
In a nutshell, the meaning of a single symbol can change dramatically when combined with another one. You've probably heard about the use of two characters in modern language. Roughly speaking, approximately 500 Chinese characters are enough to make 80% of written Chinese intelligible. Overall, there are over 50,000 Chinese characters, with a large majority rarely used in daily conversations. In linguistic matters, it is quite important for a Chinese translator to have a good command of sentence patterns, since it speaks about the person’s language ability. And this is a single example amongst many other variations.īroadly speaking, the complex sentence is composed of combinations of simple ones. Compared to English, the predicate isn’t always a verb, sometimes being represented by an adjective. The first one is made out of subject, predicate and object. In Chinese, there are two types of sentences: simple and complex. For example, “big yellow moon” could have the equivalent in Chinese “silver plate in the sky”. Besides, difficulties might arise when describing things too, considering the fact that English people prefer to depict an object directly. Oftentimes, a proper reading is required, as the meaning can seem incomprehensible at first. There is a name given to traditional Chinese idioms: Chengyu. After all, Chinese is closely intertwined with tradition and culture, which reflects directly on localization. This is due to the frequent use of indirect expressions. The translation gets even more sinuous when trying to transform the way of thinking of two languages. The same word in Chinese will be used for all the tenses, and the only thing that will change will be the context. This means that you should figure it out by getting the context. Secondly, it lacks verb conjugation to indicate tenses. What makes it so challenging? Firstly, there is no singular or plural form. Next, add some extra-difficulty and try to understand Chinese grammar, as a beginner. So, let’s make sure not to spread confusion when sticking a tone to the speech. For example, "猪 (zhū)" means "pig," but "珠 (zhū)" means "pearl ". For instance, “C” will sound like “ts” in English, while Xi will be pronounced as “see / shee”. Besides, multiple combinations cannot be transposed into English. Still, it is not a piece of cake to get Pinyin from the first glance. Nowadays, its utility has become even more significant and reliable, serving as a means of typing Chinese on a standard keyboard. The technique was used in school with the aim to enhance literacy, as well as to establish a unique way of pronunciation of Chinese characters. If we take a more in-depth approach, the procedure originates in the attempt to make Chinese clear to Western learners. For example, the characters 学习中文 will be spelled in Pinyin as xué xí zhōng wén. To put it more simple, writing in Chinese with English letters. The Mandarin literal translation of Pin Yin means “spell sound”. When we talk about Pinyin, we refer to the process of Romanization of Chinese characters, by taking into account their pronunciation. This means that the translation can get really tough, especially when dealing with Mandarin paired with a linear type of writing. Right to left, left to right, or up and down, are the options you might be presented with. As long as its symbols indicate thoughts, they can be written not solely in one way. What makes Chinese tricky is the direction of writing. In this sense, the below enlisted challenges will give you a clearer insight on what makes the Chinese translation difficult. However, the task needs to be completed in order to ensure the efficiency of communication and to achieve the targeted objectives. To be frank, the day-to-day work of a linguist is already a compilation of diverse challenges, not to mention the English to Chinese translation. Add to that cultural understanding, grammatical rules, subject-verb construction and the abundance of idioms. No doubt, variations manifesting between these two languages and the pattern of thought play a key role in transposing the meaning of the mother tongue. Thus, Chinglish is the phenomenon which occurs when the Chinese way of thinking interferes with a proper translation into English. However, conveying meaning from Chinese to English and vice-versa isn’t done without any trouble along the way. No wonder, Chinese language is extending its popularity, heading today towards an even more important position. Its language is considered the oldest and the most spoken around the world. China is well-known for its populous land and abundant history.
