Youbian dubian (有邊讀邊) : any example ? :)

[boctulus]

Hi all!

 

   I've read about "Youbian dubian" principle in Wikipedia but is a very short article with no examples at all.

 

Anyone can explain me with easy examples  ?

 

Thank u in advance!

 

[skylee]

儷

艙

PS-

城 誠 盛

塘 糖 溏 醣 搪

[Geiko]

Imagine you find a new character and you don't know its pronunciation. The 有边读边 principle says that if this character consists of two parts, one being the radical (the semantic part) and the other the phonetic part, you will read that character with the same pronunciation of the phonetic component. In other words, you find the character 牯, where the left part is the radical (牛 bull) and the right part is the phonetic component, and since you know 古 is pronounced gǔ, you deduce 牯 is also gǔ. This method can give you a good idea about the pronunciation of a new character, but sometimes it can also be misleading. For example, in the case of 牯 you would have guessed it right, but you'd be wrong if you used this method for characters like 洒 (sǎ) where 西 is xī, and also in traditional characters 灑 (sǎ) vs 麗 (lì).

 

You can also read this article about phonetic components from Hacking Chinese (part 1 and 2).

 

 

 

As you can see, sometimes the pronunciation isn’t identical. For instance, the characters might have different tones (氧/洋, yǎng/yáng), initial (湯/傷, tāng/shāng) or final (踉/浪, liàng/làng) or any combination of these, but these are still incredibly valuable clues. Some phonetic components are extremely regular. 

[boctulus]

@skylee: so, in every (selected phono-semantic word) the sound match with the phonetic-component and it is in the right-side.

 

Good examples, thank u

 

@Geiko: thank u for providing a nice explanation and exceptions

 

UPDATE: thanks for the links!

[Hofmann]

Because phonetic components are usually on the right, use the right side when guessing the pronunciation of an unknown character. Here I paste part of an intro to a paper I wrote.

 

Chinese words can be mono- or polysyllabic, with most modern Chinese words being disyllabic. A Chinese character may be composed of one or more components[1]. A component may function in several ways, including:

·       It may stand alone as a simple character, such as 木 (*mok, tree), originally a pictogram of a tree.

·       It may be borrowed for its pronunciation to write a homophone, as 要 (*ʔjew, want), originally a pictogram of a person’s waist.

·       It may be a semantic component in a compound character, used for its meaning to hint at the character’s meaning, as 目 (*mjuk, eye) in 眠 (*min, sleep). Semantic components usually occur on the left side of a compound character.

·       It may be a phonetic component in a compound character, used for its pronunciation to hint at the character’s pronunciation, as 民 (*mjin, citizen) in眠. Phonetic components usually occur on the right side of a compound character.

Phono-semantic compound characters like 眠, which contain a semantic and phonetic component, compose 80 to 90 percent of all Chinese characters used in modern Chinese (Taylor & Taylor, 1995). Also as in 眠, the pronunciation of the phonetic component and the compound do not necessarily match. Two or more semantic components can also be used in an ideographic compound, as in 林 (*rjəm, grove, composed of two trees). A semantic component may also be added to reclarify a lost or obscure meaning, as 肉 (*njuk, flesh, appearing as 月) in腰 (*ʔjew, waist). Components may change form depending on position or adjacent components, such as 肉 appearing as 月when left of other components. Characters may undergo unique mutations such as omitting components, as the 宀[2] (*mjen, roof) in 宰 (*tsəʔ, slaughter) disappearing in the phono-semantic compound 梓 (*tsjəʔ, catalpa); or combining components in unique ways, as 芚 (*dun, sprout), composed of 艹 (*tshuʔ, grass) and 屯 (*dun, village), becoming  in 春 (*thjun, spring season).

[1] Sometimes the term “radical” is used to refer to any component; sometimes it only refers to the section under which the character would be classified in a dictionary. This paper will use the latter definition.

[2] All components were once characters, but some such as 宀 and 艹can no longer stand alone.

 

 

 

[boctulus]

 

Components may change form depending on position or adjacent components, such as肉 appearing as 月when left of other components. Characters may undergo unique mutations such as omitting components, as the 宀[2] (*mjen, roof) in 宰 (*tsəʔ, slaughter) disappearing in the phono-semantic compound梓 (*tsjəʔ, catalpa); or combining components in unique ways, as 芚 (*dun, sprout), composed of 艹 (*tshuʔ, grass) and 屯 (*dun, village), becoming  in 春 (*thjun, spring season).

 

 

Hi! 

 

    First thanks.  Second in HackingChinese there is an article refered before where it's said 羊 is the phonetic component of 養 and I thought It was wrong but now... I want a second opinion

[Hofmann]

Why did you think it was wrong?

[boctulus]

Well, except for the three horizontal strokes, I can't recognize the radical 羊 in 春.

 

I'm still doubting.

 

 

BTW: what is the leg (in orange) in the right side of the top radical ?!

 

 

[Hofmann]

Look. And look at 羊 if you want to see what that looks like alone. Also, there is no 羊 in 春.

 

BTW, let's call them components.

[boctulus]

Yeah, except for the "leg", the radical component looks like B05713 seal in the Richard Sears database.

 

BTW:  羊 is in fact a radical

[querido]

養: From (羊) yáng phonetic and 食 (shí) ‘food’. (ABC Dictionary)

[boctulus]

Thank u Querido