Debating Traditional v. Simplified Characters

As I have been trying to keep up-to-date with the current happenings in the Chinese governments "attempt" to modify 44 characters and reintroduce 51 characters (see image there for what they want to change), I found this cartoon kind of funny:

Hi otomik

You can find some "new comers" in the field of chemistry. In the 20th century, some Chinese characters were (completely) newly created for translating the names of chemicals and elements. Here are some examples. They are all 形声字.

钼 （mu4） molybdenum
鉭 （tan3） tantalum
氨 (an1) ammonia
氮 (dan4) nitrogen

氕 （pie1） protium
氘 (dao) deuterium
氚 (chuan1) tritium

Hi otomik

It's said that 小篆 (small seal scripts) were made by simplifying/modifying 大篆(or 籀文) that had been used in Qin Kingdom before the unificiation of China by 秦始皇, although I think that the simplification was not as radical as that in 1950s.

I'm afraid I forgot to mention another set of top-down imposed Chinese characters in my previous post. China's only empress “武则天” (624-705) invented about twenty new Chinese characters called 则天文字 (or 则天新字).

For example, her name "照" was compulsorily replaced by the new character 曌, which was made by combining 明 (bright) and 空 (sky). The most impressive one is “〇”, and this means "star" (星星). It's very easy to remember, hehe.

则天文字 gradually went out of use after the death of 武则天, and they are not used anymore in modern China, but interestingly, only "圀" (= 国/國) survived in Japan. You can find it in the name of a Japanese hero in period dramas, 水戸光圀 (Mito-Mitsukuni).

P/S. Thanks for the hilarious Mao quotation!

There was another top-down central plannning in the history of Chinese character in the past. 秦始皇 of the Qin dynasty (秦朝) introduced 小篆 (small seal scripts) as the national official character style about two thousand and two hundred years ago. In those days, different styles of Chinese characters were used in different regions in China. 秦始皇 standardized them.

inventing new characters, I think it's different from adopting a regional standard into the national one. of course the comparisons to Mao and the first emperor are many.

"He buried 460 scholars alive; we have buried forty-six thousand scholars alive... You [intellectuals] revile us for being Qin Shi Huangs. You are wrong. We have surpassed Qin Shi Huang a hundredfold." -Mao 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qin_Shi_Huang

Changye,

"[..] some schools in Taiwan have begun to compulsorily teach 简体字 to students."

Hi otomik

There was another top-down central plannning in the history of Chinese character in the past. 秦始皇 of the Qin dynasty (秦朝) introduced 小篆 (small seal scripts) as the national official character style about two thousand and two hundred years ago. In those days, different styles of Chinese characters were used in different regions in China. 秦始皇 standardized them.

Hi houtbay

As you expect, the number of 简体字-users is much larger than that of 繁体字-users. After all, the PRC has a population of more than 1.3 billion!

I hear that 简体字 has been getting popular in Taiwan as the relationship between the two countries improves. A lot of mainlanders visit Taiwan for sightseeing recently.

I read a newspaper artice the other day that say some schools in Taiwan have begun to compulsorily teach 繁体字 简体字 to students. Times have changed.

P/S. Thanks, kimiik. I've corrected the mistake.

all languages and writing systems change over time. but this is not the normal path of the emergent order of language. simplified is top down central planning, among the the historic changes this is definately an ahistoric change.

among the things constantly praised of chinese culture is it's continuity of 5000 years. while more people today know simplified, still the dead outnumber the living.

All languages and writing systems change over time. Look at how Chinese characters evolved from the markings made on bone so long ago. Things change. We should also consider the reasons for the simplification.Was it not to make things easier, so that more people can learn to read and write? I'll probably learn traditional characters after I learn the simplified ones because I'd want to be able to read all Chinese writing. Perhaps we are in a transition stage where two system exist side-by-side for a while before one dominates. Hmm is this not already happening? Aren't there more people who use simplified characters than traditional ones?

I think Singapore uses simplified characters too.

As a Brit doing business with mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, I find the simplified form much easier to learn and memorise.  Yes it's helpful to learn both and I really don't have any prejudice with regard to one being aesthetically superior to the other or conveying more meaning - but what I do know is that the simplified form survives scanners and fax machines much better!

