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B JS sent in this interesting example of using Pinyin ("spelling") as a subtext for notional meaning rendered in characters from Baidu tieba [Post Bar] (though sometimes when I look for this post it seems to get scrubbed by the censors):

Here's the overt text:

Zhè shì guójì zhǔyì de jīngshén, zhè shì gòngchǎn zhǔyì de jīngshén, měi yīgè gòngchǎndǎng yuán dōu yào xuéxí zhè zhǒng jīngshén.

这是国际主义的精神，这是共产主义的精神，每一个共产党员都要学习这种精神。

This is the spirit of internationalism, this is the spirit of communism; every member of the Communist Party should learn this spirit.

Here's the subverted text:

Zhè shì guójì zhǔyì de jīngshén, zhè shì gòngchǎn zhǔyì de jīngshén, měi yīgè tǔfěidǎng yuán dōu yào xuéxí zhè zhǒng jīngshén.

这是国际主义的精神，这是共产主义的精神，每一个土匪党员都要学习这种精神。

This is the spirit of internationalism, this is the spirit of communism; every member of the Bandit Party should learn this spirit.

When I lived in Taiwan from 1970-72, I constantly heard the expression "gòngfěi 共匪", which is short for "gòngchǎndǎng tǔfěi 共产党土匪" ("communist bandits").

It's not unusual for people to use Pinyin to substitute for Chinese characters when they forget them or for special effects, e.g.:

• "Character amnesia and the emergence of digraphia" (9/25/13)
• "Substituting Pinyin for unknown Chinese characters" (12/3/13)
• "Dumpling ingredients and character amnesia" (10/18/2014)
• "Biscriptal juxtaposition in Chinese" (8/17/14)
• "Biscriptal juxtaposition in Chinese, part 2" (10/15/14)
• "A child's substitution of Pinyin (Romanization) for characters" (11/9/14)

Instances of using Pinyin mixed in with characters to avoid censorship are less common, but increasing in number as more and more netizens realize how effective it can be, e.g.:

• "Digraphia and intentional miswriting" (3/12/15)

For many other uses of Pinyin, see:

• "The uses of Hanyu pinyin" (5/22/16)
• "Furigana-like glossing in Mandarin" (8/11/16)

When people employ Pinyin in the sophisticated, clever way illustrated at the beginning of this post, you know that digraphia is not just "emerging" (often mentioned on Language Log, e.g., here, here, here, and here), it is already in process of arriving.

March 17, 2017 @ 10:53 am · Filed by Victor Mair under Diglossia and digraphia, Spelling

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