字符与分类

字符,这里是指汉字构形学上包容“声符”、“形符”、“记号”等的概念。各种类型的文字结构之间的对应,最大可能是基于字符的层次。字符区别意义的功能,在于整个文字结构类型。字符的确定,实际上意味着意义类型的划分。每个研究者首先遇到的是具体字符的分析和归类问题,特别是面对的处理对象是复杂的文字类型,最棘手的就是如何分析出相对完整的字符单位,也就是找到相应的归类。如果各自分类标准出入比较大,无论怎样千方百计分级分层的编码设计都过于“个性化”,也就很难说得上走向实际通用。

Symbol and Classification

Symbol here refers to the notion which includes what "phonetic symbol" and "semantic symbol" denote in Chinese writing. The correspondence between the structures of different writings is most likely at the level of symbols. The composition and applications of different writings all have principles of their own to follow. To identify the symbol means to classify the category of meaning. The difficulty one meets first is the analysis and classification of individual characters, especially of the complex writing systems. The most difficult is how to make the relevant classification. If the standards of classification vary greatly, the coding design, no matter how complicated, will be too "personalized" to put into practical universality.