@koujiacheng, I think you are approaching it in the best possible way. Every learner of chinese has to deal with the fact that there are two different charachter sets. When you learn chinese just for fun, you can obviously choose which characters you like better, but if you acutally go to a country to live and work there you need to know the characters that are used there, and if you travel to different countries you might have to learn both traditional and simplified characters anyway.

In the same way that learning traditional characters is maybe easier because you can see the meaning of the characters more clearly, studiying the system of simplification is probably easier than just memorizing the simplified and tradtional version of every character.

I also think that when you have a proper explanation for every character and know all the radicals already maybe traditionals are easier to memorize. But when you don't have the time to study the etymology of every character and really just have to memorize I think simplified is just easier :)

Learning mostly online I also often find that the traditional characters are so small that I can not recognize all the strokes :(

@koujiacheng, 谢谢你! :D

This will be extremely useful!

@lechuan

Posted.  Be sure to read my explanations about the cards.  Hope you find it useful.

http://www.plecoforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=1773&p=13172#p13172

@koujiacheng

Those Flashcards sound like a great method for learning the 'other' character set! Would it be possible to post them in the Flashcards section of the Pleco forum?

Most people don't realize this, but the tables that associate traditional and simplified characters only consist of 535 transformations.  Table 1 consists of 350 unique simplifications, Table 2 consists of 132 repeated simplified
characters and 14 repeated simplified radicals.  Table 3 consists of 39 place name characters that have been simplified.  Once you learn these pattners, you will be able to deal with either form.  I have created pleco flashcards
containing these transformations and am currently learning them myself.  After only learning table 2,  I'm finding that I can read and write a huge number of traditional forms that would have eluded me previously.  So while learning all the transformations may not be trivial, it certainly makes the task of learning both forms more manageable and less intimidating.

你們好 !

I personnaly learn traditional set only for two main raisons :

- I live between Hong Kong & Taipei

- I'm 100% agree with "user300409", most simplified Characters are simply damn' ugly :p

Beside that I also started to learn simp (less than 50) back in France and I also think that learn trad is maybe more laborious (especially when you try to learn 體，獻 or 藝) but it's indeed (much) easier to remember (maybe because of the decomposition)

Hi hape

Good observation. It seems that the simplified form 专 (= 專) was perhaps newly invented by Chinese scholars when simplified characters were introduced in 1950s. On the other hand, the character 團 traditionally has a simplified/variant form (俗字) "团", which was officially adopted as (promoted to?) the simplified character for 團 in the PRC. You can find "团" in an ancient Chinese dictionary 龙龛手鉴 (long2kan1shou3jian4), which was edited by a monk in 辽国 in the late 10th century. This dictionary is well known for listing a lot of variant characters.

http://140.111.1.40/yitia/fra/fra00738.htm

P/S. 團 is simplified as 団 (not 团) in Japan.

A great interview with John B and Pete from this Dear Amber lesson regarding Traditional vs Simplified:

http://chinesepod.com/lessons/chinese-characters-and-the-history-of-sex-in-china/discussion

I don't understand why simplification is sometimes inconsistent:

trad. 專, simp. 专
trad. 傳, simp. 传
trad. 磚, simp. 砖
trad. 團, simp. 团  <<<<

Any ideas why 專 is replaced by 才 in 團/团?

For a Chinese this may obvious, but for a learner...?

@长夜

隶书和楷书字体很像，没错。

隶书是汉朝比较流行的字体，通行一时。后汉（东汉）时，隶书演变成楷书。不过在这演变过程中发展出来了几种有意思的字体。 行书是一种楷书和草书之间的字体，艺术气味很浓厚，也是最通行的书写字体，而没得草书复杂书写。草书也是从隶书发展出来的的字体，比楷书和行书早已发展出来的，草书草叶样似的，比较艺术性，尽管写出来的字体看起来比较乱七八糟，不整齐，但是写的比较快。

某外国人一看到非常难以认出来的字体，肯定来源就是草书或者行书的书法性字体。

楷书到底为什么到现在作为正体呢？我看，原因很简单，就是社会上一直要取用着最容易写、最容易认识的字体。

隶书(clerical scripts)/楷书(regular)/繁体字(traditional) basically have the same (or very similar) shapes, so if you have knowledge of 繁体字, you can even read 隶书 very easily, which was invented/used more than two thousands years ago.

