Most of the world’s languages are written alphabetically; in an alphabetic writing system the basic components represent sounds only without any reference to meaning. For example, the letter “b” in ...

Is the Chinese writing system a sufficient reason on its own to guarantee that Mandarin will not become a global language like English? That’s what someone asked me after I discussed the prima facie ...

The discovery of 5,000-year-old linguistic inscriptions predates by 1,400 years the earliest known Chinese writing and matches the age of the oldest known human writing in Mesopotamia. (via ...

This research was conducted with Simon Jerome Han as lead author. Piers Kelly receives funding from an ARC DECRA Fellowship. Charles Kemp's work on this project was supported by an ARC Future ...

BEIJING — Archaeologists say they have discovered some of the world's oldest known primitive writing, dating back 5,000 years, in eastern China, and some of the markings etched on broken axes resemble ...

Zhou Youguang, known as the father of Pinyin for creating the system of Romanized Chinese writing that has become the international standard since its introduction some 60 years ago, died Saturday in ...

CHICAGO One of the stars of the Oriental Institute’s new show, “Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East and Beyond,” is a clay tablet that dates from around 3200 B.C. On it, ...