"NBA" as an entry in Chinese dictionary

In the August 28, 2012 issue of "北京晚报", it is reported that more than a hundred Chinese scholars signed a letter sent to the Chinese government claiming that the de facto official Chinese dictionary 《现代汉语词典》 is illegal to include 239 words which begin with a letter of a western language, violating certain laws that govern the correct usage of the Chinese language. "NBA" is among the words. This news was followed by intense debate on the Internet ([1], [2], [3], [4], to name the first few). The scholars worry that gradual introduction of 字母词 or letter-words will eventually cause harm to the Chinese language, calling it "the most serious damage since the Chinese character Latinization (Romanization) initiated a hundred years ago". The pro-letter-word side of the argument claims that the Chinese language has been evolving all the time for thousands of years, and that introducing "NBA", "PM2.5", and other letter-words into the most popular dictionary helps the general public easily understand these terms which are already widely used. When CCTV changed "NBA" to "美职篮" (literally "US professional basketball"), the Chinese NBA viewers simply ignore the term and continue to say "NBA" in conversation. CCTV changed back to "NBA" as soon as the Chinese dictionary was published, semi-officially approving "NBA" as an acceptable word in the Chinese language, and more than raising the eyebrows of a handful of die-hard Chinese language scholars.

To be fair, a dictionary of a spelling language (language whose writing system is alphabet-based) never lists a Chinese word as is. An English dictionary never has a non-Latin spelling entry, thus excluding not just Chinese, but any Oriental language, Hindi, Arabic, any Slavic language, and many others as well. To incorporate "饺子" into an English dictionary, the spelling "jiaozi" is used. Now, if we need to have this "symmetry", we must add to the Chinese dictionary a Chinese-character-transliterated word such as "摁逼诶" in place of "NBA". It looks funny though. Why? I guess it's because the users of the word "NBA" in China are used to it and appreciate its simplicity. (How long do your eyes stay on "摁逼诶" for your brain to process the same info as "NBA", even if your native language is Chinese?) If this had happened a century ago, "摁逼诶" would most likely have been accepted in preference to "NBA". But nowadays the Chinese audience of "NBA" are at least able to pronounce English letters. The beauty of simplicity rules. Considering the law of survival of the fittest almost equally applicable to linguistics, I don't see a bright future for "摁逼诶" or any other transliteration.

Hence the dilemma between two rules: the established rule of dictionary compilation, and the situational usage of a word in the population. Because a Chinese character is intrinsically more difficult than a Latin-based word, incorporating "jiaozi" instead of "饺子" in a dictionary of Latin-based language is natural. But on the Chinese language side, the two rules are having a tug of war. Leaving "NBA" or any letter-word out of the Chinese dictionary retains its purity but increases inconvenience of a general reader -- he has to consult another dictionary. The awkward "摁逼诶" in the dictionary would be useless because nobody and no media would likely adopt that spelling.

My take on this: The Chinese dictionary can have an appendix listing the commonly used letter-words, without not yet accepted Chinese transliterations ("麦当劳" is OK but "摁逼诶" is not). It avoids the dilemma by explicitly stating that these words are not Chinese and yet they frequently occur in Chinese text. Inclusion of them is merely for the convenience of readers.

P.S. With the ubiquity of the Internet, this debate may become irrelevant and eventually forgotten, as the Chinese readers that care about "NBA" or any letter-word have easier access to the web for the meaning of the word than the paper-based dictionary. Although this particular dictionary, with no online version, serves as a prescriptive guide in mainland China, its definition of the letter-words may not be as authoritative as the scholars wish it would be.

"第几" has no English equivalent

It's a frequently asked question in English study forums in China (recently here). How do you say "第几" in English? When A asks B, "这是你第几次来纽约?" (literally, "This is which time you come to New York?"), B may answer "第二次" ("The second time"). A more natural English question may be, "How many times have you come to New York?", "Twice", or "How many times did you come to New York before?", "Only once (before)".

The awkward "which time" is a literal equivalent of "第几次" as in "Which time is it you come to New York?" The English "time" is one word for both the time you use a clock to keep track of and the ordinal count of repetition of you doing something, which is a measure word. Other languages may use two words for these meanings (时间, Zeit, tiempo, temps, tempo vs. 次, Mal, vez, fois, volta, respectively). The reason "which time" sounds unnatural may be related to this particular polysemy (one word having multiple meanings) of English "time".

Here are more challenging ones, "第几个", "第几件", and "第几本", as in "老师要我们读John Smith的ABC系列的所有三本书，你在读第几本?" ("The teacher wants us to read John Smith's all three books in the ABC series. Which book are you reading now?") But "Which book are you reading?" is not a good translation because the answer may well be "I'm reading his Book Title". The question in Chinese actually demands the answer "I'm reading his first|second|third book". English "which" properly matches "哪一(本)". It does not specifically ask the ordinal number as the Chinese "第几(本)". The fact that these Chinese question words are more challenging is probably because "个" and "本" have no measure word equivalents in English, and although "件" may be "piece", "Which piece ...?" does not specifically demand an answer of the ordinal number in the series.

A little follow-up. A Chinese reader says "So English is deficient?" My answer is that every language may have stronger expressive power than another in one case, but less in another. In this case, Chinese wins. In the case of subjunctive mood, Chinese loses (you have to guess whether "如果我有1000块钱" is the counter-factual "if I had 1000 dollars", although "如果我是你" is definitely "if I were you"). In the textbook case of ambiguous English sentence "He hit the man with a stick", Chinese wins because you can't make up an ambiguous sentence in Chinese. And the list goes on.

(This posting has a follow-up.)

eCollegeFinder's ESL article

eCollegeFinder has a new article on English as a Second Language, How to Educate ESL Students. It discusses two methods of education, "bilingual" (students only use their native language when they study subjects such as math and science) and "immersion" (English all the time; further divided into two methods depending on whether the students study English exclusively for a period at the beginning), then the pros and cons of each method are properly and clearly evaluated.

Here are my thoughts. Firstly, the bilingual method should be preferred if English is taught in a non-English-speaking country; it would be counter-productive if immersion were enforced, unless of course the students are outnumbered by English speaking natives in a small enclosed environment such as an American or British international school. My friend, president of a language school in China, reported that her students used to demand native English speakers who speak no Chinese as teachers many years ago, and slowly changed to bilingual teachers, as they found the latter to be more efficient for their learning. On the other hand, if the students are in an English-speaking country and surrounded by English all the time, the immersion method will definitely win. It's interesting that Texas, where I am now, is among the few that practice this "least popular" method. Some bilingual parents complain about the segregation in school and regret that they report in the school registration form before their kids go to elementary school that they speak xyz (a language other than English) at home. Unlike adults, young school children learn a foreign language better in immersion and should not be artificially isolated.

Secondly, the education science or pedagogy should learn from medical science. Strict control study should be a standard. Whether bilingual or immersion is better, and better under what condition, can be argued verbally based on personal experience and common sense, as I'm doing here. But nothing beats a well controlled study, perhaps followed for four to ten years, with statistical analysis. It may be impractical to implement a single- or double-blind study. Nevertheless, statistical numbers are more scientific than experiential observation.

Off-topic: ESL blog award

I was entered into eCollegeFinder ESL (English for Second Language) Blogs Award, and apparently got to the 39th place in the finals. Not bad, considering late entry into the nomination phase and no promotion by me or anybody. Actually, I'm not sure if my blog is for ESL. It probably was a long time ago. But now it "degenerates" into a general, English and Chinese and sometimes any language, blog.