‘On Language’ 11/9/05: A crisis in China isn’t an ‘opportunity’
Debunking misconceptions about Chinese characters
‘On Language‘
Chicago Tribune
November 9, 2005
By Nathan Bierma
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Chinese characters themselves are often misunderstood… The meaning of the characters depends on the language and culture where they are used.
This confusion is partly to blame for the common claim of self-help books that the Chinese character for the word “crisis” means both “danger” and “opportunity.”
“A whole industry of pundits and therapists has grown up around this one grossly inaccurate formulation,” Victor Mair writes at Pinyin.info. “The explication of the Chinese word for `crisis’ as made up of two components signifying `danger’ and `opportunity’ is due partly to wishful thinking, but mainly to a fundamental misunderstanding about how terms are formed in Mandarin and other Sinitic languages.”
According to the myth, to write the Chinese character for “crisis,” you combine the character for “danger” and the character for “opportunity.”
That’s based on a partial truth: the word pronounced “weiji” is made up of two characters, pronounced “wei” and “ji.” But while “wei” means danger, “ji” doesn’t mean “opportunity.”
“The `ji’ of `weiji,’ in fact, means something like `incipient moment; crucial point (when something begins or changes),’” Mair writes. “Thus, a `weiji’ is indeed a genuine crisis, a dangerous moment. . . . A `weiji’ in Chinese is every bit as fearsome as a crisis in English.”
The word “ji” only means “opportunity” in some cases, such as when it combines with the word “hui” (“occasion”) to make the word “jihui,” for “opportunity.” Its meaning changes depending on what other word it’s blending with. The crisis-means-opportunity myth, Mair says, is founded on a faulty understanding of the way languages work. ...
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