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The Yale romanizations are four systems created at Yale University for romanizing the four East Asian languages of Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean, and Japanese. The Yale romanization for Mandarin was created during World War II for use by United States military personnel, while the Yale romanization systems for the other three languages were created later, in the 1960s and 1970s.

Mandarin[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Mandarin Yale was developed in 1943 by George Kennedy to help prepare American soldiers to communicate with their Chinese allies on the battlefield. Rather than try to teach recruits to interpret the standard romanization of the time, the Wade-Giles system, a new system was invented that utilized the decoding skills that recruits would already know from having learned to read English, i.e. it used English spelling conventions to represent Chinese sounds.

It avoided the main problems that the Wade-Giles system presented to the uninitiated student or news announcer trying to get somebody's name right in a public forum, because it did not use the "rough breathing (aspiration) mark" (which looks like an apostrophe) to distinguish between sounds like jee and chee. In Wade-Giles the first of those would be written chi and the second would be written ch'i. In the Yale romanization they were written ji and chi. The Yale system also avoids the difficulties faced by the beginner trying to read pinyin romanization, which uses certain Roman letters and combinations of letters in such a way that they no longer carry their expected values.

For instance, q in pinyin is pronounced something like the ch in chicken and is written as ch in Yale Romanization. Xi in pinyin is pronounced something like the sh in sheep, but in Yale it is written as syi. Zhi in pinyin sounds something like the ger in gerbil, and is written as jr in Yale romanization. For example: in Wade-Giles, "knowledge" (知识) is chih-shih; in pinyin, zhishi; but in Yale romanization it is written jr-shr—only the last will elicit a near-correct pronunciation from an unprepared English speaker.

The tone markings from Yale romanization were adopted for pinyin.^{[citation needed]}

Mandarin Yale was widely used in Western textbooks until the late 1970s; in fact, during the height of the Cold War, preferring the "communist" pinyin system over Yale romanization was something of a political statement.^[1] The situation was reversed once the relations between the People's Republic of China and the West had improved. Communist China (PRC) became a member of the United Nations in 1971 by replacing Nationalist China (ROC). By 1979, much of the world adopted pinyin as the standard romanization for Chinese geographical names. In 1982, pinyin became an ISO standard. Interest in Mandarin Yale declined rapidly thereafter.

Cantonese[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Unlike the Mandarin Yale romanization, Cantonese Yale is still widely used in books and dictionaries for Cantonese, especially for foreign learners. Developed by Parker Po-fei Huang and Gerald P. Kok and published in 1970,^[2] it shares some similarities with Hanyu Pinyin in that unvoiced, unaspirated consonants are represented by letters traditionally used in English and most other European languages to represent voiced sounds. For example, [p] is represented as b in Yale, whereas its aspirated counterpart, [pʰ] is represented as p.

Because of this and other factors, Yale romanization is usually held to be easy for American English speakers to pronounce without much training. In Hong Kong, more people use Cantonese Pinyin and Jyutping, as these systems are more localized to Hong Kong people. Foreign students of Cantonese who attend Hong Kong University use Sidney Lau's spelling of Cantonese from his three-volume textbooks. Foreign students of Cantonese who attend Chinese University of Hong Kong's New-Asia Yale-in-China Chinese Language Center are taught to use the Yale spelling of Cantonese and eventually learn to read those traditional English voiced consonants in a new unvoiced Cantonese way subconsciously, without realizing they are doing so or without usually being aware of the linguistic difference.

Initials[link]

Finals[link]

• The finals m and ng can only be used as standalone nasal syllables.

Tones[link]

Historically, there were seven phonemically distinct tones in Guangzhou Cantonese. Cantonese Yale represents these tones using tone marks and the letter h, as shown in the following table:

• Tones can also be written using the tone number instead of the tone mark and h.
• Traditional Chinese linguistics treats the tones in syllables ending with a stop consonant as separate "entering tones". Cantonese Yale follows modern linguistic conventions in treating these the same as tones 1, 3 and 6, respectively.

Examples[link]

Korean[link]

Korean Yale was developed by Samuel Elmo Martin and his colleagues at Yale University about half a decade after McCune-Reischauer. It is the standard romanization of the Korean language in linguistics.

