yin

«yin» in Mova's school dictionary: the dark, cool, quiet, soft side in the old Chinese idea… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

part of speech

noun (yin; uncountable; usually in «yin and yang»)

meaning for a pupil

1) (Chinese philosophy) Yin is the dark, cool, quiet, soft side in the old Chinese idea of yin and yang: two opposite forces that balance each other in everything. tree →

2) (Mandarin, pinyin) «yīn» is a Chinese syllable with several meanings, for example «shady, cloudy» or «sound». tree →

sense in the lessons

Used in lessons on world beliefs and Chinese culture, and in everyday talk: «they are the yin and yang of the team» means they are opposites that fit together. The yin-yang symbol is a circle of black and white parts.

examples

• Yin and yang show how opposites balance each other. tree →
• In the symbol, yin is the dark part and yang is the light part. tree →
• Night is linked with yin, and day with yang. tree →
• The twins are the yin and yang of our class: one quiet, one loud. tree →
• Each half of the yin-yang symbol has a small dot of the other colour. tree →
• The teacher explained yin and yang in our lesson about China. tree →

note

A loanword from Mandarin Chinese, pronounced like English «yin» (rhymes with «tin»). Almost always paired: «yin and yang». In Scotland «yin» can also be dialect for «one» («that wee yin»).

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «yin» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.