By Lewei Shang
August 10, 2025
Part 1, The evolution of Chinese character expression forms
Many years ago, during a lecture on the pictographic origins of Chinese characters, an elderly white gentleman asked me: “Do Chinese characters have letters?”
I had never imagined anyone would ask such a question, to the point that I started doubting whether I’d understood him correctly. I asked again, and confirmed that he really was asking, “Do Chinese characters have letters?”
My first reaction was, “How could anyone ask such an unrealistic question?” Then I honestly told him: “Chinese characters don’t have letters.”
But that question forced me to think: Why don’t Chinese characters have letters? Do Chinese characters have something similar to letters?
What is a letter? A letter is the smallest unit in an alphabetic writing system, used to form words. Chinese is not an alphabetic writing system, so naturally it has no letters. But does it have a smallest independent unit — a structure that, like letters, cannot be divided further?
After some thought, I concluded that Chinese does have such units: independent characters that cannot be split. For example: 日 (sun), 月 (moon), 火 (fire), 土 (earth), 人 (person), 水 (water), 牛 (ox), 马 (horse), 山 (mountain), 女(woman), 口 (mouth), 门 (door), 目 (eye), 田 (field), 心 (heart), 木 (tree), and so on.
The difference between these “independent characters” and letters is that independent characters have meaning, while letters do not. But functionally, in terms of forming larger linguistic units, they are similar.
Another difference: alphabets usually have only 20–30 letters, while Chinese has about 400 independent characters — more than ten times as many. These 400+ are combined to form tens of thousands (or even over a hundred thousand) compound characters.
For example: 明 (bright), 看 (look), 灶 (stove), 妈 (mother), 吐 (spit), 炎 (flame), 休 (rest), 森 (forest), 林 (woods), 泪(tear), 思 (think), 相 (mutual). These are formed from two or more independent characters.
The emergence of compound characters allowed Chinese writing to expand from representing only tangible objects to expressing abstract concepts. For example: 明, 看, 休, 好, 思 are verbs or adjectives with no concrete shape. This greatly enhanced the expressive power of Chinese.
But even then, Chinese characters were still not enough — there were numbers, pronouns, and new concepts constantly emerging. What to do? Our ancestors invented loan characters (假借) and mutual explanation (转注).
- Loan characters: If there’s no existing character to express a meaning, borrow one temporarily. For example, 它originally meant “snake.” But since “it” (pronoun) had no character, 它 was borrowed for the pronoun. Over time, the pronoun meaning became far more common than the original “snake” meaning. People forgot 它 meant “snake,” so a new character 蛇 (with the “insect” radical) was created to restore the original meaning. Because the original character wasn’t returned, this is called loan borrowing.
- Mutual explanation: One character acquires multiple related meanings. For example, 乐 (lè, yuè), 重 (zhòng, chóng), 省 (shěng, xǐng), 行 (háng, xíng), 恶 (è, wù), 觉 (jiào, jué), etc. For instance, 乐 meaning “happy” (lè) didn’t have its own character, so the 乐 meaning “music” (yuè) was also used for “happy.” Unlike loan borrowing, no new character is created — it’s more convenient but leads to common misinterpretations, because one character can have several meanings, and learners may not master them all at once.
Some may ask: “How do you know which came first, yuè or lè?” I can say with certainty: yuè came first — you can see it from shell bone inscription.
For example, this is a set of bronze chime bells: bells on top, frame below. Chime bells are, of course, for playing music, so 乐 originally meant a musical instrument.
In many cases, we can’t be sure which meaning came first. But regardless, the result is the same: one character with multiple meanings. In fact, 99% of such polysemy comes from mutual explanation.
Even so, there still weren’t enough characters. Creating new ones is difficult and slow. What to do? Our ancestors invented word compounds — two or more characters combined to express a meaning. For example, “电脑” (computer) is formed from 电 (electricity) and 脑 (brain), instead of creating a brand-new character for “computer.”
This method works for endless terms: 计算机 (computer), 打印机 (printer), 割草机 (lawn mower), 拖拉机 (tractor), 推土机 (bulldozer), 洗碗机 (dishwasher), 订书机 (stapler). Whatever the machine, I can make a compound to name it. Same with vehicles: 马车 (horse carriage), 牛车 (ox cart), 汽车 (car), 火车 (train), 面包车 (van), 轿车 (sedan), 卡车(truck), 云霄飞车 (roller coaster), 班车 (shuttle bus), 板车 (flatbed cart), 自行车 (bicycle), 三轮车 (tricycle).
This also works with diseases: 胃病 (stomach illness), 肺病 (lung illness), 心脏病 (heart disease), 糖尿病 (diabetes). Making new compounds is far easier than inventing a new character for each disease.
The invention of compounds freed Chinese from the constant pressure to create new characters. Compound words also express meaning more precisely and subtly, and reduce confusion from homophones. For example, the single character 地sounds similar to 弟, 第, 帝, 蒂, 迪, 递, etc., which can cause misunderstandings. But in the compound 土地 (“land”), the meaning is clear, and full-homophone compounds are rarer than single-character homophones.
Our ancestors also invented reduplication: 清清楚楚 (very clear), 干干净净 (very clean), 漂漂亮亮 (very beautiful), 马马虎虎 (careless), 上上下下 (up and down). This largely solved homophone confusion.
Inspired by the above thinking, I recently developed a new approach to teaching Chinese: learning should start with independent characters. There are about 400 — not too many, and you don’t need them all. They are highly pictographic, so introducing their shapes and evolution makes them easy to learn without rote memorization.
For example, the independent characters 日, 月, 水, 火, 土, 山, 女, 口, 牛, 马, 门, 目, 木, 人. 日 is a circle with a dot in the center. 山 is three peaks. 口 is a square.
Once you’ve learned them, move on to compound characters — they’re just combinations of the independent ones, easy to understand and remember, like building with blocks: 日 + 月 = 明 (bright), 门 + 口 = 问 (ask), 女 + 马 = 妈 (mother), 火 + 土 = 灶 (stove), 水 + 目 = 泪 (tear).
Finally, learn compounds: also like building blocks. 泪水 (tears), 土灶 (earthen stove), 好马 (good horse), 妈妈 (mother), 儿子 (son), 好人 (good person), 门口 (doorway), 明月 (bright moon).
I call this the “Outline Method” for Teaching Chinese Characters:
- Independent characters are the outline (纲)
- Compound characters are the main headings (目)
- Compound words are the subheadings (次目)
Grasp the outline (independent characters), and you lift up the main headings (compound characters). Lift those, and the subheadings (words) follow.
Example with 日:
- 日 is the outline (independent character)
- Compound characters from 日: 早, 明, 星, 春, 时
- Words from these:
- 早 → 早晨, 早饭, 早操, 早退, 早自习
- 明 → 明天, 光明, 明显, 明月, 发明, 聪明
- 星 → 星光, 星火, 星辰, 零星, 卫星, 明星
- 春 → 春天, 春节, 春季, 春风, 春雨, 春联
- 时 → 时间, 时代, 时差, 时钟, 临时, 倒计时
So the evolution of Chinese character expression can be summarized as:
Independent characters → Compound characters → Compound words
This makes learning easier, faster, and more memorable. Combined with basic Chinese grammar, it forms a rich and complete language.
