Resources Archives - Origin of Alphabet

Words Beginning With “DR”

“Self, Other, and Canine”: The “Dog” Radical in Chinese History and Its Implications for Chinese Minority Identity

“自我，他指，以及犬系”: “反犬旁”在中国历史中的发展及其对中国少数民族身份的暗示 Author Unknown (It was available at http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/tempus/archives_files/Brown.pdf until Summer 2020) 作者未知(http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/tempus/archives_files/Brown.pdf) Translated by Maggie Li 译者李琪 Presented by Jennifer Ball 出品人包弫 One of…

Gender and Grammar in Chinese With Implications for Language Universals

Gender and Grammar in Chinese With Implications for Language Universals 中文里的性别和语法 ——对语言共性的影响 Dr. Catherine S. Farris University of Washington 凯瑟琳·法里斯华盛顿大学 First published in…

“Covert Sexism in Mandarin Chinese” by David Moser

Sino-Platonic Papers Number 74 January, 1997 David Moser Dept. of Asian Languages and Cultures University of Michigan Introduction Western linguists have been…

“Meow” is just another name for “cat”

Jennifer Ball Soochow University, Suzhou, China Email: [email protected] How to cite this paper: Ball, J. (2019). “Meow” Is Just Another Name for “Cat”. Open…

The Role of the “Groove” 卯 Character in Chinese Writing: 69 characters and 22 definitions

by Jennifer Ball and Xu Chao Using a Hanzi substructure-search engine designed by Xu Chao and Jennifer Ball Nov. 11, 2018 Thanks to Chinese…

The Role of the “Youth/Essence” 青/靑 Character in Chinese Writing

byJennifer Ball and Xu ChaoUsing a Hanzi substructure-search engine designed by Xu Chao and Jennifer BallNov. 11, 2018 Thanks to Chinese Text Project, Wiktionary,…

Role of the “Opposite Dog “犭 Character in Chinese Writing: 947 Characters 279 definitions

by Jennifer Ball and Xu Chao Using a Hanzi substructure-search engine designed by Xu Chao and Jennifer Ball Aug. 16, 2018 Semantic Breakdown of…

Are Jiahu Symbols Writing? Probably

In Chinese, a common type of sentence is four characters; this four-character sentence is known as a “chengyu” 成语. A chengyu is not dissimilar…

Duh, I own it: Possession is Universal

的 de (no tone) = of (possessive), target, bull’s eye Portraying ownership was one of the first usages of writing. “This is mine” was…

We all emerge from an egg stored in a secret place — 我们都来自隐秘在某处的一枚卵

excerpt: 我们都来自隐秘在某处的一枚卵

请注意以下中国汉字间的联系：

Hair as a Medium for Communication

One’s hairstyle projects one’s status. Female hair telegraphs availability. Certain styles indicate “not yet: this wearer is too young to bear children.” Early communication was often about a female’s ability to carry offspring.

The shape of the letter “V” means “female” in three different cultures and times

The shape of the letter “V” means “female” in three different cultures and times: Discovered by Denise Schmandt-Besserat, this first character is a Neolithic…

#ChangeLanguageChangeMinds #BlackIsBeautiful #DarkIsDarling #BlackIsNOTBad #DarkIsNOTBad #NoMoreBlackIsBad #NoMoreDarkIsBad

The use of darkness as a synonym for “bad” is a microaggression that results in macro-oppression. The constant devaluing of darkness pings upon the…

In ancient Sumerian, the relationship between mother and donkey is clear - both are beasts of burden.

Mother or Donkey? They are both beasts of burden

Soundwise, it’s a close call in Sumerian—Ama vs. Eme. Ama is “mother” in Sumerian 863 times; eme is “donkey” 354 times and “tongue” 178…

Tail = kun in cuneiform

Or would that be tail = cun? The word “tail” has many meanings, but on an animal it is a flag to say, “Here…

The Relationship of Stork to Child is 5,000 Years Old

The suggestive nature of the lily, as seen above, is a clue as to why these flowers were so important to early humans. The…

Could Mayan Flowers Really Be Vaginas?