Changye

Thanks for the link to those Etymology pages. Fascinating

@changye

thanks for pointing that out.

the evolution of characters from oracle bone and shell scripts to the greater seal did not always involve simplification from the point of view of stroke numbers, rather the implementation and development of a systematic approach to writing, as the examples suggest. a form of systemic simplification , eventually resulting in 楷书 becoming 正体 up till simplification in the mainland mid last century.

the examples of 甲骨文 and 大篆 characters you have provided clearly show just how many forms of the one character could be written to represent the same meaning. although they are similar in appearance, the discepancies would today of course cause people to think they were different in meaning because of their difference in form.

i still remember being roasted by my teacher in taiwan for slanting the 点 on top of some characters the wrong way and being told it is wrong and therefore has no meaning.

i'm sure the ancients who put a 点 in a different position would probably have been praised for their initiative and creativity ;-P

Hi miantiao

Actually, transitions from oracle bone scripts (甲骨文) to seal scripts (篆书) were not always simplifications. The shapes of some characters became more complex in order to make their meanings clearer. Let me show you some examples.

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E8%AF%86&submitButton1=Etymology

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E6%B8%B8&submitButton1=Etymology

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E9%BC%BB&submitButton1=Etymology

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E4%B9%98&submitButton1=Etymology

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E5%A5%A0&submitButton1=Etymology

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E8%9B%8A&submitButton1=Etymology

http://www.internationalscientific.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput=%E7%9B%A5&submitButton1=Etymology

商代时，甲骨文逐渐简单化而有系统，称为大篆。秦始皇统一中国以后，大篆简化成了小篆。改变小篆的形体，制造了隶书。后来隶书发展了草书。后汉时代，有一位学者利用笔、墨、纸张的便利创造了楷书而楷书奠定了到上个世纪正体被简化的时候中文正体。

百家的老子、孔子、床子、墨子等等，肯定不是在用楷书来写字的。

象形文字现在就占了中文字体的一小部分， 字体演变到了楷书的时候就难看到了象形字体的痕迹了。

a chinese friend just taught me this recently...its a newbie thing i should have learned a long time ago!

繁体字( 繁體字 trad.) fan2 ti3 zi4  means traditional character

简体字 (簡體字 trad.) jian3 ti3 zi4 means simplified character

chinese written language would be impossible if romanised, and why should it be?

naming for one would lose its integrity. why should the chinese romanise their language in order to please growing frustration from outside their own culture?

i agree that the number of characters does prolong the process of literacy, but when a language is based on tones and single syllable words i can't see any other way other than to use multitudes of symbols.

the written form has been simplified on the mainland and may be simplified further, or perhaps it may revert to 楷书， which has been 正式的字体(正体）up until the simplification. simplifiaction was the simplification of 楷书。

romanising the chinese language is implausable and impossible.

i've noticed mainland chinese may not recognise some traditional characters individually, but in context have no problem at all.

and i'm sure it works the other way round.

the larger one's vocab gets the easier it is to recognise either forms in context.

i guess i'm lucky though, having had an education in both but not by design. having realised the value of studying both, after some initial frustration, i continue to read texts in both forms.

changye said

The debater's remark is just a nonsense.

You may call it nonsense, but the main reason of the character reforms in the 1950's is a political one: to destroy "old" culture.

It is also interesting that Chairman Mao never used simplified characters.

antony73

Haha. Yeah. I really got confused with the 干 character， knowing that there were more than just one meaning, such as ：

干= shield; to invade

幹=to do

乾= dry

My Chinese teacher suggests learning BOTH simplified and traditional character sets.

Hi tvan

You are very right. The characters used in a time when Confucius and Laozi lived are very different even from today's "traditional" characters, both in shapes and pronunciations. The debater's remark is just a nonsense.

Some characters only change a little and are easy for simplified readers to recognize, like 謝 and even 學.  I only really know about 50 traditional so far, and I'm having very little difficulty due to being able to pick out the simplified character within the traditional.

