PLANNING CHINESE CHARACTERS

Language Policy

VOLUME 9

Series Editors:

Bernard Spolsky, Bar-llan University, Israel

Elana Shohamy, Tel Aviv University, Israel
Editorial Board:

Claire Kramsch, University of California at Berkeley, USA

Georges Lüdi, University of Basel, Switzerland
Normand Labrie, University of Toronto, Canada
Anne Pakir, National University of Singapore, Singapore
John Trim, Former Fellow, Selwyn College, Cambridge, UK
Guadalupe Valdes, Stanford University, USA
The last half century has witnessed an explosive shift in language diversity not
unlike the Biblical story of the Tower of Babel, but involving now a rapid spread of
global languages and an associated threat to small languages. The diffusion of
global languages, the stampede towards English, the counter-pressures in the form
of ethnic efforts to reverse or slow process, the continued determination of nation-
states to assert national identity through language, and, in an opposite direction,
the greater tolerance shown to multilingualism and the increasing concern for
language rights, all these are working to make the study of the nature and
possibilities of language policy and planning a field of swift growth.

The series will publish empirical studies of general language policy or of language
education policy, or monographs dealing with the theory and general nature of the
field. We welcome detailed accounts of language policy-making – who is involved,
what is done, how it develops, why it is attempted. We will publish research dealing
with the development of policy under different conditions and the effect of
implementation. We will be interested in accounts of policy development by
governments and governmental agencies, by large international companies,
foundations, and organizations, as well as the efforts of groups attempting to resist
or modify governmental policies. We will also consider empirical studies that are
relevant to policy of a general nature, e.g. the local effects of the developing
European policy of starting language teaching earlier, the numbers of hours of
instruction needed to achieve competence, selection and training of language
teachers, the language effects of the Internet. Other possible topics include the
legal basis for language policy, the role of social identity in policy development, the
influence of political ideology on language policy, the role of economic factors,
policy as a reflection of social change.

The series is intended for scholars in the field of language policy and others
interested in the topic, including sociolinguists, educational and applied linguists,
language planners, language educators, sociologists, political scientists, and
comparative educationalists.
PLANNING CHINESE CHARACTERS
Reaction, Evolution or Revolution?

by

SHOUHUI ZHAO
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

RICHARD B. BALDAUF Jr.

University of Queensland, Australia
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 DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to

our mentors and our colleagues
who are working to understand the
limits of language planning
Contents

Dedication.................................................................................................... v

Authors ....................................................................................................... ix

Abbreviations............................................................................................... xi

Preface ...................................................................................................... xiii

Foreword.................................................................................................... xv

Prologue....................................................................................................... 1

Chapter 1 Making Hanzi Accessible.................................................... 23

Chapter 2 Reflections on New Perspectives......................................... 71

Chapter 3 New Challenges for a Digital Society ............................... 111

Chapter 4 Standardization as a Solution ............................................ 137

Chapter 5 Influencing Outcomes ....................................................... 191

Chapter 6 Envisioning the Future ....................................................... 249

Chapter 7 Some Critical Issues .......................................................... 287

vii
viii Contents

Acknowledgments ................................................................................... 329

Appendix.................................................................................................. 331

Notes ........................................................................................................ 361

References................................................................................................ 377

Content Index........................................................................................... 407

Author Index............................................................................................ 415

Authors

Zhao Shouhui (PhD, University of Sydney) is Research Fellow at the

Centre for Research in Pedagogy and Practice (CRPP), NIE at Nanyang
Technological University, Singapore. A professional language teacher by
training, Zhao has been teaching and researching in Chinese applied
linguistics for the past 19 years at 7 universities in 5 countries beginning in
1988, when he completed his MA in Chinese Applied Linguistics at
Renmin University of China (Beijing). Zhao is a member of All-China
Society of Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language and the Singapore
Association of Applied Linguistics. He has published in the areas of
linguistics and education. Zhao is the primary co-author of three dual-
authored Chinese language textbooks and the co-complier of two diction-
aries. He has also contributed a number of ephemeral pieces (e.g., prose,
short stories, film reviews, etc.) to a range of literary publications, websites
and broadcasts.

Richard B. Baldauf Jr. (PhD, University of Hawai’i) is Associate

Professor of TESOL in the School of Education at the University of
Queensland and is on the Executive of the International Association of
Applied Linguistics (AILA). He has published numerous articles in
refereed journals and books. He is co-editor of Language Planning and
Education in Australasia and the South Pacific (Multilingual Matters,
1990), principal researcher and editor for the Viability of Low Candidature
LOTE Courses in Universities (DEET, 1995) and co-author with Robert
B. Kaplan of Language Planning from Practice to Theory (Multilingual
Matters, 1997) and Language and Language-in-Education Planning in the

ix
x Authors

Pacific Basin (Kluwer, 2003). He is Executive Editor of the journal

Current Issues in Language Planning and co-editor of six volumes in the
Multilingual Matters Series, Language Planning and Policy.
Abbreviations

AI – Artificial Intelligence
GB 2312-80 – Basic Set of Standard Chinese Characters for Information
Interchange-GB 2312-80
CCCF – Chinese Character Cultural Faction
CCP – Chinese Communist Party
CCSR – Commission of Chinese Script Reform
CIP – Chinese Information Processing
CTSC – Comprehensive Table of Standardized Characters
CWCC – Corpus of Whole Chinese Characters
FSS – First Simplification Scheme
FTVVF – First Table of Verified Variant Forms
GB – Guojia Biaozhan: National Standard
GLPFCC – General List of Print Fonts of Chinese Characters
GLSC – General List of Simplified Characters
IR – Information Retrieval
IT – Information Technology
LPers – Language Planners
LPP – Language Policy and Planning
NCLW – National Conference on Language Work
OCR – Optical Character Recognition
PRC – People’s Republic of China
RC – Rare Characters
RIAL – Research Institute of Applied Linguistics
SCLW – State Commission of Language Work
SR – Speech Recognition
SSS – Second Simplification Scheme
TSC – Table of Simplified Characters
xi
Preface

One of the remarkable things about Chinese language policy over the
millennia has been the power of the writing system to unite what are
disparate if related spoken varieties. We have already published one book
on PRC language policy in this series, a collection edited by Minglang
Zhou that covered the full range of topics including the development of
Putonghua (common speech), the status of minority languages, and some
interesting chapters on the reform of the writing system. This last subject is
of such complexity and importance to justify adding to the series a book
going into more detail on developments in efforts to manage and cultivate
the writing system in the last 50 years, taking into account the rapid
growth of the Chinese economy and the technological developments
associated with computers and the web.
It is important, we feel, to back up the common generalizations about
language policy with detailed studies of specific topics, where one can
observe at close hand the plans and activities of language managers, the
problems they set out to solve, and their successes and failures. This is
precisely what Zhao and Baldauf set out to do in this full account and
analysis of the challenges met by recent efforts to adjust the Chinese
writing system to new demands.
We would like to express our thanks to the authors and to the others
who contributed to the production of this volume. In particular, we want to

xiii
xiv Preface

thank the specialist reviewers who carefully read the manuscript, raising
interesting points in a controversial field, and proposing some modifica-
tions that have made it a better book.

Bernard Spolsky and Elana Shohamy

Series Editors
March 2007
Foreword

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is a growing, developing, and

dynamic society that is moving to take its place as a major world power.
Having the world’s largest population – i.e., human resource base – it is
estimated that sometime in the next 20 years, China will move from having
the third to having the world’s largest economy. Everyone knows that the
world’s most populous country has been experiencing radical change over
the past two decades, yet few people are aware that at the same time the
Chinese writing system has also undergone a less prominent, but no less
significant silent revolution. This development has led a number of
language experts to predict that as the power and influence of China
grows, so too will the spread of the Chinese language. Some commentators
have even suggested Chinese will surpass English as the world’s most
common lingua franca.
However, for the Chinese language to grow in power and influence, a
number of hurdles first must be overcome, in particular the challenges of
technology. The barriers to the growth and spread of the Chinese language
are very different for spoken and written Chinese. This monograph focuses
on the written variety as it traces the language policy and planning-related
developments for Chinese characters, with particular emphasis on the post-
1950 period of the PRC and the more recent challenges that technology,
and particularly the use of Chinese on the world wide web have posed for
the language. This volume examines the linguistic, cultural, political, and
economic debate, the outcome of which could determine whether Chinese
reaches its international language potential, and explores some possible
language policy and planning directions for the future.

xv
xvi Foreword

Historically, while Chinese language policy and planning developments

can generally be characterized as evolutionary, during the last century, and
particularly after the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in the
1950s, there have been forces, both reactionary (i.e., elements of traditional
language and cultural purism) and revolutionary (i.e., ‘alphabetic’ or radical
simplification schemes) at work in language policy and planning (LPP).
Over recent decades, this conflict of forces about the direction of
character (hanzi) development has become intense, particularly since the
milestone National Conference on Language Work held in 1986, where
future possible simplification or radical treatment of the physical shape of
hanzi and full-fledged Romanization were ruled out by the official
working agenda of the conference. At the same time, to address the new
challenges brought on by the advances that have occurred in communi-
cation technology, a more comprehensive and larger scale LPP program
with the goal of ultimately overhauling the hanzi repertoire has been
undertaken. The focus of this major operation has been the so called ‘Four
Fixations’ or standardizations, aimed at settling the four most unstable
attributes of hanzi, namely the number of hanzi, their ordering, shape and
pronunciation. It is widely believed that once these four features are fixed
or standardized and implemented through legally binding governmental
measures like the Comprehensive Table of Standardized Characters
(CTSC) and the Corpus of Whole Chinese Character (CWCC), some of
China’s major language and communication problems will be on the way
to being resolved. More importantly, and of more direct consequence, once
they are required for new information technology (IT) products, it is
argued there will be far-reaching effects and a significant impact on the
linguistic life of the whole population. This may, eventually, in a silent and
programmatic way, come to create a revolutionary impact on the visual
communication life of hanzi users across the globe.
Given the importance of China and the potential of the Chinese
language, an understanding of these issues is critical for not only our
understanding of China, but also for second-language policies and their
implementation as they relate to the teaching of Chinese around the world.
This book summarizes struggle to modernize the Chinese writing system,
with a particular focus on the emerging conflict between the world’s oldest
surviving writing system and the latest advances that have occurred in
technology.
The structure of the book has been developed around the problem-
solution paradigm characteristic of much of classical language planning.
The historical context and some discussion of basic features of hanzi are
briefly reviewed in the Prologue for the benefit of readers not familiar with
Foreword xvii

this background. In Chapter 1 we provide a relatively detailed presentation

of modern simplification history, starting with a summary of dynastic sim-
plifications, followed by the three simplification processes that occurred in
the period spanning the 1930s to the 1970s. These were the most important
clinical treatments that ever have been performed on the hanzi in their
historical development.
Chapter 2 briefly reviews past LPP experiences with a focus on the
undesirable outcomes of the previous reforms from the perspective of the
new historical context. The authors examine the chaotic situation that exist-
ed in the public’s use of hanzi in 1980s, and the prevailing confusion in
academia about the evaluation of hanzi reform and hanzi’s future as it was
affected by simplification and social transformation processes. The
analysis of this transformation focuses on the impact of the cultural and
socio-political dimensions of LPP activities. Chapter 3 sets out the problem.
It concentrates on the conflicts between hanzi as a visual communication
system and the needs of modern information technology in a digital society.
A description of the enormous efforts Chinese scientists have undertaken to
computerize hanzi is provided, illustrating for non-specialist readers the
problems that Chinese IT experts and LPP professionals confront in tackling
hanzi’s mechanical deficiencies. In particular, a substantial part of this
section is devoted to the two key concepts: chongma and luanma. The
former can be defined as accidental homophonic occurrence in hanzi
computer input typically found when using phonetic input methods, the
dominant scheme for entering hanzi into a computer. The latter refers to a
string of unintelligible gibberish that occurs when hanzi are decoded by
different encoding platforms or applications or during the transmission
of Chinese encoded information over international computer networks.
Chapters 2 and 3 provide the rationale for the argument that further LPP
programs need to be carried out, thus forming the central focus for the
subsequent chapters.
Chapter 4 discusses hanzi’s standardization, or the so-called four
fixations (hanzi siding), as the means to overcome hanzi’s inherent
limitations in the technological applications described in Chapter 2. Since
the mid-1980s, standardization has been pinpointed as the societal solution
to address a situation where hanzi have become a retarding factor in
upgrading Chinese communication technology. The standardization issue
has come to take on greater significance as it is increasingly essential for
the enhancement of communication in Chinese. It may not be an exagger-
ation to say that it has now come to the stage where no major advances in
Chinese computerization can be expected until the hanzi infrastructure is
improved. In other words, if this issue is not resolved actively and quickly,
xviii Foreword

the question of hanzi’s survival as a mass writing form may be at stake.

The major portion of this chapter provides a comprehensive examination
of the contents of the four fixations and the various difficulties related to
the standardization movement. Then, in the last section, an introduction is
provided to the Comprehensive Table of Standardized Characters and the
overhauling of the repertoire of all Chinese characters, the two major
undertakings of official IT-oriented LPP agendas in the current context.
In Chapter 5, we set out the external enabling factors that are bound to
influence and determine hanzi standardization work and future trends in a
more general fashion. Seven influential factors or sociolinguistic dimen-
sions are identified and discussed. The discussions of these seven dimen-
sions are presented according to a hierarchy of the influence or power that
individual factors can exert on hanzi reform development, aiming to
identify possible cause-and-effect patterns that would influence the
direction of future reform. Each dimension is critically discussed through
either: a) generalizations from historical experience and inquiry, b) an
examination of the current trends and future directions using analytic
approaches, or c) international comparisons.
In Chapter 6, which summarizes the past and looks to the future, the
external conditions for LPP are further examined from a sociolinguistic
perspective. The first section focuses on the conflict between social deve-
lopment and technological advancement by analyzing the compatibility
between standardization and societal conditions. To accommodate the new
context, a pluricentric model of hanzi standardization is proposed. As
standardization involves the choice between more than one alternative
variant, the changes in linguistic behavior can only come about if there is a
more open consensus building approach to LPP. Therefore, as part of an
examination of the reform process, the last section of this chapter argues
that it is also necessary to explore the possibility of establishing reliable
and trustworthy LPP mechanisms that guarantee democracy and trans-
parency for future hanzi reforms.
The concluding chapter reflects critically on some key issues concern-
ing hanzi planning that do not conveniently fit into the previous chapters.
These issues are arranged under three rubrics: 1) the renewed interest in
Romanization, 2) how to deal with two kinds of problems arising from the
two simplification schemes implemented in the 1950s and 1970s, i.e., a) a
strong survival of some simplified characters from the Second Scheme
(1977) among the public, and b) the failure to develop an automatic
conversion between simplified and traditional characters as the result of
oversimplification in the Table of Simplified Characters (1956, 1964), and
3) a section on a common script that considers the possibility of a cross-
Foreword xix

national unifying standard among hanzi-using regions. This final issue is

examined at two levels: the use of a set of real life standardized hanzi
shared by all concerned hanzi-using polities and a unifying set of IT
standards for encoding their use in cyberspace.
By tracing the developments and challenges for China through an
examination of the Chinese writing system, in this book we contemplate
some possible futures for the country. Put another way, given China’s
phenomenal economic growth, and the beginnings of the accompanying
radical political and social development, the question may well be asked
whether the evolutionary process that has occurred over the last half
century with Chinese characters will lead to reaction or revolution.
Because of the world’s dependence on the communication of information,
these LPP developments may well help to determine the place of Chinese
language in the world. Thus, while the discussion of these issues could be
seen as just another scholarly debate, we believe the broader implications
of these questions deserve a wider audience.

Shouhui Zhao
21 April 2007 Richard B. Baldauf Jr.
PROLOGUE1

1. THE ORIGINS OF HANZI

Due to the lack of authentic records, there is very little certainty about
the earliest development of hanzi and only rough conclusions can be
drawn. Archaeological findings have shown that the earliest embryonic
forms of Chinese writing existed as far back as 4000 BCE on Neolithic
pottery vessels. These earliest pictorial signs, referred to as Early Proto-
Characters (e.g., Hook and Twitchett 1991), are believed to be closely
linked to signs inscribed on animal bones and tortoise shells ( jiaguwen)
dating from the 13th century BCE. Although they were just the forerunners
of Chinese ideograms, it shows that hanzi had developed for thousands of
years before they were fully established as a writing system, adding more
weight to the claim that hanzi are the world’s oldest continuing writing
regimen. Jiaguwen are undisputedly regarded as the earliest relatively
stabilized and systematically constructed form of Chinese writing. During
the Shang dynasty (BCE 1600-1100), the major function of these inscrip-
tions was to keep records of divination, rather than being a communication
system for people’s everyday use. Some time after it was developed, the
jiaguwen disappeared from history until they were accidentally rediscov-
ered in 1899, and the complications surrounding this discovery have added
an additional mysterious element to hanzi’s history2. Before that, they went
unrecognized for what they were and were called dragon-bone, an expen-
sive ingredient in traditional medicine. About 150,000 pieces of jiaguwen

1
2 Prologue

from the Shang and Zhou dynasties have been found, with the best
example bearing 128 recognizable inscriptions.
Archaeological evidence of hanzi’s early development are so fragmen-
tary that all theories about their origin are considered to be conjectural and
speculative before jiaguwen’s time. However, even today there are at least
four factors that keep Chinese characters shrouded in the mist of legend.
First, there is hanzi’s long enduring history and imaginary explanations
about its origin. Second, there is hanzi’s pictographic/ideographic
structure. Third, the purposes of the early forms of Chinese characters are
unclear (i.e., whether the oracle bone inscriptions were for divination
purposes, or bronze inscriptions were for ancestor worship, the diviners
were the only people who could give explanations of their meaning).
Finally, there is the beauty of recondite Chinese calligraphy, which is
essentially a very personal faculty that epitomizes spiritual expression and
completely denies analysis.
It is difficult to say who was the first person to concoct these stories,
but traditionally, there are four theories about how hanzi were formed.
Cooper (1989: 129), who finds a number of languages were imbued with
legendary stories about the creation of their writing system, concludes that
“supernatural assistance in the invention of writing systems is a common
claim”. The most unique and best known legend ascribed the invention of
hanzi to Cangjie, the official recorder of the mythical figure Huang Di
(Yellow Emperor). It is said that Cangjie created hanzi wholesale out of
the inspiration provided by a bird’s foot print. The other three theories are
that hanzi: a) originated in incising notches on wood; b) were related to
the invention of the notched stick which is dated at in the 27th century BCE,
and c) evolved from tying knots in strings. The latter explanation is a
universal visible communication method, found in many other cultures
across the world, e.g., Quipus (Quechua for ‘knot’) used by tribes living in
South America prior to the Spanish conquest, which consists of cords of
different colors or shapes knotted in a very complicated way (Cobarrubias
1983). The Bagua (Eight Trigram) hypothesis provides another possible
fascinating explanation. In the Yinyang Bagua system, which was said to
have been invented by the legendary Emperor Fu Xi, all natural pheno-
mena in the universe can be represented through a notational system using
only two primary mystic signs ‘–’ and ‘– –’, or yang and yin3, in an
oracular arrangement. This very sophisticated method can be practically
understood using the analogy of the binary digit system (Zheng 1988:
316), although whether there is any relationship between Yinyang Bagua
and the modern computer is debatable.
Prologue 3

2. STRUCTURE EVOLUTION – FROM PICTURES

TO SYMBOLS

It is generally agreed that there have been five major changes in the
physical shape of hanzi: i.e., Oracle (including turtle shell and animal)
bone inscription (jiaguwen, 甲骨文), bronze inscription (jinwen, 金文),
Seal Script (zhuanshu, 篆书), Clerical Script (lishu, 隶书) and Square
Script (kaishu, 楷书) (see Figure P-1). In the following sections, we
briefly trace the five iconic stages that have marked the periodization of
hanzi’s physical changes during its historical development, illustrating the
general trend of how hanzi have evolved from their original prototype to
what we see today, and examining the conditions under which these
changes have occurred.

Figure P-1. The evolution of Chinese hanzi (Ager 2005)

4 Prologue

2.1 Oracle Bone Inscription ( jiaguwen, 甲骨文).

Hanzi’s traceable history began from pottery inscriptions, which were
found to have existed 6,000-7,000 years ago, and have been archaeo-
logically verified as the earliest signs for which the genetic link with
jiaguwen can be established. Out of 4,672 character types found and
identified on jiaguwen, only 1,723 can be deciphered without dispute
among jiaguwen scholars.
Because these characters are engraved by knife on turtle shells or big
animal bones – written characters are pretty rare – jiaguwen are structured
in thin and rugged lines and feature a long shape characterized by sharp
shoulders, giving a strong impression of cutting. In comparison with its
forerunners found on pottery, jiaguwen developed into a fuller linear form, but
is still conspicuously pictorial and most are varied in a wide range of
inconsistent shapes and unstable numbers of strokes. Constrained by the hard
materials (knife and bone), only the outline of the object can be conveniently
delineated. The elaborate drawing that often was found in pottery inscriptions
was inevitably simplified and replaced by a few summary lines. Another
striking feature of jiaguwen is that it is sometimes hard to tell if it is one or
more than one character from the way it is written (see Figure P-2).
The underlying principles for later hanzi formation also took shape at
this time, as jiaguwen were sufficient in number for those needed for basic
expression, and were a movement away from drawing actual objects. For
these reasons, jiaguwen are considered to represent the coming to maturity
of hanzi as a writing system.

Figure P-2. Inscribed Oracle Bone (Crystal 2005). (The concise and readable inscription is a
record of deciphering the natural shell texture or crack patterns after being toasted over fire.)
Prologue 5

2.2 Bronze Inscription ( jinwen, 金文)

Bronze inscription can be said to have directly evolved from jiaguwen.
The biggest difference from jiaguwen is its rounded shape with thicker
lines, as these characters were cast or incised on bronze ware including
ritual utensils and containers, and sometimes on stone monuments. Despite
bearing some similarities to jiaguwen, and occasionally using picture-like
signs in the text, a further step was taken in moving away from drawing
pictures. Furthermore, not only was the size of each individual character
standardized, but the rugged, uneven strokes that had characterized
jiaguwen were also transformed into smooth, regular ones. The shape of
these hanzi was more graceful and symmetrical (see Figure P-3).
While jiaguwen were mainly used for divination purposes, bronze
inscriptions were used in important ceremonies and the service of ancestor
worship, so most contents (the longest extant text has 497 characters)
functioned as a vehicle to perpetuated the patriarchal system, serving as a
kind of materialization of social power and the status quo from a political
perspective (Wang and Zou 1999). For the same reason, as Chiang Yee
(1973: 43) observes, all characters are elaborately made to “be dignified
and sublime, and designed to endure for many generations”, so bronze
inscription has become the model for practicing calligraphy. A new aca-
demic subject – epigraphy (Jinshixue, the study of ancient inscriptions on
cast bronze and carved in stone) – became a thriving academic study from
the Song period (960-1279) lasting until the Qing period, when the
scholars’ interest in hanzi switched to Jiaguxue as more oracle bone
inscriptions were excavated.

Figure P-3. Bronze inscription (Galambos 2005)

6 Prologue

During the later developmental phase of bronze inscription, a recorder

at the court called Zhou (籀) synthesized the writing styles of bronze
inscriptions, unifying to some extent the structure of these characters,
making them easier to recognize and write. These redefined characters,
typically represented by the so-called Stone Drum Inscription, depicting
hunting expeditions, later came to be known as the Great Seal Script or
Zhouwen. The great seal script Zhouwen was the major written communi-
cation means during the Zhou Dynasty (1100-221 BCE) and was used by
all of the feudal states up to the Qin unification.

2.3 Small Seal Script4 (xiaozhuan, 小篆)

Although it continued from the previous period, and was used into the late
Zhou period, particularly during the time of the Warring States (475-221
BCE), the great seal script was no longer maintained as a universal
standard in a disunified country. It was very common for the same charac-
ter to have numerous variants in different competing states. Therefore,
when the Qin Empire completed unification, a standardized form of great
seal script was adopted as the standard character set to overcome the
chaotic orthographic situation caused by half a millennium of feudal wars.
It was called small seal because it was simpler and had a smaller number
of strokes (although this is not true for all characters). Furthermore, each
character was made to occupy a smaller imaginary square. Physically, the
descriptive pictorial and representational ideographic rationality is still a
dominant feature of small seal characters, albeit being further weakened,
i.e., the pursuit of representing real things began to give way to the abstract
symbols. Through this human intervention, all the irregularities of the
earlier forms were dropped, and the writing style was marked by a pref-
erence for symmetry, balanced structure and a gently-curving stroke.
Small seal script can be seen as a stepping-stone, connecting the earlier
structure with the later evolution; it “break[s] away from pictographic
forms, moving more towards linear and symbolic forms” (Yin and
Rohsenow 1997: 35). But, by the small seal period, people were finding it
increasingly impossible to express complex reality through near-real-life
imitation, and a more productive method had to be found to represent oral
expression. This development led to the combination of the existing
ideographical signs and oral words, increasing semantic-phonetic charac-
ters to 80 percent of the total. This was a significant step towards creating
a symbolic communication system. In this sense, although it gained official
status by political coercion, the appearance and structure of small seal
Prologue 7

script has been generally regarded as being in accordance with the natural
direction of script development.

2.4 Clerical Script (lishu, 隶书)

Clerical script was a parallel style that prevailed at the same time as
small seal script, and it came into being out of the need for a script with a
higher speed of execution, so clerical script is the pragmatic shorthand
form of seal script. As its name suggests, it was first used by clerks,
military book-keepers and other civilian personnel serving in the huge
administrative system of the highly centralized Qin Empire.
As the state apparatuses grew more complex, the convenience and
operational efficiency of communication became a major concern. Finding
that small seal characters were still slow and laborious to write, Qin clerks
simply ignored those unnecessarily strict formal pictorial elements needed
to create an actual resemblance. Thus, for writing convenience, the circle
was squared and rounded drawing lines were replaced by dots and straight
lines, i.e., strokes. Through extensive use of strokes and square elements,
the solid angles of jiaguwen were much softened and a great deal of
movement and ease for writing was added. Hence the remarkable feature
of this transformation is that the pictorial nature of hanzi was largely lost.
This great change in developmental history has been referred to as ‘Li
(cleric)-Change’ by Chinese philologists.
Clerical script was not only popular among public servants in the short-
lived Qin Dynasty (221-207 BCE), but was also strongly promoted during
the next dynasty – the Han (206 BCE-220 CE). One of the major factors
for promoting clerical script might have been that the majority of the
members of the ruling class during the initial period of the Han Dynasty
were from a lower social stratum, therefore, they probably found them-
selves more comfortable with these pragmatic forms. The clerical script
actually developed so quickly that it usurped the position of the small seal
as the most popular style and achieved recognition among both ruling
elites and plebeians, and by the Eastern Han (25-220 CE) period, the small
seal script had lost favor even among the scholars. It was during this
latter period that Xu Shen compiled the dictionary Shuowen jiezi 《说文 (
解字》), in an attempt to resume the orthodox status of small seal script
(Wang and Zou 1999). From this point of view, this dictionary can be seen
as a result of the struggle between the pragmatists and the conservatives in
the ruling elites.
8 Prologue

2.5 Square Script (kaishu, 楷书)

As a further simplification reform of the clerical script, the square
script took root during the Eastern Han period and become the mainstream
style during the Northern and Southern dynasties (420-581), but it only
was finalized during the Sui (581-618) and Tang (618-960) periods.
While writing speed had been greatly increased by the change from small
seal script to clerical script, it still was constrained by some structural
conventions, such as the worm-head-like dot and swallow-tail-like ending
stroke that posed obstacles to further efficiency. Square script reduced the
remaining factors related to concrete objects to a few simple abstract lines.
Its square structure and smooth level lines make it easier for common
people to master, and partly due to the wide support lent by prestigious
calligraphers, it quickly became the model style for learners to practice,
hence its Chinese name, which literally means ‘Model Script’. Hanzi, at
this stage, had deviated so much from its original forms that there would
seem to be not much to associate it with the photographic image of its
ancient origin. This last refinement created stability. For a thousand years
after the introduction of square script, hanzi did not change significantly in
its shape or style until the 1950s, when comprehensive simplification was
first sanctioned by the government5.
Today, these four types of archaic characters that came before square
script are not a practical medium for daily use except as graphic art,
i.e., Chinese calligraphy, or more rarely, personal communication among
idiosyncratic eccentric individuals (e.g., Language Reform 1974). How-
ever, with nationalism on the rise in the PRC since the 1990s, there has
been a lot of interest from both LP professionals and academics from other
disciplines in preventing these culturally charged characters from disap-
pearing, and for integrating them into modern communication medium.
The graphical changes discussed in the previous sections are basically
confined to the stroke and composition. However, hanzi’s shape also saw
radical changes at the major developmental phases of the four typical
styles, which in general can be illustrated by the shapes in Figure P-46.

Figure P-4. Historical changes in Hanzi shape

Prologue 9

2.6 Summary of Historical Development

In summary, the development of Chinese hanzi has followed a circle of

standardization and simplification, and standardization characterized by
evolution and reaction, i.e., the constant conflict between the desire to
maintain the standard and the demand for operational efficiency which was
facilitated by new writing instruments. For example, clerical script trans-
formed the decorative elements of circular, curved and rounded lines of the
small seal into the square, the polyangular and straight ones. This occurred
to meet the requirement of writing quickly, as well as being the result of a
change of the writing medium from hard and sharp implements to soft and
pliable brushes. The clerical script transformation (Li-change) was a criti-
cal step in the process of developing from the imitation of primitive real
things to an abstract and symbolic system. This development conformed to
historical tendency, and the square script saw another sudden leap forward
in construction and shape of hanzi that has remained basically unchanged
up to the present. This extremely long period of total stabilization of the
square script was no doubt due to the improvements made to the writing
materials and means of writing, namely, the invention of the brush-pen,
paper, and most critically, printing technology. This testifies to the propo-
sition that technique innovation is the material foundation for any signi-
ficant change in the Chinese writing system (see Table 7-2, Section 2.3,
Chapter 7).

3. CHARACTERISTICS OF CHINESE HANZI

Hanzi are a culturally rich script system and have many unique traits.
The following discussion focuses on four major factors that are believed to
be relevant to the discussion in the subsequent chapters of this book. These
are: abstraction, structural complexity, open-ended number and artistic
features.

3.1 Abstraction: From Pictogram and Ideogram

to Phonogram

Hanzi are generally known as a prime example of an ideographic

writing system, but as Tang Lan (1965: 81) points out, an important ten-
dency found in its general evolution “is the transformation from the
original elaborate picture characters into purely symbolic signs which were
10 Prologue

graphically composed of a narrow range of conventional strokes”. But the

process, by which Chinese script evolved from primitive pictures to char-
acters, has taken a long time. Even with the emergence of greater abstrac-
tion, the pictographic components have remained the basic building blocks
that form hanzi. As hanzi have progressively become more abstract, the
potential to create new characters has greatly increased.
[A]s the script matured, it became simpler and progressively began to
lose some of its pictographic qualities; devices other than pictures were
eventually formulated in order to represent concepts and abstract terms
which could not otherwise be represented graphically (Gao 2000: 75).
Consequently, parallel to this process, phoneticization began to emerge.
Developing from an ideographic structure to a phonetic compound is
generally seen as another marked tendency. Hanzi’s phonetic tendency
was so evident as to lead some researchers to believe that Chinese script
“is phonetic, not an ideological system of writing” (DeFrancis 1984b: 133).
However, instead of outright phoneticization (graphic representation of
units of sounds in a language), phonetic factors in hanzi, as a writing
system, were largely manifested in two ways. On the one hand, there was
the development of a phonetic compound in a semantic-phonetic character.
The semantic-phonetic method was so robust that it is believed that by the
time the Shuowen jiezi dictionary was compiled, nearly 80 percent of hanzi
were composed by semantic-phonetic characters. On the other hand, there
was an increase in the occurrence of homophony, i.e., a number of very
frequently used characters served as an inventory of possible syllables to
represent characters with the same pronunciation but different semantic
meanings.
This method is in essence a homophonous substitution, or the extension
of the traditional ‘Jiajie’ (phonetic loan) method. The Jiajie method allows
people to employ a small number of the most used simple hanzi as basic
syllables to represent other concepts or words with the same or similar
sounds, disregarding these characters’ original meaning. These relatively
small numbers of the commonest characters are used purely to vocally
annotate the pronunciation for another unknown character and are called
syllabic hanzi. The increased use of syllabic characters, only for their
phonetic value in the text, is seen as a big step in the direction of a phono-
graphic script (Li 1934). As a consequence, the number of homophonous
characters or words have greatly increased, which in turn has become a
driving force leading to word di-syllabication and poly-syllabication.
Wang Fengyang (1989) points out, a developing trend in di-syllabization
and poly-syllabication of Chinese vocabulary is the manifestation of a
Prologue 11

phonographic tendency, and it provides the material basis for hanzi

developing from pictograms and ideograms to phonograms, because only
disyllabic and polysyllabic words or compound words can tolerate homo-
phonous substitution without causing semantic misunderstanding.
A number of linguists insist on viewing the development of writing in
terms of two stages, “language tends to undergo a linear process of evolu-
tion from the ideographical writing to the phonetic system as man becomes
more sophisticated in his knowledge about the use of language as code for
communication” (Jackson and T’sou 1979: 81). In the first stage, the picto-
graphic symbols, which Gelb (1963: 59) called “the forerunners of writing”,
are descriptive and representative. At the second stage, a kind of device
like the phonetic elements was needed, as the previous pictographic and
ideographic methods were insufficient to suitably and competently repre-
sent increasingly complex speech. Pictographic forms, most of which were
carried over from the first stage, broke away from the real-life objects and
began to orally represent the concept. Woon (1987: 270) observes, “[a]ltho-
ugh many things happened in the structural evolution of Chinese charac-
ters, the most important development was that the writing system began to

Figure P-5. The structural complexity of Chinese characters (Ager 2005)

12 Prologue

tend towards phoneticization and that this led to the development of the
phonetic compound.” The unique aspect of this change process is that it
suddenly stopped, instead of developing into a full-fledged phonetic
orthography, a phenomenon that still puzzles modern hanzi specialists and
linguists.

