p'in-yin

A form of pinyin — A phonetic script or romanization system for various languages spoken in the People's Republic of China, e.g. Tibetan

Meanings

proper noun
  1. alternativeAlternative form of PinyinFirst known use 20th c.

    This paper follows the Wade-Giles system of transliteration, not the p'in-yin method.

    2004, Ultimate Reality and Meaning, volume 27, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 30
    5 more examples

    There is no hurry about resolving the question of whether p'īn-yīn will in the future replace characters. This is absolutely the case.

    [1973, Language Planning in Mainland China, →OCLC, page 163

    Concrete evaluations of, for example, the p'in-yin movement in China and the expansion of the [redacted] were well covered.

    1979 September, Annual Historical Review US Army Intelligence and Security Command Fiscal Year 1979, published 2018, page 142

    The more serious non-Sinological specialists, "intelligent readers", etc. will have on their bookshelves copies of Cheng Te-k'un's "Archaeology of China" series, Chang Kwang-chih's The Archaeology of China (1st - 3rd editions), Joseph Needham's multi-volume Science and Civilization in China, etc. Can one image the authors of these three valuable publications changing horses midstream, either in succeeding volume or in succeeding editions, and adopting p'in-yin?

    1983, Reports on Visits to Mainland China, Taiwan, and the USA : Participation in Conferences in These Countries, and Some Notes and Impressions, →OCLC, page 121

    Despite increasing use, over the last decade, of the mainland Chinese p'in-yin system, the Wade-Giles system remains the standard by sheer weight of accumulated publication over the last century, and by virtue of its continuing use in current and forthcoming publications in English (including Chang Kwang-chi, 1986).

    1999, “Preface and Acknowledgements”, in Ian Shaw, Robert Jameson, editors, A Dictionary of Archaeology, Blackwell Publishers, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page xii

    A small minority who might well have disguised their origins by romanising their names in p'in-yin or Cantonese dialect have deliberately kept old Dutch-inspired spellings in the phone book and on business cards and signs .

    2002, Charles A. Coppel, Studying Ethnic Chinese in Indonesia, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 364

Origin

  1. Mandarin拼音
  2. Englishp'in-yin

From Mandarin 拼音 (pīnyīn) Wade–Giles romanization: pʻin¹-yin¹.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

p'in-yin. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/p'in-yin

MLA

“p'in-yin.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/p'in-yin. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “p'in-yin,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/p'in-yin.

Source: p'in-yin on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.