部首意符的教育價值

Abstract

Bushou is the traditional indexing instrument for Hanzi. With few exceptions, all the semantic radicals in Hanzi are included amongst the Bushou. Although some have suggested that Bushou can be used to teach Hanzi acquisition, it is not certain whether all Bushou are suitable or only those that are semantic radicals, and whether this belief is true. We analyzed nearly thirty thousand Hanzi, to see if all Bushou possess semantic properties, and whether their level of semantic representation is similar. At the same time we also analyzed the ability for sound representation. The study revealed that as Bushou was developed for indexing purpose, about a fifth contain Hanzi which may share only common physical appearance and few semantic or phonological proximity. Some other Bushou contain more than one semantic property, or include just physically close Hanzi. Thus the degree of reliable semantic representation varies. About 20% of Bushou are based on physical appearance alone, the Hanzi within these Bushou do not share semantic relationships. Reliance on Bushou which are of low semantic reliability to access meaning can lead to serious misinterpretation of Hanzi and frustration. We selected 66 highly reliable semantic radicals, one of which is not a Bushou, as the most useful to learn. The use of semantically reliable radicals rather than Bushou will improve the semantic transparency of Hanzi, leading to better learning.