# の for 的, 之



## Aoyama

This thread could also find its place in the Japanese Forum ...
During a recent trip to Taiwan, I found out, to my surprise, that Taiwanese use the hiragana の instead of 的 (or also,but more rarely, instead of 之) in Chinese (Mandarin) sentences.
Can someone confirm and comment ?


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## Ghabi

Hi Aoyama. I'm not sure if it's what you mean, but sometimes you can see the の  in a Chinese context (for example in book titles or product names). That's an orthographic gimmick only (i.e. to convey a "Japanese feeling"); when people say it, they pronounce it as 之 or 的, not _no_.


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## Aoyama

Thank you for your answer Ghabi.
Of course, I understand (I can figure) that this *の*will _not_ be pronounced as in Japanese, it would be taken as an ideogram (which is originally what it is, because as we know, it derives from the calligraphic form of *乃*) and pronounced as 之 or 的, in Chinese.
Now, is this use 


> to convey a "Japanese feeling"


limited to Taiwan or can/could it be found also in Hong-Kong or in Mainland China (both places where I have never seen it) ?


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## Ghabi

Yes, it's very popular in HK, to the extent of being _cliché._


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## xiaolijie

If you see it in Taiwan, I've got the feeling that you can see it in Hong Kong.

Hey, you beat me to it, Ghabi!


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## Aoyama

OK. Now, the last question : is this usage recent, not so recent ... When can it be dated ? 1990 ? Before, After ?


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## Ghabi

Not recent ... I learnt *の* when I was a kid (but of course I didn't know it's pronounced as _no_ then!).

Imagine someone who doesn't know any Japanese.  Judging from what he sees in the advertisements, he has come to regard *の *as an equivalent of Chinese 的. Now that we can add 的 after a modifier in Chinese, right? Why, then of course *の*  can be added after a modifier, too! That's what exactly has happened in HK. We got, for example, 新の城. That doesn't make much sense in terms of Japanese grammar (assume that you tries to read it as Japanese), and 新之城 sounds just awful in Chinese (one would either say 新城 or 新的城市), but who cares! At least our property developers don't.


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## xiaolijie

> We got, for example, 新の城. That doesn't make much sense


But as you already acknowledged, the addition of  *の *is not for *sense*, only for the *flavour*


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## BODYholic

Aoyama said:


> This thread could also find its place in the Japanese Forum ...
> During a recent trip to Taiwan, I found out, to my surprise, that Taiwanese use the hiragana の instead of 的 (or also,but more rarely, instead of 之) in Chinese (Mandarin) sentences.
> Can someone confirm and comment ?



That is because Taiwan
1. was a previous colony of Japan.
2. geographical location between the two countries.

Wiki: Taiwan under Japanese rule


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## viajero_canjeado

I was sort of surprised when I first saw の on a sign in 台中, because it didn't look like a character to me. Someone explained that it's used like 的. Now when I'm writing hurriedly I usually use の to replace 的 since it saves seven strokes.


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## Mugi

You also see へ from time to time, when something is intended to be read in Hokkien, as へ is often pronounced in Japanese as "e", which in turn is very similar to the Hokkien equivalent of 的/之.


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## Aoyama

The へ thing is news to me ...
 As for Taiwan being occupied by Japan, right, but why would the influence of Japanese (the language) apply to _only_ one kana ?
This being said, look at all the kanjis (and the kanas coming from kanjis) Japanese borrowed ...
 Still, why only の ? Less strokes than 的, right, though 的 is hardly difficult to write ... Why not む instead of 無 then, etc ... ?


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## Mugi

Aoyama said:


> The へ thing is news to me ...
> Still, why only の ? Less strokes than 的, right, though 的 is hardly difficult to write ... Why not む instead of 無 then, etc ... ?


My guess would be frequency of use in Japanese, and the fact that it isn't hard to identify の as the possessive particle if you can read kanji. Even if a Chinese speaker doesn't know any Japanese, they can soon deduce that something like 私の犬 means 我的狗, not to mention journalese like 政府の推進計画. The fact that の is circular makes it stand out, and appear "cute" (even to Japanese).


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## Aoyama

Deducing the meaning of の is one thing (and there, of course, you're right), using it as an "extraneous" element is another.
Now, of course, that could also be compared to the use of "off", "in", "de" (French) etc in Japanese, but (and this is a bit off-topic already) then this would deal with the propensity (or the tropism) the Japanese have for foreign words, an inclination Chinese speakers do not share (and could not share, because of the structure of the language, as we know).


