Zhou Youguang, an economist-turned-linguist known as the father of the pinyin system of romanisation for Mandarin and who later become an outspoken critic of the communist government, has died at age ...

Zhou Youguang, the inventor of a system to convert Chinese characters into words with the Roman alphabet, died Saturday at the age of 111. Since his system was introduced nearly six decades ago, few ...

Mandarin Chinese is spoken by over a billion people across Asia and around the globe, making it a useful language for travelers to know. Learning pinyin, which romanizes Chinese characters, can ...

So begins one of the most beautiful and well-known Tang dynasty poems, Farewell, composed by Wang Wei (AD699-761). To spell out this passage using Hanyu pinyin, mainland China’s official system of ...

FEW people live to 111. Fewer still leave as big a mark on linguistic lives as Zhou Youguang, who died on January 14th. Mr Zhou was the chief architect of pinyin, the system that the Chinese use to ...

Mr Zhou has remained optimistic about life despite going through tough times Students struggling to learn Chinese might not know it, but their task has been made easier because of the work of one man.

Mandarin characters don’t tell you how to pronounce a word. They are more like pictures that represent an object or an idea. Burt: Correct! Mandarin characters don't give us the sound of a word, so ...

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

The father of hanyu pinyin, Mr Zhou Youguang, turned 109 on Tuesday. The linguist and dissident came up with the system of transliterating Chinese characters into roman letters in the 1950s. The ...