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Jyutping or pingyam (yale) Hello there! I learned cantonese through my parents but they never taught me how to read Chinese character. So now I want to improve my vocabulary but the books are using different romanization. I want to know which one is the best and widespread. Thanks
Sep 15, 2014 9:07 PM
Answers · 4
2
The bad news is that there are a lot of different Cantonese romanizations out there (I've probably run across five, give or take). The good news is that they all tend to be similar enough that you can adjust back and forth fairly easily. I'd suggest Jyutping to start with, since it's very easy to pick up.
September 16, 2014
1
According to my teaching experience, I would prefer Yale. There are four romanization systems, they are Pingyam, Yale, Jyutping and Sidney Lau. In my opinions, the tranditional Pingyam is the "worst", however, there are books still using this old school romanization system. For example the word "girl" - neoy4 (Pingyam) , neui5 (Yale) , neoi5 (Jyutping), nui5 (Sidney Lau) Although there are slightly different between Yale, Jyutping, it make much sense to locals when you type neui5, instead of neoi5. Also, take "like" as an example, if you type Zung1 ji3, most of the HK people will be confused; but if you type Jung1 Yi3, most of us will understand what you mean immediately. Considering most of the foreign prefer not to learn the characters, so it makes a big differences when you want to make some sentences by using romanization system. For you reference, you can see the difference between 4 randomization system by visiting this website. http://cpime.hk/pingjam/
September 18, 2014
1
Agreed with kendallcorinne. It's quite easy to read other romanizations if you know one of them. But people sometimes comfuse about "z" and "j" when using Jyutping. eg, 1. " Zung1 Ji3" 2. " Jung1 Yi3" ( both means "like',1. wrote in Jyutping; 2. in Yale) I' d suggest you check which system those usful books and websites around you use. Then learn the major romanization they focus on. :)
September 17, 2014
If you plan on becoming a serious student of Cantonese using Romanization you will eventually learn both Yale and Jyutping. Just select one and run with it. Learning a Romanization system was the best thing I ever did to improve my Cantonese. I prefer Yale but can read both, and often use a hybrid of Yale initials and finals with Jyutping tone numbers. Good luck.
September 29, 2014
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