Re:The Chinese character system is a brake on development
by wibr on Friday January 22, 2016 @05:05AM
(#10951845)
Radicals are just a system which was invented to look up characters in dictionaries, so a character is often composed of components with different functions (e.g. sound component or meaning component) and one of those components can be the radical.
Re:The Chinese character system is a brake on development
by GordonS on Friday January 22, 2016 @05:19AM
(#10951883)
> Radicals are just a system which was invented to look up characters in dictionaries
First I've heard of it; source please?
Re:The Chinese character system is a brake on development
by GordonS on Friday January 22, 2016 @06:51AM
(#10952176)
Actually, most of the radicals existed long before the Shuōwén Jiězì, as recurring graphic elements[1].
They might not have been called 'radicals', or been used to look up dictionaries, but they certainly existed.
[1] Wilkinson, Endymion (2013), Chinese History: A New Manual, Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, ISBN 978-0-674-06715-8
They're not discrete but composed of radicals that might hint at the meaning or pronunciation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_(Chinese_characters)