The Chinese word "纽约州" (Niǔyuē Zhōu) is formed through a combination of phonetic transcription and semantic categorization: the first two characters "纽约" are a phonetic approximation of "New York," using characters that sound similar but carry neutral or positive connotations (纽 meaning "link" and 约 meaning "agreement/treaty"), while the final character "州" explicitly denotes "state," providing a clear semantic classification to indicate it is the U.S. state of New York, as opposed to just the city (纽约市). This structure follows the common Chinese practice for translating foreign geographical names, where sound borrowing is paired with a meaningful descriptor.