3.2 Structural Complexity

Ostensibly, complex strokes make hanzi a time-consuming writing

system (see Figure P-5). For 6,763 characters (39 are non-character
graphic signs) in the Basic Set of Standard Chinese Characters for
Information Interchange (henceforth, GB 2312-80; GB stands for Guojia
Biaozhun: National Standard), the average number of strokes is 10.665;
characters with more than nine strokes account for nearly 70 percent of the
total (Su 2001b). More problematically, although strokes in a character are
written according to fixed rules, the shapes of components are diverse and
notorious for their inconsistency. As a consequence of these factors, and
others, it is generally agreed that acquisition of writing skills requires a
minimum of five years’ formal schooling, and as many as ten years to
achieve durable literacy. Furthermore, there are many uncertainties when
describing characters, such as the definition of the component, the number
of radicals, what to call radicals and what the differences are between
radicals and components, creating a high degree of complexity. (see
Section 2.2, Chapter 4) Hanzi’s complexity in composition can be
understood through three basic terms – strokes, radicals, components –
discussed in the following sections.

3.2.1 Strokes (bihua, 笔画)

Strokes are the smallest possible structural units used to form a

character. When writing Chinese characters, each individual stroke can be
seen as the continuous contact of one’s pen with the paper. Bihua is
actually a term that came into being after lishu and kaishu, because, as
previously mentioned, before Li-change, a character’s stroke was not
clear-cut as most of time the writing tools were not the pen (bi). A
character may consist of between 1 and 64 strokes. The stroke is the
universal basis for any type of writing system. An alphabetic script is also
comprised of letters that are composed of strokes, but hanzi are written
using a much more diversified and recurrent array of strokes in which the
Prologue 13

shape varies for different types of strokes. Out of the approximately 30

strokes, only 8 are considered basic ones and all others are their variants.
For example, a hook stroke can be a left hook or a right hook, a straight
hook or a bent hook. Although the stroke’s thickness and length do not
impinge on the meaning of a hanzi, a number of factors are taken into
account in forming a character correctly: stroke shape, the relationship
among the strokes, stroke ordering, and stroke number.

3.2.2 Radicals (bushou, 部首) and Compounds (pianpang, 偏旁)

It is the radical7, however, not the strokes, that is basic to the hanzi
writing system. The radical, the head under which characters have been
classified in dictionaries, is the minimum meaningful composing element.
Characters may be classified into two categories in terms of structural
complexity: simple characters and compound characters. Simple char-
acters, accounting for about four percent of the total, are arranged as a
compact integral and are not further divisible into distinct components.
Many radicals are themselves simple single-unit characters, thus they can
only be seen as a radical when used as a composing element in compound
characters.
The radicals that are used in the dictionary as a classifying index to
group the characters are bushou, which are just graphic parts of characters
used as headings in dictionaries without heuristic values. Characters con-
taining the same radical are arranged under the same bushou in ascending
order by number of residual strokes. Overall, radicals can range in number
from 200 to 600, according to the approach taken in different dictionaries.
One of the biggest problems with a radical is that there is no standardized
way to verbally describe it, and this is increasingly becoming a daily
problem as computers rapidly become more common (see Section 2.4,
Chapter 4).
Another term related to radical is compound (Pianpang), which is
another structural element that makes up a character. There are two kinds
of basic compounds in characters: a semantic compound (yipang – 义旁),
which more often than not overlaps with radicals, that specifies the
meaning category of the whole character, and the phonetic compound
(shengpang –声旁), which signals something about the pronunciation.
However, not only semantic compound, but a number of phonetic com-
pounds also have separate lexical status. Semantic-phonetic compounding
is the most dominant method of character formation.
14 Prologue

3.2.3 Components or Unit (bujian/zigen/ziyuan/zisu,

部件/子根/字 元/字素)

‘Components’ are a new concept, born out of the need for designing
schemes for computer typing, and hence is a flexible term. In addition to
strokes and radicals, there is a need reconstruct characters into more ma-
neuverable units, this being necessitated by the limited space on the ideo-
graphically arranged keyboard. In most character-based input schemes,
characters are broken into components instead of radicals or strokes (e.g.,
the 6 components illustrated in Figure P-6). The component is purely a
graphological composing unit, qualitatively between strokes and simple
characters, with an emphasis on position in constructing the character regard-
less of its phonetic and semantic functions. Therefore, the component is
essentially different from the radical in that the radical is either seman-
tically or phonetically rational, but the component is not. It is based on the
stroke, but normally smaller and simpler than a radical. Take the character
in Figure P-6 as an example. 齉 (nàng, blocked nose) is the most
complicated character in the Modern Chinese Dictionary (the most popular
household dictionary in China since 1970s). In the scheme of the six
traditional types of Chinese characters, i.e., liushu, it consists of a semantic
compound 鼻 (bí, nose) and a phonetic compound 囊 (náng, bag), but to
reproduce and input it into the computer using a hanzi keyboard, it has to
be decomposed or divided into smaller units – bujian. In this example, it
is dismantled into six components. However, in actual practice, each
particular type of software analyzes characters according to its own
principles. For instance, in this character, the components 田 (tian3, field)
and (the top component of the right radical) may not be treated as two
independent components in some input schemes, because they also can be
expressed as: 田 = 口 + 十; = 口 + 十. Consequently, on some
Chinese keyboards imprinted with radicals and components, the users
cannot find 田 and , but just 口 and 十.
Su (2001b: 79) defines components as “a combined stroke collection
that appears in more than one hanzi structure and one that is universal to
all characters”. The newly created units have sparked controversy because
they are purely for the convenience of processing characters mechanically.
They are unsystematic as a whole because each input scheme differs every
other in disassembling the character. As a result confusion existed until
December 1997, when the Information Processing Standard Components
for GB 13000.1 Character Set (GF 3001-1997) was issued by the State
Commission of Language Work (henceforth SCLW). In this official
standard, 560 of the so-called basic components have been standardized
Prologue 15

based on an investigation of 20,902 characters, but the disagreement

remains between historians of hanzi study and programmers about their
validity.

Figure P-6. The difference between compounds and components

3.3 An Open-Ended Number of Characters

It is well known that there are an incredible number of hanzi in current

use. Hanzi form an open system, the total number of which grows with
time. Table P-1 shows the growth in the total number of hanzi included in
various historical dictionaries8. These characters differ greatly in frequency
of usage. Although it is commonly acknowledged that the most common
3,000 hanzi cover more than 99 percent of all characters used in modern
writing, occasionally other characters may be used (see Section 2.1.1,
Chapter 4).
Table P-1 shows that historically the total number of Chinese characters
has increased gradually with some deviations from this general tendency.
There are various reasons to account for this. One obvious deviation is
Yu Pian in 543. According to Li Jianguo (2000: 140), because of its far-
reaching influence, it was revised and enlarged from time to time before the
total number of characters was finally fixed in 1013. This wider coverage
explains why the number of characters included in the subsequent
dictionaries declined rather than increased. Ji Yun in 1039 marks another
steep increase followed by a decrease. It contains many variant characters
and obsolete signs listed under each official standard entry. It also provides
16 Prologue

Table P-1. The historical growth of the number of hanzi (Reproduced from the Research
Team of Computer Information Processing 1980: 70-71; Wu, 1995: 79-80)

Number of
Date Dynasty/Polity Dictionary Compiler
Characters
《仓颉篇》
? Han ? 3,300
(Cangjie Pian)
《训纂篇》
1-5 Han Yang Xiong 5,340
(Xunzuan Pian)
《续训篇》
60-70 Han Ban Gu 6,180
(Xuxun Pian)
《说文解字》
100 East Han Xu Shen 9,353
(Shuowen jiezi)
《声类》
227-239 Wei Li Deng 11,520
(Sheng Lei)
《字林》
400 Jin Lü Chen 12,824
(Zi Lin)
《字通》
500 Northern Wei Yang Chengqing 13,734
(Zi Tong)
《玉篇》
543 Nan Liang Gu Yewang 22,726
(Yu Pian)
《切韵》
601 Sui Lu Fayan 12,150
(Qie Yun)
《唐韵》
751 Tang Sun Mian 15,000
(Tang Yun)
《韵海镜源》
753 Tang Yan Zhenqing 26,911
(Yunhai Jingyuan)
《龙龛手鉴》
997 Liao Xing Jun 26,430
(Longkan Shoujian)
《广韵》
1008 Song Chen Pengnian etc. 26,194
(Guang Yun)
《集韵》
1039 Song Ding Du etc. 53,525
(Ji Yun)
《类篇》
1066 Song Wang Mu 31,319
(Lei Pian)
《字汇》
1615 Ming Mei Yingzuo 33,170
(Zi Hui)
《正字通》
1675 Ming Zhang Zilie 33,440
(Zhengzi Tong)
《康熙字典》
1716 Qing ZhangYushu etc. 47,043
(Kangxi Zidian)9
《中华大字典》
1915 P.R. China Lu Feikui etc. 44,908
(Zhonghua Dazidian)
《汉语大字典》
1990 P.R. China Xu Zhongshu 54,678
(Hanyu Da Zidian)
《中华字海》
1994 P.R. China Leng Yulong etc. 85,000
(Zhonghua Zihai)
Prologue 17

different style fonts for the same character listing them in both Kaishu and
seal script.
In addition, as Su (2000: 5-6) reminds us, the numbers listed here do
not necessarily reflect the reality of the period in question, because on the
one hand, it is impossible for any dictionary or author to represent or
collect all characters in use, as many must have been missed. On the other
hand, if we do not count the large number of variant forms, the actual
number for each period would be a lot fewer. As the discussion in Section
2.1.1, Chapter 4 shows, variant forms, obsolete, and rare characters are
three major reasons why the total number of hanzi is misleadingly large.

3.4 Artistic Features: Writing Stylization, Print Fonts

Hanzi are characterized by the fact that they are both a means of
communication and a traditional art form. DeFrancis (1984b: 202) has
argued that “the Chinese writing system, especially as expressed in calli-
graphy, is itself part cultural and therefore more than a mere conveyor”.
Writing has been so highly valued that it was elevated to a place among
other fine arts, and “the most fundamental artistic manifestation of the
national mind” (Chiang 1973: 107). Hanzi’s dual role as both graphic art
and visual communication has had a twofold impact on hanzi develop-
ment. Opponents of reform use this argument as the grounds for rejecting
simplification. They claim that calligraphy is inherently and intrinsically
associated with traditional characters, and that simplification stifles the
vigor of one of the important traditional treasures. However, historically,
there has been a consistent drive to push the characters towards simpli-
fication, particularly through the grass style, and running style, two major
styles of calligraphy which are actually the most important sources of
simplified characters.
The subject of calligraphy is somewhat outside the province of
linguistic concerns, however, the calligrapher’s role in simplifying and
standardizing hanzi is an important topic. While calligraphers are generally
known as staunch guardians of traditional characters, a great number of
simplified characters are derived from calligraphic forms10. There are no
accurate and reliable statistics on how many simplified characters have
resulted from the practice of calligraphy, because there were no clear-cut
differences between handwriting, calligraphy and printing prior to modern
times. Nevertheless, the artistic expression of Chinese writing system is
18 Prologue

undoubtedly an important contributing factor that cannot be emphasized

too strongly in examining developments in hanzi simplification. Unfortu-
nately, this artistic quality of hanzi has long been ignored when reforming
characters and the resultant negative effect has made it more difficult for
simplified characters to be accepted by older generations. For example,
there is a cohort of hanzi users that gained their writing skills through the
traditional method of copying the model book for various historical
schools of calligraphy. They felt very frustrated in their attempt to switch
to the restructured characters when they found that the stroke order
differed from the one they had learned. For these people, some stroke-
simplified characters seem even more complex than their original forms.
This kind of unexpected problem, which arises from the complete lack of
study of the calligraphic features of the hanzi, is labeled the ‘chang-effect’
and is discussed in Section 1.2.2, Chapter 2.
Font or typeface style, which refers to the printed style of a glyph or
character set, is an important concept when talking about hanzi artistic
style. According to Fu Yonghe (1993), there are four major distinct types
of print fonts that mark hanzi’s course of development. Only one type of
font (Song Style, or Songti) existed before the 1920s and 30s when another
two styles, the Imitative Song Style (Fang Songti) and the Standard Style
(kaiti) were devised, and a Bold Style (heiti) was introduced from Japan at
about the same time. Kaiti is an industrial use of Square Script, and Songti
is the Chinese equivalent of Times New Roman (together with kaiti) in terms
of its primacy among shapes available for use. ‘Ti’ is the standard form used
for printing purposes, so it is actually a strict technological term in the
Chinese printing industry, referring to a kind of font for typesetting and
editing purposes, based on a series of technical yardsticks about the stroke
lines and structural proportions. Other standards, for example, include the
national standards for the 32 x 32 Dot Matrix Font Set and Data Set of
Chinese Ideogram for Information Interchange. Modern publications are
printed in different font styles depending on the taste of their authors and
target readers. For instance, kaiti is normally used in school textbooks at
the lower grades, whereas the style is changed to songti when the students
progress to higher grades. Most newspapers are also printed in songti.
As for handwriting, there are broadly three forms that have developed,
each with its own stylistic peculiarities: Model/Standard characters (kaishu),
Running Characters (xingshu) and Grass/Cursive Characters (caoshu).
Running characters are used mainly to save time when handwriting, while
grass style is quicker but has the appearance of scrawling, like twisted grass,
hence the Chinese name. For alphabetic-familiar readers it should be pointed
out that what differentiates the hanzi fonts is the number of strokes and the
Prologue 19

way they are constructed – instead of the shape of the strokes, i.e., the width,
length and thickness. For grassy characters and running characters, the aim
is to economize the writing complexity without losing legibility. This can be
done through a conscious combination of the separable elements of model
characters, script characters being kept to a minimum: the number of strokes
is lessened; double or triple curves are contracted to single curves or lines;
certain minor elements are eliminated. The following three sections provide
a brief introduction to these three styles.

3.4.1 Model Style Characters (kaishu, 楷书)

The model style character, i.e., kaishu, is a genre of Chinese calli-

graphy. Briefly speaking, it is the artistic representation of square script
and kaiti. Most books on Chinese characters do not bother to make
distinctions among these three terms. It should be noted, model style
characters are different from kaiti and square script mentioned previously.
Kaiti, as just described, is an industrially defined standard referring to a
font style printed by kaiti silver or copper mould before the introduction of
computers. Square script is a broader concept, used in defining a structural
style when discussing the developmental history of hanzi’s physical
structures. Model style characters are based on the former two, but the
term is used exclusively to refer to calligraphy. The focus is on its artistic
features, and with the passage of centuries, it has developed an unimagi-
nable number of varieties or sub-styles with different personal characteris-
tics created over time by well-known masters of the brush-pen. However,
they are intrinsically related to each other, and share common features,
e.g., standardness and regularity. Sometimes a character may be called by
any of these three names, square script, model style character or kaiti, but
in most cases, they represent different things. Therefore, it is worth noting
that the same term, kaishu, refers to different aspects of hanzi when it is
used in different contexts.

3.4.2 Grass Style Characters (caoshu, 草书)

Grass style is the cursive style of Chinese calligraphy. It is derived

from quick handwriting and evolved into a form of visual art, eventually
gaining wide popularity among appreciative readers of literature. Grass
style reached its peak during the time of Wang Xizhi (321-379), who
worked during the East Jin period (317-420), and was the greatest
calligrapher in history. He was also the first scholar to devote his whole
life to developing writing into an independent art. Grass style’s practical
20 Prologue

value has virtually been lost, because it is just a rough sketch of the
character, retaining only the basic outline of the character, thus legibility is
often very poor for the layperson. It allows for freer handling and more
vivid movement, and grew more and more carefree and grassy, as the
uncurbed force and rapidity of the style causes every character in a
complete piece to have both an inherent and visible link with the rest.
Grass style’s graceful forms and undulating movement have not only been
attractive to the minds of Chinese scholars, but it is also the most
decorative style used for its beauty by common people. Mao Zedong is a
widely acknowledged as a modern master of caoshu.

3.4.3 Running Style Characters (xingshu, 行书)

As a shorthand style writing form, running style writing is a compro-

mise form to bridge the gap between the model style and grass style.
Although the strokes have been simplified to some extent, it is still
discernible enough to the general reader, and it allows writing at a fair
speed with sufficient freedom of personal expression. Thus it has become
the most popular style and is widely used in writing manuscripts, personal
letters and other informal papers. Except for special visual effects such as
headlines and titles in the press, or on advertisements and packages,
running style is rarely used in normal text printing. Nonetheless, this is
changing with the convenience brought about by computer technology.
There is a new trend for more fonts or previously rarely used writing styles
for printing purposes to be used in computer-typed materials, although
songti and kaiti are still dominant.
The impact of IT on the Chinese Hanzi writing style and its relationship
to standardization deserves further elaboration. Traditionally, although
numerous distinctive personalized writing styles have been developed,
recorded and studied for at least 3,000 years, there have only been a couple
of different fonts readily available to be selected for mechanical typesetting.
Currently, with the convenience brought about by technological advances,
although songti and kaiti hold an uncontested place both as practical
medium for daily use and as a graphic art, it is simply a matter of time and
money before a large number of writing styles will emerge. (For some
examples, please see Figure P-7.) Unlike English, which has a set of well-
developed and accepted fonts, Chinese has an almost limitless range of
stylistic expression due to its complex structure and flexible composition,
meaning there is always room for novelty. These would-be fonts, either
ancient or modern, scattered in both calligraphy books and other written
Prologue 21

materials, need to be further defined before being programmed into

software products and made available for public use. From a language
management perspective, standardization is essential to make sure that
new fonts will not cause too many difficulties for the IT industry, for
instance, for optical character recognition (henceforth OCR, see Section
2.2.2.2, Chapter 3).

Figure P-7. Some samples of stylistic fonts of Chinese characters

4. PROLOGUE SUMMARY

Chinese characters are characterized by their historical continuity. In

this Prologue we have briefly discussed some key aspects of the ancient
context that has shaped the basic features of today’s hanzi. In addition, we
have examined some of their essential characteristics, providing a found-
ation for understanding the recent developments in hanzi standardization
that are the focus of this monograph.
22 Prologue

In the first chapter, after describing the standardization work in

dynastic China, we examine “The Three Simplifications”, the most impor-
tant standardizations undertaken in more modern times.
Chapter 1
MAKING HANZI ACCESSIBLE
Three Simplification Movements in Modern Times

1. INTRODUCTION

As we have seen in the Prologue, the structural shape of Chinese hanzi

was finalized in the Eastern Han period. Historically, numerous diction-
aries, compiled either by individual etymologists or under royal patronage,
were published, and because all dynastic governments’ script policies were
characterized by a backward-looking conservative orientation, hanzi’s
structure in formal publications remained extremely stable over this 1800-
year period of development. This situation lasted until the modern period1
when the issue of language and script increasingly became a common
concern among the educated. In this chapter we look at the history of
governmental intervention in hanzi’s development to provide the necessary
background information to better understand the modern reform move-
ments.
The major focus of this chapter is the three rounds of character
simplification that have been carried out by the Nationalist and Communist
post-imperial Chinese governments: two aborted simplification attempts in
1935 and 1977 and a completed simplification in the 1950s. This brief
historical account, while providing the necessary backdrop for the forth-
coming discussion on hanzi planning history, attempts to illustrate the
complex multi-dimensional context that accounts for the outcome of the
script reform programs. Except for this general introduction, the emphasis
in this discussion is placed on one or two focal points for each simplifi-
cation, i.e., an exploration of the reasons for the failure of the first scheme

23
24 Making Hanzi Accessible

from a cultural purist perspective; an examination of the actor change in

LP and a brief assessment of the resultant influence of the 1950s’
simplification; and the implementation and abandonment of the aborted
scheme of 1977.
In this volume, a new chronological system has been used to describe the
modern historical period of hanzi simplification. Traditionally, historical
studies dealing with Chinese LP were viewed through a political lens which
labeled the 1956 simplification the First Reform and the failed one in 1977
the Second Reform. The reform movement in 1935 was called the Simpli-
fication Scheme before Liberation. That scheme emphasized the political
boundaries before and after the Liberation of 1949, devaluing the historical
position of the low profile 1935 scheme. In this book, more emphasis is
given to LP and to the historical continuity of the hanzi simplification pro-
cess. We argue there is an inseparable relationship between the schemes of
1935 and 1956, particularly in quantitative terms.
Under this new classification system, the two simplification attempts in
1935 and 1977 are called the First Simplification Scheme (FSS, see
Appendix A) and the Second Simplification Scheme (SSS, see Appendix
B) respectively, while the 1956 reform is generally referred to as the Table
of Simplified Characters (TSC). It includes the two minor revisions to the
Table completed in 1964 and 1986. Under the system used in this book,
the 1950s’ simplification is seen as a coming to fruition and an extension
of the previous attempts carried out just twenty years earlier to reform
hanzi. Thus, despite the changes brought about by the altered political
circumstances of 1949, in technical terms, the TSC inherited a major
legacy from the First Scheme of 1935, which was a collective accomplish-
ment of the LP modernization pioneers. However, before looking at these
three schemes, the next section provides a brief historical reflection on
hanzi’s unification and standardization in dynastic China.

2. HANZI UNIFICATION AND

STANDARDIZATION IN DYNASTIC CHINA

Chinese hanzi have undergone numberless modifications and reform

even before modern times, and its adaptability and flexibility is undoubtedly
a major reason that has enabled hanzi to escape the fate of other ancient
scripts. Given their continuity over such a long history, an examination of
any aspect of character development would be incomplete without a look at
Chapter 1 25

the past. The following description provides a historical sketch of govern-

mental participation in standardizing characters.

2.1 One State, One Script – Qin Empire

The Qin Dynasty (221-207 BCE) was a defining period for the
coherence and unity of hanzi. But the idea of standardizing writing was not
new as discussions of the importance of language and script standard-
ization can be found in the classical canons and analects of the scholars
of the Hundreds Schools Contending, during the period when Chinese
culture started to flourish, about 2,500 years ago. Ancient philosophers
were highly interested in etymological matters because of their importance
for logical arguments – as the Confucians said, “it is very essential to
clarify the concept”. In his book Zheng Ming (Concept Clarification –《正
名), Xun Zi (the originator of the Legalism School) said that deliberate
misuse words or distortion of language conventions should be treated as
serious criminal behavior. He argued that such offenders should be punished
equally to those committing criminal offences such as forging documents
and counterfeiting money.
The Qin government unified the warring states with the help of a cohort
of disciples of Xun Zi creating the first highly centralized dynasty in
China. One staunch believer in the Legalism School and Xun Zi’s favorite
student was Li Si, the perpetrator of the catastrophic ‘Burning of the
Books’. As the empire’s Prime Minister, Li Si drew up an official list of
3,500 uniform characters to be adopted as the only officially mandated
government standard, a standard form which later came to be known as the
small seal script. Qin Shihuang, Qin’s first emperor and one of the most
powerful despots in China’s dynastic history, is believed by historians to
have had “a penchant for uniformity – standardizing among other things
weights, measures, and the written language” (Wong 1990: 72). Unifying
the script was an urgent policy and an essential part in a series of unifi-
cation measures, and it was done in a bold and resolute manner by the
Empire. Except for three books (volumes on Cangjie, Yuanli and Boxue)
written by three of his top advisers as textbooks for primary education, the
Qin government used standard characters mainly to produce official
documents and to inscribe utensils and vessels. In 219 BCE, during an
inspection tour of his far-flung empire, Emperor Qin declared his
campaign of character standardization a success by having his handwritten
characters ‘Tongshu Wenzi’ (Eternal Characters for Common Writing – 同
书文字) engraved in stone. Interestingly, at about the same period,
26 Making Hanzi Accessible

Ashoka, the equally great emperor of India, also started to establish

imperial communication to linguistically unify his empire by cutting
inscriptions into steles in many parts of the country (Ferguson 1996).
Although it was the shortest dynasty in Chinese history, Qin did every-
thing to ensure it had a lasting impact. The script reform instituted by the
Qin government had a far-reaching effect. As Moore (2000: 63) notes,
“Measures undertaken by the Qin government also established a firm basis
for the later development of several major forms of brush writing”. Seeing
it as the major contribution to the country’s unity, power consolidation and
social stability, subsequent governments, without exception, carried out
language and script standardization immediately after completing national
political unification, making it a common practice for the central govern-
ment to standardize language and script use, employing state-based force
(Geng 1996).

2.2 Subsequent Developments Prior to Modern China

In the course of Qin’s efforts to unify people’s way of thinking, almost

all books (most in bamboo slips), except those on medicine and agriculture
that existed prior to the Qin unification were destroyed in the Burning of
All Books, creating a terrible loss for the development of Chinese civili-
zation. To fight such human pillage and natural disaster, people turned to
engraving characters on stone as an enduring means to help them survive
the ravages of water, fire and time. Thus, stone engraving became a fa-
vorite medium for preserving permanent records of human intellectual
achievement.
After the Qin ideological dictatorship, the Han Dynasty witnessed a
renewed emphasis on Confucian morality and scholarship. The resurgence
of Confucianism led to unprecedented enthusiasm in engraving classical
canons. Beginning in 175, following the proposal of Cai Yi, the eminent
royal scholar, the Han Dynasty took eight years to complete engraving Six
Canons on stone tablets (known as Xiping Shijing), and erected them before
the gate of the Imperial University as model characters. Thus began a
tradition to engrave the state-sanctioned standard characters onto stone
tablets. In subsequent dynasties, at least three governments, Wei (368-550,
Three Dimension Stone Canon), Tang (618-907, Kaicheng Stone Canon)
and Qing (1644-1911, Thirteen Classic Stone Canon), followed the practice
of setting up stone inscriptions before the gates of the imperial university or
royal academy. The Sui (581-618) and Tang were two other dynasties that
gave much importance to language work and a new academic subject, the
Chapter 1 27

‘Character Shape Study’, was also developed during this period. During
the Tang Dynasty, Taizong, the second emperor of the dynasty and one of
the best-known monarchs in Chinese history, issued an edict for the best
etymologists to review and re-edit the Character Standardization books
sanctioned by previous dynasties and work out their own standard. Of
these books, the well-known Ganlu Character Book was the most
influential.
In the Song Dynasty (960-1279), the official standard character book,
Lei Pian (categories), which involved a number of high-ranking officials in
the imperial court, was compiled over a period of 38 years. Pei Xie, a
private collection of various forms of characters, also played an active role
in standardizing characters and should, therefore, not be ignored. The Ming
Dynasty (1368-1644) attached even more importance to character standardi-
zation. Zhu Yuanzhang, Ming’s first emperor, personally organized his
ministers and distinguished scholars to set up the official standard. It
combined standards for both pronunciation and characters into one book. He
used the title of his regime to name the book Hongwu Zhengyun, which
literally means ‘the authentic rhyming dictionary of the Hongwu regime’.
The Qing Dynasty ushered in another peak in cultural prosperity. The
Kangxi Dictionary （ 《康熙字典》 ）is one of its remarkable achievements. This
dictionary is still extensively used and plays a very important role in endors-
ing today’s standardization efforts.

2.3 Standardization Summary

From this brief historical overview of Chinese hanzi development, we

can see the development of the basic modus operandi for structuring and
writing hanzi, stressing the importance of standardization – a critical focus
for this volume – during both ancient times and during the more recent
dynastic period. Wang T.K. (2004: 192) has summarized the three
principal measures used to standardize ancient scripts as follows:
• To make standard character shapes and textbooks through rationaliza-
tion. Volume on Cangjie（ 《仓颉篇》 ）, Volume on Yuanli（ 《爰历 篇》 ）
and Volume on Boxue, were all the results of Qin’s effort to overhaul the
script, following Qin Shihuang’s unification of the country in 221 BCE.
• To make known the model characters through engraving the classics on
stone tablets, e.g., the well-known Xiping Stone Inscriptions 《熹平石
(
经》, 175 BCE) of seven canonical works were the earliest stone
engraving set.
28 Making Hanzi Accessible

• To unify character shapes through compiling dictionaries, rectifying

variant forms and culling inauthentic characters, e.g., Collection of
Characters (Zihui,《字汇》) by Mei Yingzuo in the Ming Dynasty
(1279-1368).

Geng (1996: 23) has summarized the four characteristics of the stand-
ardization that occurred in dynastic China:
• From top to bottom, by royal mandate. In most cases the emperor
himself became personally involved and a number of key national level
officials were the major source of the initiative;
• As an integral means of consolidating the foundation, at a time the
country was on the rise;
• Organizationally, it was a governmental initiative without rejection of
individual commitment;
• It was basically confined to the cultural circle that propagated the
official standards and had, as such, little impact among the masses, a
fact that may account for the huge divergence in characters and the
flourishing of unorthodox forms among the rank and file.

In the next section we examine the ‘Three Simplifications’ undertaken

in more modern times. Table 1-1 provides a summary of the three re-
spective modernization schemes. The circumstances of each simplification
scheme then are examined in detail in the sections that follow.

3. THE FIRST SIMPLIFICATION SCHEME IN 1935

By comparison with the other two subsequent simplifications, the first

simplification scheme has been weakly documented and has long been
ignored by LP researchers. Therefore, in this section, while focusing on the
reasons that led to its failure, we look more closely at some of the sub-
stantive issues related to this scheme in order to fill the gap in evaluating
this first important reform venture in the history of modern hanzi. The
authors hold that the traditionalists’ struggle to keep the writing system
intact is by its very nature a manifestation of linguistic purism. Through
the application of this notion of purism and by using a multi-dimension
analysis, this scheme can be more thoroughly explored and new light can
be shed on the failure of the first government-sanctioned simplification
scheme.
 Table 1-1. Three Chinese character simplification schemes
Chapter 1

First Simplification Scheme Table of Simplification Scheme Second Simplification Scheme

(FSS, 8.1935) (TSC, 1.1956) (SSS, 12.1977)
Content 324 characters 230 characters in List 1 248 characters in List 1
(For immediate use) (for immediate use)
285 characters in List 2 605 characters in List 2
(For trial use and discussion) (For trial use and discussion)
54 components in List 3
Organizations Ministry of Education Ministry of Education Some appointed members in the Commission
(Republic of China) (People’s Republic of China) for Chinese Script Reform of State Council.
Commission for Chinese Script Reform of State
Council (Cabinet)
People’s Congress (Parliament)
Results Withdrawn after 6 months A general list of 2236 characters combining List Stopped in the following year;
1 and List 2, as well as characters containing the Official repeal in 1986.
54 basic components in List 3 was republished in
1964 and 1986.
Reasons Fierce opposition from the conservative Alleged failure to win public support;
camp and from a high-ranking senior Incomplete legal procedures;
official; War against Japan was imminent. Oversimplification caused radical change;
Economic losses (to re-typeset some major
reference books and computer chips).
Background Writing simplification as an integral part of Enthusiasm by zealous population; Carefully Abnormal state of political life (end of the
language reform, originating in the May organized by the government; Favorable cultural revolution); People were sensitive to
Fourth Movement of 1919; Leading environment created by de facto adoption of FFS. drastic change.
linguist’s Qian Xuantong’s work was
appreciated by the elites; Widespread and
extensive actual use of simplified characters.
29
30 Making Hanzi Accessible

3.1 Background Review

There is a tendency for language reform to go hand in hand with the

socio-political upheaval. By the late 1800s after the first and second opium
wars in China (1840, 1856), the military defeats inflicted by the Western
Powers began to provoke demands for mass education within China, which
inevitably led to a literacy campaign and script reform. However, although
the debate on language reform was heard with increasing frequency as the
Manchu Dynasty came to an end in 1912, the move towards character
simplification was slower than reform on the other language issues such as
vernacularization2 of archaic language use, national language promotion
and writing system alphabetization or Romanization. The first round of
character simplification did not occur until 1935 when a list of 324
simplified characters was officially accepted by the government of the
Republic of China.
As the discussion in this chapter has shown, hanzi simplification is a
continuing historical phenomenon, and simplified variant forms of more
complex characters have existed since Jiaguwen (Yin and Rohsenow
1997). Whereas the complex characters were promoted by consecutive
governments, and were thus given official status, characters with fewer
strokes and a simpler structure were stigmatized and called ‘vulgar charac-
ters’ (Suzi). Huang Zongxi (1610-1695), a Confucian philosopher in the
Ming Dynasty, was the first scholar who consciously used these vulgar
characters in his writing (Zhou 1979).
Sociolinguists and LP theorists have long recognized and endorsed the
important role that amateurs, dedicated individuals and academics play in
engaging in preliminary research and in initiating LP programs (see
Cooper 1989; Thomas 1991). This was the case in the first modern attempt
to simplify Chinese characters. The first simplification movement, initiated
and supported by a constellation of individual elitists in various disci-
plines, was purely an academic enterprise and can be seen as a typical
bottom-up venture. Among these scholars, Qian Xuantong, a renowned
linguist, played the most eminent role through his prolonged commitment
to champion simplified characters. It was under his leadership and by
using his simplification principles (see following discussion), that some of
the staff working in the Association for Promoting a Unified National
Language drafted a table of over 2,000 characters, which became the
blueprint for the FSS, that was jointly approved by the Senate Session and
the Central Political Conference on August 21, 1935. It was withdrawn in
the following year.
Chapter 1 31

3.2 Exploring Reasons for Failure: Cultural Continuity

In this section we examine three issues, personal intervention, cultural

explanations and politicization that underlie the failure of the first scheme.

