日 月 明
sun, day moon brilliant, bright,
enlightened
Combining the light from both solar and lunar orbs results in a word that expresses a luminous totality; ‘ming’ conveys a brilliance whose qualities are both diurnal and nocturnal, conscious and unconscious. It is an ideogram that combines two polar opposites into a union whose new symbolic power transcends the sum of its parts.
Jung might call this word a manifestation of the Coniunctio, an alchemical term referring to chemical combinations (also represented by ‘Sol’ and ‘Luna”) and psychologically pointing to the union of opposites whose coming together produces new possibilities for the individual.
白 明白
clear, white, plain to understand
空中小姐
empty/sky middle little elder sister (middle of the empty/sky little sister)
A personal favorite of mine, these four characters combine
to form the one word used to mean ‘flight attendant.’ Of course, there was not much need for this word pre-1929 or
so. Nevertheless, the symbolic
rendering of this occupation suggests some of the mytho-poetic richness that
awaits the student of Chinese.
奴 心 怒 怕
slave (woman/again) heart anger (slave of the heart) fear (white heart)
女 子 好
woman boy, son good
One of the most often spoken words, ‘hao’ or ‘good,’ is part
of a standard daily greeting. In
Cantonese speaking China, ‘you good’ means ‘hi,’ and ‘you good?’ means ‘how are
you?’ After learning the character/word
for woman, I was at first surprised to learn that the word ‘good’ is an
ideogram comprising a woman and her son.
Mother and child are good. Much
like Fenollosa says, the etymology of a word in Chinese is always visible. The socio-political implications, in
addition to those archetypal and cultural, are nearby. The most basic of family units, the mother
and child, symbolizes growth and balance (both idealized by the Chinese) as
well as the closest humans come to achieving immortality of body.
安 字
peace, contentment (woman under roof) written character (boy, son under roof)
Here is woman, again, this time she is under a roof. This character means tranquility, serenity and peacefulness. When a boy is under the roof, we have the character for the written word. Something privileged young Chinese boys have had to do for more than twenty-five hundred years (stay home and study writing). One could say that woman, privileged or not, have also been associated with the household in China for much longer.
田 力 男
rice field force man, male
The character for a rice field is an excellent example of a
pictogram, if one thinks of this aerial view as an accurate layout for Chinese
farming that continues to this day.
Combining power or force by placing it under the field creates the
ideogram for man and male. Rice, of
course, is the major staple grain for the entire south of China. The connection between rice and the sustenance
of life is a clear one. That sweat and
hard work are needed to harvest this reward seems to be implied by this
ideogram for man.
豕 家 嫁
pig house, family to marry (woman as subject)
(pig under roof) (woman next to family, patrilineal)
耳 又 娶 妻
ear hand to marry (man as subject) wife (woman under broom)
to obtain a woman,
take her by the ear
人 大 太
person great, big too much
天 夫 太太
heaven husband madam, wife (Mrs.)
目 見
eye see (eye on legs)
夢 白日夢
dream daydream
(sun/day, bright, dream)
火 禾 秋
fire grain autumn
中 心 忠
middle heart loyalty
開 心 開心
open heart happiness
心理學 原型
psychology archetype