Time in Chinese
Joshua the Poet lives in Taiwan now, where he studies Chinese language and literature. We are pen pals. He recently sent me an email with a list of interesting differences between Chinese and English. He writes:
One of the slightly weirder ones to get to used to is that, using English, we think of the future as ahead and the past as behind, but using Chinese the future is behind and the past is ahead. I'm assuming that English has a notion of the future that thinks of people going towards the future (as in walking towards a specific destination), while the Chinese think the past is concrete (and therefore visible), but the future is unknown (not yet visible). Kind of interesting.
Forward as where you are going, vs. forward as what you can see clearly. Backward as where you are coming from vs. backward as what is unknown.
In these metaphors, what does it mean to turn around, or change direction? In the first, one is directing oneself towards a different future. In the second, it is.... Maybe that's related to how for Confucius, there is only one Way.
One of the slightly weirder ones to get to used to is that, using English, we think of the future as ahead and the past as behind, but using Chinese the future is behind and the past is ahead. I'm assuming that English has a notion of the future that thinks of people going towards the future (as in walking towards a specific destination), while the Chinese think the past is concrete (and therefore visible), but the future is unknown (not yet visible). Kind of interesting.
Forward as where you are going, vs. forward as what you can see clearly. Backward as where you are coming from vs. backward as what is unknown.
In these metaphors, what does it mean to turn around, or change direction? In the first, one is directing oneself towards a different future. In the second, it is.... Maybe that's related to how for Confucius, there is only one Way.