3.2.1 Personal Intervention

There is disagreement among scholars why such a carefully deliberated

and extensively discussed reform program should be withdrawn less than
six months after its formal ratification. A widely held view – that a senior
official’s opposition was the major reason for the withdrawal of the char-
acters lacks credible supporting evidence. This explanation was first put
forward in Zhou Youguang’s (1979: 325) book, Introduction to Chinese
Script Reform and has been widely quoted ipso facto in the LP literature,
but no primary historical sources can be found to support the claim, as Yao
(2000), a Chinese LP observer from Hong Kong, has pointed out. It is
worthwhile noting that, historical sources show that despite the rising
voice of opposition, there had been no sign of a change in policy just two
months before the abandonment was formally announced (Du 1935).
According to Wang Xuewen (1997: 13), an eminent Taiwan script reform
researcher:
It was said that Mr. Dai Jitao was extremely angry at the decree public-
ation. To promote simplified characters by using governmental force
was equal to a self-imposed destruction of the national foundation – the
result it caused would be even more harmful than national doom. Dai
cited Dr. Sun Yatsen’s quotation, saying that the writing in education
was the most important element for national life, and he argued that
this was a hasty decision. Therefore, he wrote to Mr. Yuan Jiahua, the
minister of Higher Education, and to Mr. Wang Shijie, the Minister of
Education, and required Mr. Wang to withdraw the decree of the FSS.
Consequently, the government of the Republic of China cancelled the
order.
Interestingly, both Zhou and Wang were very careful about the word-
ing they used when speculating about the cancellation of the FSS, both
using the phrase ‘it was said’. While some other rather insignificant events
of the 1930s were discussed in relatively great detail in the Chronology of
Chinese Modernization for One Century (Fei 1997), only a short paragraph
is devoted to the promulgation of the FSS, and no discussion of opposition
to the FSS can be found in this chronology. This perplexing situation
32 Making Hanzi Accessible

suggests that there might have been regarding the public response to the
publication of the FSS.
As this issue is given only sporadic mention in relevant research arti-
cles, how much of the 1935 decision can be credited to personal oppo-
sition, as has been suggested, is uncertain and must await further historical
investigation. Although it appears that Dai must have been one of the
strongest opponents of reform among the higher-ranking officials of the
Republic of China, it seems unlikely that he could have been solely
responsible. Developments that occurred several years later suggest that
this abrupt and unexpected turnabout can best be understood as the
outcome of a complex set of interactions between the ideologies of the
antagonistic parties, and their perceptions about cultural issues as well as
their struggle for power. These issues are briefly examined in the follow-
ing discussion.

3.2.2 Cultural Explanations – Attitudes and Beliefs in Language

After China’s failure to revitalize through the introduction of Western

technological knowledge, military models and a democratic political
system, the pioneers of the May Fourth Movement of 1919 saw cultural
reform as essential to prevent the country’s demise. This was most
strongly expressed in Lu Xun’s (the greatest writer in China’s modern
history) proposition that ‘either Chinese characters die out, or China does’
( 汉 字 不 灭 , 中 国 必 亡 ). The anti-classical, anti-traditional and pro-
modern movement sparked a wave of reaction to the constraints inherent in
traditional Confucian society. This goal of saving the nation was given
as the justification for the government’s decision to simplify Chinese
characters. This nationalist modernist aspiration, however, was not adopted
by every member of the elite stratum, as we will see later. On the contrary,
the foremost point made by opponents, leading to the withdrawal of the
FSS, was that there was a need to save the nation from a cultural demise
that would result from script simplification – a cry that resonates with
segments of the current Chinese society as well.
The idea of simplification raised questions related to cultural continuity,
the legitimacy of simplified characters, of script worship and psychological
factors, all of which came to the fore when the FSS simplification was
proposed. Traditional characters were seen as inextricably associated with
ancestral roots, cultural heritage and nationhood. The notion of purism,
which deals with attitudes and beliefs in linguistic culture, provides a useful
sociolinguistic explanation for the failure of the FSS. Purism has been
defined in a number of different ways with Jernudd and Shapiro (1989)
Chapter 1 33

emphasizing that purism is maintaining the linguistic consistency and the

standard of a language. Schiffman (1996: 61) points out that it often
involves a return to (or a search for) linguistic authenticity. It “takes the
form of removing from the language elements that appear to be foreign, or
corrupt, or lacking in true authenticity in the linguistic culture in question.”
Viewed from this perspective, linguistic purism can be seen as the general
population’s belief in Chinese hanzi as the focal point of Chinese culture.
As the following paragraphs suggest, this notion is supported by an
analysis of the literature on this topic.
Since China’s ancestors have handed down the characters for thousands
of years, the characters should maintain their purity and authenticity, and
any change made to them is unacceptable and cannot be tolerated. In
ancient times, “scholar officials shrouded writings in mysticism, making it
sacred and inviolable in the popular mind” (Seybolt and Chiang 1979: 17).
Taylor and Taylor (1995: 74-76) also note that hanzi “are imbued with
magical, mystical quality and power, and hence are objects of reverence”.
It is a set of beliefs about the antiquity and purity of hanzi that unites a
segment of the speech community in its resistance to any change in the
status of the traditional system. According to the diehard opponents of
simplification, such as Dai Jitao and He Jian, the founder of the All China
Character Preservation Congress, character simplification is tantamount to
national doom and racial extinction. The opinion that Chinese characters
and the written word are to be worshipped and venerated originated partly
in their use for linguistic divinity and myth. In antiquity, hanzi were
engraved on bones and bronze vessels, only used either for divination or
for important official rites, and monopolized by a tiny group of shamans
and sorcerers, who were “never averse to using anything to imbue their
calling with mystique, …to seize the opportunity to add a new touch of
mystery to their craft by ostensibly reading omens and fortunes of good or
evil” (Wong 1990: 58).
Like mystification, sanctification also can be seen as another source of
linguistic purism. Fishman (2002: 17) said that “there is no human culture
without language and no human culture without the notion of the holy”,
but the forms of language holiness may well differ from one culture to
another.
Chinese society is secular, but classical canons were treated as holy in
every sense, in both their moral value and their importance in people’s
spiritual life. So from their very origin, hanzi have been sanctified and
have taken on an aura of fixed-once-and-for-all. As a Chinese proverb
would have it, ‘every stroke has life and spirit’ [or more literally, ‘every
34 Making Hanzi Accessible

stroke is mandated by God’, yi bi yi hua, jie tian jing di yi – 一点一画,

皆 天 经 地 义 ]. In Chinese culture, there are many stories about the
treatment of characters as sacred things in ancient times, and one did not
dare to challenge their authenticity. It was a common practice in the Civil
Service Examinations that examiners would fail a candidate on the
grounds that a certain character was miswritten (see e.g., Peng 2001). In
Historical Recordings (Shi Ji), the best-known Chinese history book, “a
highly placed official of the Han Dynasty was in a great panic [for fear of
being sentenced to death] when he found that one tail [stroke] was missing
in writing ‘ma’ [馬, horse]3” (Hu 1998: 29).
The mythology and saintliness of hanzi were not given much attention
in planning the Chinese script system. Li Zehou (1999), a renowned Chinese
modern thinker, has called for further study that goes beyond hanzi as a
visible communication system. Even in modern daily life, phenomena can
very often be observed that attest to the Chinese reverence for hanzi (e.g.,
Lu 1992: 125, Zhang 1992: 37), for example:

• Until recently, old people would say ‘pay respect to your characters and
paper’ (jing xi zi zhi – 敬惜字纸) when they saw children throwing
away paper with hanzi on it;
• Taoist priests always keep a hook handy to pick up any discarded paper
with hanzi written on it;
• One of the widely held beliefs about cezi masters (测字先生) was that
the visual structure of people’s names in characters conveyed a man-
date from heaven that could be used to foretell a person’s fate;
• In some areas in the countryside, people still believe that Fu (符, a
hanzi-derived magical figure drawn by Taoist Priests) can exorcise evil
spirits and cure illnesses, or evoke ill fortune. (see Figure 1-1; the ini-
tial right vertical line is the user’s instructions: please burn this Fu, and
drink the ash with water, which is the common way to use Fu.)

Thus, it should come as no surprise that hanzi are the main component
of a system of symbols, when arguing that languages have often come to
be considered holy. Fishman (2002: 17) classified classical Chinese as a
‘holy language’, and pointed out that once languages are sanctified, “their
very structure and corpus is assumed to have been transformed or shaped
by their unique ‘holy vessel’ function. Like all holy phenomena, these
languages are considered unalterable, just as are their texts”.
The implication of language sanctification in LP is that it retards human
efforts in language modernization. Fishman (2002: 21) argues:
Chapter 1 35

Figure 1-1. A Fu image from the notebook of an early 20th century shaman (Hook and
Twitchett 1991: 122)

Sanctity being every bit as much socially constructed as other societal

beliefs and convictions. …these very same convictions also tend to
complicate or restrict language modernization efforts, constraining them
to be more ‘authentic’, purist, ausbau, and indigenous in orientation
rather than following along the lines of ‘internationalization’ which
corpus planning for modernization normally pursues.
To overcome the difficulty brought about by linguistic holiness and
purism, there are cases where conscious efforts have been made to
accommodate people’s beliefs, or to avoid the conflict between the plan-
ning programs and the holy nature people placed on their languages.
Cooper (1989) argues that in general, language reforms that are consistent
with the values and belief system of the target population are more likely
to succeed than alternatives with respect to physical behavior. This is
illustrated by a speech made by Mao Zedong at the Conference of Issues
on Intellectual Elements, held in 1956. According to Ye Laishi (1981: 60),
the former vice-director of the Commission of Chinese Script Reform
(henceforth, CCSR), Chairman Mao said:
About the reform on writing, there is no objection from the masses, it
comes from the intellectuals. Some professors said to me that Chinese
characters are the best script system in the world and cannot be
changed. Supposing they are replaced by a kind of Chinese traditional
form – that is OK. But the problem is that Latin letters were invented
by foreigners and that China has to learn from others.
36 Making Hanzi Accessible

In the debate about the FSS between the conservatives and script
reformers, the former, while accusing their reform proponents of being
ignorant of their own history and of forgetting their origins, praised
themselves as being defenders of orthodoxy, and in accord with national
sentiment having an enthusiastic affection toward the traditional heritage.
Their typical accusation was that the simplifiers deliberately cut off the
multi-millennial lifeline of nationhood, which is bound to lead to the
undermining of the vitality of the cultural heritage, and as such, will bring
calamity to the country and the people. There is no greater crime than this
sin; whoever changes or gives up characters is committing the most heinous
national crime and must be condemned by history. This interpretation finds
resonance even today. To rebut current script reformers’ opinions, Peng
(2001) has argued, “The defeat in war is temporary and recoverable, but
once the culture is lost, it vanishes forever”.
Specific fears about the eventual loss of the traditional cultural heritage
include (also see Figure 7.2 in Section 3.3, Chapter 7):

• Classical literature cannot be fully appreciated if it is recorded in

simplified characters;
• Aesthetic values, such as calligraphy and other art forms derived from
characters, will be lost;
• Language precision will be sacrificed because consistency within the
hanzi system has been altered.

In its very essence, purism is the manifestation of nationalism. Societal

ideologies, including nationalism and traditionalism, are fundamental to
the success of script reform, and nationalistic feeling was clearly an all-
pervasive factor in 1935. Being well aware of this, when the linguists
proposed the simplification scheme to the Kuomintung government
through the Preparatory Commission of National Language Unification,
their very first stated reason and objective was “in order to save and
preserve the characters”. Simplification advocates also tried to prove that
simplified hanzi would be more convenient and effective than the
traditional ones for reading classical texts. In 1955, when a new wave of
simplification enthusiasm surged in Taiwan, the first justification, out of
four reasons given by Luo Jialun, a renowned Taiwanese scholar who led
the campaign, was, “to preserve Chinese characters” (Wang 1997: 26-27).
Chapter 1 37

3.2.3 Politicization

Purist arguments aside, it is believed that a more immediate reason for

withdrawing the FSS table was the impending struggle against the Japanese
who were to invade China two years later. The cultural controversy over the
fate of China’s writing system gave way to the more burning issue of saving
the nation from imminent destruction. But, Du Zijin (1935: 27) has argued
that the national crisis was actually a contributing factor to the government’s
initial decision to implement the FSS, because the war with Japan involved
gaining the wider support of the population. The defense forces were
constituted of illiterate ordinary people and the simplification movement
could help to educate them about the significance of the upcoming war.
Furthermore, there was also a possible political consideration for the
Nationalist government – not to allow the Chinese Communist Party
(CCP) insurgent forces to gain the upper hand by taking advantage of the
situation. There appears to be an inherent relationship between simplifi-
cation reform and leftist political power internationally. For example,
when a state LP body, the English Academy, modeled on French and
Italian academies was proposed, it was opposed by Whigs because “Whig
philosophy in the eighteenth century aimed at restricting the Royal power”
(Ager 2003: 75). Another more recent example is the spelling simpli-
fication that was favored by working class parents in the 1990s in the
German-speaking world (Clyne 1995). Similarly, simplification was regard-
ed as akin to the ideological embodiment of the communist doctrine as
there was seen to be an innate relationship between the ordinary people,
simplification and the mass movement. In China the reality was that the
CCP was more enthusiastic and liberal in reforming the language since it
viewed cultural issues not as a peripheral activity but as an essential part of
governance. As such, language and script must be controlled, directed, and
regulated by the state for the benefit of the state. For instance, it was the
Communist Party that did a great deal of work to promote Romanization in
Party-controlled liberated areas. Thus, the ruling Nationalist Party was not
willing to be instrumental in doing anything in concert with its archrival.
This hypothesis can be partially verified by the subsequent debate on
simplification in the 1950s and 60s in Taiwan. It is generally believed that
the only explanation for Taiwan’s unwillingness to adopt simplified
characters in a wholesale fashion was the authorities’ fear of being seen as
following the Communist lead in Mainland China. Since the Kuomintung
government fled to Taiwan, the issue of Chinese character simplification
has been raised from time to time, by both influential politicians and
academics. For instance, during the 1950s, Luo Jialun proposed character
38 Making Hanzi Accessible

simplification and received significant and enthusiastic support from the

population. He was, however, condemned by Chiang Kaishek as being
“orchestrated by the Communists across the Strait” – and the reform was
quashed.

3.3 Implications for the Forthcoming Reforms

Despite the failure of the first governmental attempt to change modern

character development, the FSS has been regarded as a precursor of
subsequent simplification efforts as it provided the background and basis
for future reforms. It can be said to have met with reasonable success, if
success is measured in terms of its far-reaching effect upon later develop-
ment. As Su (1993: 42) has metaphorically said, “the bud of 1935 bloomed
in 1956”.
The first governmental attempt is also significant in that it planted the
seeds of reform in a time-tested writing system and shook the shibboleths
about hanzi. As a means of written communication, hanzi had taken shape
over a long historical period. Wang Fengyang (1992) stresses that over
such a long developmental period, negative lethargic habits have evolved
in language use. The force of habit is pervasive and irrational, and once
inertia sets in and develops, it is resistant to any alteration unless it is faced
with massive coercive pressures. Without doubt, the nationwide discussion
and the governmental action to promote simplified characters diminished
the profound veneration attached to characters. That fact is attested to by
the use of simplified characters by more and more people.

3.4 Government vs Individuals

Another aspect of the FSS that might be of interest to LP researchers is

the role that individuals have played in instigating LP programs. From the
very beginning, the government intentionally played a minor role, and all
the initiatives came from non-governmental organizations that were often
dominated by prestigious individuals. These individuals’ professional
profiles varied considerably, but they were able to organize the propa-
gation of a common point of view among those occupying key adminis-
trative positions. The government took little or no part in initiating the
reform program, and basically accepted various individual proposals.
Experience shows that more often than not the lack of strong central
leadership is conducive to script reform. Thus, before the government had
shown any interest in it, the simplification campaign already had drawn a
Chapter 1 39

lot of interest from the wider population. Numerous tables of characters

and dictionaries promoting simplified characters had been published (see
Table 1-2). Zhou (1979: 324-325) noted that from 1927 to 1934, over 30
journals, periodicals and newspapers began to publish research papers and
articles discussing simplified characters. The printing industry and publish-
ing houses were free to use their own type fonts and forms of characters,
and between 1931 and 1993 four books on the topic were published, and in
the spring of 1935 a joint petition by over 200 elite scholars from cultural
circles supporting the simplification was signed. In addition, fifteen
publishers and some magazines took it upon themselves to begin to publish
in simplified characters.
At the same time, the individuality in LP is a two-edged sword. The
failure to retain the reforms embodied in the FSS also demonstrates that a
mechanism to guarantee legal and democratic procedures is essential to
successfully carry out script reform. A script is one of the fundamental
institutions in human life and deeply rooted in people’s minds. Over time,
once legitimized and enforced, the social effects the reform creates have
important consequences that need to have a certain degree of immunity
from the pressure of individuals or interest groups, without rejecting the
important role individuals can play in campaigning and implementing LP
reforms.

Table 1-2. Individual efforts to simplify characters in the 1930s

Book Compiler Publisher Year Characters

simplified
Table of Popular Liu Fu, Li Jiarui Historical Institution 1930 6,240
Characters Since the of the Central
Song and Yuan Academy
Dynasties
Dictionary of Rong Geng Harvard -Yanjing 1936 4,445
Simplified Characters University Press
Table of Common Chen Guangyao Beixin Book Bureau 1936 3,150
Simplified Characters
Table of Simplified Character Shape Same as compiler 1937 1,700
Characters Association of
Beijing Academy
40 Making Hanzi Accessible

3.5 Methodological Issues

From a methodological perspective, the implementation of the FSS can

be described as a soft landing. First of all, even though they were small in
number and there was little risk of opposition, the original counterparts of
the simplified hanzi were not to be abolished when official status was
granted to the latter. Furthermore, the Education Ministry required that
students should be able to read the simplified and original forms at the
same time. Wang Li (1938) contends that the legalization of simplified
characters, instead of releasing students from the cumbersome memorizing
burden, now forced them to spend twice the time and energy to learn two
systems. This may, however, be regarded as one stabilizing tactic to
minimize the disturbing shock that the FSS may have caused to society.
Furthermore, the more characters a scheme intends to simplify, the greater
the risk that it will run into conflict with traditional conservatism. The FSS
was a very conservative reform in quantitative terms (only 324 characters),
but it was a well-prepared and meticulously planned program. This was
confirmed by the adoption of over eighty percent of its simplified forms in
the TSC in the 1956 scheme.
The principle of ‘recognizing without creating’ (shu er bu zuo – 述而
不作), put forward by the Preparatory Commission of National Language
Unification, had a far-reaching impact upon further simplification endea-
vors. Adhering to this principle, the government saw its own role in
simplifying hanzi as just collecting and implementing already existing
characters, either from historical texts or those in long-time circulation in
public writings, rather than creating new forms. The 1920s also produced
the first scholar, Qian Xuantong, to try to categorize the existing methods
of simplification, and since then, his eight methods have remained the
most comprehensive way to simplify hanzi. 4
There were two other reasons why the FSS did not have a strong
influence on orthographic life. First, the 324 adopted characters were
chosen from over 2,400 that were originally recommended, and this
number accounted for only 10 percent of the characters in daily use, all of
which had a long history. Second, although the decree was promulgated by
the Education Ministry and the measures were clear and draconian, its
impact was strictly confined to the schools. Public usage was mentioned in
the Order promulgating the FSS, but in the Order it was just suggested that
simplified characters be used “as possible”, with no specific measures
being formulated to implement the Order, despite the fact that two months
after its issue, the Order was re-promulgated in the name of the central
government (Zhang et al 1997).
Chapter 1 41

4. SIMPLIFICATION MOVEMENTS IN THE 1950s

AND 1960s

While the TSC is the most unprecedented simplification movement in

Chinese history since the hanzi were stabilized during the square script
period, it is in some respects, as we have argued, a continuation and
realization of the FSS reforms of 1935. As the whole process of formu-
lation of the FSS reforms has been well-documented in both the Chinese
and English literature (see e.g., Chen P. 1999, DeFrancis 1984b, Seybolt
and Chiang 1979, and most recently, Zhao 2005), the following discussion
concentrates on the characteristic role of state power, and briefly assesses
the outcome of the 1950s simplification activities, which have been largely
ignored in the previous studies.

4.1 Dynamic Intervention from the State –

Organizational Change

As the preceding section indicates, prior to 1949 the Nationalist

government adopted a non-interventionist policy toward language issues,
but this situation was abruptly changed with the establishment of the
People’s Republic of China (PRC). Language was seen as an important
part of the nation’s resources and listed as a political task on the working
agenda. The new government started to carry out language reform through
increasingly vigorous intervention on a scale previously unheard of.
The first distinct feature of LP in the new China was the extensive
involvement of the state’s organizations and a top-down language adminis-
tration policy. The national-level LP agencies changed four times during
the brief period of the establishment of the PRC. Gradual release of histor-
ical data in academic literature and personal accounts since the 1990s, on
what happened during the first period of the establishment of the PRC,
enables us to take a closer look at what was occurring in a relatively
detailed fashion.

4.1.1 Coalition of Chinese Script Reform and Association of

Chinese Script Reform

The first step taken by the CCP was to merge the Guoluo School5 with
the Beila School (Northern Latinization pro-communist organization). At the
dawn of the country’s foundation, the LP activists within the Party began to
think about how to integrate experienced human sources in language reform
42 Making Hanzi Accessible

into a large-scale nationwide language modernization campaign. Obvi-

ously, the best way to achieve this end was to set up an organization to
bring the key members of previous reform movements, with good linguis-
tics training, together under one roof. At the time, the people who were
enthusiastically designing phonetic orthography and trying to simplify
hanzi were numerous, ranging from devoted individuals to organizations
operating under different ideological patronage. It appeared that ‘Coali-
tion’ was the best term to unite all the sides involved, including members
of the Association of Unified National Language Promotion, which was
related to the Nationalist government regime. A brief look at the list of the
participants gathered at the founding conference (Wang 1995) reveals that
its members were chiefly composed of academics from higher institutions
in Beijing.
However, there had been frequent correspondence between some
Coalition members and Communist Party leaders, and what was a totally
non-government organization, embracing a wide range of individuals with
different backgrounds in terms of political ideology and academic special-
ties, existed only for a short time. After some months, the organization
changed its name from Coalition to Research Commission. On August 28,
1949, at the third meeting of all proponents, Wu Yuzhang, who used to be
a pioneer in the Latinization movement in the 1920s and 1930s, which was
backed by the CCP to spread revolutionary knowledge among Chinese
workers living in Russia, made the proposal to change the name from
Coalition to Research Commission. It was later revealed that this modifica-
tion occurred at the direction of Mao Zedong and some other high-ranking
Communist Party leaders. Although it was a non-government organ in
name, this first nationwide organization of language reform was virtually
under the direct control of the newly formed state central administration. It
came into being just ten days after the birth of the PRC and seventy-eight
members were elected by the universities in Beijing, representing all sec-
tions of society. The major tasks, as stated in the conference documents,
were to study and test the Latin alphabetic writing system.

4.1.2 Research Commission of Chinese Script Reform

Then after two months’ operation, a more significant change in the

nature of leadership occurred. Under an order from the central government,
the Association was again reorganized and merged with the Research
Commission and the Education Minister, and Ma Xulun was appointed as
the director. Chia (1992: 185) describes this arrangement as “[f]or the first
time in sixty years, the non-official script reform movement gained a
Chapter 1 43

legitimate status. Now, the reform programs can be officially enforced by

the government through the education ministry.”

4.1.3 Commission of Chinese Script Reform

With the rapid development of script reform, driven by the intensified

activities of governmental LP workers, language planning issues increas-
ingly had become a major agenda for the central administration, and it
appeared that it was the right time for the government to act. Proposed by
the Premier Zhou Enlai, the Standing Commission of the People’s
Congress approved the establishment of a Commission of Script Reform
on October 8, 1954. With this decision, the script reform plan went from
being a theoretical study to a practical plan for action that was going to be
enforced from the top through state power. Wu Yuzhang, its director,
suggested in his Working Report, “Before, it was a research institution;
from now on, we have to go among the masses and get into the society
itself, to take tangible and feasible measures to promote various concrete
programs of script reform” (Fei 1997: 193-194).
In addition to the national-level script reform organizations just
discussed, a number of provincial level and local organizations had been
established across the country. The most influential one was the Association
of Shanghai New Script Workers, which was founded on September 4,
1949. It was chaired by Chen Wangdao and Ni Haishu, two prime script
reform activists for several decades, and it had 110 members. Its work
focused on promoting Romanization that was left uncompleted by the
Association of Unified National Language Promotion.
Table 1-3 records the name changes and functions of the LP organs,
indicating its gradual increase in official stature during this hectic
transition period. The table indicates vigorous participation from the wider
academic community, and powerful central leadership from the newly
formed government. During the first three years of its establishment, the
name changed from Coalition to Association to Research Commission, then
from Research Commission to Commission, each indicating the increas-
ing importance of government power in its functioning process 6. Chia
(1992) sees the last reconstruction of the LP organization and its official
governmental control as a positive change in language reform. But Duan
Shengnong (1990: 207) and Lü Guanxiong (2003), two Chinese LP
analysts, are critical of these changes, arguing that “the scholar’s role has
eventually been reduced”. Duan (1990) blames top-down bureaucratic
interference caused by these changes as the factor responsible for the
 44

Table 1-3. The change in Chinese LP agencies in the 1950s (Chia 1992, Fei 1997, Wang 1995, Wu 1978)

Organization’s Name Founding Affiliation Leaders/Initiator Purpose

Date
Coalition of Chinese Script 7.8.1949 Non-official Wu Yuzhang, Xu Teli To exchange views on Chinese Romanization
Reform (senior revolutionaries); Li
(中国文字改革协进会) Jinxi, Luo Changpei
(linguists)

Association of Chinese Script 10.10.1949 Semi official organization Wu Yuzhang a. to unify Chinese script reform workers;
Reform under the auspices of the (director) b. to promote Chinese script reform;
(中国文字改革协会) new government; 78 c. to study and carry out experiments with the
reform methods.
members

Research Commission of Script 2.5.1952 Under the Education Ma Xulun (director, a. to study and work out an alphabetic
Reform Commission of the State education minister); scheme (based on a character stroke)
(中国文字改革研究委员会) Council of the Central Wu Yuzhang (vice- b. investigate character simplification
director) and work out a simplification scheme.
Government; 12 members

Commission of Script Issues of the 1.10.1953 Central Commission of Hu Qiaomu (Mao a. to coordinate the different views on
the CCP; over 30 Zedong’s secretary of script reform within the Party;
Chinese Communist Party Central
members political affairs); b. to discuss the major principles and steps
Commission to execute the script reform programs;
(中共中央文字问题委员会) Fan Wenlan (vice-director; c. to provide the Central Commission of the
historian) CCP with practical and feasible suggestions.

Wu Yuzhang (director) a. to increase governmental influence in enforcing

Commission of Chinese Script 23.12.1954 Under the direct leader- script reform;
Reform ship of the State Council Hu Yuzhi (vice-director
communist ideologist b. to progress research work to a practical stage;
(中国文字改革委员会) (highest governmental c. to complement the national language
theorist)
apparatus); 23 members policy across the country.
Making Hanzi Accessible
Chapter 1 45

subsequent undesirable effects on Chinese characters. This shift in

responsibility is consistent with the role of agency (i.e., actors in Cooper’s
(1989) terms) found more general international experience. For example,
Baldauf and Kaplan (2003: 33) observe that “applied linguists are not
involved in language policy making to any significant extent. The actors
are most likely to be (top-down) politicians, constrained by historical/
constitutional circumstances, or else bureaucrats.”

4.2 A Tentative Evaluation of the Table of Simplified

Characters of 1956 – Periodic Success

In 1951, the Ministry of Education published the First Group of Simpli-

fied Characters, containing 555 characters. After seeking advice from
experts in various fields, the government drafted a Scheme of Simplified
Characters in 1954, which was formally published in the People’s Daily in
January 1956. The Scheme consisted of three tables: a first track of 230
simplified characters already in use, a second track of 285 newly modified
characters, and a third track of 54 streamlined radicals. It was a require-
ment that all school textbooks and educational publications should be in
simplified characters starting from the first semester following the issuance
of the Scheme.
To put these changes in context, it is necessary to look at the simplifi-
cation methods used. Methodologically, the Scheme had basically adopted
Qian Xuantong’s principles (see Note 4), and, to conform with Mao’s
directives, the simplified shapes made extensive use of the popular
‘running’ (xingshu) and ‘cursive’ (caoshu) writing styles, as well as substi-
tuting characters by others with the same pronunciation. DeFrancis (1979:
147) and Tsang (1996: 8-11) have listed these changes under three broad
categories:
• Simplification by shape: a) using part of the original character to
represent the whole: 業 业 (ye, profession), 術 术 (shu, skill);
b) using just the silhouetted outline of the original one: 斉 齐 (qi,
complete), 變 变 (bian, change): c) using a simplified sign to
replace the complex part in the original one: 趙 赵 (zhao, surname),
漢 汉 (han, Chinese).
• Simplification by pronunciation: a) using the existing simple or simpli-
fied identical or similar component to replace the more complex
phonetic compound of the original one: 殱 歼 (jian, destroy), 鄰
邻 (lin, neighbor); b) using the existing simple or simplified full or
partial homonym of similar or even unrelated meaning, to replace the
46 Making Hanzi Accessible

complex character with the same or similar pronunciation: 鬥 斗

(dou, to fight), 鬰 郁 (yu, gloomy).
• Simplification by semantic implications: Creating a new simple charac-
ter by combining two characters according to their semantic relations:
塵 尘 (chen, dust), 滅 灭 (mie, to perish).

The simplification reform of 1956 that people talk about today

generally refers to the General List of Simplified Characters (GLSC) of
1964, as this list is the final outcome of a series of tables that preceded it.
The co-existence of a number of tables published in the 1950s confused
users, with the biggest discrepancy being how to treat some characters
when their simplified form is used as a component in other characters. In
February 1964, the State Council decreed that it was acceptable to
abbreviate most of the characters whenever they appeared as radicals or
components in other characters. The following May, the CCSR published a
General List of Simplified Characters containing 2,238 characters. How-
ever, simplification of traditional Chinese writing actually involves two
additional processes, apart from the structural simplification for each
individual character through stroke reduction; it also refers to the total
number of strokes that are reduced and the shape standardization. The
latter is evident in the two accompanying lists: the First Table of Verified
Variant Forms (1955), and the General List of Print Fonts of Chinese
Characters (GLPFCC) of 1965. Under the first measure 1,053 variant
forms, referring to several characters having the same meaning and pro-
nunciation but different forms, were eliminated through careful selection
(some 26 of these subsequently have been resumed). Second, in the
GLPFCC, shapes, stroke number and writing conventions of 6,196 charac-
ters were fixed, thus bringing to an end the chaotic situation that had
plagued publications.
Another important event that occurred during this period of the script
modernization in the 1950s and 1960s was the promulgation of the
Alphabetic Scheme of Chinese Romanization (more widely known as
pinyin) in 1958. This reform is a major outcome of government policy to
promote early literacy teaching in schools, but its introduction has not
posed a threat to hanzi writing and use. Aspects of this reform are referred
to subsequently (see Section 2, Chapter 7).
The deficiencies in the simplified hanzi system came under fire from
overseas Chinese residents from the very beginning. Because the
discussion was heated and the criticism was sharp even before the TSC
was commissioned, dissident voices in mainland China were silenced as
part of the Anti-Rightists Campaign7 of 1958, and contentious academic
Chapter 1 47

views were indiscriminately labeled as politically-biased attacks. Thus, no

negative comments were heard about the TSC until a symposium that was
held in December 1986. The effect of this repression inside the country
was that since its publication in 1956, no overarching assessment was
attempted to examine any unexpected impacts on the writing system. This
is abnormal in most LP situations, and as a consequence, since the mid-1980s
there has been an increasing amount written about dysfunctionality in
Chinese script reform. Overseas opposition forces have been joined by a
growing number of Mainland scholars, who now admit that simplification
was not entirely perfect.
Understandably, Taiwan has produced more publications that critically
analyze the failures of the Mainland language reform than any other place.
Despite the fact that many authors are detractors rather than objective
critics in this politically and culturally charged intellectual tussle8, there
are analysts, such as Huang Peirong (1992) and Tsang Yuan-hou (1996),
whose work is analytic with conclusions that are free of political bias. Chia
(1992), a scholar from Singapore, is thought to be the first person to have
comprehensively and objectively analyzed the problems in the TSC that
have become evident over a relatively long period of time of use.
Ferguson (1996: 283) points out that “the measurement of efficiency
must always be in terms of particular goals; if these are left inexplicit; the
whole definition of efficiency becomes problematic”. Critical comments
that evaluate simplification gains and losses tend to take an ahistorical
perspective. We would argue that the 1950s script reform is an embedded
historical process that is more meaningfully understood if it is looked at
systematically in three separate historical periods.

4.2.1 The Mao Era (1949-1977)

The achievements during the Mao period have manifested themselves

in economic interests and political gains. From the very beginning, party
leaders stressed that script reform must be treated as a political task. This
was partly because the new government needed to consolidate its legiti-
macy to rule through the creation of visible achievements. The objectives
of the hanzi simplifications were often presented through slogans and then
specifically used to further particular governmental political purposes. For
example, adult literacy was realized by teaching agriculture and production
knowledge, or by making the more fundamental goal of educating the next
revolutionary generation easier. It can be said that hanzi simplification is
one of the few revolutionary actions, occurring during Mao’s era that has
not been denounced and reversed after the Cultural Revolution.
48 Making Hanzi Accessible

Considering the fact that only frequently used characters were simpli-
fied, the degree of convenience created varies, depending on the type of
text. Table 1-4 provides a better idea of the quantitative impact of stroke
reduction as viewed from a number of comparative perspectives.

