What is the main difference between Chinese characters and a phonetic alphabet?
Q: What is the main difference between Chinese characters and a phonetic alphabet?
A: Chinese characters are a logographic writing system, meaning that the writing mainly shows the words' meaning rather than its pronunciation. A phonetic alphabet is a writing system that uses symbols to represent sounds, so it can be used to write down words in many different languages.
Q: How does this cause confusion when naming places in China?
A: Since there has been no phonetic alphabet for thousands of years, it can be challenging to know which spoken dialect to use when writing out the name in the Roman alphabet (a phonetic writing system). This created a lot of confusion and misinformation for non-Chinese speakers on what to call Chinese place names.
Q: What did the Chinese Communist Party do to help with this issue?
A: The Chinese Communist Party made Hanyu Pinyin the only accepted romanization in official use and banned all other romanizations in official use in mainland China. This allowed non-Chinese speakers, especially English speakers, to say Chinese place names much more accurately according to their Mandarin pronunciations.
Q: How do autonomous regions handle place names differently from mainland China?
A: In autonomous regions, places in China where certain minority groups make up a large part of the region's population, many place names changed back from Chinese to the local languages in order to represent the local languages. For example, after Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region was formed Dihua (迪化) was changed back to Urumqi which is its name in Uyghur language.
Q: How are Taiwanese cities usually spelled?
A: The names of Taiwanese cities are usually spelled using Chinese postal romanization instead of Hanyu Pinyin which is generally accepted worldwide as standard romanization of Mandarin Chinese. This is because many Taiwanese dislike using Hanyu Pinyin since it was created by the Chinese Communist Party which they don't like.
Q: What kind of spelling inconsistency exists within Taiwan?
A: Within northern Taiwanese cities most names of streets, districts, and subway stops are written using Hanyu Pinyin while cities located further south tend not use any particular spelling system simply resist using Hanyu Pinyin resulting into several different spellings for one street or district - for example "Shinjann Rd." and "Sin Jhan Rd." for Xinzhan Road (新站路) located at Banqiao city.