Is this first character really a Water Lily? Especially considering the package this jaguar is sporting? (See reddened circles.) The bisymmetry of the “u…

Words Beginning With “STR”

The sound “str” is all about objects that are straight, or have structure: “straw” in “strawberries,” for instance, are little straight lines that align. When…

Words Beginning With “CR”

The sound “cr” implies a narrow hole, such as a crack or crevice, or even something bigger that might hold a creature, such as…

Words Beginning With “CL”

The sound “cl” implies two or more things that cluster together because they are very close. They might share a hinge or symmetry or…

Words Beginning With “GR”

The sound “gr” is all about watching the growth of green things: grapes, grass, grain, which all gradually ripen, and when they reach the grocery store,…

Words Beginning With “TH”

Words that begin with “th” are often about other people: One of the biggest holidays in the United States is Thanksgiving, and it always falls…

Words Beginning With “SH”

There are many types of shells: eggshells, seashells, and the outer shell of beans, but all are a shelter for what is inside. “Sh!”…

Words Beginning With “GL”

The sound “GL” has “reflection” at its root because “glacier” and “glaze” show characteristics of ice, which glows when light hits it. Icing or…

Words Beginning With “FR”

The sound “fr” suggests fragmentation. Freckles are fragments of melanin. French fries are fractions of potato. Human fractures make one frail. A frog jumps…

Words Beginning With “BR”

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] Language operates on metaphor: The sound “Br” imparts the sense of “branch”—and the actual branch turns into practical broom or brush: a tool.…

Words Beginning With “BL”

The sound “BL” implies a relationship with eyes: “blink” is two eyes closing and opening—“blind” is when they never reopen. The colors “blue” and…

Mammals depicted in Linear B script including male and female characters Female characters are differentiated by an inverted letter V.

More evidence that the “V” shape means “female”— this time in Linear B (circa 1,450 BC)

Script depictions are from a no-longer functional website, but you can find equivalent source material here: https://linearbknossosmycenae.com/2014/04/26/linear-b-ideograms-level-5-0-advanced-ideograms-formed-by-combinations-of-syllabograms/ The vagina is the most consistently represented…

Sumerian symbols for animals depict their genitals

The complementary relationship between female and male animal signs in cuneiform suggests that these signs are not arbitrary. The authors of Archaic Bookkeeping did…

Bibliography

For Jennifer Ball’s theory on the origins of language which takes a Darwinian approach to written scripts. Proposed: That all ancient written languages reflect…

The Chinese word for “heart” 心 comes from a penis

Precursors of 心 from http://hanziyuan.net. The penis is the real source of male emotion. The precursors of 姦 “adultery, wicked, debauchery” make it clear…

Prototype for a Substructure – Searchable Database of Hanzi

Let’s say you wanted to find all incidents of 卯 in every Chinese character, which right now you cannot. You would take a cursor…

Letter A: From Hawk to Ox

The oldest Egyptian hieroglyphs to have been discovered were inscribed around 3200 BC, fully formed, with no clear antecedent. This is more than 5,000…

Breasts, Vaginas, and Tools: Musings on the roots of our alphabet

If you want to describe something to someone, but neither of you speak the same language, drawing a picture is the simplest way to…

Maggie Li’s Speech: When Socrates Meets Confucius

Maggie Li, whose real name is pronounced “Lee Chee” (Li Qi is the pinyin) is a friend and student of mine who came in…

Eyes come as a pair, even when you’re only talking about one

My Business Card in Chinese and English

Nanotech at Suda is the Best – Spring 2013

Chinese Nanotech Students sing

A video I made for my Soochow University Nanotech English Spring 2013 students:

My wonderful students

Chinese Quadruple Radicals Provide New Insight Into the Meaning of Singular Words

By Jennifer Ball and Maggie Li (李琪) Quadruple radicals are not common, but they do give a sense of what one character means if…

What is the symbol for adultery? A man encounters three women apparently burning in hell.

Chinese Triple Radicals Tells You a Lot About the Culture that Created Them

If one radical means X, three radicals should mean 3X, so studying triple radicals, even if some are archaic, tells you a lot about…

Seal-Ovum-“gp”-Shaped Analysis

卵 ovum – luan3 (leon2 leon5 lo5) 孵 hatch, sit on eggs – fu1 (fu1) 㲉 eggshells – kai4 ke2 (dik1 hok3) 毈 fertile eggs;…

A spoon of rice bears resemblance to “semen”, a relationship that can be seen in the Chinese character for each word.