Table 1-4. Comparison of stroke reduction before and after simplification

Statistics Before After Simplified

simplification simplification by
Average number of strokes for
544 characters that underwent 16.08 strokes 8.17 strokes 50 %
simplification (Wang 1995: 148)

Characters with less than ten

strokes for 2,238 characters in the 141 1,263 Increase from
General List (Chia 1992: 236- characters characters 6.3 % to 56.4 %
237)

Number of strokes for characters

with less than ten strokes for 6 strokes on
36,283 strokes 23,055 strokes
2,238 characters in the General average
List (Chia 1992: 236-237)

Average strokes in one million

characters of running text (Zhou 9.15 strokes 7.67 strokes 8.4%
1979: 341-342)

Average number of strokes for

most used 2,000 characters (Zhou 11.2 9.18 12%
1992: 168)

4.2.2 The Deng Era (1978 to the beginning of the 1990s)

Simplification caused a break between the writing system used in the

mainland and that of the overseas community. The problems, stemming
from the inconvenience of communicating with traditional character
regions, only became evident in the Deng (Xiaoping) era after 1978 as
political and economic policy moved to take on a more external focus.
Given the socio-political setting in the 1950s, it was not surprising that
little consideration was given to the external users. However, since the
1980s, there have been many reports that visiting and returning overseas
Chinese have found themselves suddenly alienated from their own
Chapter 1 49

motherland and culture of origin. The cultural barrier the change has
caused, both within China and in other character using regions, has led to
international communication barriers in the East Asian region. As yet, no
research has been done on the impact this may have had on external
investment in China. While this kind of two-way interaction between
regions using the simplified characters and traditional characters was of no
concern during Mao’s leadership, when China was basically an inwardly-
focused country – it may even have been deliberately pursued to block the
people from communicating with the outside world – it became an issue
during Deng’s economic reform and ‘opening-up’. The change from
inwardness to outwardness offers a good illustration of Ferguson’s (1996:
283) point: “if the goal is to facilitate linguistic understanding with a
neighboring nation, one kind of orthography may be highly efficient, while
if the goal is to have a nationally distinctive language or to inhibit
communication with the other nation then a different kind of orthography
would be more efficient”.

4.2.3 The IT Era in the 1990s

Today, while simplified characters have won significant approval

among the majority of Chinese scholars, both inside and outside China, it
has become clear to them that systematic rationalization is more vital than
the quantitative reduction of stroke complexity. In keeping abreast of the
information age, reducing the number of components has attracted a lot of
attention from scholars. One of the earliest, Hung Hin-chung9 (1980: 34),
recognized the shortcomings of pure simplification from his own experi-
ence in mechanizing hanzi:
Chinese people are shortsighted people. Today, we write characters
with a pen, so it is reasonable to simplify the strokes in order to save
time, but this is not a future-oriented thought. If we still write
characters by using strokes in the next century, then Chinese culture
will become extinct even if Chinese characters survive the time.
As this brief history of the FSS and TSC suggests, the TSC in the
1950s was adopted as an interim measure for contemporary convenience,
prior to formally embarking on the road to Romanization. Feng Zhiwei
(2001: personal communication10) argued vividly that the TSC was not the
only thing that was in the government’s ‘pockets’: they only took out the
items in one side-pocket to test the public’s response; the real objective –
Romanization – was in the other pocket. The guiding ideology in this
situation, ‘the simpler, the more efficient’, became the dominant premise
50 Making Hanzi Accessible

of simplification. However, the problems that have emanated from the

technological developments of the information age were unanticipated, and
these will be left for relevant sections in forthcoming chapters.

4.2.4 Lessons Learned from the TSC

It is unquestionable that the 1956 simplification contributed to the great

success achieved in diminishing the large number of illiterates and in
spreading the knowledge about nation building. However, since China
embarked upon a policy of economic reform and opening up in 1978, the
anarchic situation that can be seen in actual language use indicates that
simplified character use in Mainland China has not been the success it first
seemed to be. This is indubitably so after the advent of the modern
computer as will be seen in subsequent chapters in this volume. In the end,
therefore, what has been achieved is limited and has only lasted for a
relatively short period of time (see e.g., Zhou 1986a; 1992). The historical
phenomenon of initial success, but with more and more problems arising
because the social conditions in which the reform was made had changed,
offers Chinese LP workers some lessons on which to reflect:
• Script reform is a kind of large-scale social experiment; being a time-
related phenomenon, it is difficult to determine the degree to which
goals are fulfilled and the far-reaching impact of the various outcomes
that are subject to historical settings and technological conditions. As
Kaplan and Baldauf (1997: 5) observe, LP projects target human
behavior, which “usually goes beyond the life of any political
administration. At the termination of the project, there is no palpable
outcome to see. There is no easy or agreed way to measure the benefits
derived from the project.”
• The historical nature of Chinese hanzi – which are used by one quarter
of the world’s population and have survived an enormously long
history almost intact – cannot be overlooked. Any reform of a well-
developed and time-honored language cannot be achieved over a short
time frame.
• How one can consolidate the achievements, gained in a highly centrally
controlled and pre-reform society, in a rapidly changing sociolinguistic
environment, remains unresolved.
• As this section suggests, the reform of 1956 can be regarded as
linguistically successful. But this observation is made in the abstract,
without sufficient emphasis on the wider social context. Therefore, the
Chapter 1 51

problem of the impact of the traditional system emanating from the

communication problems with regions outside China, where, to varying
degrees, traditional characters are still in use, has not been assessed.

5. SECOND SIMPLIFICATION SCHEME (SSS)

(1977)

The drafting work on the SSS started in the 1960s. After the GLSC was
published in 1964, it was agreed that there were still a large number of
commonly used characters that had more than ten strokes. Some simplified
forms of these characters were shown to the public to elicit their opinions
along with a series of simplification tables, published in the 1950s. There
were a range of views on how to simplify some characters, but the
government promised these characters would be simplified when further
elaborations were available and further simplified characters had been
collected. However, the beginning of the Cultural Revolution meant that
the formulation process was not able to proceed in the same manner as in
the 1950s. In particular, during the chaotic period of the Cultural
Revolution in the mid-1970s, when the revolutionary spirit of the masses
had reached its peak, the table in question was substantially expanded and
gained the attention of the top national leaders. But for some reason, as yet
not clearly explained, the proposal was shelved and was not passed by the
central government until the end of 1977, immediately after the end of the
Cultural Revolution and the celebration of the demise of the Gang of
Four11.
The Scheme came out as two lists, although the preface stated that the
first list, which contained 248 characters, was to be put into immediate
formal use, while the remaining 605 characters could be used in trials.
However, in most cases, this distinction was not made in actual practice.
Furthermore, due to the well-defined and effective Communist propaganda
system, the Scheme very quickly penetrated deeply into public life. The
Scheme encountered a mixed reaction following its official publication,
and momentum opposing it grew so quickly and was so strong, that by
July 1978, barely eight months after it took effect, the SSS was withdrawn
from use in school textbooks and the major national newspapers, and was
finally formally rescinded in 1986. In order to better understand these
events better, we need to understand the ideological nature of the political
system in China.
52 Making Hanzi Accessible

5.1 Political Presence in Chinese Characters and

Character Planning

The Chinese Communist Party identifies itself with Marxist tenets. The
main elements in Marx’s theory of society can be summarized as follows:
the mode of production and relations of production, the economic base and
superstructure, contradictions and class struggle, social formation (such as
capitalist and communist society) and revolutionary change. Thus, the
mode of production determines the general social, political, and intel-
lectual life process, i.e., the superstructure. According to the Marxist
school of thought, in 1949, when the people (i.e., the Communist Party)
took power and replaced capitalism with socialism, there still remained an
important economic base to give rise to a new bourgeois element. A
potential conflict in the superstructure could not be ruled out as long as the
struggle between the two antagonistic economic classes continued.
The decisive factor in creating the nature and function of language is
the political need of the dominant class. Thus, in a class-based society
characters inevitably become an instrument of proletarian indoctrination.
For example, in discussing how language is related to politics, Kim (1992:
242) says that in the 1960s, North Korea’s socialist movement for
language reform was “a logical product of the communist doctrine, in
which language is not just a medium of interpersonal communication but
is viewed as ‘a weapon of revolution’, or instrument for implementing
communist ideals such as social equality and justice, egalitarianism, etc.”
This helps us to understand the political impact on script reform, which
was seen as a part of an ideological structure, containing a matrix of sup-
portive versus contradictory relationships between the economic structure
and character simplification. According to CCP doctrine, China prior to
liberation in 1949 was a semi-colonial, semi-feudal society, where the
dominant classes were the landlords and capitalists (see Figure 1-2), and
where the superstructure was aligned with the economic base. For the ruling
classes, reading and writing skills were a source of their power and
influence, so a supportive relationship existed between social class and
traditional characters. After liberation, when China had become a socialist
country, the means of writing was no longer compatible with ruling class as
the superstructure should satisfy the economic substructure. Therefore, the
proletarian masses now had both the need and the power to reform the
writing system in order to make it serve the new society more effectively.
Nevertheless, from an analysis of the relationships of production, potential
capitalist factors continued to exist in socialist China after the simplification
Chapter 1 53

scheme of 1956. The various reactionary elements (persons with power,

capital, education) representing the capitalists’ interests, invariably opposed
character simplification.
According to N.Y. Marr, a dominant linguist in developing a ‘socialist
linguistics theory’ in the former Soviet Union, language, including writing,
has a class nature in that it is part of the superstructure. Language changes
when the economic base undergoes change as a new class comes to power,
as in the transition from feudalism to capitalism to socialism. Marr’s idea
found fertile soil in China because of hanzi’s apparent class nature. It was
seized upon by Chinese Romanization advocates to buttress their argu-
ments for a more fundamental reform, i.e., replacing Chinese characters
with an alphabetic system. The Declaration of the New Latinized Script,
passed by the First Congress of Chinese New Script, which was organized
by exiled members of the CCP in the Soviet Union on September 26, 1931
announced:

Figure 1-2. Class analysis of script reform (Adapted from Kwong 1979: 12)
54 Making Hanzi Accessible

[T]his congress holds that Chinese characters are an attachment of the

past and feudalism, and that they have become a tool for the ruling
class to oppress the poor class. For the vast working people they are a
real obstacle to gaining literacy, thus hanzi are not in conformity with
the new era (Li M.S. 2000: 299).
Luckily for Chinese hanzi, this class-based theory was not sufficiently
long-lived to create a more pernicious effect on Chinese language reform.
Because the Marr School was quickly losing approval when Joseph
Stalin’s Marxism on Linguistic Issues was published in mid-1950s, his
followers in China were also forced to self-criticize (see Wu 1978).
In fact, during the founding years of the PRC, the relatively democratic
climate provided a favorable environment for any cultural undertaking. In
this atmosphere, script reform work might have proceeded along a smoother
road had not a turn to the left in the political arena produced the Anti-
Rightists Movement and the Cultural Revolution.

5.2 Formalization and Implementation

After noting how political ideological was incorporated into the notion
of Chinese character reform, in the following sections, we look at how the
radical SSS, which was boldly expanded from about 100 characters to a
seemingly impossible 850 characters over a short period, got published.

5.2.1 The Dying Cinders Glowing Again

In 1965, GLPFCC was officially published, and 6196 characters had

their standard fonts for the publishing industry defined. After this, due to
the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution, publications related to LP were
virtually discontinued until 1972, when Guo Moruo, the authoritative
scholar in the study of jiaguwen and the president of the China Academy
of Sciences, published an article in Hongqi (Red Flag) Magazine, praising
the masses’ enthusiasm for creating new simple characters (Guo 1972: 84-
85). Given the fact that this was the first significant article to be published
on language reform issues in seven years, and that it appeared not in a
linguistics journal, but in the mouthpiece and the theoretical journal of the
CCP (Guo was China’s then Vice-Premier), its political significance was
self-evident. Milsky (1973: 98-133), a Paris-based Sinologist, was so excit-
ed by the latest development of the official policy in Chinese language
reform heralded by this article, that he made an unusually detailed analysis
of its significance, section by section.
Chapter 1 55

Similarly, some other articles that had appeared at the beginning of the
1970s are of special significance when discussing the historical events
leading up to the resumption of simplification and the publication of the
Second Scheme. In 1973, two articles with heavy political overtones
appeared in the People’s Daily, by the same author (Wen Hua, an obvious
pseudonym), entitled The Written Language Must be Reformed and On
Reforming Written Chinese. Despite the fact that the class basis of
characters had been rebutted in Stalin’s comments in the 1950s, the debate
over script reform in China began to be raised as a political issue again. In
order to justify why so much importance should be placed on script
reform, its political significance was raised in another form, with the
emphasis on the class nature of writing reform instead of on writing per se.
As Wen Hua (cited in DeFrancis 1984b: 267) points out, “Written lan-
guage is a system of symbols for recording spoken language. It has no class
nature in and of itself; the work of reforming it has a clear-cut class
nature.” In another article, Wen Hua (Seybolt and Chiang 1979: 351)
provided a further explanation about the class orientation of writing reform
work:
The fierce struggle between the two classes and the two lines within
our country is reflected in the work of language reform. In 1957, the
right wing of the bourgeoisie attacked language reform. Swindlers like
Liu Shaoqi and Lin Biao are the deadly enemies of socialism. Within
our Party, they represent the landlords and bourgeoisie. “They do not
want workers and peasants to lift their heads politically and culturally”
[Mao Zedong].
While this reasoning sounds somewhat convoluted, the political fervor
it expressed was very much the standard of the times; therefore no one
appears to have come forward to challenge it. To serve political ends, the
Special Language Reform Unit of Nanjing University (in collaboration
with its counterpart, the Beijing University), led a campaign to criticize the
Confucian ‘great man’ historical theory claimed to be promoted by Lin
Biao12. In January of 1974, a paper, written by this Unit, entitled ‘Cangjie
means the Masses and the Masses Means Cangjie’, was published in the
Guangming Daily. The article emphasized that the ‘mass line’ in script
reform is the underlying principle of language reform, “the great masses
have contributed to language reform by using their wisdom to create new
simplified characters.” This is the so-called for the masses, by the masses
doctrine, because the masses not only have created the hanzi, but also were
the force to push forward its development forward. Considering that the
nature of the Cultural Revolution was a political game or exercise, to use
56 Making Hanzi Accessible

mass movements to achieve personal ends (see e.g., Liu 1986), this slogan
of ‘come from the people, back to the people’ is a reflection of the Cultural
Revolution at work in language work. In addition, the theme of alignment
was furthered by a series of other activities. A biweekly column on
language reform in the Guangming Daily was resumed, and articles encou-
raging further simplification by the masses were published in this column.
A small dictionary of newly simplified characters was given official support
and published in 1973, and a book, entitled The Overhauling and Simpli-
fication of Chinese Characters, was edited by the Language Reform Press
(Beijing) in 1974. The book, which is a collection of articles dealing with
simplified characters, was authored by peasants, soldiers, and workers,
which were then propagated as the ‘basic elements of revolutionary
masses’. More significantly, most of the trained LP staff were expelled
from the CCSR, and it was restructured and staffed with non-expert
personnel representing the masses.

5.2.2 A Critical Review of Promulgation

The SSS took shape in 1974, and it was originally scheduled to be

given national publicity in 1975. But after the Scheme was submitted to
the State Council for further review, in the name of the CCSR, the request
was not acted upon immediately. In some areas in late 1975, however, the
draft proposal was distributed for discussion, to people down to the
brigade level of the rural communes.
Many questions around the formalization of the SSS and its final public
release still remain to be answered. It was assumed that while much
valuable information remains political and personally sensitive, key figures
involved in Chinese LP would know a great deal about these decisions.
The first author has tried to obtain more information about some of these
questions through personal contact with the key figures, but failed to get
unambiguous and satisfactory answers, leaving the issue vague for the
foreseeable future. No open discussion of the formalization process is
available, not even to the extent of there being some sketchy paragraphs on
this issue. As most personnel who participated in the process are still
active in LP or in other academic circles, it remains a very sensitive topic.
In the Chinese cultural context, it is always best to avoid specifying the
person responsible for an event when that person would be linked
negatively to a situation. This cultural behavior makes it very hard to piece
together a complete picture of what happened in order to draw reliable
conclusions. The literature concerning the process is quite confusing, with
contradictory articles.
Chapter 1 57

In addition to cultural and social reluctance, much valuable infor-

mation, especially that from the 1960s and 70s, is still classified and
withheld for various political and strategic reasons – it is common policy
for many governments around the world to withhold documents in their
archives for 25 or 30 years. As Blachford (2004: 183) laments, “the
greatest difficulty in analyzing the policy process in China derives from
the practice of closed-door meetings and the confidentiality of almost all
internal documents”. In discussing Mao’s role in LP programs in the
1950s, DeFrancis (1984b: 257) uses phrases like “[T]his remains buried in
archives that it is hoped will one day be opened for study”, or “the tan-
talizing uncertainties whose resolution awaits further information” (p.
258). Official data for events or actions, reported in the highly party-
controlled media, are more likely to be based on political considerations
than on being related to the existing reality.
In 1974, an eight-member delegation of American linguists visited
China and held wide-ranging discussions with LP practitioners, including
some key members in the CCSR. The CCSR’s officials claimed, according
to the accounts subsequently published by the delegation (Lehmann 1975:
46-47), that since 1964, the Committee had collected simplified characters
coined by the masses. After a systematic study of these characters, it sub-
mitted the draft list of about 100 simplified characters to the State Council
for approval. It was expected that these would be promulgated in 1975,
and then the list of approved characters would again be distributed to the
masses for discussion and comment before its official publication. If this
was the expectation, two questions arise:

• Why was its promulgation delayed for two years until 1977?
• How did a moderate list of 100 characters become a list of 853 charac-
ters when it was finally presented to the public?

At first glance, the following standard official explanation seems to

provide an answer to the first question (Seybolt and Chiang 1979: 379):

As early as May 1975, the Committee for Chinese Writing Reform

submitted the ‘Second Plan for Simplifying Chinese Characters
(Draft),’ but it was suppressed unreasonably by Zhang Chunqiao, using
authority that he has stolen. Now that the Gang of Four has been struck
down, there is hope for writing reform. Under the leadership of the
Party Central Committee headed by Chairman Hua, the ‘Second Plan
for Simplifying Chinese Characters (Draft)’, which the masses have
long awaited, has finally been introduced to them.
58 Making Hanzi Accessible

Except for this kind of slogan-like denouncement beset with political

cliché, no substantial evidence has been given to suggest Zhang (Vice-
Premier of the State Council during the Cultural Revolution) or his colla-
borators in the Gang of Four had been obstructing the simplification
process. The following, more detailed account, appeared in People’s Daily
on February 22, 1977. It is the only description that can be found in official
publications regarding their crime against Party language reform policy.
In May 1975, the CCSR submitted the SSS to the State Council. Just at
this time … Zhang Chunqiao had usurped the Party and seized the
leadership. He did not even look at the SSS, but held it unreasonably
for two months, excusing himself that “I don’t know the historical
development of character reform well”. Then he deliberately passed it
to Premier Zhou Enlai … Even if it is true that he [Zhang] did not
know it very well, he could order an investigation into it through
relevant organizations. In fact, Zhang Chunqiao was an opponent of the
Vernacularization Movement during the 1930s … Jiang Qing also once
complained and shouted “simplified characters make people like us
become almost illiterate …”
Historical sources indicate, however, that Zhang himself used to be one
of the pioneers advocating the simplification and Vernacular Movement in
the 1930s (Li 1934; Fei 1997: 66). Zhang’s indecision is more of a
technical concern rather than being politically inspired. “Their reservations
concerning some of the shortcomings of the draft, shared by many who
saw it later, was quoted as evidence of ‘suppression’ immediately after
their fall from power”, as Rohsenow (1986: 84) has rightly pointed out.
Furthermore, as previously noted, the formation of the SSS was an out-
come of the Cultural Revolution, which the Gang of Four enthusiastically
supported and directly benefited from. The enlarged list generously
included ‘creations by the masses’, and as such manifested their ‘revolu-
tionary spirit’. It appears, therefore, that some other explanations ought to
be sought to account for the two-year delay in the release of the SSS.
It is reasonable to infer that the simplified character list, submitted to
the State Council, was the shorter version of the aforementioned approxi-
mately 100 characters that had been properly selected from the masses
since 1964 and tabulated by senior experts for fuller, careful examination.
The risk of being branded anti-revolutionary Rightists by the Leftist
faction in the CCSR left them no choice but to put it forward to the central
government. However, Left radicals, both in the political domain and
within the linguistic institutions including the CCSR, considered the
proposal not to be revolutionary enough – not embracing all the creations
Chapter 1 59

by the masses that they would have liked to have seen. For instance, Chi
Qun, one of the followers of the Gang of Four and the ‘responsible person’
for science, education, and cultural affairs, was a strong supporter of
increasing the Scheme’s scope (Rohsenow 1986: 76).
Invisible political power games at the highest level were being played
out most visibly in the superstructure (ideological) areas, such as the
cultural and educational sphere, and these became increasingly fierce
towards the end of the decade-long Cultural Revolution. The Leftist forces
of the politically ambitious Gang of Four penetrated into virtually every
institution. The CCSR, which was subordinate to the State Council and
functioned at the ministerial level, was an important battlefield in this
political struggle. One of the original sections in the CCSR was respon-
sible for the collection and standardization of simplified characters in use
by the masses or suggested by them, as well as for the preparation of draft
lists for consideration by the committee. During the Cultural Revolution,
this section was reorganized as the ‘748 Project’ Special Research Group
of Standard Characters13, with an emphasis on non-scholar members and
independence from the CCSR. The composition of this group can only be
surmised, due to the lack of reliable data about its formation and members.
What we can be certain of is that this was an ad hoc body of members,
drawn from the non-academic staff of all organizations concerned with the
Chinese language, such as news agencies and publishing houses, as well as
the CCSR office.
This special group was believed to have played a very instrumental role
in broadening the basic list of about 100 characters to 853. In order to have
a specific source to justify what they had done and to drum-up support in
the publicity campaign for the final publication, Zhou’s instruction was
deliberately quoted in an article published in the People’s Daily (February
22, 1977), in the name of the CCSR:
Our beloved Premier Zhou, being possessed by the demon of disease,
went through the whole draft and report on his sickbed. Premier Zhou
instructed us: “It has been such a long time since Chairman Mao talked
about the simplification of characters, why has so little been done? To
get the opinions from the masses is correct; allow them to revise it …”
DeFrancis (1984b: 261) also noted that this list was the work of some
working staff in the CCSR “without consultation with and, of course,
without the approval of official members of the committee. The draft was
sent directly to the State Council for approval.” But, how could this Leftist
work be published over one year after the fall of the Gang of Four? One
plausible explanation is the ascendance of another well-known official
60 Making Hanzi Accessible

named Ni Zhifu14, who had taken over Zhang’s responsibility for the areas
of education, culture and propaganda after the Gang of Four was arrested
in October 1976. Rohsenow (1986: 78) believes Ni had played a key role
in making it happen:
Finding that Zhang Chunqiao has taken no action on the draft since it
has been submitted to the State Council in May 1975, in order to
protect himself, Ni had no choice but to submit it as he found it,
probably in late 1977. As the draft had been properly submitted by the
CCSR two years earlier, shelved by Zhang Chunqiao, and purportedly
supported by the ever-popular Zhou, the State Council, having far more
pressing matters to deal with, simply approved it and sanctioned its
release for trial use and public comment.
Given the intensity of the political situation during the Cultural
Revolution, especially at the time around 1976, it is not surprising that the
SSS was formed and promulgated in such an unusual way. Another source,
provided by a participant, despite its equivocal paraphrasing, tells us more
about the behind-the-scene facts surrounding its mysterious publication,
and about how confusing the situation was at that time. When Hu Yuzhi,
who was the former vice-director of the CCSR and the former vice-
chairman of the Standing Committee of the Great People’s Congress and
had played a big role in overturning the SSS, wanted to know who had
authorized this scheme for publication in the national newspaper, he had to
turn to staff in the People’s Daily. “Some years after the Second Scheme
was officially published, one day, comrade Hu Yuzhi asked me how the
Second Scheme could get published and ordered me to write a self-
criticism,” said Zhang Xuetao (2000: 6), who served as a journalist with
the China national Xinhua News Agency before his retirement. In his own
words:
When the Great Cultural Revolution began, all members of the CCSR
went to ‘5.7’ Cadre’s Rehabilitation School and they did not return to
the city until the middle of the 1970s, when the revolution came to an
end. … at that time, our ‘748 Project’ Research Group of Standard
Chinese Characters got a room from the CCSR and went to work there
every day. One comrade in our group was from People’s Daily, and he
was very enthusiastic about the script reform. So our group was able to
have the typesetting of the SSS arranged in advance through this
comrade. After it was studied many times by the rank and file within
the CCSR, without the approval from the National People’s Congress,
Chapter 1 61

the SSS was published in a very hurried fashion under the mood of
‘revolution is right’.
The following narrative affords us additional information to get a
clearer understanding of the situation. During a face-to-face argument with
SSS opponents in an officially sponsored meeting on hanzi issues, Zheng
Linxi (1988b: 348), a widely respected script reform pioneer, said:
The SSS has nothing to do with the ‘Gang of Four’, neither is it a con-
comitant of the ‘Leftist Line’. Factually, the first person who insisted
on submitting the draft of the SSS to the ‘above’ [top authority] was
Zhou Rongxin, the then Education Minister. He was persecuted to
death by [nobody but] the ‘Gang of Four’. Therefore, it is contrary to
the historical facts to put a Leftist cap on the SSS. This is a groundless
accusation.
Based on Zhang and Zheng’s statement, we can assume that it is more
likely that the internal conflict between competing forces within the
CCSR, rather than the more superficial political struggles, played a
substantial role in the process. It used to be customary to disgrace ousted
politicians by holding them responsible for all faults committed during
their time in office, which partially explains why the media was so keen to
pick on the ‘Gang of Four’ and blacken other individuals’ names. But this
approach, which oversimplifies the actual situation, is not salutary to any
scientific research and not only blurs historical facts, but also puts up
barriers to a rational analysis, taking attention away from the underlying
reasons which have to be evaluated and submitted to critical analysis in the
future.
Jackson and T’sou (1979: 78) point out that language reform can be
used as a means to gain political balance among various interest groups.
[A]ny language reform must be taken at such a pace that it may not
exacerbate the differences and mutual distrust, [because] the leadership
in the government maintains its position in power by means of a variety
of social, economic and political strategies. … Such a situation may be
acted upon by subversive and anti-communist groups or by factions
within the Party itself who wish to oust the group currently in power.
In case of the SSS, it is interesting to see that the same faction within
the Party that was at one time criticized as a ‘road-blocking tiger’ (ob-
stacle) on the way to the release of the Scheme, was at another time accused
of being its mastermind. The picture of the whole process may become
more ambiguous if we uncritically accept the information offered by
62 Making Hanzi Accessible

official documents. Revealing the complex socio-political fabric in which

LP is embedded can shed some light on our understanding of the origin
and development of the entire process. However, politically biased reviews
invariably downplay and distort certain factors and tend to overlook the
complexity of LP. So particular questions are avoided: If the Gang of Four
were the guilty party in the Scheme’s postponement, what were the likely
underlying factors leading to that failure? What is the implication of
accusing a clique of ousted politicians? Can other attempts be similarly
generalized, say, the previous failed reforms of 1935?
Furthermore, a tentative exploration of the official version of the SSS’s
publication process shows that any LP evaluation should not concern itself
purely with examining the political context or finding the individual who
bears real responsibility. To ensure that attention is not distracted from
examining LP as a whole, politically charged explanations require some
degree of conscientious examination.

5.2.3 The Abandonment of the Second Scheme

The Scheme was published in full in China’s two most important news-
papers (People’s Daily and Guangming Daily) on December 20, 1977,
along with editorials, entitled Speeding up the Pace of Character
Simplification and A Jolly Event Welcomed by the Masses, respectively.
The next day, these two major papers started to use the characters from the
first list. In the first few days after the announcement, many signed articles
were arranged to hail the publication, and the response from the general
public was to a greater or lesser extent positive. In particular, the Language
Reform column of the Guangming Daily poured out a great number of
articles which recorded enthusiastic support from the masses, but
vigorously criticized the Gang of Four for their role in retarding the reform
process, and for the “heavy losses they caused in education and language
planning” (December 20, 1977, People’s Daily and Guangming Daily).
Blame even extended to Liu Shaoqi15 and Lin Biao, regardless of the
evidence to the contrary which supported Liu’s actual role in reforming
hanzi, and to Lin Biao who was at no stage known to oppose the simpli-
fication.
Perhaps because of this fervent initial official reception, withdrawal of
the Scheme was not straightforward and three distinct phases can be seen.
1. The cooling-down period. This was marked by three observable facts
that contributed to a subsiding fervor in the political tone of the SSS:
Chapter 1 63

• It got a chilly response from professional circles. Chinese Linguistics

(Zhongguo Yuwen), the country’s foremost linguistics journal, nei-
ther used SSS characters nor published articles to endorse the SSS,
which is in stark contrast to its enthusiastic role in the 1950s
simplifications;
• More unusually, at the annual Conference of the National People’s
Congress and the political consultancy held in March of 1978, the
conference organizing secretariat was strongly cautioned before
the meeting not to use SSS characters in any official documents
of the conference by some prominent linguists, who were them-
selves representatives at the conference (Fei 1997: 352);
• Then, on January 7, 1980, when answering readers’ letters, the
People’s Daily declared: “the large-scale experiment [of the SSS]
has been accomplished and will enter a revision phase”. To clear up
any confusion, this official position was reiterated by a news report
in People’s Daily (12.5.1980), announcing that: The trial use needed
further revision before it could be submitted to the State Council for
approval.

2. The re-evaluation period. This started in the spring of 1980, when the
functions of the CCSR were resumed and a special SSS Revision
Committee was set up, headed by Wang Li, who had suffered political
persecution for expressing his views on language issues. The re-evalu-
ation process involved consecutive closed-door meetings for which no
references are available, so it is not known how consensus was reached
to settle differences among the members. But there are detectable
indications of disagreement that suggest that the process eventually
came down essentially to one issue: “What should be the guiding
principles for the revision outcomes and for further simplification
generally”. For example, should simplification be based on a careful
and systematic overhaul of the whole system of characters, or a greater
use of the forms already in use by and coming from the masses, but
giving little consideration to the scientific view of treating the hanzi
system as a whole? There was even more widespread opposition to any
further changes to the shape of hanzi. The dispute on these matters was
inevitably complicated by the need for fundamental and theoretical
political correctness, with which none of the academics would have
liked to have become embroiled, given the nature of the unfathomable
situation and capricious policy during that period. Seen from this
perspective, it is not hard to understand why it took so many years for
the Revision Committee and the CCSR to contemplate the issue, while
64 Making Hanzi Accessible

still being unable to come up with a definite decision as expected. The

competing views within the CCSR were not clearly recognized by
outsiders, and one hardly finds any news items or articles about the
Scheme. This murky situation lasted until 1984, and there was even
some unofficial information that “in fact, the revised version of the SSS
had been shelved temporarily and perhaps indefinitely” (Rohsenow
1986: 83). It appeared that the decision had to wait for a clearer
political climate or message from higher authorities.
3. The formal abandonment. As the previous section shows, in theory, the
SSS operated in a state of “eliciting opinions” for seven years (Fei
1997: 425), until the formal decision was made at a seven day meeting
of the National Conference on Language Work which was held in
Beijing in January, 1986. The decision-making process was kept from
outsiders, but from the official documents released from the Confer-
ence and sporadic scholarly discussions that followed, it was obvious
that the SSS was one of the hardest issues that the conference had to
deal with, partly owing to the fact that during this period, the Party did
not adopt a clear position relative to the further reform of hanzi. An
analysis of the conference documents suggests that the mood was
characterized by the views of relatively conservative scholars, and was
unrepresentative of the radicals who had contributed to the SSS, and
who turned out to have few real friends at the meeting. It appears that
there was little dispute on the repudiation of the second batch of char-
acters proposed under the SSS (605 characters), but the representatives
could not agree on the treatment of the first batch (248 characters),
particularly on those well-established 110 characters recommended by
the Revision Committee. Finally, after much wrangling, the conference
participants decided to wash their hands of this sticky issue and pass it
on to “those more senior”. So the final decision to reject probably was
made at the end of the conference, not as a result of conference discus-
sion, based on top-level decisive authority. Instead of a clear explan-
ation, the overthrow of the SSS was accompanied by a general policy
statement indicating that in the future the government would take an
extremely prudent approach to hanzi reform.

5.3 Factors That Led to the Abandonment

The four factors that are implicated in the abandonment of the SSS,
institutional forces, timing factors, technical rationals and economic ratio-
nals are discussed in the following sections.
Chapter 1 65

5.3.1 Institutional Forces

Because the SSS was put into effect under an unusual set of circum-
stances, although it was in fact enacted by the appropriate state organ, the
official LPers were not involved in the full decision-making process, and
its legality has been often cited as a reason that led to its final rejection
(e.g., Zhou 1992). But, this did not seem to be the central concern when
the authorities decided to nullify the Scheme in 1986, because the legality
issue was never mentioned. It is believed that some influential members in
the CCSR, and other high-ranking authoritative figures in charge of ideo-
logical affairs, played a decisive part in the wholesale rejection. The
strongest attack came from a rather unified group centered in the CCSR.
As time went by, their stand created a climate in which an ever-increasing
number of people articulated their dissenting views. As indicated previ-
ously, most members of the pre-Cultural Revolution CCSR, who were the
protagonists in drawing up the TSC, suffered from being prosecuted as
Rightists during the Cultural Revolution political struggle. When it ended,
these scholars came back to the city from the countryside, eventually
taking up their original posts in the reorganized CCSR16. In 1986, the two
conflicting factions invariably despised each other. Owing to a lack of
common ‘language’, ideological divergences arose that added more fuel
than necessary to the ‘language struggle’. These members felt uncom-
fortable with the appearance of the SSS, not because they tended to be
naturally conservative, but because they were reacting strongly against the
unqualified non-specialist members in the agency, who should have been
made accountable for broadening the originally moderate draft Scheme to
the more radical one accepted in 1977. Many did not even try to conceal
their personal aversion and their attempts to overturn the SSS through
unofficial channels. Liu Yongquan (1991: 397) once said, “I totally oppos-
ed the SSS and lodged my complaints with the higher leaders whenever
an opportunity was available”. This kind of sentiment was pointed out by
some scholars (e.g., Chen Y.S. 2004; Yu 1996) in latter reflections on the
abandonment of the SSS.
It may be difficult for outsiders to believe that a decision on national
language policy could be decided on the basis of the support or antipathy
of an influential lobby group. Unfortunately, cases in which language
reform was sabotaged by a personal affront have been attested to in other
polities. The well-known ‘Japanese Language Council Incident’ of 1961
(He 2001), and the feuding over which of the highly-disputed character sets
(CCCII vs CNS 11643) to use as the hanzi encoding standard in Taiwan
(Hsieh and Huang 1989; Hsieh 2001), can be cited as other examples.
66 Making Hanzi Accessible

In discussing the influence of social concerns on the script reform

controversy, Geerts et al (1977: 233) cites Couvreur as saying, “For some
combatants it seems to be just an occasion to settle personal grudges”.
Gonzalez (2002: 10) attributed the slow development of Pilipino, the
national language of the Philippines intellectualization to “jejune debate of
personal opinions of members” of the national commission on Filipino
language.