The Yale system places primary emphasis on showing a word's morphophonemic structure. This distinguishes it from the other two widely used systems for romanizing Korean, the Revised Romanization of Korean (RR) and McCune-Reischauer. These two usually provide the pronunciation for an entire word, but the morphophonemic elements accounting for that pronunciation often cannot be recovered from the romanizations, which makes them ill-suited for linguistic use. In terms of morphophonemic content, the Yale system's approach can be compared to a North Korean orthography known as Chosŏnŏ sin ch'ŏlchapŏp (Hanja: 朝鮮語新綴字法).

The Yale system tries to use a single consistent spelling for each morphophonemic element irrespective of its context. But Yale and Hangul differ in how back vowels are handled.

Yale may be used for both modern Korean and Middle Korean. There are separate rules for Middle Korean. Martin's 1992 Reference Grammar of Korean uses italics for Middle Korean as well as other texts predating the 1933 abandonment of arae a, whereas it shows current language in boldface.

Vowels[link]

Yale writes the basic vowels as a, e, o, and u. The vowels which are written to the right in Hangul (ㅏ, ㅓ) are written as a or e, and the vowels which are written below (ㅗ,ㅜ,ㆍ, ㅡ) are o or u. Yale indicates fronting of a vowel, written in Hangul as an additional final stroke ㅣ, by a final -y. Palatalization is shown by a medial -y-. Although Hangul treats the rounded back vowels (ㅜ, ㅗ) of Middle Korean as simple vowels, the Yale system writes them as a basic vowel (ㅡ, ㆍ) combined with a medial -w-.

*Since modern standard Korean has lost the vowel ㆍ (arae a), the medial w, used to distinguish it from ㅗwo in Middle Korean, can be omitted. Thus it is important to consider the time period in question when interpreting Yale romanization.

**As this w isn't phonemically distinctive after labial consonants in modern Korean, the Yale system omits it in that context, merging hangul ㅜ (RR u) and ㅡ (RR eu). Thus, there is not a one-to-one correspondence in the spelling of back vowels. Also,

Consonants[link]

Yale uses unvoiced consonant letters to write the modern Korean consonants. The Middle Korean letter ㅿ (bansiot) is written as z. Tense consonants and consonant clusters are transcribed according to the Hangul spelling. Aspirated consonants are written as if they were clusters ending in h.

Other symbols[link]

The letter q indicates reinforcement which is not shown in hangul spelling:

• 할 일 halq il /hallil/
• 할 것 halq kes /halkket/
• 글자 kulqca /kulcca/

A period indicates the orthographic syllable boundary in cases of letter combinations that would otherwise be ambiguous. It is also used for other purposes such as to indicate sound change:

• 늙은 nulk.un “old”
• 같이 kath.i /kachi/ “together”; “like”, “as” etc.

A macron over a vowel letter indicate that in old or dialectal language, this vowel is pronounced long:

• 말 māl “word(s)”
• 말 mal “horse(s)”

Accents marks are used instead of or in addition to the macron when recording dialects, such as Gyeongsang or Hamgyeong, which have retained tones. Note: Vowel length (or pitch, depending on the dialect) as a distinctive feature seems to have disappeared at least among younger speakers of the Seoul dialect sometime in the late 20th century.

A superscript letter indicates consonants that have disappeared from a word's South Korean orthography and standard pronunciation. For example, the South Korean orthographic syllable 영 (RR yeong) is romanized as follows:

• yeng where no initial consonant has been dropped.
  Example: 영어 (英語) yenge
• ^lyeng where an initial l (ㄹ) has been dropped or changed to n (ㄴ) in the South Korean standard language.
  Examples: 영[=령]도 (領導) ^lyengto; 노[=로]무현 (盧武鉉) ^lNo Muhyen
• ⁿyeng where an initial n (ㄴ) has been dropped in the South Korean standard language.
  Example: 영[=녕]변 (寧邊) ⁿYengpyen

The indication of vowel length or pitch and disappeared consonants often make it easier to predict how a word is pronounced in Korean dialects when given its Yale romanization compared to its South Korean hangul spelling.

High levels of analysis[link]

At higher levels of morphological abstraction, superscript and subscript vowel symbols joined by a slash may be used to indicate alternations due to vowel harmony. If used for modern day language, this just means the symbol ^e/_a, though Middle Korean also had the vowel alteration ^u/_o.

An apostrophe may be used for vowel elision or crasis.

