The modular structure of Chinese: recognising shared blocks as the key to unlocking vocabulary and making it memorable. 

The Beijing Language and Culture University (BCLU) has assembled a massive corpus of Chinese text with a total length of 15 billion characters.  93% of that corpus is comprised of words which are either one or two characters long, in almost equal proportion.

Buy one, get two free!

98.5% of the two character words in the corpus are composed of characters that are also single character words.  What this means is that whenever we have a two character word to learn (like “电脑 = computer”), we will almost get two extra words for free (in this case, “电 = electricity” and “脑 = brain”).

Look again at that vocabulary list

To show what a difference this makes to learning Chinese, let’s look at the prescribed vocabulary for HSK 1, the first level of the world’s most popular Chinese language proficiency tests.  There are 150 words to learn, including “电脑 = computer.”

“脑 = brain” is only used once at this level (as part of “电脑 = computer”), but “电 = electricity” on the other hand is used three more times:

电脑	电 + brain	computer
电视	电 + vision	television
电影	电 + shadows	film/movie
电话	电 + speech	telephone

In other words, when we learn “电脑 = computer” we are also learning half of three other words on the list.

But the potential return is even greater still.  If we put 电 with any of the other characters on the HSK 1 characters we can make nearly 30 more words!

HSK 3 adds 2 more words that contain 电, but in fact 130 words are unlocked.  HSK 5 adds 4 more words that contain 电, but nearly 285 are unlocked. HSK 6 adds 1 more word that contains 电, but more than 60 are unlocked.  Across the 6 levels of HSK, without the learner having to memorise any characters beyond those which already occur in the set vocabulary lists, 电 actually unlocks not just the 11 words which may be tested in the official exams but more than 500 words in Chinese as a whole!  That is an unbelievable return on the learner’s investment in acquiring the character 电 and  is quite unrivalled in any other language.

As I hope will be obvious, the point is not to add to the learning burden by giving ourselves masses more vocabulary to memorise but rather to help us realise that 电 is much more useful to us than simply as half of the word for “computer.”  And if we have to learn any of those other words in the future, we’ll find we’re already half way there.

English vs Chinese Vocabulary

To further cement the point, contrast the task of learning these 6 vocabulary items from HSK 1 list in English rather than in Chinese:

English	Syllables	Chinese	Syllables
brain	1	脑	1
electricity	5	电	1
computer	3	电脑	2
television	4	电视	2
film/movie	1/2	电影	2
telephone	3	电话	2
Total syllables	17/18	Total syllables	10
Different syllables	15/16	Different syllables	5

Whilst each individual item in English may look lighter and easier to pick up than the Chinese equivalent, the inconsistent format of the words in English, the additional space they require and the lack of obvious connections between them makes the list as a whole harder to acquire.  The opposite is the case with Chinese: whilst each individual item may be heavier and harder to pick up than the English equivalent, the consistent format of the words and the re-using of existing blocks makes the list as a whole easier to acquire.

In short, it is harder to learn a single word in Chinese like “电脑” than it is to learn a single word in English like “computer.”  But it is easier to learn a list of words in Chinese like “电脑”, “电视”, “电影” and “电话” than it is to learn a list of words in English like “computer”, “television”, “film/movie” and “telephone.”

Think Chinese

To enjoy the benefits the modular structure of Chinese offers us in our learning, we have to stop simply translating.  A quick scan of the lists of words containing “电” above shows that even at a basic level, “电” could mean “electricity”, “electric”, “electrical”, “electronic”, “electronics”, “power” or “charge” as well as indicating that something either runs on electricity (like a “tram/trolleybus”) or is built using electronics (like a “computer”).  That makes “电” far more useful than any of its potential English equivalents.  But it also means that in order to really understand what “电” means, we need to see how it is used in a range of different situations.
  

We might start by looking at a list of words that contain “电” (like “电脑”, “电视”, “电影” and “电话”) and consider what they have in common: what connects “computer”, “television”, “film/movie” and “telephone”?  When we have recognised that it is “electricity” or “electronics,” we will not be surprised to discover that the origin of the character “电” is a pictograph for a bolt of lightning.  We can reinforce this sense of what “电” represents by trying to guess what the words on the left might mean before matching them up with their English equivalents on the right.

水电	water + 电	hydroelectric power
没电	not have + 电	out of (electric) power
电力	电 + power	electric power
水电	water + 电	hydroelectric power
电死	电 + death	to electrocute
电路	电 + road/path	electric circuit
电信	电 + message	telecommunications
手电	hand + 电	torch/flashlight
天电	sky/heavens + 电	atmospherics
电压	电 + pressure	voltage
心电图	heart +  电 + picture	electrocardiogram (ECG)

Remember, this is an exercise we can do even when we have only the most basic level of Chinese and may not yet know any more of the characters in the list above apart from “电.” 

It is unimaginable in any other language that a learner who only knows one syllable block should already have mastered half of extremely advanced vocabulary such as electrocardiogram, atmospherics, hydroelectric power and telecommunications.  Such is the unique power of Chinese and its distinct modular structure.

To explore further features of Chinese or enquire about our courses, please contact info@thinkchinese.net

This article is written by Tim Nash @ ZipF