinese teacher could figure it out! This article is full of words like "dehistoricization" (qulishihua, for those who care!) and we're assuming "fasheng xue" is something like "empiricism" or....? The way it's used in the sentence, it really seems like a category or field of study.

Here's the part of the sentence it's in, romanized:

"Wenhua yu zhongzu zhijian buying you fasheng xue shang de yinguo guanxi..."

My interpretation, minus the strange term: "Between culture and race there shouldn't be a cause and effect relationship under/from the perspective of ("shangde") fasheng xue."

Anyone have a clue?

Thanks in advance!

taobenli

[roddy]

Embryology or genetics, according to the ABC Dictionary. I think I'd probably translate it as something like "There should be no genetic relationship between race and culture."

Roddy

EDIT: Interesting word. Looking at it you'd think it's happenology or something, but when you know what it means it makes sense - develop life study.

[elina]

About 10 years ago, I worked in a travel agency that especially received and arranged of adoption groups for Chinese children. At that time, I did some translation on relevant adoptive documents, such as home study / 家庭调查报告，non-criminal record certificate / 无犯罪记录证明，health certificate / 健康证明，etc.

"Wenhua yu zhongzu zhijian buying you fasheng xue shang de yinguo guanxi..."

I think this sentence is: 文化与种族之间不应有“发声学”上的因果关系 / Culture and race should not affect “vocalization”. I think it comments on that after a Chinese child is adopted by a foreign family, he/she can learn and grasp the foreign language well, without problem caused by different culture and race.

[skylee]

"Fasheng" meaning happen/occur[/color'], and "xue" as study.

“发声[/color']学”

??? Some misunderstanding here ...

[skylee]

Another term may be "genesis". Take a look at this paper (it looks like slides used for a lecture).

一切学问的要义是研究其发生学(genesis):前人（大师级的人物）究竟观察到什么现象，提出什么问题，给出什么解答？他的想法与思维方式从何而来？受谁影响？有何局限？

[hakkaboy]

When I read that I wondered if "phenomenology" was the word. But the other posters are probably much closer.

[elina]

Since I never heard the phrase of “发生学”，I just thought “发生学”was a typo of “发声学”, which was a mistake caused by Pin Yin input method. It’s 经验主义 / empiricism.

But thanks for skylee’s point, now I know it’s not as simply as that. I search “发生学” in yahoo, and find this:

近年来，发生学作为观念与方法在人文科学领域运用日渐频繁，使用范围日渐广泛。然而，一些人在使用这一概念时存在着误解，最常见的是将发生理解为起源，将发生学理解为起源学。之所以出现这样的误解，是由于混淆了观念的发生与事件的发生。观念的发生与事件的发生是两个不同的概念，前者强调主观认识，后者强调客观现象，因此，发生学研究人类知识结构的生成，而起源学研究事件在历史中的出现；发生是逻辑推理概念，而起源是历史时间概念。

So it shows “发生学” is similar with “genesis”, but not exact as it.

People can always learn Chinese on this forum, no matter from a Chinese or even from a foreigner. It’s interesting and great!

[Quest]

I think Roddy is right, the sentence seems to mean "race and culture are separate things, so an adopted child belonging to a different race should be allowed to inherit the culture of another race (that of the adoptive parents')." or something like that....

[xiaocai]

发生学 can not be embryology or genetics since both of them already have their official Chinese translations, and I've never seen this word used in biological and medical circumstances.

[in_lab]

Does this thread count as a point against using pinyin instead of characters for writing Chinese, because 發生 and 發聲 are not differentiated by pinyin? Or does this count as a point against using characters, because using Chinese characters in this thread was not sufficient to eliminate the confusion about what the word means?

[elina]

I agree:

Does this thread count as a point against using pinyin instead of characters for writing Chinese,

And by the way, what's "dehistoricization" (qulishihua, for those who care!) (taobenli's saying)?

[skylee]

And by the way, what's "dehistoricization" (qulishihua, for those who care!) (taobenli's saying)?

Probably it is 去歷史化.

[elina]

Thanks for your reply, skylee.

Maybe qulishihua is 娶李诗画, I’m really not sure, though.

I wonder how long the 正主儿 / taobenli will appear and make it clear.

[(JR)]

from the guoyu cidian entry for 發生學:

"以動植物中細胞生物的分化﹑成長﹑形態形成為研究對象的一門學科。一般是指動植物個體的發生而言。早在古希臘希波克拉底時代就有數個胚胎發生的論說。西元一六五一年，英國哈維首先發表論文，顯微鏡發達以後，發生學也跟著快速進步。"

[roddy]

发生学 can not be embryology or genetics since both of them already have their official Chinese translations, and I've never seen this word used in biological and medical circumstances.

I can't see what else it can mean in this context though - although there's no guarantee the word was used accurately I suppose.

The quote from the Guoyu Cidian above mentions 西元一六五一年，英國哈維首先發表論文 - which refers to William Harvey, whose 1651 'On the Generation Of Animals' is, according to this site,

considered the basis for modern embryology

What would genetics and embryology usually be in Chinese? I have 胚胎学, and 遗传学, unrespectively.

Roddy

[elina]

I think there are two kinds of “发生学” in different fields, perhaps there are other third or fourth “发生学” in the future posts appeared, who knows.

Till now, it seems that one “发生学” is in the field of biology or maybe embryology, this is what Roddy and (JR) said; the other “发生学” is in the field of anthropology, this is what skylee and I said. I think the second “发生学” is more suitable to taobenli’ original post according to the context.

And now I second Quest:

the sentence seems to mean "race and culture are separate things, so an adopted child belonging to a different race should be allowed to inherit the culture of another race (that of the adoptive parents')." or something like that....

What would genetics and embryology usually be in Chinese?

According to 金山词霸，genetics: 遗传学, embryology: 胚胎学

By the way, how to make a beautiful link, like this:

Another term may be "genesis". Take a look at this paper (it looks like slides used for a lecture).

I can only make an ugly link, like this:

But thanks for skylee’s point' date=' now I know it’s not as simply as that. I search “发生学” in yahoo, and find the following:

[url']http://www.gmw.cn/01gmrb/2005-01/11/content_163266.htm[/url]

[skylee]

elina, to make a beautiful link, first highlight the text you want to use to hide the URL, then click this icon -> . And then fill in the URL at the pop-up window and press enter.

[elina]

Thank you very much, skylee! Look at my No. 7 post, now I can be as beautiful as you, I’m glad.

[randall_flagg]

Mmh. I haven’t read all the links that have been posted above but from what I am reading the word we are looking for is a mixture of embryology, anthropology and genetics, plus it has something to do with races. Have you considered that it might be described the weird concept of miscegenation? That seems to sound pretty right in the context. What do ya’ll think?

[Quest]

I think the context is cross racial and cross cultural adoption, and miscegenation does not fit in the sentence. 发生学 is not limited to evolution, but Darwin's theory of evolution is an example of 发生学。In that context, we have 因果关系. This normally would mean cause and effect, but here it probably means genetical relationship in the sense that a parent is the cause and his/her genetical children are the effect.