5.3.2 Timing Factors

Matters of timing are key factors in ensuring the success of a LP

program (e.g., Ball 1999). The SSS was promulgated at a time when the
whole population was eager to settle down to a normal life after more than
a decade of social upheaval during the Cultural Revolution; they were fed
up with constant drastic changes (Zhou 1992). On the other hand, there
was a strong tendency to undo things that had been done under the ‘wrong
political line’ adopted by the gang of four. “This sentiment had become
stronger after 1979, when Hua Guofeng, Mao’s successor, who vigorously
resisted any reassessment and correction of previous policies, was remov-
ed by the political clout of reformers led by Deng Xiaoping.” (Zhao 2005:
339)
Eastman (1983: 24) argued that script reform “affects all at once the
web of communication, it cannot be introduced gradually but requires an
immediate willingness to change habits”. In this sense, we can venture to
hypothesize that, if the second simplification had been carried out a few
years earlier, or as the result of a more normal decision-making process in
the 1980s, the likelihood of success would have been greatly increased. At
least the initially proposed 100 characters were quite soundly based from a
technical point of view. Therefore, the assumption that external interfer-
ence probably overruled linguistic considerations in the final rejection of
the Second Scheme is probably valid.

5.3.3 Technical Rationales

Cheng (1983: 5-6) points to three factors that should be considered in

measuring the success of Chinese script reform:

• Popularity: acceptability of affected characters among the common

user;
• Stability: the number of (school) years between the two simplifications;
• Scale of Change: reduction made to the total number of common char-
acters and number of strokes for individual characters.
Chapter 1 67

Except for popularity, which is a very controversial subject and

difficult to measure exactly, the numerical results for the other two factors
are readily known. For stability, the time span between the TSC and SSS is
22 years, which is not considered long enough on a normal scale of
linguistic evolution to bring about any substantial changes. The change
scale can be partly seen from the two tables in this scheme: the first
contains 248 characters and the second 605. The second scheme, however,
was projected to encompass 4,500 commonly used characters and over 270
re-simplified or abolished characters17.
Furthermore, the recipients of the SSS were not as homogenous a group
as either the FSS or the TSC. By the time the SSS was publicized, the TSC
had been in use for 22 years, and a generation had been educated in the
simplified system of writing. While it might have been welcomed by the
preschooler and the illiterate, it also may have been seen as a burden by
significant segments of the population, including not only the older gene-
ration, who had switched from traditional to simplified characters 22 years
ago, but also to the people who had received their education under the
TSC. More significantly, by this time the illiterates that the FSS aimed to
serve had been overtaken in number by the literate population who were
familiar with the TSC characters and felt uncomfortable with SSS
characters.
Lastly, from a methodological point of view, the arbitrary nature of
oversimplification was a technical failure. The success of the TSC lay
quite significantly in the fact that most simplified characters included in
the TSC had been circulated among ordinary people for daily use for
centuries before the TSC scheme was drawn up. For example, a significant
number of simplified forms in the first table of the TSC are from the FSS.
Su (2001c: 199) counted 288 same or similar FSS forms that were adopted
in the TSC, which accounts for 88 percent of the total in FSS. ‘Established
usage’ is widely considered the basic principle underlying both the FSS in
1935 and the TSC in 1956. It is acknowledged that simplified forms,
already prevalent among the masses, are easy to promote although they are
not necessarily rational or systematic. Zhou (1986b) contends that the
failure of the Second Scheme is chiefly due to its deviation from this
principle; it suddenly created a large number of ‘new-faced’ characters that
had never been seen previously. As Zhao (2005: 337) points out, “Just as
the Great Leap Forward happened on the economic scene in 1958, the
immature SSS was issued under a similar Leftist atmosphere of utopian
68 Making Hanzi Accessible

idealism, hoping for a quick result through a mass campaign”. More

importantly, it should not have included additional industry specific
characters and regional variants (Zhou 1986c).

5.3.4 Economic Rationales

Another aspect of the technical considerations was the rapid develop-

ment of the IT industry, which was not allowed enough time to make the
comprehensive changes that were required. The national standard, BSSC
CII-GB 2312-80, had just come into force in 1980, and to reprogram the
large number of imported hard disks would have been an unaffordable
financial burden (Fu 2002: personal communication). After a long break in
the cultural infrastructure work because of the Cultural Revolution, some
state-sponsored reference books, encyclopedias and dictionaries of national
importance were under way or being completed, and any change made to
the characters meant an enormous repetition of work and economic losses
for the participating academics and the publishing industry. For example,
Chen Yuan, a renowned sociolinguist and the director of the Commercial
Press (the most prestigious press in the Chinese world), was a fierce
opponent (Chen 2001: personal communication).

5.4 Summarizing the Second Simplification Scheme

To sum up, the authors hold that although the revision process involved
much deliberation and discussion, in hindsight, it was completed without
comprehensive study and internal consensus. Therefore, the 1986 decision,
which at first was put forward as a compromise solution intended to please
the contenders in both camps (advocates and opponents), left problems that
needed to be dealt with unresolved. But, like many other deviations in LP
development in China, where opaqueness and behind-the-scene manipula-
tions have been common place, many questions about the formalization of
the SSS and its final public release still remain a matter of conjecture until
there is access to further relevant evidence.
Political taboos in present-day China are still very considerable, and
some areas of LP – like the SSS in 1977 – that require further investigation
are currently unlikely to be discussed because of their sensitive political
nature. The little information that is available in the relevant publications
is confused and full of contradictions. In private talks and public dis-
cussions with the first author, many official scholars, when faced with
challenging questions, keep within safe boundaries by either engaging in
Chapter 1 69

an abstract discussion, or by denouncing the Gang of Four, rarely ventur-

ing to make critical comments on these issues. Regrettably, it has always
been easier to condemn the Cultural Revolution as a harbinger of all
present ills rather than trying to understand in detail the underlying reality.
In CCP history, official views on many historical events have shifted, e.g.,
as noted previously, when the SSS was first published, Zhang, a key
member of the Gang of Four, was blamed for not being revolutionary
enough to give the go-ahead for the Scheme. This contradicts the post-Mao
official version of history that Zhang was an extreme leftist who wanted to
revolutionize all traditional things.
The ultimate importance of the SSS for Chinese LP is the ambiguous
position in which hanzi planning was left as the result of the decisions of
1986. By failing to resolve a number of crucial issues, LP efforts were
weakened. The results of these decisions are discussed in the following
chapter.
Chapter 2
REFLECTIONS ON NEW PERSPECTIVES
The Opening Up of Chinese Society

1. SCRIPT REFORM TRANSFORMED:

REFLECTION AND RE-ORIENTATION

This chapter provides a relatively comprehensive review of the impact

of the three previously discussed reform programs. To cope with the new
challenge from advances in technology, and to summarize past experience
as well as to formulate an agenda for the future, an all important National
Conference on Language Work (NCLW) was held in Beijing in January
1986. The first part of this section is devoted to a relatively detailed
description of how the language planning focus was shifted and the new
tasks that faced LPers in their newly reorganized context, i.e., there was a
reorientation of priorities and a redefinition of roles created by governmental
approaches to language planning that occurred in the mid-1980s.
Then we proceed to another theme of the conference – reflection on the
past experience with hanzi simplification. After a brief description of
impact of that conference on language planning, this section discusses the
details of the three major historical experiences that emerged from the
clinical treatment of hanzi prior to the conference. We hold that three types
of undesired outcomes found in 1950s’ simplification deserve more
attention than others if the further reform of the hanzi system is to be
considered. To summarize these historical lessons at a theoretical level,
two important constructs, the ‘Chang-effect’ and the ‘Guo-phenomenon’,
are conceptualized and substantiated based on the data from that period.

71
72 Reflections on New Perspectives

The problems encountered during the three decades of practical use of

the simplified characters make abundantly clear the multifaceted nature of
hanzi planning. With this in mind, a further and even more complex layer
is added in the final section, i.e., that hanzi is almost totally enmeshed in
the social environment, and thus one must deal with the socio-political
aspects of script reform if progress in language planning is ever to be
achieved. Thus, the third focus in the chapter is the developments in
China’s language planning in relation to the change in the political arena
and the impact of technological advances that happened after mid-1980s.
At the NCLW in 1986, further simplification of Chinese characters was
dropped from the agenda of the revised policy and the possibility of
phoneticization was also implicitly ruled out. But shortly after these deci-
sions were taken, a debate on the future of hanzi took place between
conservatives and reformers. Drawing on the implications of this long
lasted debate, this section highlights the complicated nature of Chinese
script planning and thus gives rise to the necessity of examining the issue
from multiple perspectives in subsequent chapters.

1.1 Adjustment to Meet the Needs of a New Society –

NCLW (1986)

The convening of the NCLW in 1986 was a watershed for Chinese

language reform movements. The first milestone had been the national
language conference of 1955, and this was the second time in the history
of the PRC that the central government had organized a conference on
language affairs on this scale. The conference, which was under the aegis
of Central Committee of CCP and State Council, was held from 6th to 13th
January 1986 in Beijing and was attended by over 280 LP workers,
linguists, and cultural and educational officials from across the country.
The conference was convened at a key moment in history when
Chinese language work was at a crossroads, and when, as will be seen in
the following discussion, a number of key LP issues urgently needed to be
addressed. Therefore, the decisions made in the conference were very
significant for national linguistic life and the future LP policy basis of
language work for decades to come. The outcomes of most direct concern
for the whole population were the wholesale formal rejection of the second
simplification scheme and the withdrawal of official support for Roman-
ization of the orthography. The repeated stress at the conference on
linguistic stability and the failure in official documents to mention simpli-
fication conveyed a very strong message against constant change and was
Chapter 2 73

a clear signal of a more conservative atmosphere. This marked a signi-

ficant shift in LP priorities, as since 1950s simplification and Romani-
zation had been listed as two of the three major tasks of language reform.
This is the first time that these two tasks were officially rescinded,
although this occurred in an implicit manner in order to avoid provoking
opposition from the group of strong advocates of simplification and
Romanization, whose views were dominant just before the meeting.
The decision that drew the most attention in the conference is the esta-
blishment of a standardization focus. Standardization was also the major
theme of the national language conference in 1955. But, in the 1950s
standardization was carried out in support of national language promotion,
so the focus was on pronunciation and grammar with the aim of using
putonghua as the basis to unify the widely diverse regionalects. At this
conference, although putonghua promotion was reiterated, the real em-
phasis was on Chinese characters. When the meeting was held, Chinese
linguists and computer scientist were engaged in devising the first gene-
ration of computer input schemes. Input program design is such a robust
venture that, almost without exception, all the major Chinese IT companies
have developed out of their work on character input software, and at the
beginning of this period, ideographically based schemes provided the main
focus for development. The first difficulty to overcome was how to set a
series of standards for the characters so that there was a binding set of
conventions for both the software vendors and the consumers to ensure
operational efficiency. These standards for hanzi, which have been labeled
the ‘Four Fixations’ in modern hanzi studies, include: having a fixed total
number of characters, creating physical uniformity, unifying pronunciation,
and standardizing the order of hanzi’s composition. These are essential to
dismantle and reproduce hanzi on computers, and thereby fundamental to
computerizing information in Chinese. Given the fact that information
technology was seen as the pillar for industry in the country’s aspiration to
embark on the road to modernization, and Chinese information processing
was the precondition for developing an IT industry, it was natural, that
hanzi standardization, or the so-called Four Fixations, come to the fore in
the discussions held at the conference and was pinpointed as one of the
central focuses in the concluding statement which set a new tone for the
future agenda of language work.
Facing the new challenge brought about by the emerging IT industry,
and in order to effectively address an IT oriented LP task that is largely
different from that of the pre-conference period, the restructuring of the
national LP agency was another important initiative of the conference. At
the conference, the Commission of Chinese Script Reform, which had
74 Reflections on New Perspectives

been in operation since 1956, was replaced by the State Commission of

Language Work. The reorganized body was given a new functional role in
dealing with the complex diversification of LP issues, particularly techno-
logical compacts in the new historical context.
Then after a decade of development, when language issues become
more important in national life, the SCWL went through another major
reform in 1998. Traditionally, since the mid-1950s, the top LP organ had
operated under the leadership of State Council, which meant that its
function was prestigious and executive. In this reform, it was transferred to
the jurisdiction of the Education Ministry and enlarged to include two
specialist offices: the Department of Language and Information Adminis-
tration and the Department of Social Use of Language and Script. This
gave the SCWL more administrative power, allowing it to act more
independently, specifically in carrying out LP activities. At the same time,
a well staffed research establishment – The Research Institute of Applied
Linguistics (henceforth RIAL), which was set up within China Academy
of Social Science in 1984, was also relocated under the dual administration
of the SCLW and the Education Ministry. As a research arm of the SCLW,
the RIAL’s daily research activities cover all aspects of LP goals, includ-
ing studies on theoretical and practical issues concerning the sociolin-
guistic application of language and script, currently with an emphasis on
hanzi standardization, lexical codification as well as national speech
promotion. In addition to providing research-based advisory assistance for
LP decision-making, the RIAL was also designated to be responsible for a
number of institutional functions, namely, to edit and publish LP journals,
to carry out training and testing activities and to organize consultative
services on language affairs.
The assessment of past LP experience has been cited as the main
achievement accomplished at the conference, but it was clearly impossible
to comprehensively examine any specific LP issue in a conference of this
scale. As for hanzi reform, the relatively free discussions and comments on
simplification, along with some other issues concerning language reform,
reflected the views that were being discussed prior to the conference and
were undoubtedly one of factors that led to its organization. On the other
hand, the conclusions drawn about script reform encouraged further
discussion on this sensitive topic. Therefore, a specific focus symposium
on the hanzi issue was organized by the RIAL in December of the same
year. One needs to remember that the mid-1980s was a special period in
the PRC’s history when democracy and transparency were probably the
least controlled. Thus, this nation-wide five day conference, which was
attended by academic peers from across the country with a wide diversity
Chapter 2 75

of backgrounds and views should be seen as the first time that the script
reform issues were discussed largely free of political constraints, and the
first time that individuals belonging to conflicting camps could sit together
and engage in face to face debates over issues.
The papers presented at the Symposium published in the Collected
Papers of Symposium on Issues of Chinese Characters are the only com-
prehensive assessment that has been made of hanzi simplification since
1950s. Therefore, the volume has been invaluable in helping to objectively
review the gains and losses of the script reform movement launched three
decades previously. While we basically draw on the views expressed in
this Symposium, the following evaluative description goes well beyond a
summary of Symposium’s views, even though, the major points summar-
ized here should not be construed as an attempt at an overall evaluation of
the whole hanzi simplification issue. The issues raised are too complex for
that, and despite a great deal more openness in what information is
available, in the PRC, as, for example, with cabinet papers in the UK and
Russia which are only made available after 50 years, there are still issues
which are too sensitive to discuss.

1.2 Reflection on Past Experience

A number of simplified hanzi, in both the TSC and the SSS, were
found to be unsatisfactory in practical use, i.e., an over-emphasis on the
effectiveness of stroke reduction may counteract the benefits brought about
by simplification. Thus, for some characters, although the number of
strokes was reduced, the resultant simplified forms may have been more
difficult to write because they were hard to differentiate from some similar
ones, or the new stroke ordering was not familiar, or the way they were
composed differed from established writing habits. Some characters were
not welcomed by the public, because their physical structures were culturally
or psychologically unacceptable, or lacked aesthetic appeal. Hu Qiaomu
(Guangming Daily 1999) has argued that a systematic view is needed to
amend simplified characters. Not only should the SSS characters be
corrected, but also “those ill-simplified characters in the First Table of
1956” should be reexamined and fixed. The three ill-simplified types of
characters – those lacking systematicity, the Chang-effect and Guo-pheno-
menon – which this chapter suggests the authorities should reconsider1, are
discussed in the following sections.
76 Reflections on New Perspectives

1.2.1 Oversimplification and the Lack of a Systems View

To understand what has been lost and gained, one must examine the
interrelatedness of various aspects of the subject matter. Insufficient
consideration in a systematic way has been found to be the foremost issue
that draws most criticism in appraising methodological principles of
simplification, which is also the cause of oversimplification. An examina-
tion of the Chinese script reform experience that has targeted Chinese
character shape shows a lack of a systematic plan. Hannas (1997: 207)
rightly points out that to reduce complexity in one sphere merely transfers
complexity to another. This may give the appearance of progress but, in
fact, only shifts the problem between aspects of the system2. The excessive
pursuit of stroke reduction created complexity rather than simplification in
the writing system as a whole, although this only came to be realized only
at a later stage. In addition, some of these mistakes were made due to the
politically motivated and short sighted approaches taken to reform – a
good lesson that is worth further exploration. More recently, as techno-
logical considerations have become more significant, unsatisfactory results
brought about by this lack of foresight have become more evident, making
re-examination more urgent. The problems that stem from the excessive
pursuit of stroke reduction to achieve simplification can be categorized
under the following five rubrics: inconsistent principles, ill-simplified
characters, technically unfriendly characters, incompatible in classification,
and misunderstandings.

1.2.1.1 Inconsistent principles

Popular mass characters and simplification by analogy are the two
basic principles for the 1956 simplification. The latter refers to the method
of reasoning by analogy, the former were also called ‘characters of the
people’. They had been simplified by the public and were well established
through historical tradition. In spite of their popularity and acceptance,
because these characters were randomly created by individuals, most of
them are either illogical or unsystematic. For example, 購 (gou, to pur-
chase) was simplified as 购. As an isolated instance, the simplification
looks apt as the new sound compound 勾 not only is much easier to write,
but also precisely provides the pronunciation of the whole character. But, it
is unlikely that the individual ‘masses’ would be aware that the original
component 冓 is widely used in many other characters, such as in 講
and 遘. It is obviously very convenient for users if one change can be
universally generalized to all cases. Therefore, it is preferable that all
characters with components 冓 should be replaced by same simplified
78 Reflections on New Perspectives

efficiency of automation. However, in order to fulfill the goal of simpli-

fication, not only were about ten newly created composing signs added to
the hanzi system, but in many cases, when a complex component was
simplified, the same original component remained part of the hanzi system,
i.e., some components that should have been simplified by analogy remain
unchanged.
For instance, suppose a complex component X appears in more than
one character, when X is simplified as Y, a Rule A can be described as: all
components X in all characters should be replaced by the new components
Y, if all other conditions are the same or similar. It would be ideal for
character processing schemes if Rule A is applicable to all characters in
hanzi system. However, as shown in the left column of Figure 2-1, in
reality, X (阑) in some characters, such as in 揀, was replaced by a newly
created component Y (东); in some other characters, such as in 澜, 谏,
etc…, X is still used. So in order for the system not to break down when
hanzi is being automatically processed, a Rule B has to be designed
stipulating that under what conditions, component X should not be
replaced. Unfortunately, often no reason was given nor can one be derived
by analogy.

Figure 2-1. Illustration of ‘the components get simplified, the composing structure becomes
complicated’
Chapter 2 79

In the case of the right column, ostensibly, the complex character 習

was simplified to a simpler one (习). But 習 is also used as component in
a number of other characters that were not simplified. Furthermore,
although the simplified form consists of fewer strokes, devisors of the
input schemes prefer the original complex one to the simplified one
because, despite of its complexity of structure, it can be resembled by two
smaller extant units: 習 = 羽＋白. On other hand, although 习 is a
smaller composite unit of 羽, 习 is never used as an independent unit, so
it becomes a newly created extra component that is used only once in the
whole hanzi system. This one unit uses as much space as any recurring
unit does; and if it is used in an ideographic input scheme, it also takes up
equal physical space on the keyboard. These two problems are illustrated
in Figure 2-1.

1.2.1.4 Incompatible in classification

Some of the newly created symbols are irregular and unpredictable
elements standing outside the wholeness of the hanzi system, thus resulting
in the so-called hanzi that are ‘simplified individually, complicated sys-
tematically’. Because these units are inconsistent with the whole system,
although simple in form with fewer strokes, they are not necessarily easier
to write, recognize and memorize. And what is more, etymologists and IT
experts find it hard to classify an atypical component into the existing
classification and retrieval systems that are used to index dictionaries and
standard sets of encoding characters. This is further evidence that demon-
strates that a perfect correlation does not exist between simplification and
ease of operation. Some characters may be very complex in physical
shape, but as long as their structures are logical and consistent, they may
be are easier to mentally and physically process than their simplified
counterparts.

1.2.1.5 Misunderstanding
Some seemly unnecessary elements in characters have their own
semantic value and serve as category indices. There is a good possibility
that stroke reduction and/or homophonous substitution cause semantic
misunderstanding. This is indubitably true for characters which are created
by the ‘huiyi’ (associative compounds) and ‘xingsheng’ (semantic-pho-
netic) methods. Chen Y. C. (1994) gives this example, 遊 (to travel) was
merged into 游 (to swim); when 游 is used before places ending with
‘he/jiang’ (river), ‘hai’ (ocean) or related words such as ‘you Zhuhai’ (游
珠海) (a city name and the name of the ocean along which it is located), or
‘you Heilong Jiang’ (游黑龙江) (a northern province, named after the big
80 Reflections on New Perspectives

river Heilong Jiang bordering Russia). Such coincident combinations can

be easily confused, particularly for overseas Chinese and foreign visitors.
Beyond the semantic problems that homophones cause by making use of
one character to substitute for characters with the same or similar pronun-
ciation but with different meanings, homophonous substitution can, to
some extent, compromise sound accuracy in semantic-phonetic characters.
Shi Youwei’s statistics (1991: 177-178) show that representation efficien-
cy of sound signifiers for the first 508 traditional characters in the GLSC
is 0.5983. It was reduced to 0.324 after these characters were simplified.

1.2.2 Characters at Variance with Writing Habits:

The Chang-effect

When the political environment became more open to criticism in the

1980s, it did not take long for more and more people to realize that
neglecting ingrained writing habits can create more problems than it
solves. While characters with fewer strokes are definitely easier for new
learners, for literate users these adulterated characters may cause problems
because fewer strokes do not necessarily make them easier to write if the
way they are required to be written does not conform to common writing
habits or customary writing practices. Modern characters have not yet
developed far enough from their origin to stand on their own. Some
features of writing characters are the legacy of brush writing and calli-
graphic art, although that has been long abandoned, influences from the
old writing style on modern characters inherently persist and are some-
times very strong.
长 (chang, long; Traditional form: 長) and 尧 (yao, proper name;
Traditional form: 堯) are two good examples that are extensively quoted
as illustrating the flaws of ill-simplified characters (e.g., Gao 2002, Su
2003, Zhou 1992). The simplified composition of 长 is not in accord with
ordinary people’s deeply seated writing habits and in 尧, the upper part is
a newly created component. Ouyang Zhongshi (1988), one of the best-
known modern calligraphers, noted that 长 was stipulated as a four-
stroke character, but it is actually very hard to write in four strokes. This
problematic simplification is frequently noted by some other scholars.
Zeng Xingchu (1988: 319), a noted psychologist, said “chang is really very
hard to write with one stroke less”. As further evidence, the personal
experience of the first author in teaching Chinese as a foreign language
may help to make the point. In his 16 years of experience, the author has
found that hardly any traditional character user correctly writes the
82 Reflections on New Perspectives

1.2.3 Characters Conflicting with Cultural Values:

Guo-phenomenon

Each culture has its own symbolic system of visual communication.

Some anthropologists argue that to perceive the world visually is an
important feature of Chinese culture. As an ideographic-based script, most
hanzi are analytic from their graphic makeup, the so-called telling the
meaning by its look ( jian xing zhi yi – 见形知义), as one would say in
Chinese. Because Chinese hanzi are composed of differing components
each with a meaning of its own, the important role of the phonetic compo-
unds, apart from being a phonetic indicator, is to convey information about
the meaning of the character. Effective adult readers of logographic scripts
break complex characters down into their phonetic and semantic com-
pounds, and then process each in an extremely efficient manner. Educated
people, in particular, have a strong awareness of a character’s structure.
Therefore, when one encounters an ideographical character, people
habitually identify its visual elements in order to guess its literal meaning,
and from this further implications of the image can be inferred, that
concurrently creates their stereotyped concept about the character’s
structure. Such analysis originates in the way that characters are created.
All characters are perceived to consist of an analyzable structure according
to the principles of Xu Shen’s liushu. It is worth noting that characters
simplified according to these principles are the most successful ones.
Hanzi riddles, which are concocted by using hanzi’s physical composition
features, are a favorite game played by many Chinese and have been used
by opponents of simplification to justify the argument that hanzi should
not be changed or abandoned. Some popular folk adages, which are very
powerful expressions, are also formed by making use of these hanzi
characteristics. Furthermore, the analysis of characters in semantic terms
has been used as a very valuable mnemonic technique, and characters have
long been clustered and taught in such terms. It is unquestionably an indis-
pensable aid to make the learning of characters easier and longer lasting.
Trying to use graphic images to imbue hanzi with an auspicious message
through a visual link, is a conspicuous feature of Chinese hanzi culture.
The most typical example, showing the hanzi creator’s or reformer’s
conscious effort to embody specific values in ideographic compositions, is
the ‘Guo-phenomenon’. The current form 国 of ‘Guo’ (country/state), is
physically composed by 囗 = borders + 玉 = jade, wealth. Its traditional
form 國 ( 口 = population, 戈 = weapon, 囗 = four borders) was
stabilized through the writing unification in the Qin Dynasty prior to the
.
84 Reflections on New Perspectives

the state is the oppressing apparatus of ruling class as well as an outcome

of uncompromising class struggles, which is a tenet of Marxism.
The evolution of the graphic make-up of ‘Guo’ implies that, from a
broader perspective, characters themselves are an element of the Chinese
cultural system. Hanzi are characterized by integrating cultural specifics in
their structure and in the way they are composed. As Coulmas (1991: 228)
points out, “few other cultures are based on writing in a more profound
sense than the Chinese”. The influence from the cultural heritage is
pervasive in hanzi; in addition to linguistic considerations, script reform
should be socially and culturally treated. The numbers of this kind of
character may not be large, but they are among the most frequently used
characters and have the potential to create endless trouble. A few of them
are not acceptable to particular groups of people, especially when personal
names are involved, or the time or occasion makes their use ridiculous.
Leng Yulong (2004: 339) notes that in the hanzi repertoire, there is a
group of characters that can be called as “Sensitive Characters”. These are
the characters that “the whole population is very familiar with; they are
frequently used and of high concern. Any change made to these characters
is bound to trigger vibrating reaction”. Leng warns that we should be
extremely careful in dealing these “Sensitive Characters”, even a small
alteration may touch the most sensitive part of hanzi’s societal use and
people’s sentiment. In order to make a character socially and culturally
acceptable, many factors are inevitably involved. Competent logographic
readers find it particularly hard to resist the temptation to extract semantic
clues from characters, which is plainly evidenced in frequent criticisms of
some simplified forms. Therefore, as Zhang Jinqiu (1999: 23) aptly warns,
if the cultural factors are not given proper consideration, any reform made
to characters will end up ‘carrying water with a basket’ [i.e., ‘ending up
with nothing despite great efforts’ because bamboo baskets contain holes
that leak water]. The construction of the ‘Guo-phenomenon’ brings the
disorderly conglomeration of previously found problematic simplifications
under one concept and provides guidelines to conveniently deal with
similar types of characters. The ‘Guo-phenomenon’ manifests itself in four
specific categories.

1.2.3.1 Guo-phenomenon type one: Value-laden components

The complex form of 愛 (ai, to love) includes both the 心 (heart)
and 友 (friendship, comradeship) compound. The ‘heart’ was omitted in
the simplified character, so it turned into 爱. Although “the heart has
traditionally been regarded as the seat of the intellect, not the organ of
passion” (Unger 2004: 15), for instance, Mencius’s famous saying “Xi zhi
Chapter 2 85

guan ze si – 心之官则思 (the function of heart is to think)”, quite a few

people, overseas Chinese in particular, were furious about this simpli-
fication. They ask: “How can we love someone without heart, is this the
Communist feeling of ‘love’?” (Lu 1992: 218) Further politically charged
accusations include: ‘Love’ is not a much-used word in the Communist
Party’s dictionary; Using ‘comradeship’ to replace the original semantic
compound 心 indicates, that for the Communist Party there is no ‘love’,
but only ‘comradeship’. For example, Chen Mengjia (1957), who was
condemned to death partly because of his opposition to simplification
during the Anti-rightist Campaign in the 1950s, insisted that the ‘heart’
component in this character was essential. On the other hand, Zhao
Wenzhu (2004: 5), a modern hermit but a very prolific writer of books
mocking weird phenomena in modern China, poked fun at it by saying this
was a very appropriate simplified form and an insightful invention for
love, because there is no real love (from heart) in today’s society. A similar
case is 儿 (er, son/kid). The traditional form 儿 had been written as 兒
since jiaguwen. “The upper part signifies a head with an open mouth and
the lower part two legs. After simplification, the head was cut off and only
the legs were left; So what kind of baby is that? ” (Ni 2003: 3)
爱 is very representative of this group of simplified forms, as it is
vulnerable to criticism that is hard to avoid. This kind of culturally
unacceptable simplified character has caused extensive concern even to
some staunch simplification advocates. Xu Jialu (1990: 39), the top
national leader directly involved in LP, once said in an interview with
scholars from Taiwan, “some simplified characters just do not make sense.
How come, very earthly (圣, 又= more, 土 = earth/soil) can be ‘sheng’
(sage); and why does one heart ( , 一 (upper part) = one , 心 = heart)
in simplified form in the SSS mean ‘de’ (virtue)?”

1.2.3.2 Guo-phenomenon type two: Psychological aesthetics

Kaplan and Baldauf (1997) note that one of the big problems that
language planning has as an academic discipline is that language is a
public communication tool and every one sees themselves as the expert
and has a strong view on it from some perspectives. Ferguson (1996: 280)
calls such perceptions of members of the speech community on language
as ‘users’ evaluation’. If users agree on some language evaluation for
particularly reasons, then Ferguson calls this “rationalized evaluation”.
Ferguson notes that in many cases this kind of users’ evaluation may
reflect “such different realities as idealization, stereotypes, completely
unconscious, shared values, or individual attitudes”. Even if the rationali-
zations on particular features of language structure or use may just be their
86 Reflections on New Perspectives

unconscious feelings, the language users accept some forms just because
these forms “sound better”. Ferguson appears to agree that users’ judg-
ments, be they rational or irrational, are often seen as signals of group
identity; they may have “special importance as indicators of trends and
values, and they constitute the primitive source from which institutional
language planning activities ultimately are derived” (p. 281). Therefore,
Ferguson emphasizes “[T]he whole area of user’s evaluations of language
is of great importance for identifying language change but it has only been
treated in general terms”.
Psychological factors, or in Ferguson’s term, users’ evaluation, are
something that had been largely ignored in reforming characters. DeFrancis
(1984b: 78) observes, “aesthetics plays an exceedingly important role in
Chinese writing, more so than any other system of writing”. Culturally
acceptable and eye pleasing forms deserve more attention, as was unexpect-
edly found by Liu Mingchen (1997: 144) in his survey about the reasons
for the resurgence of traditional characters in the 1980s. He found that
“among various reasons accounting for people’s preference in writing
traditional characters, aesthetic perception and artistic sense is the first
consideration”. For some others, like 厂: 廠 (chang, plant/mill), 广: 廣
(guang, wide/extensive), and 产: 產 (chan, to produce/grow), are not
welcomed by some people and are criticized just because they are not
‘good-looking’, due to the symmetrical structure in the authentic form
becoming unbalanced after simplification (Li 2001: 16; see also Yan et al
2004; Su 2003). Li further points out that sometimes, the people’s feelings
are hard to explain, or even irrational, but they are worth paying attention
to. Some think the character 丽 for beautiful/pretty is not beautiful, and
they prefer to write the original 麗, even though it has twelve strokes
more than the simplified one. Hu Qiaomu (Editing Team 1999: 80) gives
another example: the ‘Constitution of the Peoples’ Republic of China’ (中
华人民共和国宪法) written in simplified characters looks less solemn
than their traditional forms (中華人民共和國憲法). Some people feel
that after simplification even the characters for 庄 严 (zhuangyan,
solemn), are less solemn than their original forms (莊嚴). Ferguson (1996:
283) offers a good example that is illustrative of the similar point. He says
that if Swedes consider that some archaic forms of language used for
church’s worship is more “solemn and spiritually satisfying”, “these
judgments reflect not direct natural response to linguistic features but
feelings of appropriateness due to customary use of these varieties for their
respective purposes”. This also reminds people of the debate about the
exclusion of 朕 (zhen in Chinese, or chin in Japanese, used exclusively by
the Emperor meaning, I, the sovereign) from the Table of Contemporary
Chapter 2 87

Characters (Japanese). It was reintroduced into that table in 1981, because

“it provokes some funny imaginations if the character is written in
Japanese kana” (He 2001: 133). More ironically, some people even found
a relationship between the form of the simplified character for “commerce”
in the SSS and the reason for commodity scarcity in the market that occur-
red at the end of Culture Revolution (Chen Y.S. 2004: 355).

