Essays on Chinese Characters

Introduction

Systems of writing have been cited as one of the earliest and greatest inventions of human beings. Kanji is a broad term used to refer to logographic characters widely used in the Japanese writing system. In Japanese, Kanji simply means “Han Characters.” Kanji is therefore inherently Chinese which was adopted by the Japanese due to their close interactions in trade in the early years dating back to around 57AD (Rodgers 25). As a result, therefore, some modifications and alterations have been done on the initial Japanese Kanji to fit it into the Japanese language. Japanese Kanji has undergone tremendous ...

Use of Language in the Contemporary Arts

In contemporary art, the ways and methods of artists in expressing their thought go beyond the mere replica of objects made as subjects for their art works. There are modern artists that explore various modes of expressionism. There are those who use the combination of words and letters in their works to give a message to their audience. Various artists practice the distinct combination of letters and figures and employment of words as part of the features of their practices in art. The use of words and letters in their artworks is also associated with the sense of authorship, ...

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of learning a new language with new characters, in particular Chinese characters, in other words, how do second language adult students acquire knowledge about orthographic characters of a new language system. While past research has shown that adult learners with no previous Chinese exposure learn more effectively by receiving explicit instructions of orthographic rules (Taft & Chung, 1999; Dunlap, Perfetti, Liu & Wu). This study focuses particularly in the semantic rules. Our results support previous results in that those learners who were given explicit instructions of semantic rules did learn more effectively the ...

The art of calligraphy can be traced back in time, when technology did not provide people with the modern conveniences people of the 21st century enjoy. Calligraphy was considered a means of giving things -and life itself- a meaning because “sound couldn’t travel to another place and couldn’t remain, so writings came into being to act as the track of meaning and sound.” (Qian 36) From the first picture-like calligraphy works found about 4,000 years ago (Lu and Aiken 25) to the so-called Modern Calligraphy of the 1980s and 1990s (Zhuzhong and Desheng 109), a lot has changed.

Evolution of Chinese Calligraphy

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This Chinese cultural resume made to help reader is to learn about different aspects that combine to form a unique culture identified in the world. The significant aspects include customs and courtesies of the culture, lifestyle of the people living in that culture, nation's whole story like some history and some present scenarios and last but not the last this report will also shed light on the styles of communication in the selected culture. China is one of the four “ancient civilizations” in the world .

Nation

China’s official name is People’s Republic of China (PRC) which is located in ...

Final Field Notes

Observation: A Little Dynasty Chinese School, Miss. V’s advanced-level classroom. This is the advanced Zhuyin class so the teacher teaches students different combination of Zhuyin and some simple Chinese characters. Miss V’s classroom is spacious and heavily decorated student artwork, graphics on Chinese literature, learning charts on different aspects (grammar, spelling, punctuation and numerals) and a number of books in shelves. The classroom is brightly lit and the warm inviting colors create ambience and serenity for the classroom. The back of the classroom contains a kitchen sink that is filled with a number of toys and utensils. There is ...

Enlightenment, love, experience, and even chaos and the brutality of war- the word ‘war’ here used to include a wide array of conflicts and disagreements that result in various kinds of brutality- are central themes in many philosophical discussions. Many of these discussions discern these aspects, but also find the interrelationship between them, either implicitly or explicitly. The readings in class: Shirane’s Traditional Japanese Literature, De Barry’s discussions in the Sources of East Asian Tradition, among others do the same, offering their various insights into these elements and more (often implicitly). But most importantly, these sources show that, ...