Re: several messages about <i> and many related subjects

Ca Phun Ung wrote:
> In Chinese names are traditionally distinguished with a underline to 
> indicate it is in fact a name, this has been the case for thousands of 
> years, otherwise it is hard for the reader to distinguish meaning 
> because a person's name is usually taken from common words, such as 
> "dragon", "peace", "gold", "clever" etc.
Sorry, I need to correct myself regarding the above. Punctuations, which 
includes underlines, only came into being during the Chinese cultural 
revolution  around 1919. Before this there were no punctuations in 
Chinese literature. So the Chinese got by for thousands of years without 
any form of underline, period, comma, brackets etc. Punctuation is a 
western influence. And in recent years underlining people's names have 
become less and less a norm, though still understood when it happens and 
usually often used to zero out ambiguity if the person's name is odd or 
uncommon.

-- 
Ca Phun Ung

Web: http://yelotofu.com

Received on Tuesday, 15 April 2008 15:23:59 UTC