1.2.3.3 Guo-phenomenon type three: Name taboos

Another specific example worth mentioning that demonstrates the
impact of cultural heritage on script reform is the ‘names taboo’. Certain
characters are often used for proper names and deserve special attention.
Although a note under the First Table of Verified Variant Forms (1955,
henceforth FTVVF) says that “the original forms of abandoned variants
can continue to be used as surnames in publications, this applies only to
the characters exclusively used for the surname.”
One of the difficulties of structurally changing the character Yin (see
Section 2.2.1, Chapter 4) is the fear that “the people whose surname is Yin
must be very furious about this” (Fu 2002: personal communication). This
is because to change one’s name is one of the most offensive and intol-
erable things a Chinese person can do. As a popular Chinese saying goes:
I’ll not conceal my first name, in spite of wrongdoing; I’ll never change
my surname because of my indecent behavior (xing bu geng ming, zuo bu
gai xing – 行 不 更 名 , 做 不 改 姓 ). In analyzing the cultural and
psychological implications, Wu Chang’an (1995: 76-77) argues that:
[t]here are over two thousand surname-only characters. No matter
which one is to be reformed, it is hardly possible to obtain the consent
of the person who has this surname. Even if his surname is 刘 (liu),
which has the ominous meaning ‘to kill’ or ‘to slaughter’, he is unwill-
ing to change to another character as suggested by Yuen Ren Chao.
Traditionally, Chinese have had a strong feeling that their names ought
to be written in their original form. In a study conducted by Zhao (1999), it
was found that the simplified characters were generally well accepted by
adult Thai Chinese students who are culturally traditional character users,
but not for their handwritten names which appeared on the cover of their
course assignments. When people see anything that appears somewhat
formal, important or solemn, things like shop plates or signboards, com-
mercial marks and documents such as marriage certificates, they are
particularly reluctant to have them changed just because of their sense of
88 Reflections on New Perspectives

permanence and eternity (Huang 1992: 61). The government was well
aware of this issue and succeeded in a nationwide campaign, launched in
the 1960s, to simplify the geographical names under the principle
‘consensus must be gained from the local population first’5. However, it
must be acknowledged that it was much less successful in simplifying
characters for naming. The principle that was stated in the 1950s simpli-
fication and reduction campaigns, was that the only exceptional situation
in which obsolete characters are allowed to be used is for surnames. But
this principle has been much compromised in reality. Some variant forms
(yiti zi) still exist when it comes to their use with public celebrities; the
much publicized case of how to deal with Rong (鎔, to cast), which was
discarded as a variant form of Rong (溶, to melt), will suffice as an
example. When Rongji (鎔基, to consolidate the foundation), the given
name of the former Chinese Premier, is rewritten as 溶基, it takes on the
meaning ‘to undermine the foundation’. It is understandable, therefore,
particularly if the taboo effect enshrined in Chinese names is taken into
account, that the Premier himself absolutely was opposed to his name
being printed with its opposite meaning in the media. Furthermore,
Chinese people, especially the older generations, who have a strong faith
in Fengshui (fortune telling), would consider it unlucky to have a premier
with a first name implying ‘to undermine the foundation’6.
One of the most common Chinese family names 趙 (zhao, the No. 1
surname in a traditional character book for children, first compiled in Song
Dynasty, 960-1279), was simplified as 赵; a complex phonetic compound
was substituted by the fewer-strokes sign 乂. But 乂 is the sign for the
death sentence in traditional performing arts, such as Peking Opera.
Probably for this reason, it was simplified as in the First Scheme in
1935 (see Appendix A); and Hu Qiaomu (Editing Team 1999: 292)
suggested simplifying it as (小-xiao which is one stroke more than 又
and 乂, but is phonetically more appropriate). Zhao Ziyang, the former
chairman of the CCP, was said to have complained about his surname being
crossed (Wang 2002: personal communication).
It has not been uncommon to hear that some well-known people
complain or just refuse to use simplified characters for their names
themselves or, let them be used by others, particularly characters for
surnames. For instance, 蕭-萧-肖 , 阎-闫 , this kind of simplification
has attracted wide criticism. Thus, not just surname-only characters should
be resumed, but also those commonly discarded variant forms of charac-
ters, when used as surname, should be allowed to be used7. Similar
problems occur very often with geographical names that use particular
characters. A number of characters with historical significance require a
90 Reflections on New Perspectives

Hall. Older Chinese feel especially disgusted by it, not just those Chinese
whose surnames are ‘zhan’.
Some characters are problematic just because of their politically
unacceptability. Before simplification, 臺 (tai) was for Taiwan, and 颱
exclusively for taifeng (typhoon). But as the latter was discarded as the
variant form of the former, the word 抗台 (kangtai) can be ambiguously
interpreted as ‘against typhoon’ or ‘against Taiwan’. So the sentence, “The
government mobilizes the people in coastal areas in Fujian Province10 to
act and fight the typhoon,” can be easily interpreted as, “The government
mobilizes the people in coastal areas in Fujian Province to act and fight
Taiwan” (Shen and Shen 2001: 226).

2. SOCIO-POLITICAL ASPECTS
OF THE TRANSFORMATION

Social transition and policy reorientation in 1980s have produced two

outcomes in the area of character planning. The 1980s saw the most
chaotic period in character use. There were two factors contributing to
the chaos: 1) the impinging effect of Second Simplification Scheme and 2)
the intrusion of the banned traditional characters. These factors increased
the arbitrary use of non-standard characters. In addition, the shift in Party’s
propaganda strategy, while rarely loosing political control, created a favor-
able environment in which dissenting views were more generally tolerated.
The renewed interest in traditional heritage triggered a debate on a number
of issues related to Chinese characters that are still going on. This section
focuses on a discussion of the socio-political implications of the practical
use of hanzi and of hanzi’s future.

2.1 Chaotic Situation During Social Transition

China in the 1980s was socio-politically a very homogenous country in

every respect, yet in contrast to the highly centrally-controlled nature of
Chinese society, character use was in a chaotic state. Before the SSS
characters were sanctioned in 1977, China had attained a remarkable
degree of script coherence and a very stable standard that was virtually
consistent with that prescribed by the government. Thus, in comparison
with the character use prior to the 1980s, China witnessed more deviation
from the official standard in its script use when the once-favored ideals of
uniformity began to loose strength. As Chen Ping (1999: 192) noted, the
Chapter 2 91

“regulations on language issues are beginning to lose the authority or

binding force they used to enjoy in the 1960s and 1970s”.
It needs to be remembered that official standards for script usage apply
primarily to print materials and public usage, but that in informal settings
for private correspondence, to save time many people invent their own
simplified shorthand-style characters. That is, a very large number of
variant forms have been coined, using the analogy of the methods of
previous simplification schemes, and a good many of these have taken root
more widely. In addition, by the 1980s the return of traditional characters
to Mainland had been progressing rapidly, and some bureaucrats were
alarmed by their appearance in a wide range of official or semi-official
publications11. The introduction of unofficial hanzi was not revolutionary
in scope, but they were happening in parallel with the changes under way
in the political, economic and social fields, and they had even caught the
attention of the highest political authorities. For example, in his speech
delivered at the 1986 Conference, Wan Li, the then Chinese vice-premier,
lamented that “the laissez-fire state of Chinese characters has caused harm
to our two-civilization – referring to material and spiritual civilizations –
development and it hence invites widespread criticism from influential
personnel both within our own country and abroad”. The “severe situation
of the disorder in character use” was emphatically documented in SCLW’s
application to the State Council for the official withdrawal of the SSS (The
Office of Standard Work 1997: 20).
The term ‘unofficial characters’ is ambiguous and inconsistent. At
present in Mainland China, unofficial characters include mainly yiti zi and
fanti zi each of which are discussed in the following sections.

2.1.1 Variant Forms of Characters: yiti zi

Several characters, having the same meaning and pronunciation but

different forms, are called yiti zi. Here, yiti zi is used in a broad sense; it
refers to all forms of characters that are neither listed in the TSC of 1956
nor are traditional forms, including newly created handwritten characters,
and characters that can be seen only in regional dialects, or in other
languages such as Japanese (more discussion about yiti zi can be found in
Section 2.1.3, Chapter 4). The sources of yiti zi have been both geo-
graphical and chronological. Specifically, apart from characters in the SSS,
the other main sources of yiti zi include informal writing such as manu-
scripts, local newspapers and literature, propaganda bulletins and posters,
advertising signs, and personal correspondence. The SSS’s persistent
92 Reflections on New Perspectives

survival in society has resulted in a new breed of yiti zi; these are also
known as New Yiti zi.
In contrast to a closed alphabetic letter system, the Chinese character
system is open to public creativity and productivity. In one sense, every
Chinese person can be a hanzi creator, which consequently makes the
number of the character shapes literally too large to describe. Probably,
because writing characters is apt to be a very idiosyncratic thing, parallel
forms have learned to co-exist, and people have always been accustomed
to using a wide range of diverse forms of characters. For the same reason,
not only readers, but the government as well has developed a greater
tolerance towards individual writing peculiarities and even mistakes.
Although constantly monitored and managed by consecutive governments,
it is doubtful whether there has ever been a single, unified form of
conformity of writing throughout history.
With a mushrooming emergence of new types of simplified characters,
the 1980s saw one of the most creative periods in simplification. ‘Mass
Line’ and ‘Mass Movement’ doctrines that dominated the Cultural Revo-
lution in other areas influenced language issues and created an atmosphere
that made character creation a fashionable thing. There are two types of
policy towards these non-official or people’s characters: To control, and to
guide according to the circumstances. The latter adopts a liberal attitude
toward non-standard characters: to recognize and recommend a reasonable
one and then leave the final decision to ‘usage’. But LP authorities worried
that, with more than one system in use, it was going to be too incongruent
with official standards and would thus lead to chaos in character use.

2.1.2 Traditional Characters ( fanti zi)

Fanti zi literally means physically complex character, but is called

zhengti zi (orthodox character) in Taiwan and Hong Kong because there it
is still the official standard. Their intrusion into the Mainland is related
more to socio-politics and economics than to geographical contiguity.
There are five generally agreed upon factors that have played a major role
in the pervasive intrusion of traditional characters in the PRC in the 1980s
and 1990s: cultural factors, geographical factors, psychological factors,
traditional obsession, and decision-making (Shi 1993). The last two factors
need some further explanation.
Traditional characters have long been viewed as superior to the
simplified characters as symbol of a good education. This erroneous belief
is borne out by an undeniable phenomenon that indicates the original
forms enjoy high prestige and authentic status as they are associated with a
Chapter 2 93

time-honored literary heritage. The traditional heritage was seen as an

object that needed to be revolutionized prior to and during the Cultural
Revolution. But, beginning in the 1980s, the Party’s attitudinal pendulum
began to swing from the left to the right in social, educational and political
matters. With the rise of a more positive attitude towards the traditional
heritage at the end of the Cultural Revolution, there was a return to
traditional things and this trend was fuelled by political manipulations that
created blind admiration for everything that had existed in the past. The
relationship between the hanzi’s use and political movements will be
becoming clearer in the following discussion and is raised again in Section
7.1, Chapter 5.
Therefore, fanti zi was unintentionally and obliquely encouraged due to
the central authority’s renewed interest in traditional culture. Furthermore,
being nervous about a growing dissatisfaction with the limitations of
freedom in cultural life, the central authority tried to avoid being seen as
unnecessarily heavy-handed in such matters. Thus, loose control at the
ideological level created an environment in which the general population
had more choice in character use and an opportunity to make their mark on
the official standard. In addition to this, the long adhered to policy of
phoneticization and simplification was openly rescinded in an official
document passed at the 1986 conference. Although there was hardly any
outright opposition to this most authoritative decision, there were obvious-
ly widespread differences of opinion about it both within and outside
linguistic circles. For all of these reasons it seemed to predictable that a
direct conflict between the traditionalists and reformers was unavoidable.

2.2 A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Character Use

The analysis in the preceding sections shows that there is a lack of

conformity of handwritten characters with official standards. Thus, in today’s
society, there are many cases where hanzi are written using different forms
in handwritten manuscripts for general communication purposes by adults.
The situation can be illustrated by the simple graphic representation
provided in Figure 2-3.
Under this model of character use in 1980s, we assume that, theoret-
ically, there were at present seven types of character users: S, V, T, ST,
SV, VT, and STV. While the S type of user is supposed to represent
character users in Mainland China, most Chinese are actually multi-variant
character users. The majority of users undoubtedly fall into the STV
(central circle) type, only the types V, T, and VT, can be safely excluded
94 Reflections on New Perspectives

in Mainland China. Confronted with such extensive variation in people’s

preference for writing hanzi, naturally, questions arise as to the reasons for
this phenomenon.

Figure 2-3. Model of types of character users

Every individual has their own script-using orientation, gained from

their own experiences and sociolinguistic environment. The types of
character users represented by the circles are largely determined by factors
that include age, educational background, profession and personal psycho-
logical traits. If a user was educated before 1956, s/he may write tradi-
tional characters, in addition to using the ones that appeared in the TSC
and Second Scheme. This is partly because writing habits, which were
acquired in early life, are not easily changed, and, when people write, they
concentrate their attention on the content rather than the external form of
language, without taking into consideration the deliberate changes to the
traditional writing system or the conscious adherence to official standards.
A nationwide survey on language use (see Section 3.3.3, Chapter 6)
among 470,000 people from 160,000 families across the country revealed
that over 95 percent of the population “use standard hanzi in their daily
life”. If this reflects actual use, then in our model, this 95 percent of the
population should be categorized as STV users instead of S users. For the
younger users, like teenagers immediately preceding and following their
graduation from school, non-standard forms (type V and T) are unfamiliar
to them. They are S-type users at this stage, but as they grow older, they
are subject to being ‘polluted’ by the new hanzi environment. The ‘S’
circle would gradually descend, and they might be categorized as type ST,
SV or STV users, depending on the extent to which they are exposed to a
Chapter 2 95

certain kinds of character-use settings. Supposing a person becomes a type

ST user. This indicates they are extensively involved in using traditional
characters, most probably because their duties require them to keep in
frequent contact with overseas Chinese in commercial and industrial areas.
In a survey12 conducted by the authors to investigate into the handwriting
habits of people from different social strata, we found that the number of
traditional characters use by the old readers of a newspaper closely
associated with Taiwan is significantly higher than that for three other
groups of people, namely primary teachers, farmers and university stu-
dents. In contrast, if the circle moves closer to S, although the user is still
an ST-type user in this case, traditional characters may only be used very
occasionally in writing.
Official orthography policy is binding only on school pupils and civil
servants; outside schools and government offices, many use the official
standard, but many others do not. In real situations where most writing
occurs, people are inclined to use the easiest form rather than trying to
write in line with print-oriented standards. The actual existence of multi-
type character users means there is a need for some regulation. However, it
is considered inevitable that the regulating activities always lag behind
hanzi creation. Therefore, all efforts being made in this field will be
inadequate; by the time the regulators get around to looking at the charac-
ters, the damage may be irreparable. On the other hand, being a social
behavior, writing habits are largely acquired from exposure to a society
where ubiquitous non-government controlled sources of writing production
are always available in geographically and professionally wide-ranging
areas. At least in the near future, while the status of the TSC remains the
same, characters from the other two sources will comfortably coexist with
the official standard.
The situation where non-official hanzi continue to persist parallels that
of Schiffman’s (2002: 98) application of Bourdieu’s “linguistic black
market” in analyzing the ineffectiveness of centralist LP policy for French.
Perhaps we also need to think of these non-official hanzi as a kind of
commodity in Bourdieu’s “black market” model, particularly the tradi-
tional characters, as they are purported to be “illegally imported [from
Taiwan and Hong Kong] and ‘consumed’ because it has covert prestige,
and consumers in the linguistic market place want them, irrespective of its
legality” (Schiffman 2002: 98). We find that the “covert prestige”, or
“signitive power”, which refers to “the association of language attributes
which have a value, positive or negative, in the mind of the perceiver”
(Rahman 2002: 40) has apt explanatory power for the strong comeback of
traditional characters in 1980s. As described previously, the prestige of
96 Reflections on New Perspectives

traditional characters comes from two main sources. First, it is the medium
of time-honored classical Chinese, thus it is imbued with knowledge and
education. Second, it is the official standard of economically advanced
Taiwan and Hong Kong and used by most of influential overseas Chinese,
so that it is associated with modernity and internationality. Despite their
illegitimate status in the government controlled language market, and
government’s relentless push to remove them from Mainland for last three
decades, fanti zi are considered a badge of refinement and esteem by large
segments of users who desire to procure symbolic power. Today, fanti zi
are not only extensively seen on business cards, in restaurants and hotels,
in commercial advertisements, on shop signs and in product manuals, but
in many public domains people are also tempted to use them, thereby
flouting government regulations. The use of Bourdieu’s economic terms,
such as capital, market and exchange, to analyze language management
appears to provide us with a way to understand why the government’s
strenuous efforts have failed to keep fanti zi at bay.

2.3 The Polemic (Debate) on hanzi’s Future

Some controversies about a number of issues related to hanzi had been

going on for quite some time before the NCLW in 1986. Some views on
how to assess the achievements of the past reform programs and the
linguistic nature of the hanzi system, which are directly related to some of
the more critical questions regarding hanzi’s future, were so confronting
that the participants were polarized, and a fierce debate broke out between
two camps in the late 1980s. A line can be roughly drawn between the
conservatives, grouped around the Chinese Character Cultural Faction
(CCCF) and the reformers. The conservatives were called the CCCF partly
because they established an organization called the International Institute
of Hanzi Culture Studies with Hanzi Culture13 as their leading journal, but
more importantly because they brought to the fore the debate on hanzi
issues at a time when cultural issues had became a very hot and intriguing
topic. This new context was different from societal environment in which
the 1950s conservatives or the 1930s traditionalists had been living. Before
examining the implications of the debate, we need to look at the CCCF’s
position to understand the advantages or superiorities they claim for hanzi.
Chapter 2 97

2.3.1 Hanzi’s Six Superiorities

The CCCF have claimed many things about hanzi, often exaggerating
what they see as the merits of ideographic system14. Most of what has been
touted as “new discoveries” go back to long held controversial arguments
in the history of Chinese hanzi and language study. For example, the use of
monosyllables in Chinese is a strength rather than a weakness, because it
makes Chinese very economic in expression; association is the mother of
all inventions and, as Chinese hanzi encourages association, it stands
Chinese in good stead; Chinese grammar is the closest to the rules of
mathematics, musical notation, chemical symbols, and so Chinese has the
potential to become the most used international language (Guo 2004: 96-
97). The most radical claim is that hanzi are China’s fifth great gift to
world civilization, and that eventually they will replace all other scripts to
become the world’s writing system.
Most of these theories on the advantages of the Chinese writing system,
that have been labeled “new wine in old bottles” (Zhao 2005: 348), have
been enumerated by DeFrancis under six headings in his classic book
Chinese Language (1984b). Unger (2004: 1-12) provides an insightful
analysis of these “myths” about Chinese hanzi. While it may seem exces-
sive to go through the details of the debate surrounding this issue, it is
necessary to provide the main points as a backdrop to understanding LP
issues.

2.3.1.1 Information oriented

In rebutting the notion that hanzi-based writing systems create diffi-
culties for the countries using them in tapping into the emerging
information age, champions of hanzi superiority claim that from the
perspective of computational linguistics, characters are an information-
oriented writing system which becomes more powerful when it is comput-
erized. Chinese characters contain more information than their phonetic
counterparts (bigger entropy), and not only is Chinese the clearest and the
most concise language in the world, but Chinese hanzi is economic in
expression, because the ideographs themselves are expressive of meanings
and store more information than linear alphabetic writings. A recurring
example, given by the CCCF to prove these claims, is the fact that,
compared with the versions recorded in the other five United Nations
working languages, the Chinese version of a document is always the
shortest.
98 Reflections on New Perspectives

But in many cases, as hanzi critics have pointed out convincingly,

when discussing how the Chinese writing system works, most articles
produced by the CCCF lack the necessary linguistic discernment between
character and lexical units, such as word and morpheme. In addition, many
of the advantages they have claimed are a feature of the Chinese language
itself rather than its writing system. Opposing scholars use this claim as
evidence that these ‘hanzi preservers’ cannot even tell the difference
between the language and the system-script that represents it.

2.3.1.2 Intelligent script

Square Chinese characters are good for the development of the nervous
system of the human brain and make the learner more intelligent. The
characters are composed of symbols and images and, as such, are unique in
evoking mental images that contribute to the development of intelligence.
The evidence often quoted is the academic intelligence of the Chinese
character-hemisphere countries, which excel in mathematics and have
produced encouraging results from experiments with aphasia therapy.
Additional evidence of cognitive improvement is based on some small-
scale experiments done by American psychologists showing that thirty
American children with reading problems could learn to understand
limited English if the words are written in Chinese characters (Zhang
1994). That hanzi has a positive effect on human intelligence is nothing
more than a hypothesis, due to a lack of factual evidence. Reformers argue
that it is deceptive to claim that learning characters is a kind of memory
training. Yet such conjectures are hard to test and inconclusive results lead
one into the realm of speculation.

2.3.1.3 Transferability and internationality

The thought that hanzi is virtually language independent and thus
applicable to any language has been one of most contentious arguments,
and has led to a great deal of confusion. Hanzi’s transferability, or the
universality myth, is a long, controversial, but appealing topic. Coulmas
(1991: 233) defined transferability as “the property of a written system to
be applicable to languages other than one for which it was designed”.
Krzak (1987: 61) declared that the Chinese script “is nowadays the most
universal script for it does not essentially depend on the properties of
Chinese language and theoretically it could be used for any other lan-
guage”. Hanzi automatically expresses its meaning by its shape, and without
the knowledge of its pronunciation, it is automatically readable by all
Chinese as well as by East Asians whose languages are generally considered
Chapter 2 99

to be genetically and typologically unrelated to Chinese. The logical

extension of this belief is that the ideographic symbols convey their
message directly to our minds. The new traditionalists have tried to apply
this to all languages, therefore, hanzi, as a self-evident script is intelligible
to speakers of all languages. The CCCF have frequently advanced and
cited this new discovery in their treatises. The best rebuke to this claim is
that the jiaguwen and jinwen are the ideographic characters that are most
closely related to drawings and pictures of actual objects, but two-thirds of
the former have not been deciphered and about eight hundred characters of
the latter remain unknown to the best hanzi specialists, who have devoted
their whole lives to studying these so-called self-evident signs.

2.3.1.4 Permanent perspicuity – Unifying force

Hanzi transcends chronological and geographical limitations and
enables speakers from different dialectal areas, to communicate in writing
even though they do not know each other’s speech. DeFrancis (1984b:
149) has noted that “[t]his view has been expressed countless times in the
past four centuries”. It is also a topic that traditional conservatives, and
now the CCCF members, love to talk about. Because of great variation in
other aspects of Chinese language, the characters have created a common
bond of unity for peoples, which are otherwise divided by diversified oral
speech. More than that, the historically derived forms of hanzi [non-
Chinese scripts, but where the forms were derived from hanzi] make hanzi
a focal point for ethnic unity and cultural cohesion and affinity – the role
that Latin has played for the Romance languages.
The view that hanzi functions as a national means of written communi-
cation, readily recognizable across different regions where people speak
virtually unintelligible dialects, is particularly attractive to politicians
because unification and the leveling of differences in the vast country areas
is vigorously encouraged by the government which sees the multiplicity of
linguistics groups as a factor that may threaten national unity.

2.3.1.5 Learnability
The CCCF holds that the structure of Chinese characters is the most
logical and scientific among human languages, and is therefore easy to
learn. Ann’s (1982) five-volume work, Cracking the Chinese Puzzles,
reveals, in contrast to the common perception that characters are a system
that is extremely cumbersome to write and hard to memorize, learning
hanzi can be a very enjoyable activity. There is an internal economy in the
Chinese writing system, and once one gets initial command of the basic
100 Reflections on New Perspectives

knowledge, hanzi are virtually the same as all other scripts – it is the
world’s easiest writing system to learn. Furthermore, hanzi is remarkable
for generating more with less. Learning characters is very much like
building up a vocabulary, using the fewest building blocks to produce a
great quantity of different signs for communication. Compared with hanzi’s
other strong points discovered by Hanzi Culture advocates, this quality,
although not necessarily an advantage over other orthographic systems, is at
least much more acceptable to some, and it has to be acknowledged that the
difficulty of character learning might be exaggerated or overemphasized by
others.

2.3.1.6 Cultural heritage and historicity

Risk of losing China’s extraordinary, rich cultural heritage of tens of
thousands of ancient works written in the old form of characters, is the
traditional fear of hanzi reforming opponents. As the sole functioning
writing system with an unbroken history, hanzi is not only a Chinese
national treasure; it also contributes much to the dominance of Chinese
influence in South-East Asian culture. Aesthetics is another concern, since
calligraphy is a unique art form stemming from hanzi which can be found
nowhere else in other cultures.
As for hanzi’s historicity, Eileen Chen (1982: 138) has argued, that
“[t]he study of Chinese characters will throw light on ancient cultural
developments, such as the social system revealed in the ideographic sys-
tem, and ancient inventions manifested in pictography”. Hanzi makes it
possible to read classic works, written over a period of millennia, in
complete disregard of the tremendously changed appearance of the
characters over time.

2.3.2 The Socio-Political Background

It is not hard to see that most of CCCF’s arguments are not essentially
different from those produced by simplification’s opponents in the 1930’s
and 50s. But in the new historical context they stirred up the public’s
interest, and sparked wide involvement and protracted debate in academic
circles. It has been generally agreed that the most important reason, as
revealed in the later developments, was the tactic of aligning themselves
with the changing political environment. Culture had become a fashionable
word in party politics, particularly the indigenous culture at the end of
1980s, which was seen by the Party as a weapon to counteract the
undesired impact of Western influence. As Bakken (1999: 6) notes, “[t]he
Chapter 2 101

Party has in fact returned to the memories of the Chinese past, old forms of
control have been subsequently modernized, redeployed, augmented and
refined in order to ‘bind’ or ‘stabilize’ a potentially disorderly population”.
Barme (1999: 256) observes the same trend:
The rapid decay of Maoist ideological beliefs and the need for
continued stability in the Chinese Communist Party led to an increased
reliance on nationalism as a unifying ideology. During the 1980s, the
Party emphasized its role as the paramount patriotic force in the nation
and it mobilized nationalist symbols and mythology to shore up its
position.
Therefore, the primary thrust behind the renewed interest in traditional
characters was the official favor attached to emerging nationalist
sentiment. Cultural issues have always played a unique role in shaping the
country’s political landscape. The nationalistic sentiment in the new
historical era was marked by pervasive Neo-traditionalism, which in many
cases featured a blind worship for anything indigenous. At the time, an
emerging phenomenon in the cultural field was that the Party propa-
gandists have tried to tighten the reins on society through the glorification
of indigenous cultural achievements. Revitalizing the traditional culture is
the theme of the CCP’s Patriotism Education propaganda15 and of the ‘the
Country’s Reality Education’ (Guoqing Jiaoyu – 国情教育) campaign,
launched in the aftermath of 1989 Democracy Movement.
In this context, it should be evident that the natural tendency of hanzi
culture promotion would be to lead to the total undermining of past
commitments to hanzi simplification. In addition, because language
officials were conditioned to work either by following the Party’s line, or
working practically inside the administration, they became extremely
cautious about being seen as being against the Party line. Furthermore, the
horrible memory, left by the anti-rightists movement in the 1950s, still
lingered on in many indigenous scholars’ minds. In these circumstances,
faced by this attack from the CCCF, the language officials took an unusual
weak position.
Even so, we must ask how it was possible that in a disciplined society
like China’s, an unofficial organization could challenge the country’s long
supported LP policy. The answer may lie in the fact that personal influence
is a unique aspect of Chinese LP. Some key members in the CCCF played
a very special and practical role in boosting its social profile. Yuan
Xiaoyuan, the guru of the CCCF, is a returned overseas Chinese. Her
personal influence among the Party’s elites stemmed from her special
background16. The Party was eager to set her up as a model, showcasing
102 Reflections on New Perspectives

the benefits of wooing patriotic overseas Chinese to resettle in the

motherland. Her close relationship with the country’s top leaders and
unstinting commitments enabled her to break even sensitive political
taboos in Mainland China. For instance, although it was an open secret that
no Romanization schemes submitted by individuals had ever been
considered by the government since 1958, the green light was given to her
phonetic scheme at the highest level. The SCLW not only had to organize
a special forum to look into it, but also launched a spelling and reading
experiment in a state-run school, which is said to be the only such instance
to have ever occurred in the PRC (Wu 2001: personal communication; Li
M.S. 2000).
Another two key members of the CCCF, An Zijie (or Ann T.K., a HK
based textile tycoon and the then Vice-chairman of Chinese People’s
Political Consultative Conference) and Xu Dejiang also had an overseas
backgrounds as well. In launching the hanzi cultural movement, their
successful strategy of getting directives issued from the top created a sub-
stantial and lasting impact. Apart from the attempts to promote individual
schemes through experiments in the state-run schools, there was a massive
publicity drive in the daily press and research journals.
The so-called academic corruption, stemming from academics’ econo-
mic involvement in society, is another factor worth noting. When the
whole intellectual class is stripped of its independent judgment and critical
insight, it provides one of the most vexing obstacles to social progress.
Intellectuals were increasingly becoming a profit-oriented social stratum,
i.e., their principles, reputations and credibility could be traded on the
marketplace (Collective Editors 2004). In these circumstances it might not
be surprising that so many authoritative figures in academic circles, society
luminaries and prestigious personages graced conferences, seminars,
demonstrations and other events the CCCF had organized to promote hanzi
culture. Ironically, some, such as Hu Qiaomu, Zhang Youyu, Liu Daosheng
and Xu Jialu, used to be (vice) directors of the SCLW or its precursor
organization, the CCSR.
The propaganda campaign by the CCCF included: producing TV
serials and inviting overseas Chinese children to visit China to promote
traditional writing; sponsoring a contest to prove that Chinese typing is
faster than English; and convening international symposia on hanzi culture
in the Great Hall of the People’s Congress (Chinese Parliament House).
They went even further by writing special newspaper sections, thereby
selling their ideas in national newspapers despite the government’s ban on
the private sector becoming involved in the government press. For
instance, Renmin Ribao, which is the mouthpiece of the CCP, remains
Chapter 2 103

under the tight control of the censorship system. Any subject that appears
in it must be considered as having great political importance. Therefore,
there were reasons to think that these articles and programs, appearing
in the nationwide public media, were representative of the government’s
stance. Thus, upon closer examination, it can be assumed that the essential
prerequisite for Hanzi Culture’s increasing momentum is the tacit consent
of the authorities concerned at the central government level. After
enumerating some of their most publicized events, held in politically
symbolic venues, Guo Yingjie (2004: 108) said, “It is hard to know what
went on behind the scenes, but it is safe to assume that these events would
not have taken place at these key state venues without consent from the
top”. This, perhaps, is the reason that despite its negative effect on LP
policy and the confusion it created, even today no one dares to ask who
bears the responsibility for letting the situation develop to the point of
influencing the Party’s strategic position on language, instead of keeping it
in check from the very beginning.
The debate between the hanzi culture advocates and their opponents
came to a head in 1994 (Chen W.Z. 1999), the year in which three
important events took place: 1) The publication of Rehabilitating One
Century of a Wrong Case: An Zijie’s Scientific System of Characters; 2)
the founding of the Association of Chinese Language Modernization; and
3) the beginning of its institutional publication, Forum on Language
Modernization, which came into being after its first conference. The
Association was established by the language reformers as a formal
response to the hanzi culture camp.
The debate eventually developed beyond academic borders and the
political color of the articles produced reminded the people of the period of
the Cultural Revolution. Politicization became inevitable when there
appeared to be a clear connection between the political tenor of the
newspapers and their favored attitudes in weighing the pros and cons in the
debate. Liu Bin, the then education minister, was the highest official to
participate in the polemic debate that openly linked the Hanzi Culture
advocates with political conspiracy. In a speech, delivered in 1992 at the
National Education Work Conference, he dubbed the movement as being
“under the influence of Hong Kong and Taiwan ideology” (Li 1992: 22).
It has been a tradition that discussion of culture related topics has
always been fundamentally a politically dominated issue in China, and
opponents of script reform were naturally perceived as political opponents.
Considering the point of the CCCF’s arguments of hanzi’s superiority,
under the banner of patriotism, was to resume traditional characters, it was
said that the real objective behind the hanzi cultural claims was to echo the
104 Reflections on New Perspectives

arguments from across the Strait, and to follow Taiwan’s strategy to

culturally reclaim the Mainland. Therefore, when the polemic threatened to
undo several decades of solid progress made in LP, it was brought to a
close by political intervention (Jiang Zeming’s speech in 1996. see Zhang
and Xia 2001: 264). But, it needs to be noted that many underlying and
unsettled disputed issues that were brought up during the debate had
existed for some time, and were just waiting for their chance to emerge.

2.3.3 The Implications of the Debate

In this section a comparative description is used to provide a more

complete picture of the complications created by the debate which
becomes clearer by looking at the differences between this debate on the
future of hanzi characters and previous ones.