Rice-Semen Analysis of Chinese Characters

Rice-semen metaphor analysis Compiled by Jennifer Ball © September 4, 2010 Black = rice (米 or 禾) component Blue = essence, youth 青component Green…

Female substructures (乃，丫，丑，母，etc.) in Chinese script

Females in Chinese Script by Jennifer Ball © February 16, 2011 Why is “Y” at the end of our alphabet? Because the shape of…

Vaginas depicted in Sumerian: a database with commentary

This is the Sumerian word for “woman,” rotated 90° clockwise. During the development of their writing, the Sumerians rotated everything counter-clockwise by 90° for…

I aspire to Esperanto, especially if breasts are mamoj…

Breasts are “mamoj” in Esperanto as in “mammaries”? Milk is “lakto” in Esperanto as in “lactose”? Tits are “paroj” in Esperanto as in “pair”?…

Men’s taste in women hasn’t changed much

05/18/2012 / Jennifer Ball / No Comments Avatar, 2010, is seen to the left. Hathor, the cow-woman goddess, circa 500 B.C., is seen…

Cantonese characters for penis and vagina

Argument for a Structural Analysis of Chinese Characters

㧕 to feel or touch with hands; to hold, to lay the hand on, to cover jiu4 liu3 yu2 (lau5) 捫 lay hands on;…

Biking in China：在中国, 我骑自行车

Men and Girls 男和妞: Pictures From China

4 = West = Wine

A Structural Analysis of Written Chinese The book Reading and writing Chinese: a guide to the Chinese writing system, the student’s 1,020 list, the…

CAVes and VAGinas are the same concept in Chinese

Mandarin II Berkeley Extension – Class 2 – Feb. 6, 2012 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Homework: Workbook, pages 52-53. Make a copy…

The Sumerian character for ‘seed,’ may suggest the act of sex between a man and woman.

“Slave Girl” in Chinese and “female” in Sumerian are oddly alike

丫= “slave girl” in Chinese = “woman” in Sumerian This similarity should make you think about the alphabet’s letter Y. It starts words…

Mandarin II to you too

Putonghua Uncensored Class 1

Figureheads Bare Breasts to Tame the Sea

Search Terms for Origin of Alphabet

Why does “uncle” in Hebrew look like “TIT”?

Why does דוד mean “uncle, beloved” in Hebrew? Is this an amazing coincidence to TIT or are humans simple? I’m going with simple. The…

Interesting Chinese Characters #6: To Shoot; To Spurt

㢩 to shoot; to spurt, (same as 的) target for archery di4 ( Cantonese: dik1 dim3 tiu4) 的 = of, “de” in Chinese and…

The cunning chipmunk holds something in its mouth.

Interesting Chinese Characters #4 and #5: Cunning involves holding something in one’s mouth

刁 tricky, sly, crafty, cunning diao1 (diu1) 叼 holding in mouth diao1 (diu1) http://ctext.org/dictionary In order to be cunning, what do you suppose one…

Interesting Chinese Character #3: Ghost of One Devoured by Tiger

倀/伥 Ghost of one devoured by tiger; groping; rash; reckless Pinyin: chang1 Cantonese: coeng1, zaang1 http://ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char= 伥 http://www.mandarintools.com/

The Large Pool of Bursa, by Jean-Leon Gerome, 1885, depicts a harem of women and children around a series of pools.

Interesting Chinese Characters #2: “Profundity”: you know this has to mean “sex”—in the form of a harem

㽎 The profundity of the harem, the mysterious and profound of the forbidden palace, the flourishing and exuberant of the flame. Pinyin: dǎn tán.…

Tarte de la vaca

Ms Lin’s corrections: The equivalent symbol for $ (US dollars) to yuan 元 is ¥ yuan 元 is the same as ¥ ¥ Renminbi…

Who’s up for Mandarin II?

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension Class 12 Nov. 29, 2011 425 Market StreetSan Francisco, CAProfessor: Virginia Mau Mandarin II is now available for enrollment. I…

Grain has symbolic meaning in China

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension Class – 11 – Nov. 22, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau Homework: Menu Include:Name of…

The word for “Eat” looks a lot like a head

Mandarin I – Berkeley Extension – Class 10 Nov. 15, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau 餐厅 can1 ting1 =…

The sound “be” means “vagina” in Chinese. To be or not to be: up to the vagina

Mandarin Uncensored In which we discover that the worst word in English is the same part of the female body as the worst word…

Why is “woman”女 in the character for “Japanese”倭? Is this an insult?