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## BODYholic

Aoyama said:


> The へ thing is news to me ...


へ - If you are in to Taiwanese comics and anime, you would see plenty of "へへへ". へ is pronounced as 'he' in Japanese. Hence, "hehehe"  . This is another influence by the Japanese. In Chinese, it would be "嘻嘻嘻"



Aoyama said:


> As for Taiwan being occupied by Japan, right, but why would the influence of Japanese (the language) apply to _only_ one kana ?


The fact that we know _only one _does not necessary mean that there's _only one_.


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## indigoduck

Aoyama said:


> OK. Now, the last question : is this usage recent, not so recent ... When can it be dated ? 1990 ? Before, After ?


 
I think it was a trendy thing in Taiwan among the young who wanted to learn japanese or were forced by family when Japan was a big economical powerhouse.

Most of the people i knew saw it as a direct substitution for 之 rather than 的.  Sub-consciously we know 的 (zhi) means 之 (de) because of its use in classical chinese.

I saw tons of food items using "no" for the character 之 (zhi).

I don't know how it got to Hong Kong, but my guess how it got to China was many of those same Taiwanese food companies setup shop in Mainland.

As a result, not long afterwards in supermarkets, i saw tons of imitation food items that looked like they were made in Taiwan, but the fine print said "Made in China" with a factory either in Fujian or Guangdong province.


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## indigoduck

Aoyama said:


> The へ thing is news to me ...
> As for Taiwan being occupied by Japan, right, but why would the influence of Japanese (the language) apply to _only_ one kana ?
> This being said, look at all the kanjis (and the kanas coming from kanjis) Japanese borrowed ...
> Still, why only の ? Less strokes than 的, right, though 的 is hardly difficult to write ... Why not む instead of 無 then, etc ... ?


 
As to applying to only one kana. I'm not sure i understand your argument here but have you seen the katakana equivalent of "no" ? From a trend perspective, what looks trendier, the katakana "no" which for lack of imagination looks like a straight line or the hiragana "no" ?? My vote is on hiragana "no".

I suppose you can talk to the person who started the trend and ask why.

As to why not む instead of 無 -- how practical is the character 無 (wu) versus む (hiragana mu) ?

In Japanese school, not many beginners was able to draw a pretty hiragana mu. Compare that to hiragana No.

Why don't you start the trend, and let's see if it catches on ??

Honestly, i believe there was nothing fancy at work here. A bunch of taiwanese individuals saw something trendy, simplicity, and with practicality.

And it took off - and unless someone in Taiwan can confirm this for me, the trend has died already.  It's no longer as ubiquitous as it used to be.


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## viajero_canjeado

I don't know that it's died out.. in Taiwan, when writing, people often abbreviate with Japanese characters, like 關 and 犧, once a Taiwanese even insisted to me that the bottom of 犧 was actually 我 like in Japanese.. so sometimes these abbreviations get pretty deep set in the Taiwanese consciousness. I guess those aren't kanas, though, but kanji. Anyway, back to の: I don't know how to type it so I use it exclusively when writing, and I think most Taiwanese can recognize it and many probably use it in the same way I do. When you compare 1 stroke to 8, it's really not a hard choice (even if 的 is relatively easy to write).

As for using the kana for 無, I'd rather stick with the mainland China simplified one because to me the shape is a lot more similar and easy to remember. Plus I'm exposed to mainland's simplified a lot more than Japan's, so that's what I'm more used to.

Oh, and lastly: へ, if you're reading Taiwanese comics, is probably the 注音 symbol ㄟ and is often used something like the English "hey" and sounds like "ei" in pinyin. It could be used as a laugh, but I think normally it's closer to "hey hey hey, get out of my cookie jar!"


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## wfxincheng588

sometimes you can see the の in a Chinese context , it is very common in china now, some times i use の instead of 之，becasue it looks beautiful , and i have also learn well japanese! in a word don,t be surprice, world langage begin to complex these days.


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## Lamb67

's and の are similar both in meaning and writing.


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## Aoyama

Thank you to all.
That Chinese would use a (or a few) hiragana(s) is a sign that history and cultural streams can change course. Not a bad thing.


