How Often Are Chinese Names in Pinyin Misread in an Asian History Class?

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As a person born in the 1980s, I would say I saw a significant amount of technology and methods develop, I remembered typing my high school thesis stuck with a very old PC, working on my college group paper with a better PC, and finally had a laptop during my graduate school days. Back then, I remembered when Chinese schools taught Zhuyin (which I really dislike), I didn't pass my Zhuyin subject (good thing, the Chinese language teacher didn't make me take summer since I should be applying for college), and how pinyin was barely taught. It was pretty much like how some older Taiwanese folks had a bad attitude toward pinyin. Barriotic people do exist and I'm afraid that pinyin's potential was never explored back then.

It's going to be obvious that names in Chinese will be written in pinyin in the history books. I really thought there was a typographical error when Mao Zedong was spelled as such. I was used to hearing Mao Zedong as Mao Tse Tung. People read the z and the d like it was in the English language. A lot of names were mispronounced. I guess that's why the old Chinese methodology taught Zhuyin since if one knew Zhuyin, it would be harder to mispronounce. However, with a little practice, one can know when to read a little differently with another language. It's like how the letter j in Filipino is read as a softer h. People who don't know it are bound to make funny mistakes. It's like how often hear Spanish and Filipino words and names misread such as Juan, Alejo, and Junta. 


So, the basic drill is that certain letters will be read somewhat alike but different. We have the BOPOMOFO in pinyin. The drill would go like this:
  1. BP would mean reading a softer P followed by a harder P.
  2. DT would mean reading a softer T followed by a harder T.
  3. GK would mean reading a softer K followed by a harder K.
  4. JQ would mean reading a softer Qi followed by a harder Qi.
  5. CH-SH would mean reading a softer CH followed by a harder CH.
  6. ZS would mean reading a softer TS followed by a harder TS.
Basically, Z and D in Mao Zedong with be read with a softer TS and a softer T. So, reading Mao Zedong as Mao Zedong with the Z and D read like the English alphabet is fully wrong. Because of this, it's very common to misread a lot of Chinese names spelled in a romanized context. Even more, it would be important to get the tone right. The tones would be spelled as Máo Zédōng which means reading "ao" and "e" with a quick rise and "o" with a bit of a stretch. The "ao" and "e" are read with the second tone. The "o" is read with a first tone.  

The mistakes are made even by several Asian history teachers. I'm afraid that Asian history hasn't been taught to read the pinyin. That's why they are prone to reading pinyin like the English alphabet. I could remember how a Chinese language teacher soon taught some Asian history teachers how to pronounce certain words. I even remembered telling my teacher how to read Zhang Ziyi's name in pinyin. Though, I'd have missed the tones since they'll be written as Zhāng Zǐyí. 

Right now, I'm practically an advocate for the use of pinyin. I could care less if Taiwan still requires its citizens to learn zhuyin. Zhuyin is pretty much part of their heritage as much as Cebuano is to Cebu and Tagalog is the national language of the Philippines. Though, for international students, pinyin has become more accessible. It's because there will always be a need to make some changes. International marketing would mean foreign investors may need to make adjustments where they go. I believe pinyin is one of the best adjustments ever made as Chinese language is increasing worldwide. 

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