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension Class 8 Nov. 1, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau Homework for next class 11/8: Lesson…

Now we know why they have to be funny…

Clowns have breasts but no milk by Jennifer Ball 笨笑哭 Meaning: foolish laugh cry Characteristics crinkly eyes, funny face crinkly eyes, open…

Interesting Chinese Characters #1: Mythical Animal that Eats Its Mother

獍 A mythical animal that eats its mother when it is born; Manchurian tiger. Pinyin: jing4. Cantonese: ging3. Very few animals eat their mothers; occasionally some insects and…

Puyi had a wet nurse (not shown) until age 14

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension Class 7 Oct. 18, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau Test 11/1 (next class): Comprehensive –…

Mothers are flowers, aren’t they?

“Mother,” “son,” and “flower”: all have breast imagery in the Maya hieroglyphs Son Mother Flower

You say “gege,” I say “gugu”; you’re Chinese, I’m Akkadian, and we’re both talking about virgins

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension – Class 6 – Oct. 11, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau “Ge ge” (guh-guh) means…

The Chinese character for ‘please’ combines the characters for ‘flesh’ and ‘explosion,’ another way to say ‘ejaculate.’ The character for rice includes the character for semen. In the image, semen is suggested by a spoonful of rice pudding.

The roots of “Please 请” are kind of messy

请 Please qing3 = please The right-hand phonetic 青 is also in the word for“semen”: 精 jing1. This makes sense: the bottom is the moon stand-in…

Wang ba is a cuckold which is a tortoise

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension – Class 5 – Oct. 4, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau Notes taken and commentary…

Bubble Tea – Boba Nai Cha – and the biggest-breasted woman in China

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension – Class 4 – Sept. 27, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau Notes taken and commentary…

Was Chinese simplification a way to make the characters look less like pictures?

Sept. 20, 2011 Class 3 Berkeley Extension 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau (pronounced “Mew”) Notes taken and commentary (marked by“Note:”)…

Symbols for mountains often represent breasts and symbols for breasts often look like mountains.

In Chinese, English, Egyptian, and Hebrew, A Similar Symbol Represents “Tits”

太太 = Mrs. tàitài tai4 tai4 Think about a “Mrs.” at a time of no birth control. These two “tais” represent breasts. “Tài tài”…

It takes sharp eyes 色 to see at night 晚

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension – Class 2 – Sept. 13, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau (pronounced “Mew”) Email: [email protected]…

Mandarin Uncensored – Class 1

Mandarin I Berkeley Extension – Class 1 Sept. 6, 2011 425 Market Street San Francisco, CA Professor: Virginia Mau (pronounced “Mew”) Email: [email protected] Notes…

Sumerian Titillation

Early Porn musician goddess prostitute, fox rotated 90° cw Sumerian cuneiform 2600–2500 BC Cuneiform depiction and definition are from the Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary …

“Seed” in Sumerian

Based on this character for “seed,” do you think the Sumerians understood sex? Note that the Akkadian word for “seed” is “zeru,”…

Harmony “hamun” is fish plus salt in Sumerian

Sumerian cuneiform is considered the oldest written language. Sumerian is the spoken language, cuneiform is the script; just like English is our language, but…

Music, the ultimate narcotic, lulls one to sleep (along with milk)

05/27/2011 / Jennifer Ball / No Comments Musician “Nar” is the Sumerian word for “musician” 643 times, yet this character looks like a female…

“Lady Gaga” meant “wet nurse” in Sumerian

Lady Gaga vs. Emegagu Emegagu is the Sumerian word for “wet nurse.” It translates as “female with milk,” but it sounds like the name…

Could “Diddly squat” have come from the Babylonians?

Could “diddly squat” have come from the Babylonians? Didi meant “small” in cuneiform. When things are small, you might have several, like children or wives. When you…

Greek and Sumerian agree: Malag/malakos = prostitute/secondary wife—And an excellent source of milk

“Milkah” meant “queen” in the Bible, possibly because she bore her uncle eight children, because that was the kind of relationship you had with…

Who knew Sumerians were just like electricians?

Sumerian signs for sheep and goats with male to female correspondence. Signs taken from Archaic Bookkeeping by Hans J. Nissen, Peter Damerow, Robert K.Englund, and…