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## indigoduck

viajero_canjeado said:


> I don't know that it's died out.. in Taiwan, when writing, people often abbreviate with Japanese characters, like 關 and 犧, once a Taiwanese even insisted to me that the bottom of 犧 was actually 我 like in Japanese..
> 
> Oh, and lastly: へ, if you're reading Taiwanese comics, is probably the 注音 symbol ㄟ and is often used something like the English "hey" and sounds like "ei" in pinyin. It could be used as a laugh, but I think normally it's closer to "hey hey hey, get out of my cookie jar!"


 
Yes, i agree.   It's not japanese.  It's the taiwanese romanization system.  They use it often to express "taiwanese words" (Gin La) or even these kinds of human/animal sounds.


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## Aoyama

You are talking about the so-called "bo po mo fo" system ?


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## wfxincheng588

のis used nearly the same as 的，such as  jack のfuel tanks, 杰克的油箱, it is polular in young gay groups!


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## Aoyama

> it is polular in young gay groups!


where, in PRC, ROC, both ?


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## viajero_canjeado

That's right, Aoyama: it's the bopomofo system, also known as 注音。 



indigoduck said:


> Yes, i agree.   It's not japanese.  It's the taiwanese romanization system.



Just a little hair to split: 注音 isn't a romanization system. Tongyong pinyin is because it uses the Roman alphabet, but 注音 doesn't. I guess it's just called a phonetic system..?


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## Aoyama

Yes bo po ... and you're right, it's a phonetic system, which is not romanization.
That being said, I was surprised to see (my last trip to Taiwan was in ... 1979) that the ROC has also switched to pinyin (mostly), though the old Wade-Giles system still co-exists, and is even mixed ... Bad idea. But that is another problem, off-topic here.


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## Mugi

Usage of Zhuyin ㄟ in comics should probably be differentiated from usage of へ/ㄟ to represent the Hokkien possessive particle (≈ 的), "e". I guess it's possible that ㄟ is the basis of "e", but pronunciation-wise, Hokkien "e" is much closer to the Japanese へ (as in こちらへどうぞ) than ㄟ/ei. In regular Zhuyin, it would be represented by ㄝ, or specifically ㆤ (almost identical to katakana セ) in Extended Zhuyin.


> "taiwanese words" (Gin La)


What is "Gin La"? gín-á = 囡仔 = 孩子?


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## avlee

We, mainlanders, also see a lot of の being used in advertising stuff in China. 
And most people accept that usage just because it's easy for us to write and comprehend the meaning.


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## Aoyama

So mainlanders do/use it also. Now, one may ask about who started first, Taiwan, Hong-Kong, the Mainland ? My guess is Taiwan.


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## Ghabi

Aoyama said:


> So mainlanders do/use it also. Now, one may ask about who started first, Taiwan, Hong-Kong, the Mainland ? My guess is Taiwan.


I see you're a monogeneticist, Aoyama San. Seriously, I don't think we need to assume a single origin of the usage. As Mugi implies above, の is probably the only Japanese word (_kunyomi_-ed though) that many a Chinese speaker knows, and it'd be his only choice when he wants to _wafuu_-ize his Chinese, whether he's from Mainland, Taiwan or HK.

Viajero mentions above that he uses の to save some strokes when writing. Actually I also used の occasionally when I was a kid ─ not to save strokes, but just to annoy the teachers (you see I was a very perverse kid ). I think many other Chinese speakers, unknown to each other, employ the の too, for one reason or another.


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## Aoyama

I read you Ghabi. I still think that there is some rule in this usage. At least in Taiwan I saw some magazines using の, some posters, even some product labels.
I follow the idea of "giving a japanese touch" for quality or ... snobism, as for example English or French words do, but 1) I don't think it has anything to do with the Occupation of Taiwan by the Japanese, 2) interestingly, Koreans, who are as close and as influenced by Japan/the Japanese don't use any kanas (they could).


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## indigoduck

Mugi said:


> UWhat is "Gin La"? gín-á = 囡仔 = 孩子?


 
Sorry, when i meant Gin, i meant it literally as 巜一ㄣˋ .

It's taiwanese language.  I'm uncertain what it means.


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## nazha1024

Chinese is a big big country.we learn some words,some languages,from latino.from jp.from संस्कृता वाक् that is normal and typical.


Chinese language is much more complicated than you can imagine.some jp words. or latino words.That's just a tip of iceberg.

if will be more funny if you keep on learning chinese.different dialects.different pronounciations.different writings.


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