2.3.3.1 Political factors

In the 1950s, the conservatives’ argument was seen as a malicious
attack on the Party’s ideological line. In Hanzi Culture debate, although
the discussion is characterized by sentimental ideological arguments, a
relatively liberal political environment meant that there was no ideological
persecution. Although the CCCF was touted as ‘neoconservative’ and
‘regressive force’ by some radical reformers, no direct intervention from
politicians occurred until 1996. The unusual silence on the matter during
the whole process by those in authority was one of the reasons given for
the cloudy policy on the direction of script reform during this period. Prior
to the Cultural Revolution, the leaders’ roles were much more active and
directive. Conservatives in the 1950s were passive in adapting to the
political environment and fell victim to it. In the 1990s, the CCCF learned
to tactically make use of the political situation. As the preceding para-
graphs have indicated, the Mainland experienced many facets of traditional
nostalgia during the 1990s – the past was imbued with national
youthfulness and vitality. Hanzi culture advocates tactically repositioned
themselves as the salvation of the traditional heritage and changed their
roles in conformity with the growth of populist commercial nationalism,
fed by the Party propaganda.
The following example offers further evidence for the case that
academic intensity alone is not enough to take advantage of the political
climate. The precursor of the hanzi superiority advocates was, in fact, an
indigenous scholar, Zeng Xingchu, a psychology professor. He was the
first Mainlander who challenged the official language policy. His lengthy
Chapter 2 105

treatise, Evidence about Hanzi – Easy to Study, Easy to Use, was published
in the early 1980s (Zeng 1983). Zeng’s argument drew an immediate fiery
attack from the simplification defenders and the only voice of discontent
was muffled before it could cause an earthquake. In the wake of the
repercussions of the Cultural Revolution, normal academic discussion was
not yet back on track.
Another issue worth citing that indicates the intricacy and complexity
of the situation is that in previous debates, participants on both sides were
confined to a small group, basically linguists, LP practitioners and scholars
in the relevant areas. The debate in 1950s was a brief fight within the
framework of traditional philology, and was brought to a sudden halt by
the ensuing anti-rightists campaign. In contrast, the more recent large-scale
discussions have lasted over a decade and are still continuing to some
extent, involving interests from a wide range of academic sectors. It is
unusual that this debate has not been fully described so far in linguistic
work published in the last few years. For example, there is hardly any
relevant information in Fei’s (1997) Chronology of Chinese Modernization
for One Century, a semi-official history of Chinese LP, collectively
compiled by the staff of the RIAL. It was given little attention in Outline
of Research on Modern Hanzi (Su 1994), which is a comprehensive
introduction to modern hanzi, developed as a university textbook. There is
no mention of it at all in the Applying Studies of Linguistics in the
Twentieth Century (Yu 1996), which uses many official historical ac-
counts, written by a member of the language planning authority. Presum-
ably, it should be understood that the fact that no summary has been written
about this debate in the academic community, does not imply an ostrich-
like policy in the official attitude towards the struggle of competing
interests in script reform. On the contrary, it only indicates that language
issues are still sensitive and under the full control of the Party.

2.3.3.2 Technology oriented

There was little debate in previous discussions about the desirability of
having a machine-efficient writing system. The only issues that were
talked about were those related to typewriting and the mechanical aspects
of the printing process. In this debate, hanzi’s capacity for mechanical
reproduction was the central topic, although, as we have seen, cultural
concern was another. One of the most often used concepts is entropy, an
important concept in information studies to measure the efficiency of
written communication systems in a particular language. According to
Feng Zhiwei’s (1989) calculation, Chinese entropy is nearly ten bits; it is
106 Reflections on New Perspectives

only about half of this in other languages. However, the two sides of the
debate see the high entropy in different ways. While the reformers see it as
the obstacle in the way of modernizing Chinese, the CCCF argued it was
one of the superiorities, proving that hanzi is an information rich writing
system.
Similarly, there are competing views about the fact that characters have
been, to some extent, successfully computerized. The CCCF has argued
that the laborious process to master the characters has been greatly
reduced. Therefore, not only is the effort to further reform hanzi deemed
to be unnecessary, the completed reform programs, given their harmful
effect on China’s cultural heritage, should be reviewed and revised. The
reformers, on the other hand, argue that the current resolutions to character
input are far from satisfactory. Thus, in spite of the exponential need for
human resources and the tragic waste of creativity in inventing the
thousands upon thousands of input schemes over the past couple of
decades, machine processing of written Chinese requires such sophisti-
cation that it has remained the domain of the privileged few. Moreover,
character input and word processing do not encompass the whole of
Chinese computerization. Insofar as the Internet is concerned, it appears
that there is a long way to go to insure effective and efficient transmission.
Then, as we will see in the next chapter, there are the higher level
applications for artificial intelligence and Chinese information processing,
which are seen as very critical for China’s competitiveness in the areas of
science and technology.

2.3.3.3 Linguistic implications

Most of the linguistic concerns rearticulated in this debate, in one form
or another, had exercised the minds of Chinese thinkers for more than a
century without being resolved, and this debate provided an opportunity
for both sides to review the issues against the new historical context.
The discussion has generated a vast increase in publications on various
linguistic issues, which has enhanced our understanding of the merits and
shortcomings of hanzi, as well as providing scientific evaluation of hanzi’s
role in preserving traditional heritage and furthering the country’s
modernization. It has also aroused considerable interest and stimulated the
population’s awareness of LP problems. This, as it has turned out, has
grown into a permanent academic interest, which in turn has produced
new, gradually burgeoning publications on up-to-date information on
various aspects about hanzi itself and its study as a subject.
Chapter 2 107

The renewed interest in hanzi studies, in the context of the emerging

telecommunications era, has encouraged more linguistic experts to rethink
the reasons for taking up and reforming the traditional methodology of
hanzi study. Traditionally, Chinese philology has been an independent
subject with a tradition dating back more than a thousand years. Since
Indo-European language-based modern linguistics was introduced, indi-
genous philology has been integrated into general linguistics and treated as
an insignificant part of the introductory material. In the 1990s, provoked
by the push from advancing technology, and by inspiration sparked by the
debate, a new academic subject, Modern Hanzi Study, has been taking
shape (Su 1994).

2.3.3.4 Nationalism and script reform from a historical perspective

From the New Culture movement in the 1910s to the most recent trends
of modernism, the Chinese language reform wars waged between
conservative purists and social reformers have seen three major disputes
about the script reform. These movements first tended towards Western-
ization, then experienced a shift back to traditionalism that was followed
by the propaganda of patriotism. It might be more useful to examine the
differences between the two debates in the 1950s and 1980-1990s from a
continuum perspective. As Guo (2004: 97) has put it, “There is good
reason to believe that cultural nationalists’ re-examination of the language
reforms today is but a continuation of the century-old resistance to
language reform and part of their subversion of the whole May Fourth
iconoclastic tradition”.
Every revolution or social transformation brings about change in social
and productive relations. This kind of robust change sends a tremor
through culture, creating the social conditions for script reform. The path
of modern script reform runs parallel with modern history and is closely
intermingled with the political circumstances; thus the debate in the 1980s-
90s, after a period when China had experienced an abrupt shift, is not
accidental. Systematic modern language reform in China dates back to the
May Fourth Movement, which occurred in the first decades of the last
century. A brief review of the Chinese script reform development reveals
that politicization of the Chinese script reform is characterized by a
manifest relationship between script reform and the nationalism move-
ment. If we relate script reform programs, implemented after WWII, to
DeFrancis’ (1950: 220) observation that “All five of these periods of
intense nationalism coincide roughly with periods of the most active interest
in reforming the script,” we get the relationship suggested by Table 2-1.
 108

Table 2-1. Script reform punctuated by social change

Self-Strengthening Xinhai Revolution May 4th Movement Founding of P.R. Cultural Economic Reform Technology
and Reform Ending of in 1919 Promoting China in 1949 Revolution and Opening up Revolution
Movement in 1898 Monarchic Democracy and Construction of during 1966-76 Market Economy Information Age
Learning from the Rule in 1911 Science Socialism Ideological and Digital
West Struggle Society
2000 Renewed
controversy over
the future of hanzi
and Romanization
1980 1986: Postponement of
Romanization;
Abandonment of the 2nd
Scheme; four fixations
1970 1977: 2nd Scheme
of Simplification
1950 Table of Simplified
Characters in 1956
and pinyin in 1958
1930 1928: Creation of the
National Language
Romanization Scheme;
1935: 1st Scheme of
Simplification
1920 Conference on
Unification of
Pronunciation in 1913;
first Official Pronuncia-
tion Alphabet in 1918
1898 New script proposed
by Lu Zhuangzhang
and other pioneers
Reflections on New Perspectives
Chapter 2 109

Recognizing the importance of the role of the nationalist movement,

DeFrancis (1950: 129) emphasized the intrinsic relationship between
nationalism and script reform by saying that script reform in China,
Romanization in particular, is purely a political issue rather than a
linguistic one. Although this proposition was formulated on the basis of
Chinese history before the PRC, his anticipatory arguments are supported
by the developments that have occurred in the subsequent Chinese lang-
uage reform. Nationalism tends to come to the fore, and arouse the whole
population to undertake radical action when the nation is either being
strengthened or under threat by foreign forces. When a population is
consciously patriotic, as it is in Chinese society today, issues of natio-
nalism will continue to have a dynamic effect on any reform attempt.
The Hanzi Culture advocates were able to succeed in exploiting the
shift in language policy and the Party’s propaganda strategy. It reminds us
that Chinese script modernization is a long and arduous process that can be
reversed at any time. The present situation seems to satisfy no one. It can
be cautiously predicted that as long as issues related to the writing system
are unresolved and the socio-political circumstances in China remain as
they are, political factors, notably nationalism, could reignite this dispute.
Chapter 3
NEW CHALLENGES FOR A DIGITAL SOCIETY
Hanzi in the Computer Age

1. INTRODUCTION

By concentrating on the planning process for hanzi simplification, the

previous chapters have provided an overview of the developing trajectory
of script reform. This reflection on history provides the background and
context for an investigation of the relationships between external influ-
ential factors and hanzi’s future development. This contextual material
should not only provide the basis for understanding the current problems in
hanzi development, but sets in place the basis for the future directions that
further language planning might take. In this chapter, we first look at the
how hanzi are processed by computer, showing how hanzi clash with
modern-day computer technology.
This chapter deals with two major issues and focuses on two key
notions – chongma and luanma. Tackling these two annoying phenomenon
is an every day problem for every Chinese language computer user and has
been a continuing challenge for Chinese information processing experts.
While chongma is related to inputting hanzi, luanma happens when hanzi
is displayed on a different platform or hanzi wrapped information is
transmitted and viewed over international communication networks. These
two issues mark the two kinds of problems that plague Chinese character
computerization: how to get hanzi into the computer effectively and how
to display these computerized hanzi in digital environments reliably and
legibly; or how to reliably encode and latter decode hanzi. The first part of

111
112 New Challenges for a Digital Society

this chapter is devoted to providing the basic background knowledge of

how the first problem is tackled while the second part covers the second
problem, including the basic principles of information digitalization and
some practical issues when dealing with Chinese online information. As
computer-mediated language knows no borders, the issues concerning
international standards of hanzi encoding sets among East Asian hanzi-
using polities is also briefly discussed.

2. DEALING WITH THE PROBLEMS

OF A DIGITAL SOCIETY

Modern word processors, originally invented in the West to process

written alphabetic letters, bring efficiency to language processing, whereas
Chinese hanzi have long been noted for their inefficiency in non-human
mechanical contexts. In the digital era, with the widespread use of compu-
ters and communication networks, the deficiencies of the Chinese script
have become even more apparent. This section explores the kinds of diffi-
culties that Chinese language users have confronted in adapting their
writing system to technology, and how various methods have been tried to
overcome hanzi’s mechanical deficiencies. It is essential to comprehend
two basic concepts in order to understand the quandary faced by those
working on hanzi computerization: chongma (see Section 2.2.1, Chapter 3)
and luanma (see Section 3.1, Chapter 3). Briefly, the former (literally
meaning duplicated codes) refers to the homophonic occurrence of Chinese
character when hanzi is input into computer, whether phonologically or
ideographically; the latter (literally meaning disordered or messy codes)
refers to the unintelligible gibberish Chinese internet users frequently
encounter when trying to view and display Chinese information trans-
mitted via international communication.

2.1 Chinese Character’s Machine Applications

Hanzi’s progress towards modernization can be divided into two

historical periods – mechanization and computerization – but the diffi-
culties confronted during both of these periods were basically the same in
nature. The problems that Chinese people are currently trying to tackle in
processing hanzi on the computer are similar to those left unresolved by
hanzi typewriter designers. Therefore, any examination of computerization
Chapter 3 113

needs to start with a look at what was done when designing Chinese
typewriters.

2.1.1 Mechanical Processing

The introduction of European typing machines in the nineteenth century

inspired Chinese intellectuals to make hanzi suitable for mechanical
reproduction, and these efforts to devise Chinese typewriters, most of them
by individuals, lasted until the advent of computer technology. The
persistent attempts to make characters mechanically processable left no
possibilities unexplored, but produced only meager results. Some widely
used approaches to typing characters include:

• Whole character typing: This is a very primitive and straightforward

method, derived from traditional printing technology, and only highly
trained operators can pick up the needed character at a reasonable
speed from the many thousands of characters arranged on a big and
awkward tray. Obviously, the physical dimensions of the device create
visual and motor hindrances for the operator, thus greatly reducing the
typing speed.
• Telegraphy method: It is based on the principle of sending and receiv-
ing Chinese telegrams, which was a clever invention by the American
Samuel Morse (1791-1872) and was adopted in 1881 in China. Every
Chinese character was assigned a ‘four digit number’ as used for
encoding telegrams, and mapped on a reference numeral from 0001 to
9999 thereby accommodating up to 10,000 characters, about the
number needed for general purposes. When the operator wanted to type
a particular character, s/he picked the character by looking it up in
a code conversion book in which the characters are represented
arbitrarily by a four digit Arabic number. To accelerate selection, op-
erators have to memorize as many of the numbers related to specific
hanzi as possible. This is the main reason that prevents its wider use.
• Four corners system: This method was invented by Wang Yunwu, a
modern lexicographer. The hanzi is square in shape, and the information
represented by the stroke order or shape of the four corners of the
character is distinctive enough to differentiate characters. To represent
characters, it divides the stroke configuration into ten types represented
by the digits from 0 to 9 and identifies characters by four digit numerals
allocated by the four corners of the character. The drawback of this
system is that there are too many overlapping numerals and “many rules
with too many exceptions” (Yin and Rohsenow 1997: 249). The need
114 New Challenges for a Digital Society

for selection thwarts the ideal of one keystroke per character, preven-
ting rapid typing.
These problems of mechanical selection are only partially alleviated by
computerization, and new conflicts also arise.

2.1.2 Conflicts Between Character and Computers

at Various Levels

In broad terms, there are two levels at which Chinese characters

conflict with communication technology in the information age. There is
direct conflict, which refers to the ‘mechanical’ difficulties of character
input on the computer, but there is also indirect but more fundamental con-
flict which involves Chinese artificial intelligence and Chinese information
processing.

• Artificial Intelligence (AI): AI, also generally known as Automatic

Machine Translation, refers to the understanding of natural language
based on the syntactic analysis of the sentence structure, i.e., AI is
about developing automatic or-semi-automatic systems of analyzing,
understanding and producing the language in its natural state. Infor-
mation about the function of words in context is vital for language
processing whether in our normal everyday use or in any attempt to
simulate it. As linguists would know, Chinese is typologically an ana-
lytical language, so there is usually no systematic marker to distinguish
the functional differences among the words in Chinese as there are in
inflexional languages. What makes this more complex is that characters,
written in running text, leave no space for word boundaries. The units
of meaning are only rarely a single character in modern Chinese; much
more often they are longer chunks, compound multi-character units, set
phrases and even full sentences. This poses a major problem for natural
text analysis, because to identify words, or word segmentation, is the
first and critical step for a machine to read and understand natural
language.
• Chinese Information Processing (CIP): As a part of, but at a lower
level than AI in a strict sense, CIP which is sometimes used exchange-
ably with Chinese Computational Linguistics, principally refers to IR
(Information Retrieval). IR is an automated information storage system
that includes word processing and various computer-assisted expert
systems, such as keyword searching, content substantiation and ana-
lysis, subject threading and categorization which is also known as
automatic abstracting and indexing. Because the modern information
Chapter 3 115

processing systems have originated in the West, they are all based on
alphabetical order, while the Chinese traditional radical system appears
to be a more complex and time consuming way for both human beings
and machines to extract information. The current situation is that some
basic issues such as whether data ordering should be indexed by struc-
tural elements or pinyin remains a question yet to be adequately
addressed. Usually, one would find a number of different classification
systems are employed in libraries and other information intensive
industries, an issue that is dealt with in Section 2.4, Chapter 4.

The purpose of briefly describing these two computer applications is to

emphatically indicate that although data entry is the first step in comput-
erizing the Chinese language, the whole issue of Chinese machine auto-
mation goes far beyond designing highly efficient encoding system to
input hanzi onto computers. While AI and CIP have been major technical
ventures in the Chinese IT industry for decades, they have yet to produce
any universally acceptable solutions.

2.1.3 Character Input on Computers

A phonographic writing system makes use of relatively small numbers

of basic units to encode the language. Chinese does not have a clearly
defined set of units (or letters) to use as a basis for text input via the
keyboard, making it impossible to directly generate text on an electronic
screen. Thus, an encoding/decoding process must be completed to trans-
cribe hanzi and render them computer accessible.
If the process of Chinese character input and output on computers is
presented in a diagraph as shown in Figure 3-1, the difficulty and complex-
ity of Chinese character processing are manifested in boxes 2 and 4.
Process 5, which involves internal coding transformation, must also be
much more sophisticated than with an alphabetic script. The quality of a
particular schematic system is determined by how fully it is able to exploit
information that can be extracted and generalized from the respective
features in boxes 2 and 4, thus minimizing the time spent in process 5. The
key technological problem in box 4 is how to deal with Chongma (homo-
phones). If the encoding rules are complex, Chongma can be reduced to
some extent, but the cost is that users have to invest more energy and time
on learning the typing requirements specified by the scheme. In the words
of Hannas (1997: 267-268), “each involves some trade-off between
training time and accuracy or speed”. Therefore, it is a matter of achieving
a balance between ‘Easy to Learn, Difficult to Use’; and ‘Difficult to
116 New Challenges for a Digital Society

Learn, Easy to Use’ which is the dilemma faced by all phonographic input
scheme designers.

Figure 3-1. Functional processes in phonic-based hanzi computerization schemes

Hanzi is characterized by unlimited potential in its structure that can be

employed to represent its shape; this is thought to be the main reason why
countless input schemes have been devised over last two decades. Broadly
speaking, the information manifested in the structural makeup of hanzi is
much richer than it is in phonetic strings, so there are more character-based
schemes than the phonetics-based ones. As Mair (1991) noted, some
schemes decompose the hanzi according to components, others may
identify it by types of strokes at its corners. Others may even enter onto the
computer sequentially some or all of the strokes of a character. As a result,
since the mid-1970s Chinese people, from every walk of life have shown
great enthusiasm in devising character encoding schemes.
Zhi Binglin’s scheme of hanzi computerization, reported on the front
page of Wenhui Bao Daily (Shanghai) on July 19, 1978, was the first hanzi
input scheme developed within China. (Those designed both by Chinese
and foreigners outside of China were created much earlier.) Only 30 odd
schemes were reported in the First Nationwide Symposium of Hanzi Input
Schemes, held in Qingdao in 1978, just one year after the Cultural
Revolution came to an end. Since then, thousands of schemes have been
invented and publicized on the Mainland alone, and over 100 of these
schemes can be found in software products. Most Chinese computers have
a wide range of preinstalled hanzi input programs provided by computer
producers or vendors. No accurate statistics are available about how many
input schemes have been devised to date, but there is a widely acknow-
ledged belief that almost every fortnight a new scheme comes into being
Chapter 3 117

(Mair 1991; Zhou 2001b). At times, during the 1980s into the 1990s, there
were more than 500,000 people engaged in devising input schemes1, and
watching press briefings on the TV news about the latest schemes to
encode and decode hanzi used to be a way of life in Chinese society. This
testifies to the tremendous amount of effort that has gone into solving this
problem. However, despite the time, money and effort devoted to solving
this problem, China has yet to see a scheme that is truly satisfactory or
widely adopted. By the mid-1990s, competition in Chinese input software
was growing more intense, and the term Wanma (numberless encoding
schemes/horses) Benteng (galloping) [ten thousand horses competing] was
used to literally describe the efforts of individuals to secure themselves a
position in the national marketplace. According to Zhang Pu (1997: 6-8),
by 1997 the Patent Bureau had accepted 336 applications and 159 cases
were granted intellectual copyrights. Apart from this, the Administration
Centre of Software Registration also accepts registration applications.
Today, there are around twenty systems which have the capacity to
successfully compete in the software market from which consumers have
to choose if they want to enter characters on their computers.

2.2 Three Streams of Input Schemes

In general terms, the method of hanzi input can be categorized as either

keyboard or non-keyboard input (see Figure 3-2), and there are two streams
of keyboard entry (phonetic and ideographic) as illustrated in Figure 3-3.
Most phonetic input schemes use pinyin to transliterate Chinese characters.
However, there are some individually devised alphabetic systems, as well
as the zhuyin (or, Bopomofo) scheme, a stroke-based alphabetic transli-
teration system introduced by Chinese government in 1905. Non-pinyin
schemes normally come with a specific keyboard or modified international
keyboard as part of the hardware. The use of an international standard (i.e.,
QWERTY) keyboard is the most attractive aspect of the pinyin-based
system. Growing interest and market performance show that the most
convenient and natural way to get Chinese characters on the screen is to
type by pronunciation.
For ideographic or hanzi-based systems, one of the inconvenient aspects is
the need to use a Chinese-specific keyboard. Another disadvantage is that
there is no unifying standard for traditional stroke and radical/component
systems, so keyboards designed to represent these units vary considerably
from one to the other. Although one can use an international standard key-
board for alphabetic hanzi-based schemes, there is still no consensus on how
118 New Challenges for a Digital Society

the strokes or comp onents should be represented by the letters. For instance,
some schemes use D or O to represent 口, because of their physical resem-
blance, but some other systems may use phonetic relationships by
employing K to stand for 口, which is pronounced as Kou in Mandarin
Chinese.

OCR (Optical Character Recognition)

Non-keyboard SR (Speech Recognition)

Mouse

Computing with
Chinese Characters Pinyin
Phonetics
Non-Pinyin

Keyboard Combined
Stroke/component

Ideographic Components

Alphabetic
Figure 3-2. Computing with Chinese characters

by character/words (70s) – stats-based

(frequency use)
(standard key board only)
pinyin by phrases (80s) – corpus-based

Phonetically by sentences (90s) – linguist/AI-based

(semantics + pragmatic)

Non-pinyin/zhuyin
(Chinese/standard keyboard)
Keyboard
Inputting Combined
Method

by stroke/component
(traditional)

Ideographically by component
(traditional or self-defined)

by alphabetic
(Chinese/standard keyboard)

Figure 3-3. Taxonomy of keyboard input schemes

Chapter 3 119

2.2.1 Mainstream Schemes: Alphabetic/Phonetics-Based Method

There are a number of alphabetic, keyboard-based software packages in

which hanzi are phonetically encoded using official pinyin, including
modified pinyin, or some other individually devised phonetic system. The
best feature about the phonetics-based input method is its closeness to
human language; any putonghua speaker who has some knowledge of
pinyin can readily use it without special training. But, homophones or
chongma, putonghua requirements, and rare characters are three fatal
weaknesses of alphabet-based schemes.

2.2.1.1 Homophones
An almost irresolvable obstacle with a phonetic-based system is the
so-called chongma crisis. As previously noted, chongma or homophonous
hanzi, are superfluous characters frequently appearing on the screen along
with the correct one when phonetic syllables are input. This is a result of
the paucity of syllables available in the phonetic system compared to the
very large number of morphemic units (hanzi) in Chinese. An apt example
for an English speaker might be the distinguishing between “right, rite,
write and Wright”. When a word processor for an alphabetic language is
designed to receive spoken input rather than input from a keyboard, it
has to correctly identify the words it hears from the phonetic context. For
instance, when 赵 (zhao) is input by Microsoft pinyin 2.0, a phonetic-based
input scheme developed by Microsoft for Chinese users, 53 monosyllabic

Figure. 3-4. Illustrated sample of computer typed Chinese text

120 New Challenges for a Digital Society

homophonic chongma are displayed (see the panel bar in Figure 3-4), not
including the polysyllabic words/phrases. The users’ enthusiasm for the
alphabet-based schemes has been dampened by their low accuracy rate due
to the frequent interruption by chongma. Similarly structured characters
also cause homographic chongma for ideographic input schemes, but the
problem does not appear to be as serious as it is for phonetic schemes.
Linguistically, the Chinese speech sound system uses over 400 non-tonal
sounds to represent a huge hanzi system of as many as 3,000 characters in
modern Chinese. Theoretically, one syllable has to represent at least 7.5
homophonous characters, if the four tones are not taken into consideration
(the majority input schemes are non-tonal). Some spellings, such as shi, yi,
ji, will produce hundreds of alternatives in some schemes. As the screen
normally can only display about ten characters at a time, in order to select
the correct one, users will have to scroll through a number of display pages
(typically a bar that pops up on the screen to display homophgraphic
characters when a valid syllable is input) to search for the intended charac-
ter. For some rarely used characters, one may have to search through about
ten pages (Gu 2000: 30), severely decreasing typing speed.
When a Chinese translation of the underlined text from the previous
paragraph was typed using the popular ‘Microsoft pinyin’ input method,
which comes preinstalled on most computer systems with Windows 98 or
above, the first author, an experienced user of the system, took nine min-
utes to type the text. Most of the time was spent correcting the homopho-
nous characters, which related to 17 words. The input speed was 9.2
characters per minute; this is much slower than the average typist’s 50
words per minute (Wu and Ding 1992: 3).
Zhang Zirong and Chu Min’s (2002: 17-18) research has highlighted
the chongma problem in the natural language use. According to their
statistics, there are 1,036 homophonous characters in the latest version of
the Modern Chinese Dictionary. Only 688 characters, that form 1,036
homophonies, are used more than once as monosyllabic words in the 2.5
million characters corpus from People’s Daily, but the characters in high
use among these 1,036 homophonies are quite limited. For example, there
are nearly 100 characters that may be presented if one says ‘shi’, but the
most used one ‘是’ (shì, to be: is/are) is far more likely to be required than
any of the others. The most used 180 characters cover more than 95
percent of occurrences; only 42 characters are used less. These are
characters that are most likely to make trouble in actual grapheme-
phoneme conversion in the natural language. If these 42 characters were
able to be satisfactorily processed, theoretically and practically, the
homonym errors would be reduced to 75 percent, so chongma caused by
Chapter 3 121

homophonous words would be significantly diminished. At a more general

level, 580 words were found to be homophonous in this dictionary, but
only 170 words were found in a 2.5 million People’s Daily character
corpus, and just 48 highly frequented (above 95%) occurrences were
required to be distinguished. Using Zhang’s and Chu’s scheme, the error
rate for grapheme-phoneme conversion decreased from 8.8 per 1,000 to
4.4 per 1,000. They conclusively contend that this should set the maximum
possible rate of occurrence for homophone errors in conversion between
phonetic input and character output that can expected as the average
capacity for most systems.
Another cumbersome burden for phonetic users is that individuals have
developed their own personal alphabetic schemes. Although government
agencies have repeatedly urged everyone to adhere to the officially sanc-
tioned pinyin system, numerous new computer-oriented Romanized schemes
have been created, mostly by educated dilettantes and amateurs. Some have
claimed that their systems have reduced the homophonous coding to a
minimum level, but users’ unfamiliarity with the spelling rules of the newly
designed schemes means that they have to spend time and energy on train-
ing, which compromises the systems quantitatively and qualitatively.

2.2.1.2 Additional knowledge about pinyin and putonghua

The basic requirement for the phonetic method is that one must be able
to read and spell the hanzi correctly and precisely. Thirty percent of
China’s 1.4 billion people are speakers of various dialectal variations
(Hannas 1997: 373-4), and usually dialect speakers have problems
providing the correct phonetic input. For those who do speak Mandarin,
not everyone can use pinyin as a method of input if they lack 1) enough
functional knowledge of pinyin and/or 2) do not know the correct ortho-
graphic rules for word division. In a national large scale sociolinguistics
survey (see Section 3.3.3, Chapter 6), it was found that 68 percent of
the total population “can use pinyin”. Rohsenow (2001: 136) gives a
straightforward description of this situation:
until the population at large is educated enough in the national
language, and familiar enough with the standard pronunciation and/or
with the standard Hanyu Pinyin spellings of words, it is unlikely that
there will be a popular acceptance of the Hanyu Pinyin input systems.
However, Mair (1991: 7) argues that computer input has helped to
spread alphabetic literacy. “After a couple of years of reliance upon
122 New Challenges for a Digital Society

phonetic input schemes, users gradually become comfortable with the

notion that Romanization really does faithfully represent their language”.
The argument, that pinyin has a role in popularizing input systems, is
strongly supported by the findings of an online survey2. In response to the
question “If you use pinyin-based input systems, how did you get your
knowledge of pinyin?” Of 104 respondents, only six said they had to spend
time on learning pinyin for typing purposes, whereas most people (77/104)
used their knowledge of pinyin obtained through schooling. Interestingly,
17 respondents indicated that pinyin skills can be gained automatically
through typing practice.

2.2.1.3 Inability to spell rarely used characters

The most attractive point of the ideographic input schemes is that they
can deal with all signs that are stored in the programmed data bank as long
as they are systematically classified. Wang Shiyao (2000: 217-218) argues
that “the character is a visual code and the ideal way to input a character
should be by visual means. This can be seen by the fact that no script in the
world is being input on the computer by phonetic means”. The ideographic
method designers and proponents criticize phonetic schemes for their
inability to process rarely used characters, and these schemes will never be
considered ideal if they cannot produce all the characters available in
Chinese.

2.2.2 Non-Mainstream Schemes

Non-mainstream schemes include the ideographic input approach and

non-key board approach. The former, which refers to ideographically
reproducing characters by encoding hanzi’s structural elements (normally
strokes and components), which was the dominant approach in the initial
stage of developing character input programs. Up until the mid-1990s,
Wang Ma system, a typical ideographic input method, famous for high
input speed by professional typists, accounted for 70 percent of the total
input software market (Zhang 1993: 37). But currently, professional typing
is a sunset industry with computers being used more by urban profes-
sionals, and in this climate hanzi-based approaches have gradually lost
their dominant position among general computer users. Notwithstanding
the possibility of a significant boost in acceptance at some point in time,
the non-keyboard approach, as the following sections indicate, is not a
practical option in the near future.
Chapter 3 123

2.2.2.1 Ideograph-based method

Generally, hanzi input scheme designers use components as the units for
analysis for technical convenience instead of using components to input
characters (component-based schemes were only seen in the very early
stages of program development). Cognitive dissonance occurs because the
IT industry designs character input based on technical convenience which
goes against educational practices related to character structure and stroke
order. While the state imposes a national standard on how to analyze and
dismantle hanzi, and these standards are strictly observed in schools across
the country, they are often ignored by software designers. Another even
more critical drawback that prevents hanzi-based schemes from gaining
wider use is that they require more effort as the user must continuously
analyze the structure while typing. When the mental creation process is
interrupted, the thought flow is broken, and concentration and typing speed
are lost, confining hanzi schemes mainly to professional typists.

Table 3-1. Advantages and disadvantages of two input streams

Features Character-based Schemes Alphabet-based Schemes

Speed Depends on typing skill Typing skill has little relevance
Innateness More familiar to Chinese eyes. Culturally alien to Chinese.
It is indigenous to Chinese, accept-
able especially to older generation.
Writer friendly Interfering with thought processes, More natural and innately related to
resulting in loss of concentration. the language.
Special For most schemes, a several weeks Basically, no training needed. Once
training training course is a must; easy to the skill is acquired, it is retained
required be forgotten. for a longer time.
Conforming to Most run against the standard Most use pinyin, the official
official policy specified by language and standard; some devise their own
education authorities. alphabetic system.
Re-selection Click once and get the character Have to select from a panel of
involved right away. candidate homophonous characters.
Dialect free Welcomed most strongly by Dialect speakers find it difficult,
people from dialect areas in failing to get characters if misspelling
southern China. occurs due to wrong pronunciation.
Skill persistent Skill erodes very fast, hard to The skill is easy to retain, once
recall after a period of interruption. mastered, long lasting.
Keyboard Most use a specific or self-defined Most use the international
keyboard. standard keyboard.
124 New Challenges for a Digital Society

Combined schemes make use of both phonetic and ideographic infor-

mation to define hanzi. They try to distinguish homonyms by applying
strokes to indicate semantic information. This method is less distracting
and can save a lot of time that would otherwise be spent on homonym
discrimination when typing.
Table 3-1 compares the strengths and weaknesses of the two dominant
encoding schemes.

2.2.2.2 Non-keyboard input streams

The frustrating experience of depending only on a keyboard input method
has made people turn to other alternatives. Out of three non-keyboard
input methods (i.e., reading, handwriting and scanning), automatic speech
recognition is the long-term focus for the IT industry since mouse-based
input has been proven to be awkward and inept. OCR is the only one that
has found its way into the retail market, although it is still in the
development stage (see Figure 3-5).

Figure 3-5. Taxonomy of non-keyboard input schemes

There are two varieties of OCR: scanning and simultaneous writing.

The scanning method for OCR involves input of existing text, which is
analogous to using a scanner. Simultaneous writing OCR requires the
computer to make on-going pattern-recognition matches by simultaneously
comparing the characters input by hand with the mapped characters pre-
programmed in the computer, until one that has maximal structural
similarity is found. As the speech recognition technology is not a realistic
expectation in the foreseeable future, OCR has captured people’s imagin-
ation as a potential breakthrough in overcoming the difficulties of
inputting hanzi on a computer. The first printed hanzi OCR scheme was a
1000-character scheme developed by IBM in 1966. In China, scholars did
not start any research on OCR until the end of the 1970s, but since then
Chapter 3 125

there has been rapid research development with marketing beginning in the
1990s.

OCR has special implications for hanzi processing in China, because:

• Dialect speakers have welcomed it;

• The older generations are for various reasons not familiar with a
keyboard (Tompson 1991), and it is too late for them to gain the needed
physical skills late in life;
• Computer illiterates and pinyin illiterates can not use phonetics-based
input systems.
• The time and energy need to effectively use complex hanzi-based input
systems may be too much for many users.
• Unlike western alphabetic manuscripts, where most text is normally
typed because of the long-term use of typewriters, a large proportion of
intellectual products in Chinese are initially handwritten.

