Fundamental Properties (FP) of Languages: (10)
Phonetic Languages (PL) vs Ideographic Languages (IL); (definite article, indefinite article)
It is commonly understood that there are differences between phonetic languages and ideographic languages. One of the major distinctions is that Chinese has no definite article “the,” whereas some phonetic languages, like English, require it for further explanations. The absence of the definite article in Chinese makes it easy to learn without any requirements. However, it is perplexing and challenging for Chinese to learn English correctly when using “the” or not. Chinese will usually offer several determiners and auxiliary words that address inflection issues found in phonetic languages. Determiners and auxiliary words in Chinese play a vital role in determining when and how to replace and resolve inflections of various parts of speech, such as verb tenses, number, gender of nouns, and other inflectional features. Chinese nouns always maintain the same sound and the same written form but accompanied by different determiners or auxiliary words. These determiners and auxiliary words are placed before or after specific parts of speech (verb, adverb, adjective,etc.) according to grammatical and idiomatic rules. In essence, Chinese characters retain their basic pronunciation and form regardless of sentence inflections. For example, the singular form “cow” is “niu” (牛), and the plural form “cows” is also “niu” (牛), while the definite article “the” with “cow” is still “niu” (牛).
When learning English or other phonetic languages, Chinese speakers often tend to use just the noun itself, frequently omitting articles like “the”. However, when indicating a singular noun, Chinese commonly employs fixed combinations of words with determiners or auxiliary words. Here are some fixed combinations of singular words for reference: yi (一) = a, an
(Person)
“a man” = yi-ge nan-ren (一个男人), “men” = nan-ren (男人).
“a woman” = yi-ge nu-ren (一个女人), “women” = nu-ren (女人).
(Animal)
“a cat” = yi-zhi mao (一只猫), “cats” = mao (猫).
“a dog” = yi-zhi gou (一只狗), “dogs” = gou (狗).
“a cow” = yi-tuo niu (一头牛), “cows” = niu (牛).
“a donkey” = yi-tuo lu (一头驴), “donkeys” = lu (驴).
(Plant)
“a tree” = yi-ke shu (一棵树), “trees” = shu (树).
(Book)
“a book” = yi-ben shu (一本书), “books” = shu (书).
In summary, Chinese nouns remain unchanged and do not have inflections, but determiners and auxiliary words adapt based on habitual usage. In Chinese, the functions of determiners and auxiliary words are crucial in modifying inflections in phonetic languages across various parts of speech. Further examples of Chinese auxiliary words addressing inflections in other parts of speech will be discussed in the following sections.
(To be continued)