• 나+ㅣ = 내 na 'y = nay “my”
• 별+으로 = 별로 pel 'lo = pel lo “especially”

Special letters may be used to indicate final consonants in stem changing verbs. In this example, T stands in for the alternation between ㄷ and ㄹ

• 걷다 keTda “to walk” (dictionary citation form)
• 걸어요 keT^e/_a yo “he walks” (conjugated form)

See also[link]

• JSL romanization

References[link]

This article includes a list of references, related reading or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. Please improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (March 2009)

Bibliography[link]

• Guan, Caihua (2000). English-Cantonese Dictionary. Chinese University Press. ISBN 962-201-970-6. 
• Matthews, Stephen & Yip, Virginia (1994). Cantonese. A Comprehensive Grammar. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-08945-X. 
• Martin, Samuel E. (1992). "Yale Romanization.". A Reference Grammar of Korean (1st edition ed.). Rutland and Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle Publishing. pp. 8 ff. ISBN 0-8048-1887-8. 

External links[link]

• Comparison chart of Yale Romanization for Mandarin with Hanyu Pinyin and Zhuyin Fuhao
• Comparison chart of Romanization for Cantonese with Yale, S. Lau, Guangdong, Toho and LSHK (uses Shift JIS encoding)
• MDBG free online Chinese-English dictionary (supports Cantonese Yale romanization)
• Cukda Cantonese IME

Michelle Yeoh SPMP
Michelle Yeoh at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2011.
Chinese name	楊紫瓊 (Traditional)
Chinese name	杨紫琼 (Simplified)
Pinyin	Yáng Zǐqióng (Mandarin)
Jyutping	Joeng4 Zi2king4 (Cantonese)
Birth name	Yeoh Choo-Kheng (Iûⁿ Chí-khēng)
Born	(1963-08-06) 6 August 1963 (age 48)[1][2] Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia
Occupation	Actress/Dancer
Years active	1984–present
Spouse(s)	Dickson Poon (1988–1992) Jean Todt
Awards MTV Asia Awards Asian Film Award 2004

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

Datuk Seri Michelle Yeoh or Michelle Yeoh Choo-Kheng (born 6 August 1963^[1]) is a Hong Kong-based Malaysian actress, well known for performing her own stunts in the action films that brought her to fame in the early 1990s.

Born in Ipoh, Malaysia, she is based in Hong Kong and was chosen by People magazine as one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World in 1997.

She is best known in the Western world for her roles in the 1997 James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies, playing Wai Lin, and the multiple Academy Award-winning Chinese-language martial arts film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, for which she was nominated the BAFTA for "Best Actress". In 2008, the film critic website Rotten Tomatoes ranked her the greatest action heroine of all time.^[3] In 2009, she was listed by People magazine – as the only Asian actress – as one of the "35 All-Time Screen Beauties".^[4]

She is credited as Michelle Khan in some of her earlier films. This alias was chosen by the D&B studio who thought it might be more marketable to international and western audiences. Yeoh later preferred using her real name.^[1]

Early life and career[link]

Michelle Yeoh Choo Kheng was born to a prominent ethnic Chinese family in Ipoh, Malaysia, on 6 August 1962. Her parents are Janet Yeoh and Yeoh Kian Teik, a lawyer and MCA politician.^[2] She was keen on dance from an early age, beginning ballet at the age of four. At the age of 15, she moved with her parents to England, where she was enrolled in a boarding school. Yeoh later studied at the Royal Academy of Dance in London, majoring in ballet. However, a spinal injury prevented her from becoming a professional ballet dancer, and she transferred her attention to choreography and other arts. She later received a B.A. degree in Creative Arts with a minor in Drama.

In 1983, at the age of 21, Yeoh won the Miss Malaysia beauty pageant.^[1] She was also Malaysia's representative at the 1983 Miss World pageant in London. From there, she appeared in a television commercial with Jackie Chan which caught the attention of a fledgling Hong Kong film production company, D&B Films. Yeoh started her film career acting in action and martial arts films such as Yes, Madam in 1985, after which she did most of her own stunts.^[5]

The D&B Group in Hong Kong was run by Dickson Poon. Yeoh married Poon in 1987 and retired from acting. After the couple divorced in 1992, Yeoh returned to acting.^[1]

Wider fame[link]

Yeoh's performance in Police Story 3: Super Cop sealed her comeback. She acted in The Heroic Trio in 1993, and the Yuen Woo-ping films Tai Chi Master and Wing Chun in 1994.

