The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Why should we not balk when faced with the Great Wall of Characters, or when faced with the alternate Pīnyīn ways past it?
This week’s MEotW in the unofficial Pīnyīn Plus resource “Sing Out Joyfully” Bk. (Pīnyīn+Music, Pīnyīn Plus, Web)
Do we balk when faced with the Great Wall of Characters?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Is “just” learning Chinese characters “the hard way” the key to success in the Mandarin field?
“To Jehovah, for whom ‘a thousand years is as one day’, Chinese civilization has only been around for a few days.… “…we should boast in Jehovah, not in needlessly and self-indulgently complex knowledge relating to a mere worldly human culture” troubadourworks.com/tiandi/meotw... #MEotW #PīnyīnPlus
— tiandi, Links News (@tiandilinksnews.bsky.social) Dec 2, 2024 at 3:40 PM
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Does Jehovah see Chinese characters as a successful writing system? Or does he see characters as a Great Wall obstructing his vital preaching and teaching work in the worldwide Mandarin field?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Does each Chinese character really represent a one-syllable word?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How do we respond to the voodooesque power of the Great Wall of characters?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
As beloved as they are by many, why have there been serious, concerted efforts to simplify and replace traditional Chinese characters?
“愛” is the Traditional Chinese character for “love”. It appropriately has the “heart” radical (“心”) in it, but it’s quite…complicated. 😓
— Troubadour WW (@troubadourww) February 20, 2017
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Why is it especially important to talk to people in the Mandarin field about the evidence showing that the Creator exists?
The worldwide Mandarin field is by far the largest language field in the world, and it’s likely that it is the largest language field ever in history.
In addition to the inherent technical difficulty of the subject of creation/evolution, Mandarin field language learners also face the Great Wall of characters.
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Who is Lǐ Huá? Why have so many Chinese people and American people been talking about Lǐ Huá on the Chinese social media app Xiǎohóngshū (RedNote)?
Learning Mandarin out of spite? You're not alone.
— Duolingo (@duolingo) January 15, 2025
We’ve seen a ~216% growth in new Chinese (Mandarin) learners in the US compared to this time last year. https://t.co/9hzwBxfTgD pic.twitter.com/qWM9f5oFYA
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Might Chinese characters present a test for Mandarin field language learners? If so, what might they test?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
Are Chinese characters worthy and good just because they’re hard?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How might our enemies in the spiritual war be viewing aspects of the worldwide Mandarin field such as the Great Wall of characters?
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The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How can we talk in Mandarin about the continuing incidents of gun violence?
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When he was on earth, Jesus showed that he HATED human traditions that made it harder than necessary to serve God.
— tiandi, Links News (@TiandiLinksNews) March 12, 2023
Today, language learners in the Chinese fields face the Great Wall of Characters, emplaced by tradition. Seriously, faced with this situation, what would Jesus do? pic.twitter.com/Iw4bnLus1n
When faced with a strongly entrenched traditional way of doing things that made it way harder than necessary to serve God, e.g. re the Sabbath, Jesus did NOT just accept it and go along to get along.
— tiandi, Links News (@TiandiLinksNews) January 15, 2023
As Jesus followers, how do we respond to the Great Wall of Chinese characters? pic.twitter.com/I0qf8OUhFC
(Wordnik defines “go along to get along” as “conform in order to have acceptance and security”.)
The Mandarin Expression of the Week is:
How can we Mandarin field language learners avoid letting our Mandarin “rot”?
What happens to our Mandarin when we are faced with the Great Wall of Characters?
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The purpose of 3-line, _Pīnyīn_ Plus, etc. material was never to compete with the organization as a source of spiritual food (which is ideally in one’s mother tongue). Rather, it has always been to help Chinese field language learners get past the Great Wall of Characters. pic.twitter.com/nrFOdSRlnu
— tiandi, Links News (@TiandiLinksNews) December 9, 2022
E.g., Chinese field language learners whose mother tongue is English ideally get their spiritual food in English. For them, publications in Chinese characters are generally tools for working in a Chinese field—not spiritual food—but the characters make them really hard to use.
— tiandi, Links News (@TiandiLinksNews) December 9, 2022
The world treats characters like sacred cows, but writing systems are actually technologies—systems for reaching practical goals.
— tiandi, Links News (@TiandiLinksNews) December 9, 2022
For many Chinese field language learners, _Pīnyīn_ Plus, etc. material is better technology for showing what Chinese speech to use in the field. pic.twitter.com/UaFuJQqh3L