But also using your examples, it could be true the other way around as well for some people, since there's little-to-no relation between the simp. and trad. versions.

antony73 said

most Chinese people I know who have only studied simplified can also read traditional

OK, but for a foreigner who only learned simplified it will be very hard if he comes e.g. to Taiwan.

He knows 体 - but in Taiwan it's 體.

Or, he knows 艺 - but in Taiwan it's 藝.

etc, etc.

Really easy??

lechuan

I think that's it. After all, most Chinese people I know who have only studied simplified can also read traditional, and vise versa.

I usually break it down as follows:

If you want to go to, or are are in, Mainland China, learn Simplified.

Taiwan, Hong Kong etc? Learn Traditional.

If neither of the above, just choose one. See what resources are availble for each. What are available mangas and books in your area printed in? What subtitles are used on your favorite dramas? Flip a coin.

The worse thing you can do is delay your studies of the characters because you can't decide (as happened ot myself). I ended up arbitrarily choosing simplified because I found a really good book on learning characters that is only available for simplified characters. I plan to learn traditional later on.

It's kind of like debating whether to learn english with an american or british accent....

hitokiri That is wierd, and you're probably right about personal preference. I remember Amber saying that living in Taiwan(?) made remembering and recognizing traditional characters difficult, yet when living in Mainland, using simplified, it became much easier. The complete opposite experiance to yourself.

I started learning writing and speaking Mandarin when I was eight years old, and honestly... learning to memorize simplified characters were very confusing and quite difficult. After 2 weeks of study, I reverted to traditional and I actually found it easier to write and memorize.

But then again, it's the person's preference.

paigeums

That's interesting, you think that studying with traditional characters would have slowed your progress?

I've been studying Chinese a little under three years and have been terribly slow at studying characters. I had been thinking that maybe I should, as a beginner to characters, learn traditional. Maybe this method would save time and effort later on.

What do others think to a beginner to characters learning traditional? I am really at a loss which way to go with this.

Traditional characters are a lot more intimidating to a complete newbie.  I've been studying with simplified for nearly a year, and just now started studying the traditional counterparts of the characters I already know.  If Chinesepod had been traditional-only back when I started, there's no way I would have progressed as much as I have (if I'd stuck with Chinese at all).

I'm with changye.  It seems like you have the best of both worlds now.  The PRC's move to universal education was assisted by simplified characters; Taiwan steps in to fulfill its post-colonial role as repository of traditional Chinese culture.

I did have a quibble with the statement by one of the debaters who asserted that traditional characters have a strong association with,

"the canonical writings of Confucius, Lao Tzu and countless others who had exploited the full range and expression of the traditional characters."

I'm not positive of the specifics, but I'm pretty sure that characters underwent at least one or two simplifications since the times of Confucius and Lao Tzu.  They may have a stronger connection, but it still seems pretty tenuous.

As far as learners of Mandarin concern, the answer to this problem entirely depends on your needs and interests. I personally hope that Taiwan and Hong Kong will keep using traditional characters in the future. I love diversity.

My opinion: Most simplified Characters are simply ugly.

Look at 个, 过, 么, 当, 与, 无, 东, 写, 乐, 兴, 艺, 乡, etc.!

They have no beauty, contain no meaning, nothing, just ugly script!

Traditional characters are the path of least resistance to learning. Because they are more complex, they convey a “story” behind the character, so they are much easier to memorize!

Simplified characters IMHO are relicts of Maoism. Taiwan and HK did right to keep the beautiful and easy to learn and understand traditional script.

What's more, some restaurant owners and shopkeepers in the PRC want to show their distinctiveness and "education" and switched back to traditional script... ;-)

And:

Cit.: In Taiwan and Hong Kong, schoolchildren have no trouble learning traditional characters, and those regions demonstrate some of the highest literacy rates in the world. Meanwhile, in recent decades, the PRC has implemented policies that implicitly acknowledge the practical, cultural and aesthetic values of traditional Chinese: some traditional characters have been restored to use, and the government permits traditional characters in the practice of calligraphy.

IMHO the purpose of simplified Chinese was to destroy parts of the Chinese culture so that Communism could take its place.

Just my opinion.

繁體字 however is much preferred in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and almost all overseas Chinese communities. I haven't seen simplified characters in use outside Mainland China...

simplified chinese are more appricated in most area of China.