Taiwanese Braille

Taiwanese Braille
Type
Languages Standard Mandarin
Parent systems
Night writing
Print basis
Zhuyin
A quadriscriptal text in Chinese and Roman print and braille. In the lower right corner is the character 結 jié, written in braille as gyé; compare 西 at the center top, rendered in braille as syī.

Taiwanese Braille is the braille script used in Taiwan for Taiwanese Mandarin (Guoyu).[1] Although based marginally on international braille, the majority of consonants have been reassigned;[2] also, like Chinese Braille, Taiwanese Braille is a semi-syllabary.

An example is,

⠅ (braille pattern dots-13)⠒ (braille pattern dots-25)⠂ (braille pattern dots-2) ⠳ (braille pattern dots-1256)⠈ (braille pattern dots-4) ⠙ (braille pattern dots-145)⠞ (braille pattern dots-2345)⠈ (braille pattern dots-4) ⠓ (braille pattern dots-125)⠱ (braille pattern dots-156)⠐ (braille pattern dots-5) ⠅ (braille pattern dots-13)⠡ (braille pattern dots-16)⠐ (braille pattern dots-5) ⠗ (braille pattern dots-1235)⠩ (braille pattern dots-146)⠁ (braille pattern dots-1)
ㄨㄛˊˇㄧㄢˇˋˋˋ
guódiǎnhào

Charts

Initials

Zhuyin
Pinyin bpmfdtnlgkhjqxzhchshrzcs
Braille ⠕ (braille pattern dots-135)⠏ (braille pattern dots-1234)⠍ (braille pattern dots-134)⠟ (braille pattern dots-12345) ⠙ (braille pattern dots-145)⠋ (braille pattern dots-124)⠝ (braille pattern dots-1345)⠉ (braille pattern dots-14) ⠅ (braille pattern dots-13)⠇ (braille pattern dots-123)⠗ (braille pattern dots-1235) ⠅ (braille pattern dots-13)⠚ (braille pattern dots-245)⠑ (braille pattern dots-15) ⠁ (braille pattern dots-1)⠃ (braille pattern dots-12)⠊ (braille pattern dots-24)⠛ (braille pattern dots-1245) ⠓ (braille pattern dots-125)⠚ (braille pattern dots-245)⠑ (braille pattern dots-15)

The braille letters for zhuyin/pinyin ㄍ g (/k/), ㄘ c (/tsʰ/), and ㄙ s (/s/) double for the alveolo-palatal consonantsj (/tɕ/), ㄑ q (/tɕʰ/), and ㄒ x (/ɕ/).[3] The latter are followed by close front vowels, namely ㄧ i (/i/) and ㄩ ü (/y/), so the distinction between g, c, s (or z, k, h) and j, q, x in zhuyin and pinyin is redundant.

Medial + rime

Each medial + rime in zhuyin is written with a single letter in braille.

Zhuyin /ㄦ
Pinyin -i/eraoeêaieiaoouanenangeng
Braille ⠱ (braille pattern dots-156) ⠜ (braille pattern dots-345)⠣ (braille pattern dots-126)⠮ (braille pattern dots-2346)⠢ (braille pattern dots-26) ⠺ (braille pattern dots-2456)⠴ (braille pattern dots-356)⠩ (braille pattern dots-146)⠷ (braille pattern dots-12356) ⠧ (braille pattern dots-1236)⠥ (braille pattern dots-136)⠭ (braille pattern dots-1346)⠵ (braille pattern dots-1356)
Zhuyin ㄧㄚㄧㄛ ㄧㄝ ㄧㄞ ㄧㄠㄧㄡㄧㄢㄧㄣㄧㄤㄧㄥ
Pinyin iiaio ie iai iaoiuianinianging
Braille ⠡ (braille pattern dots-16)⠾ (braille pattern dots-23456)⠴ (braille pattern dots-356) ⠬ (braille pattern dots-346) ⠢ (braille pattern dots-26) ⠪ (braille pattern dots-246)⠎ (braille pattern dots-234) ⠞ (braille pattern dots-2345)⠹ (braille pattern dots-1456)⠨ (braille pattern dots-46)⠽ (braille pattern dots-13456)
Zhuyin ㄨㄚㄨㄛ ㄨㄞㄨㄟ ㄨㄢㄨㄣㄨㄤㄨㄥ
Pinyin uuauo uaiui uanunuangong
Braille ⠌ (braille pattern dots-34)⠔ (braille pattern dots-35)⠒ (braille pattern dots-25) ⠶ (braille pattern dots-2356)⠫ (braille pattern dots-1246) ⠻ (braille pattern dots-12456)⠿ (braille pattern dots-123456)⠸ (braille pattern dots-456)⠯ (braille pattern dots-12346)
Zhuyin ㄩㄝ ㄩㄢㄩㄣ ㄩㄥ
Pinyin ü üe üanün iong
Braille ⠳ (braille pattern dots-1256) ⠦ (braille pattern dots-236) ⠘ (braille pattern dots-45)⠲ (braille pattern dots-256) ⠖ (braille pattern dots-235)

is used for both the empty rime -i ([ɨ]), which is not written in zhuyin, and the rime ㄦ er ([ɐɚ]). See for example 斯 () located above the word Daguerre in the image at right.

Tone Marks

Tone: 12340
Zhuyin naˊˇˋ˙
Pinyin ˉˊˇˋna
Braille

Tone is always marked.[4] This includes toneless syllables such as 了 le, rendered in the image above-right.

Punctuations

Punctuation[5]

Print
Braille
Print __﹏﹏……—— ——
Braille
Print 「 」『 』( )〔 〕{ }
Braille

References

  1. Not for Taiwanese Hokkien, which commonly goes by the name "Taiwanese"
  2. Only p m d n g c a e ê ü (from p m d n k j ä è dropped-e ü) approximate the French norm. Other letters have been reassigned so that the sets of letters in groups such as d t n l and g k h are similar in shape.
  3. [sic] One might expect ㄐ j (/tɕ/) to pair with ㄗ z (/ts/), by analogy with the others. Compare here, where the character 學 xué is rendered "süé". Historically it could have been either. The principal behind the assignments seems to be that, of the historically appropriate pairs of letters g~z, k~c, and h~s, the letter with the fewer dots is used for j, q, x.
  4. http://www.languagehat.com/archives/003051.php
  5. 萬明美, 2001, 「視障教育」, 五南圖書出版股份有限公司, p. 74 ff

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Tuesday, April 19, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.