In the visual field: Morpheme and grapheme 見 jiàn ‘see’ in Mandarin Chinese

Abstract

The paper deals with the morpho-syllabic grapheme 見 jiàn in Mandarin Chinese. It explores the monosyllabic Chinese word ‘see’ in the graphemic perspective of traditional Chinese writing as well as the contribution of the radical 見 jiàn ‘see’ to the notation of the Chinese morphemes in the semantic field of “seeing”. The introduction to the topic outlines the relationship of a morpheme, syllable and grapheme. The historical background of the Kangxi radicals is discussed to show that the canon of graphemes classifies the entries in the traditional dictionaries of Chinese characters. The morphemes assigned in the dictionary to the radical 見 jiàn were analysed in the current paper with regard to “seeing” as a semantic component. Finally, drawing on the analysis, a model for the relationship of the morphemes’ prototypical meaning has been proposed.