Yeoh learned English and Malay before Cantonese, and cannot read Chinese characters; consequently she learned the lines for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon phonetically.

She starred in the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies as Wai Lin (1997). Natasha Henstridge was rumoured to be cast in the lead Bond girl role but eventually Yeoh was confirmed.^[6] Brosnan was impressed, describing her as a "wonderful actress" who was "serious and committed about her work".^[7] He referred to her as a "female James Bond" in reference to her combat abilities. She wanted again to perform her own stunts but was prevented because director Roger Spottiswoode considered it too dangerous. Still she performed all of her fighting scenes.^[8][9] Thereafter, she was offered the role of Seraph in the two sequels to The Matrix, but she could not accept due to a scheduling conflict (the Matrix writers then changed Seraph into a male character and cast Collin Chou in the role).^[10] In 2002, she produced her first English film, The Touch through her own production company, Mythical Films.

In 2005, Yeoh starred as the graceful Mameha in the film adaptation of Memoirs of a Geisha, and she continued her English-language work in 2007 with Sunshine. In 2008, Michelle Yeoh also starred in fantasy action film The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor with Brendan Fraser and Jet Li.^[11]

In 2010, she starred in Reign of Assassins.

In October 2011, she has been chosen by Guerlain to be its new skincare ambassador.^[12] Yeoh will play a role in strengthening the French cosmetics company's relationship with Asia.^[13]

Apart from action films, she is famous for playing nationalists in two biopics. In 1997, she played Soong Ai-ling in the award winning The Soong Sisters. In 2011, she portrayed Aung San Suu Kyi in Luc Besson's The Lady.

Controversy[link]

On 22 June 2011, Yeoh was deported from Burma, allegedly over a new film The Lady, in which Yeoh portrays Aung San Suu Kyi, Burmese Prodemocracy leader.^[14]

Personal life[link]

Yeoh was married to Hong Kong entrepreneur Dickson Poon, who owns businesses such as Harvey Nichols and Charles Jourdan.^[15] She is a Buddhist.^[16]

In March 2008, she visited Vietnam to film a documentary for the Asian Injury Prevention Foundation (AIPF).^{[citation needed]} On 31 July 2008, she confirmed news that she was engaged to Jean Todt, a leading figure in motor racing, during an interview with Craig Ferguson on CBS's The Late Late Show.

Yeoh is also a patron of the Save China's Tigers project committed to protect the endangered South China Tiger.^[17]

Awards, honours and styles[link]

In 1999, she was a member of the jury at the 49th Berlin International Film Festival.^[18]

On 19 April 2001, Yeoh was awarded the Darjah Datuk Paduka Mahkota Perak (DPMP), which carries the title Dato' by Sultan Azlan Shah, the Sultan of Perak, her home state, in recognition of the fame she brought to the state.^[19]

On 25 November 2002, she was honoured as The Outstanding Young Persons of the World (TOYP) (Cultural Achievement) by JCI (Junior Chamber International).^{[citation needed]}

On 23 April 2007, the then French President Jacques Chirac awarded her Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur. The decoration was presented to her in a ceremony in Kuala Lumpur on 3 October 2007.^[20]

In 2011, she received a special award for her contribution to Malaysian cinema at Malaysian Film Festival (FFM 24).

On 14 March 2012, the then French President Nicolas Sarkozy awarded her the Officier de la Légion d'honneur. The decoration was presented to her at a ceremony held at the president's official residence, the Elysee Palace on that day.^[21]

On 22 May 2012, she was awarded the Darjah Seri Paduka Mahkota Perak which carries the title Datuk Seri' during the investiture ceremony in conjunction with the Sultan of Perak Sultan Azlan Shah's birthday.

Nominations[link]

Hong Kong Film Award 1998 The Soong Sisters – Nominated as best supporting actress

BAFTA Film Award 2001 – Best Actress (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon)

Filmography[link]

Michelle Yeoh on the "Avenue of Stars" in Hong Kong

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Michelle Yeoh

• Michelle Yeoh at the Internet Movie Database
• Michelle Yeoh Web Theatre
• Michelle Yeoh at Yahoo Movies

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