Welcome to Unit2 Language

Chinese characters

The development of Chinese characters

Skim through the article and answer the following questions What is the article about? Who invented Chinese characters? How many types of Chinese characters be talked in the article?what are they? What did Chinese government do in the 1950s? The development of Chinese characters. Cang jie Two,pictographs and pictophonetic characters. The Chinese government introduced simplified Chinese characters.

Read the article carefully and divide it into several parts Paragraph 1 Paragraph 2 Paragraph 3-6 Paragraph 7-8 Brief introduction of Chinese characters. The origins of Chinese characters. Form and development of Chinese characters. Pronunciation of Chinese characters and simplified Chinese characters.

Listen to the tape and do T/F The Chinese language differs from many Western languages because Western languages use characters which have meanings and can stand alone as words. Cang jie invented the first Chinese characters which used shapes or pictures to represent different objects. The first real Chinese characters were picture-words which turned into standard forms and became more complex over time. Pictographs indicate meanings while pictophonetic characters indicate pronunciation. The method of creating pictophonetic is still used today. (F) (T)

Language points differ from in that over time as a while turn into not be the same /unlike for the reason that/because past a long time in general become/change into

differs from over time turned into Fill in the blanks with the phrases from the box below. over time differ from in that turn…into as a whole Old English _______ greatly _____ the modern English we use today. 2. Life on the island has changed __________ because of the growing number of tourists who visit it every year. 3. She said it was the teacher’s praise and encouragement that ______ her ______ a good student. differs from over time turned into

as a whole in that 4. Considering your idea ____________, I think it will contribute significantly to the development of the company. However, it may cause some problems as well. 5.I was lucky _________ I was able to find what I wanted as a whole in that

Use the following words and phrases to retell the article Chinese language, differ from, represent, ideas, objects, actions, Cang jie,shapes ,picture,pictographs,drawing standard forms, pictophonetic characters,indicating,meaning showing,sound, in the 1950s,Chinese government, simplified,widely used

Fill in the blanks with proper words or phrases The Chinese language ____ _____many Western languages __ ___it uses characters which have meanings and can stand alone __a word.Chinese people invented numerous characters to represent____ , _____ or _____. It is said that Cang Jie invented Chinese writing which used different ______or _______to represent different objects.the characters have __________ from drawings ___ standard forms. __________ indicate meanings while ________ __________ are composed of the meaning part and the sound part. differs from in that as ideas objects actions shapes pictures developed into Pictographs pictophonetic characters

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Cang jie Cang jie, who is believed to have invented Chinese characters,used to work as history official under the Yellow Emperor in ancient China. It is said that the inscriptions (题字) on bones and tortoise(龟) shells(外壳) were also invented by him. He has been taken as a legendary figure(人物) in Chinese history and culture.

Pictographs Pictographs are another from of notation(符号,标志) in transcribing(转录,抄写) linguistic(语言上的) meaning, and they are where most Chinese characters can find their origins(起源). Another example is Egyptian hieroglyphics (象形文字).

Pictophonetic characters Chinese is a pictophonetic language. Pictophones are composed of tow parts,the meaning part and the sound part. The former part tells readers its meaning while the latter part tells readers its pronunciation. It is estimated(估计) that around 90 per cent of these characters today display this symbolism(象征意义). So, by looking at the two components(成分), the reader is frequently given a hint as to either the pronunciation, meaning,or both. Through this method,the Chinese language has evolved(进化) into a richer and more diverse(多种多样的 ) language.

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