Children learning Chinese must cope with an opaque orthography lacking transparent relations between oral pronunciations and written characters: a challenge heightened for L2 learners. Use of digital Pinyin input may facilitate connections between oral and written language by allowing learners to access vocabulary they cannot yet write. We…

This paper examines the history of four Chinese vernaculars which have developed written forms, and argues that five of the patterns Hanan identifies in the early development of Bai Hua can also be found in the early development of written Wu, Cantonese, and Minnan. In each of the cases studied, there is a clear pattern of early use of the…

Evaluates various explanations for the fact that Chinese writing has remained at the ideographic stage for several thousand years. Reasons include dialect differences, social and political unrest, and attempts by the ruling class and men of letters to preserve complex character writing as an indication of class superiority. (Author/DB)

This article discusses the relationship between human gestures and the development of Chinese characters. The four main principles of Chinese writing are outlined, and the characters are discussed in terms of whole bodily attitudes, spatial relationships, and foot and manual gestures. (CLK)

Discusses the linguistic, political and social forces central to the development of Chinese characters. (CLK)

This workbook, intended for use in a bilingual education setting, is designed to accompany the Level Two reader of the same series. Each page presents the Chinese characters in clear, large, pen-and-ink drawings, and provides spaces in which to copy and practice them. (AMH)

The graphemic and functional distribution of Chinese punctuation markers are outlined, and the implications of Chinese punctuation practices for second language instruction are discussed. Three kinds of Chinese punctuation markers are described: those graphically unique to Chinese, those written and used in the same manner in both Chinese and…

The designation of the Japanese word class "joshi" (in English known as particles, post-positional case markers, or relationals) by the term te-ni-wo-ha can be traced to the early superimposition of the Chinese writing system on Japanese speech. Because of the structural differences between the two languages and the existence of elements in…

Articles contained in this special issue on language usage in Hong Kong, particularly in the context of elementary and secondary education, include: "A Comparison of English Errors Made by Hong Kong Students and Those Made by Non-Native Learners of English Internationally" (David Bunton); "Errors in Guides to English Usage for Hong…

This publication of proceedings, most in English and some in Chinese, of a conference on Chinese languages and linguistics include the following papers: "On Rule Effect and Dialect Classification" (Chin-Chuan Cheng); "Cross-Linguistic Typological Variation, Grammatical Relations, and the Chinese Language" (Bernard Comrie);…

Papers on aspects of pragmatics include: "Pragmatics and Language Learning" (Lawrence F. Bouton); "Pragmatics and Language Teaching: Bringing Pragmatics and Pedagogy Together" (Kathleen Bardovi-Harlig); "Cross-Cultural Communication and Interlanguage Pragmatics: American vs. European Requests" (Jasone Cenoz, Jose F.…

Papers from a 1993 International Conference on Language in Education include: "A Language Development Approach to Education" (M. A. K. Halliday); Text, Talk, and Inquiry: Schooling as a Semiotic Apprenticeship" (G. Wells); "Chinese Orthography and Reading" (O. J. L. Tzeng); "Task-Centred Assessment in Language…