Sinowikinese
Sinowikinese is a collaborative project to create an intuitive Romanization/Latinization spelling system for spoken Mandarin Chinese. Especially, it is geared toward using existing sounds in English to create a more accurate portrayal of the pronounciation of Mandarin
Philosophy
editA tradeoff relationship exists in Romanizing Mandarin Chinese, which influences the decision of whether to use English tones. The premise is that English tones are limited and cannot reproduce the a large number of Chinese tones. Thus, one must decide a correct balance of:
- Redefine sounds of existing Roman characters: This makes possible the representation of every Chinese tone accurately. However, it intrinsically makes pronounciation unintuitive for English speakers.
- Use existing character sounds: Any English speaker can intuitively speak them. However, phonetic accuracy is compromised, and the Romanization system is then no longer capable of representing the full spectrum of Chinse sounds.
Both Pinyin and Wade-Giles systems aims for the former goal. Sinowikinese's first priority is instead to push the restricted pool of English tones to the limit, in order to closely mimic the Chinese to any English speaker.
Members
editPlease add yourself here:
Project
editIdeas
editPlease create a subpage with a link below regarding any proposals/ideas you have for a new system.
- Gradual Karma An idea by Karmafist 04:50, 4 December 2005 (UTC) on how to help non-Chinese speakers hear the language correctly through naturally evolving intuitive adaptation. Karmafist 04:50, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
Information
editUse this section for any temporary information.
- Current usable media files from Commons:
- commons:Image:Zh-Deng_Xiaoping.ogg - "Done Sh'ow Peen"
Tools
editMedia repositories
editOur media repository for audio should be at Chinese Pronunciation on Creative Commons.
Other Systems
editThe other Romanization systems tries to maintain full phonetic accuracy, in effect redefining the sounds of characters to accurately represent the language. They are unsuited for this project but have some portions that are salvagable.