For a number of practical reasons, it is unusual to find any combined

input systems in the marketplace, which undisputedly is dominated by
pinyin-based schemes.

2.2.3 Optimizing the Input Schemes

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, there was increasing discussion about
the appropriate role for the government in the management of the input
software market. Zhou (1986c: 52) argued there was in fact no possibility
to single out a universal scheme for all purposes, because “different
services require different types of input methods”. Hu Shuangbao (1996:
404-405) proposed that the accepted set of alternatives for common and
professional users in Mainland China should be reduced to four schemes.
However, this is unlikely to happen and the public is unlikely to be satis-
fied with the alternatives as long as the following phenomena exist:

• The debate about evaluation criteria for scheme selection is ongoing;

• Speed competitions for academic and individual input projects continue
to get sponsored by interest groups; and
• The devising of input schemes is still a flourishing and dynamic
business.
While there is no agreement on a set of evaluation criteria for input
schemes, it is generally agreed that the principles and factors to be con-
sidered should be:
126 New Challenges for a Digital Society

• Scientific: Input should be in accordance with the official standards,

based on a sound linguistic theory and be compatible with the national
education policy. It also should be devised on the basis of the latest
developments in the relevant academic areas, such as human body
engineering science and ergonomics study.
• User friendly: No special training should be needed or if it is, it should
be available within an affordable timeframe. Operational principles
should be concise, consistent, and clear, and more importantly, to
enable the user to type by natural association rather than commitment
to memory. The system makes use of the characteristic features of
hanzi and the Chinese language. Traditional and modern characters
should be treated equally by adhering to consistent rules, conveniently
and indiscriminately applicable to the whole population regardless of
their age, location and educational background.
• Application in a wide range of uses: Equally effective for users with
various purposes. The general population has quite different require-
ments for speed than professionals; most schemes are designed to be
effective within the common hanzi, i.e., 6763 (to be exact, 6724
character + 39 components) characters contained in the national stan-
dard code set SCCSII GB2312-80. The ideal scheme should accommo-
date a large enough number of characters to include not only modern
Chinese, but also archaic and non-Chinese characters.
• High efficiency: Using as few key strokes as possible, i.e., coding
length is short enough to speed up the typing. In 1990, Qian Yuzhi
advanced a formula to assess the efficiency of an input scheme (Feng
1995: 74). The efficiency (represented by θ) is the optimization of the
following three factors. If ‘n’ is the total number of caps required on
the keyboard (most use all 26 letters on the international keyboard), ‘l’
(letter) is the number of key strokes required (most are 4) and ‘c’ is the
coincident occurrence (chongma) in static conditions, then the effi-
ciency θ = n x l x c. A minimum θ value means maximum efficiency.
Another two influential factors are keyboard design, and the vocabulary
database.
• National and international: It should be equally effective nationwide,
regardless of the population’s place of birth and dialect use. At present, all
alphabet-based schemes are based on the official standard pronunciation,
or putonghua, and thus are national from the perspective of alphabet-
based advocates, but criticized as locally biased by character-based
proponents. It should also be compatible with the international standard
keyboard and characters used in other character using countries and
overseas Chinese communities.
Chapter 3 127

• Consistency: It should be in conformity with school language teaching

methods, existing dictionary classification methods and database
retrieval systems. There is no doubt, that in the long run the biggest
group of beneficiaries of a good input system will be school students.
About 200-300 million students will be involved, all of whom will have
to learn computer typing, the basic requirement to acquire further IT
skills.

Prior to mid-1990s, especially in 1980s, computers were expensive

hi-tech office equipment, and the targeted users of input scheme were
confined to professional typists and secretarial and clerical staff, and
therefore high typing speed (normally meaning a lengthy period of training
and familiarity) and powerfulness (a big character database to process a
wide range of texts) were the primary pursuit of any input scheme vendor.
Over last decade or so, big strides in computer technology coupled with
radical economic development has made computers a commodity and one
of the domestic necessities for the urban household. This has significantly
changed the focus of input software developing strategies as the new users
place greater emphasis on practical factors in choosing word-processing
products, in particular, no special training requirement and good compa-
tibility. Finally, after two decades of overheated enthusiasm for input
scheme development, people finally have realized that given the complex-
ity of the problem, there can be no progress made beyond the level
currently achieved without more input from linguistic science. Indeed,
input and encoding issues are becoming less of a concern, as attention is
turning to how to transmit characters validly through international tele-
communications systems in ways that are intelligible to different appli-
cation platforms. This is now deemed to be a more urgent issue as email
and the internet have rapidly become part of Chinese language user’s lives.

3. INTERNET USE OF CHINESE CHARACTERS

Currently, more computers are beginning equipped with the special

software and/or hardware needed to work with Chinese characters. Most
handle Chinese in one of three ways. In the Chinese-speaking world, most
operating systems are localized for Chinese with all text settings set to
Chinese. The users can freely and conveniently input and display Chinese
with built-in Chinese fonts. For example, Microsoft has made available
traditional and simplified Chinese Windows for every new version. These
128 New Challenges for a Digital Society

systems are best for the people who deal only with Chinese on a daily
basis.
Another two practical ways for overseas Chinese computer users to
access characters have emerged over time. One approach is to add a
Chinese helper program, which typically comes with Chinese fonts to
enable Chinese to be used, in conjunction with another language operating
system, and programs such as word processors and Internet browsers. A
second approach, which is increasing in popularity as more programs are
equipped with Unicode, is using Unicode to handle Chinese directly
through the systems themselves. The growing popularity of Unicode
enables more computers to work in a multi-script friendly environment,
offering a potential solution for non-Chinese computer users to input and
display Chinese hanzi. However, none of these systems has proven to be
totally reliable and frequent interference with the local system is common.
In the early 1990s, when most technical standards concerning Chinese
characters were still ‘under construction’, only a small number of Chinese
citizens had computer facilities, and it was not normally possible to pro-
cess online information in Chinese characters without Chinese Windows or
installing special Chinese support software. Although there is still a long
way to go in developing the ability to view and create Chinese information
in a ‘problem free’ manner for Chinese-language internet users, currently
most Chinese computer users, despite occasionally relying on various
support software and their own skills, can largely work with Chinese
online. The following is a succinct discussion of some of the technical
matters related to the display and decoding of websites and email in
Chinese, with the aim of offering an insight into the problem of encoding
(input) and decoding (output) of Chinese characters.

3.1 Some Technical Issues in Encoding and Decoding

Chinese Characters

Before proceeding to discuss dealing with hanzi on the internet and

problems concerning hanzi encoding and decoding in multilingual text, it
might be beneficial to provide some basic understanding of Chinese
computerization. The computer works by taking only two simple orders:
yes or no; or in mathematical terms, a series of binary numbers. All
programmed computer data is represented by the two figures 0 and 1,
called the binary digit system. 28 = 256 non-identical codes can represent
all Western alphabetic 52 letters (including upper and lower cases), the 10
Arabic numerals, plus the punctuation marks in Latin script and some
Chapter 3 129

control codes on the keyboard. The process of assigning numbers to

characters is known as encoding. Decoding is the process of looking up the
encoded character through its internalized mapping table and displaying it
on the screen.
Alphabetic scripts can use a universal system for internal coding and
external exchange as an interface with other software. For other languages,
hundreds of code systems were used to encode all the orthographies used
around the world. No serious problem occurs if each language operates
within the confines of its own group of users, but when these scripts,
encoded by different systems, come into close contact in the same appli-
cation environment, they produce unintelligible masses of text (luanma) on
the screen. Chinese users, although sharing the same language, are not able
to communicate because of a lack of versatility among internalized code
labeling systems. Versatility requires that the code used in the shared
document must always be identified, so the machine can recognize and
process these identical codes. In other words, agreement on a universal
standard within the country facilitates communication. The release of
GB 2312-80, which uses double-byte (2 16 = 65,535) to encode 6,763
characters, has ended the laissez faire state of various individual code
systems used by different software manufacturers and editors in China.
However, numberless character codes have been devised and published by
respective governments or big IT industries in hanzi-using regions. Some
other influential systems are listed in Section 2.1.1.3 of Chapter 4. The
coexistence of standards, adopted in isolation, detrimentally affects all and
prevents information from stably and smoothly being communicated and
interchanged. In Section 4, Chapter 7 and Appendix F, we see how Chinese
technological standard and language management authorities undertook to
unify the various internal standard character sets and made them compatible
with international standards.
At present, to input Chinese characters, or create an e-mail message on
a non-Chinese Windows computer, usually involves activating the existing
Chinese software that comes preinstalled with the major encoding systems.
Now most Windows (after 2000 and XP) have excellent built-in Chinese
support with availability of various hanzi standard sets such as GB 2312-
80, GB 13000.1 and Big5, and at least theoretically, users have access to
Chinese fonts and input methods internationally. Over the past few years
the reliability of the system has been significantly enhanced as more
national and international technical standards for character sets are put in
place. The frustrating thing is that, for a number of reasons, programs do
not always recognize and respond as expected, and interference is common-
place when communicating with the outside world, making internet use in
130 New Challenges for a Digital Society

the Chinese language not as pleasant an experience as occurs when using

alphabetic languages. We examine this issue in the subsequent section.

3.2 Decoding Chinese Information on Web Pages

In the past, Windows web browsers such as Internet Explorer and

Netscape Navigator could support Chinese characters on their own without
the installation of special programs, but users needed to select the right
font. This often involved a trial and error process if one was not sure about
the font used to encode the information, and could be a very frustrating
experience. There are many good free software fonts for downloading,
including free language packs from Microsoft that contain methods for
inputting Chinese characters. However, installing these language packs
will also automatically set up browsers for Chinese, which sometimes can
interfere with the local system. Apart from Microsoft fonts, Chinese users
have now a number of other fonts to use in Windows. Some of these fonts
will allow the user to write e-mails in Chinese in Microsoft Outlook.
However, the predominant problem is the instability in viewing results,
commonly known as luanma, in which characters are displayed as un-
deciphered or ill-formed codes. Two primary reasons account for this kind
of garbled code: 1) different Chinese character internal codes are used for
different software or on internet servers; and 2) characters are programmed
using a single byte while alphabetic scripts use a double byte. Either of
these produces distorted characters, making the content unintelligible.
Figure 3-6 provides some examples of these luanma or corrupted text
strings. The first two lines are also called ‘kongma’ (empty code). While
for luanma there is still the possibility to restore the text using specially
designed (online) programs, kongma are irreparable and irretrievable as the
coded information has been totally lost in the course of transmission.

**********************;
  
  
;
µÚ Ò¼ ½²Ð÷ ÂÛ£-£-£-£-£-£-£-£-£-£-£-£;
üÖØÁË¡£ 1_9_9__(_(_丁茄拗杖 ū 贰探 姘 _(_;
¡£, or Öйú¸è£º·ÅÂíɽ¸è£¬ÌðÃÔÃÔ£¬¹ú¸è¡¢Â·±ßµÄÒ¹»°²»Òª²É.

Figure 3-6. Illustrated samples of corrupted text strings

As long as Windows has Chinese fonts installed, both of the major

browsers are able to display Chinese characters, and Chinese web surfers
can view different Chinese websites. But this only occurs if web pages tag
Chapter 3 131

the information to let the browser know that the script is in Chinese.
Otherwise browsers will display luanma if they mistake the information
created by coding schemes such as Big 5 as GB or vice-versa. In this case,
the user has to go to ‘View’ on the main menu and manually choose a
decoding font by clicking ‘Character Set’ (on Netscape), ‘Character
Encoding’ (on Mozilla Firefox) or ‘Fonts/Encoding’ (on Internet Explorer,
see Figure 3-7).

Figure. 3-7. Illustrated sample of hanzi character sets available on IE

The problem is complicated because the code standards used to encode

the information have to be specified from an increasingly large number of
choices. At present, simplified Chinese (GB) or traditional Chinese (Big5)
are still the most frequently used codes. The latter encodes traditional
characters and is used in Taiwan, Hong Kong and some other Chinese-
speaking communities, while GB encodes simplified characters and is used
mainly in Mainland China and Singapore; the encoding used depends on
the target audience. Unicode is growing in popularity and can be used for
both simplified and traditional hanzi, and many web sites are dual-coded,
i.e., offer the same information in both codes. Before the Unicode era, it
was standard practice for web editors to use a single encoding system to
code information, and this information is still available on the web, so it is
not uncommon that the Mainlanders cannot view the information coded in
traditional characters on a website, and vice-versa. This brief introduction
only describes how Windows browsers work. For other operating systems
such as Macintosh and Unix, the users may have trouble even after the
appropriate Chinese fonts are installed.
132 New Challenges for a Digital Society

3.3 E-mail Use on Non-Chinese Language Computers

Essentially, the difficulties and possible common solutions to viewing

emails in Chinese are the same as those for internet information. Prior to
the mid-1990s, Chinese computers used an encoding mechanism outside
the normal ASCII range used by English, making it almost impossible to
use Chinese for international e-mail. Computer users would be aware that
alphabetic languages use only seven bits of an 8-bit byte unit and anything
included in the 8th bit can be either ignored or changed. When eight bits
double-byte encoded hanzi information is sent out over the international
media network, it is transmitted and read around the world on Western
script platforms (typically, in single-byte English Windows environments).
In order to make Chinese encoding different from alphabetic codes,
Chinese character encoding editors have had to use the eighth bit as a
distinct marker to represent hanzi. However, these 8th-bit bytes used for
Chinese can be mistaken as other bytes used to create special characters,
like ampersand signs. Since the mid-1990s, computers have made major
advances in being able to handle Chinese, and the need to deal with online
Chinese information has increasingly become an international matter in the
cyber world (see Section 4, Chapter 7). This trend has caught the attention
of software developers, and as a result various decoding helpers and
special font software have been developed. Although an experienced
Chinese net surfer, aided by these supporting tools, can successfully view
or fix some damaged Chinese texts using major international browsers,
it is still the biggest obstacle preventing people from getting access to
Chinese online information.
So far, there is no universally acceptable solution to this problem, even
for those who are very experienced. As Jack Dai (1996: 24), a specialist in
cross-language computing and software localization, said, “even the most
savvy and experienced [software] manager can run from time to time into
some unexpected quirks that are unique to Asian languages”. After citing a
case study on how to deal with Asian computing challenges in a corporate
business communication, and “the granddaddy of all the headaches” in
cracking the “quirky and bizarre”, “intricate and troublesome” problems in
this case, he (p. 25) warns, “Even now I still sweat over the possibility of
getting myself grounded over the precarious business of Asian language
computing, no matter how high-flying my confidence and experience”. A
site that has tried to overcome this impasse was Bluesea (2003). In a
lengthy article (telnet//bbs.tsinghua.edu.cn, or, hppt://bbs.tsinghua.edu.cn),
entitled Complete Collection of Luanma, there is a list of twenty-four
reasons (22 pages) that may cause luanma. The authors suspect that such
Chapter 3 133

good intentions to help Chinese language internet users will be of no avail,

as the problem of luanma is so incredibly complex that even computer
experts lose their enthusiasm after getting halfway through a text. One of
our online survey’s correspondent’s experiences corroborates this obser-
vation:
Reading emails, for example, on the same machine, under the same
mechanical conditions, some characters are intelligible, some are not. If
I can read them this time, I’m not sure about next time, with the same
message. Sometimes the message in characters can be printed as it is
seen on the screen, other times it is just luanma; more puzzling, one
part is luanma, another part is intelligible text.
The outcomes of the aforementioned online survey (carried out in
2002) also shows that out of 164 respondents, only 32 people said they
rely only on hanzi in their cyber life. In answering, “Overall, how would
you describe your digital surfing experience involving Chinese characters
on the computer?” among 114 respondents, 49 people chose ‘not satisfied’
and 12 ticked ‘very frustrating, a lot of problems’. One respondent wrote,
In order to avoid the troubling delay caused by encoding and decoding
characters, my personal experience is that when I contact someone for
something urgent over the Internet, even when I surely know the
machine at the other end is installed with a Chinese character process-
ing software package, whether it is the same that I am using or not, the
most secure method is to use English or pinyin, depending on the
receiver’s proficiency in English.
Fortunately, at present most Chinese Internet users know either English
or pinyin, but with the rapid popularization of computers and the steady
lowering of the age of the computer using population, this situation will
change in the future.
As e-mail has become a worldwide phenomenon, some e-mail pro-
grams, such as Outlook and Netscape Messenger, give the user the option of
specifying the appropriate language that is being used in the body of the
text at the stage when the e-mails are being written. If this is done, the
messages can be opened and read in Chinese when they reach the end
recipients. But if the e-mail program used by end recipients is not identical
to the senders’, it will normally fail to recognize the language tag, and the
e-mail text will not be automatically displayed in characters, so the end
users will have to look for decoding helpers on the main menu of their
browsers. Again, different browsers and e-mail programs internalize this
134 New Challenges for a Digital Society

function in different ways, so only experienced and frequent users can

quickly and successfully read Chinese messages.

3.4 Summarizing the On-line Dilemma

This discussion briefly sets out some basic principles and common
approaches used to deal with Chinese online information. However, as the
operating systems of computers are becoming more sophisticated each
day, especially when connected to the international electronic communi-
cation systems, numerous instability factors arise when trying to get them
to communicate. Thus, despite more capable systems, there are just too
many unpredictable circumstances and curious incidents that occur every
day to harass the experts and big company users. Put simply, unless 100
percent compatibility of all possible factors is achieved between hardware,
software and platform, as well as exact the duplication of the original
environment, any small fault in the interchange processes may cause a
failure in displaying information, often resulting in luanma or a total loss
on non-Chinese Windows. For individual users, very often the problem of
getting Chinese characters to work is almost impossible, leaving them with
the impression that being able to view Chinese online information is a
matter of chance.
In the digitally designed linguistic environment, quality assurance and
system stability in viewing online information wrapped in hanzi has
become the bottleneck for easy web browsing. There is no available
statistical data that shows the failure rate of obtaining intelligible text. In a
succinct online survey of how Chinese language prevents overseas hanzi-
based web citizens from efficiently accessing online information (see Note
2 in this chapter), in answer to ‘How often are you able to view Internet
information or receive a message in Chinese hanzi’, more than a third of
the respondents chose ‘seldom’ (32/114) or ‘very infrequently’ (8/114),
and ten selected ‘I’ve never tried to read in Chinese’.
The development of Unicode marked a historical watershed in the
history of computer development and it provides a potential platform for
the long-standing inspiration of a common script in hanzi-using commu-
nities. Unicode was created for a particular task: to employ a single set of
numerical codes to digitally accommodate the entire world’s scripts,
allowing them to be identified, processed and displayed on all future
computers regardless of the script’s physical complexity. But as we are
going to see in Section 4, Chapter 7 and Appendix F, despite the initial
accomplishments in unifying the hanzi inventory across hanzi-using
Chapter 3 135

polities, the outcome is still far from satisfactory. First, Unicode has its own
technical limitations; second, the socio-political factors involved in the
development process make agreement on obtaining a unified electronic
environment capable of processing most of East Asia’s sinographs3 more
difficult and complex (see Section 4.2, Chapter 7).
Standardization is the prerequisite for any script to be Unicoded. How
to achieve the internal standardization of Chinese hanzi is the topic of next
chapter.
Chapter 4
STANDARDIZATION AS A SOLUTION
Multiple Standards for Specific Purposes

1. INTRODUCTION

Having examined the basic principles of hanzi computerization, the

progress made thus far, and particularly how a time-tested writing system
has come into conflict with modern communication systems, it is now
appropriate to look at what LPers have done to bring the two systems
together. “Language planning is called for wherever there are language
problems. If a linguistic situation for any reason is felt to be unsatisfactory,
there is room for a program of language planning” (Haugen 1966b: 52).
The program that has been pinpointed by Chinese LPers to tackle the
problems of the writing system was standardization. As indicated in
Chapter 2 the four fixations were formally listed as the major tasks in the
working agenda of the hallmark 1986 Conference, and to formulate com-
puter oriented language standards and to supervise the implementation of the
language standards stood out as new responsibility for Chinese language
planning authorities. However, as the evidence shows in 1986 standard-
ization was a vague notion that was primarily of theoretical concern.
Hardly any standards, guidelines or regulations regarding language use,
decreed before the Conference, gave any thought to technological stan-
dards or needs. But, subsequently it did not take long before LPers and
software developers realized the urgency of achieving a high standard
level of use when using hanzi. There also has been an increased awareness
of the applied value that corpus methods offer for tackling a number of
problems in the field of character input and CIP, that is, a systematic

137
138 Standardization as a Solution

optimization of the hanzi system, in some cases, would not only add
considerable functionally and be idealistically desirable, but would be
practical to implement. If hanzi are to be adapted to the demands of the
new technological, typographical and pedagogical adequacy, there must be
a clear understanding about the areas to which the script can be adapted.
Standardization, or correctness, has been the core theme of govern-
mentally initiated corpus planning since 1950s. The general propose has
been to maintain language within specified norms and to protect it from
fluctuation and change which are seen equated with confusion and anarchy.
But standardization movements, launched in the series of standardi-
zation conferences in 1950’s, focused on grammar and putonghua. What
grammarians and rationalists have been trying to achieve through this
standardization has been to create a basis for effective communication
across wide range of diversified regionalects. The aims of the new round
standardization focus on developing a computer friendly writing system,
so standardization is more about technological convenience than inter-
personal communication. Correctness plays an essential role for both
human communication and machine automation. It must be acknowledged,
as Cheng Rong (1999: 144) has argued, that “[i]n general, since 1955,
excepting 1977, the standardization process has gradually improved and
for the first time in history, in the last 30 years, at least in official
publications, standardization has been achieved.” However, while human
communication can occur with limited correctness, machines require a
standard operating environment, as the communication between human
and computer and machine to machine information exchange is very
intolerant of error. The rapid advances that have occurred in computer
science have led to concerns in both linguistic and IT circles that unless
there is systematic improvement in hanzi, a bottle-neck is likely to develop
which will hamper the country’s embarkation on the road to technological
modernization.
History shows, a society-targeted technology can only be rapidly
developed and popularized once it has been standardized (i.e., Fordism).
Without a set of well-defined official standards, the extensive economic
benefits of a new technology are likely to be inaccessible to a substantial
segment of the population. In Cheng Rong’s (1999: 144) provocative
words, “whether language and script comply with standardization and the
norm is an indicator of the degree of civilization of a nation and nation-
ality”. The four standardizations, or Four Fixations (Si Ding – 四定) as it
was called before the computer age (i.e., fixing the total number, physical
shape, pronunciation and stroke ordering of hanzi), have provided a major
argument for advocating an instrumental role for language planning. In the
Chapter 4 139

following sections, we look at the difficulties and technological implications

of each of these standards in some detail, with greater emphasis on
standardizing the total number as the first major step in resolving the ‘Four
Fixations’ issue.
The ‘Four Fixations’ notion was first raised in the 1950s, but previous
research was largely conducted by individual scholars or institutions on a
piecemeal basis without much consideration being given to technological
requirements. Each of these four fixations has encountered their respective
problems, and thus hanzi continue to remain the bottleneck in Chinese
language computerization. To show the government’s determination in
further enhancing the computability of the Chinese writing system through
optimizing the range of hanzi’s features, a national research project titled the
Comprehensive Table of Standardized Character was launched by Chinese
language authorities in 2002. The description of this ambitious state-
mandated LP program, along with an even more wide-ranging proposal
that suggests the overhaul of the entirety of the hanzi repertoire, is
provided and discussed in the last section of this chapter.

2. A NEW ROUND OF STANDARDIZATION:

A SOCIOLINGUISTIC SOLUTION
TO TECHNOLOGICAL IMPACT

2.1 Tackling the Total Number of Chinese Characters

The extensive nature of the Chinese character repertoire is well known

and was partly described from an historical perspective in the Prologue and
first chapter of this volume. One of the most uncertain aspects of Hanzi is
the total number of characters involved. However, before trying to fix the
total number of hanzi, one must have an overall picture of the stock of
characters, a job that has never been undertaken. This section provides a
sociolinguistic examination of complex factors involved in the process of
streamlining the total number of characters and critically analyzes the new
theoretical framework advocated by LP practitioners over recent years for
addressing the dilemma of dealing with this issue.
 140 Standardization as a Solution

2.1.1 Extensiveness in Three Domains

Given that hanzi are an open system, over the centuries and across
geographical space, the total number has grown larger and larger, making
it almost impossible to tell precisely how many there are. Thus, when the
system underlying this issue is considered, one can not consider just
‘Mandarin’ characters with all their variants. An inclusive system that
includes all characters must cover:

• Non-Chinese hanzi: Mainly referring to what Lunde (1993) has called

JKV (Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese) characters and to the hanzi
derived characters (over 20 systems throughout history) created by
Chinese ethnic minorities within China proper;
• Chinese regional or dialectal characters: Although only Cantonese
characters are used in modern publications (Zhou 1999: 175-176),
characters specific to other spoken varieties did exist historically or are
still being circulated locally with some having possibility for them to
play a more active role in written communication. They have stimu-
lated a great deal of interest in recent years (see Chen 1996; Jordan
2002); and
• Obsolete characters: Those found in ancient scripts such as jianguwen
and jinwen.

Currently, when people talk about the total number of hanzi, they
normally have one or more of three possible reference points in mind:

2.1.1.1 Influential dictionaries

In Xu Shen’s Shuowen Jiezi, 9353 characters were etymologically
explained in a systematic manner based on structural analysis. The next
very dictionary, which is used extensively even today, is Kangxi Zidian,
which was made under the royal patronage during the Kangxi period of
the Qing Dynasty (1664-1911), and it marshaled 47,035 characters.
More recently, in the Zhonghua Zihai (Ocean of Chinese Characters –
《中华字海》, 1994), the most inclusive dictionary that amasses as many
characters as possible, 85,568 characters were included. In a broader sense,
a widespread estimate is that the ultimate number of hanzi may be well
beyond 100,000, if all Chinese characters and the derived forms that have
ever existed were counted, including variant forms, non-Chinese hanzi and
dialect hanzi. (Also see the dictionary list in Table P-2)
Chapter 4 141

2.1.1.2 Character lists

Some well established pedagogic character tables and the high profile
character lists, both official and those developed by individual scholars,
show the total number required for different purposes. Two of the most
frequently quoted tables are the Table of the Most Used Characters (3500
characters, see Appendix C) and the Table of General Characters (7000
characters) published by Chinese language administration authorities in
1988. The later was intended to replace the Table of Print Forms of
Chinese Characters for Publication (6196 characters), which was issued in
1965 to meet the demand from publication industry.
Three education oriented tables of Chinese characters are worthy
mention. The Table of Characters For Illiteracy Elimination (1993) contains
2000 characters; this number is believed to cover 93.9936 percent of the
characters in publications and targets general readers; The Table of
Characters for Primary Students has 3071 characters; the third
pedagogical character table is Grading Outline of Chinese Vocabulary and
Character Proficiency Criterion. It was a collaborative product made by
the National Office of Teaching Chinese as a Second Language and the
Testing Centre of Chinese Language as a Second Language in 1991. It
includes 2905 characters arranged at four levels (A=800, B=804, C=601,
D=700) for non-Chinese speaking students.

2.1.1.3 Standard character encoding set for information interchange

To process characters, computer software developers need a list that
gives the all forms they have to deal with. Since 1980 when the first
character set, Chinese Character Code for Information Interchange
(CCCII, 53,940 characters) was published in Taiwan, numberless character
codes have been devised and published by respective governments or big
IT companies in hanzi-using regions. The two most familiar to computer
users are GB-2312 and Big5. The former has 6,763 characters and was
authorized for use by China’s National Bureau of Standards in 1981 while
the latter – Big 5, is GB-2312’s equivalent in Taiwan. It includes 13,053
characters and was jointly endorsed by five big computer companies in
Taiwan in 1984, hence the name. These standard sets have established
themselves as important parameters for examining the number of hanzi.
Some other influential national-based systems include: the Government
Chinese Character Set in Hong Kong (GCCS, 3,049 characters, 1994);
Chinese National Standard Interchange Code (CNS11643, 48,027 charac-
ters, 1980) in Taiwan; the Japanese Industry Standard (JIS Code 6226,
6,349 characters); and the Korean Information Processing Standard (KIPS,
2,192 characters). In 1993 ISO10646.1/GB 13000.1 was devised by ISO
142 Standardization as a Solution

and the Unicode Consortium and 20,902 CJK sinography were included as
a result of merging or unifying over 20 character sets and telegraphy codes
(totaling 121,403 characters) that had been introduced by USA, Taiwan,
Mainland China and Korea (Lunde 1993: 49-53). The number of hanzi
encoded in these national and international standard sets have grown year
by year. On March 17, 2000, the Ministry of Information Industry and the
former State Bureau of Technological Quality Supervision in the PRC
jointly issued GB 18030-2000, another national encoding standard for
27,484 hanzi. Because it is the most fundamental encoding standard after
CB 2312-80, it is likely that it will define the country’s computer system
for the infinite future (Lin 2004).

2.1.2 A Technological Perspective

This brief introduction to the number of Chinese characters shows the

massive total number, but also demonstrates that there are great disparities
in the total number used for different domains. Traditionally, educational
considerations have been the main thrust of arguments underlying the need
to have tables that prescribe the character numbers and usages. For
example, in programs to eliminate illiteracy, it is very important to know
the number of hanzi required for an illiterate to successfully operate in a
particular written context, and for school reading and writing education, it
is equally desirable to have some kind of restrictions on the number of
characters used. Because, as it is said, no one knows all the characters,
mastery of the most frequent hanzi is more critical as that provides
relatively high comprehension in written discourse.
With the coming of the computer era, the continued uncertainty and
increase in the number of hanzi have been a growing problem for both
LPers and computer scientists. The need to regulate character use has
appeared to be almost irresolvable. This is because:

1. In order to create input schemes for hanzi stroke or component-based

software, one needs to know what the entire range of types of strokes
and/or components are to form the basic units that represent hanzi on
the computer screen. Obtaining an optimized classification system of
stroke and/or components that can best reconstruct all Chinese charac-
ters has been attempted many times, but yielded no conclusive result
due to the lack of accurate knowledge about the total number of
characters.
2. The computer industry across the world at present employs a number
of different encoding character sets for information exchange, and the
Chapter 4 143

coexistence of these standards, adopted in isolation, detrimentally

affects and prevents the smooth and stable exchange of information
and communication. Despite the rapid rise of Unicode, there seems to
be little hope of unifying all hanzi code standards as long as there are a
large and unstable number of overall characters from which to choose.
3. The third reason is perhaps more evident. While computers are
assumed to have the capacity to process all characters, the three unique
features of hanzi, i.e., big and unstable number, complex structure, and
incapability to indicate the pronunciation, make it in fact impractical
for users to be able to deal with the characters outside their daily
purview, even with computers that are equipped with databases
capable of recognizing all characters.

More broadly speaking, the conflicts between the hanzi and the com-
puter in terms of the total number of characters manifest themselves in two
ways. First, the total number of characters currently encoded in standard
character sets is too small to process some big corpus texts in specialist
areas. At present, the total number encoded in the largest IT-oriented
Character Sets, issued by the government, are 20,902 in ISO 10646/
GB13000.1(1993), and 27,484 characters in GB18030-2000. This number
of forms is obviously far from being sufficient to process all the
orthographic forms that have ever existed. For example, the paucity of
ways to represent the Chinese classical written heritage has been talked for
quite some time. As Li Yuming (2004b) points out, the internet can be
seen as an expressway and the website as a vehicle, but even with the road,
and effective transportation, the goods for transportation are not available
(also see Xu J.L. 1999: 208). Li recommends building a digital bank of the
Chinese cultural heritage to make Chinese ancient texts available in their
original form (see discussion in Section 3.2, this chapter). The first step in
this process would be to demarcate and settle on hanzi’s total number in
modern use. To computerize the ancient texts it is necessary to analyze,
categorize and encode every character used in the colossal body of ancient
works, which inevitably would involve an overhaul of the whole repertoire
of hanzi – an inexorably difficult process.
Second, even the total number used in general texts in routine life has
proved to be too big and unstable for common readers to deal with
electronically. Therefore, to overcome this difficulty, it is also necessary to
control character use through restricting the total number used for general
purposes. For non-specialist computer users, the biggest problem is the so-
called Rarely Used Characters (henceforth RC). Studies have shown that,
in spite of the fact that the total number of characters may be incredibly
144 Standardization as a Solution

large, the number required for the common person to read modern written
material at a good level of comprehension is relatively small. Various
domains and corpuses may favor a certain type of characters, but statistical
studies on the percentage of coverage suggest that knowledge of 2500 at
lower end to 3500 at higher end is an appropriate goal for a mainland
reader to gain an over 99 percent understanding of modern printed texts. (It
might be a bit higher than this for readers in traditional character using
polities). For most people, mastery of about 3000 can be considered to be
the watershed; a knowledge of characters beyond this baseline does not
give the reader much net gain.
RCs are the real trouble-makers in information processing. As
articulated by Ao Xiaoping (2000: 74), although 3,000 characters cover
more than 99 percent of text, no one can guarantee that the 3001st character
won’t appear. “Out of seven or eight thousand characters in current
circulation, more than half are non-common characters.” This is a well-
attested phenomenon in what Zhou (1992: 156) has called the Rule of
Decreasing Percentage Coverage (Hanzi Xiaoyong Dijian Lü – 汉字效用
递减率), i.e., a relatively small number of hanzi with high-frequency
typically makes up a very high percentage of modern texts, with a large
number of lower-frequency characters occurring a few times in running
texts. One ramification of this frequency distribution is that the last few
percentage points of coverage are made up of a great number of RC.
As might be expected, most low frequency RCs are special nouns. But
these nouns have three characteristics; they are: large in number, problem-
atic in internal consistency and ubiquitous in daily human life (Zhang
1988). The instability of the total number of characters has been causing
great confusion in the IT industry. It is often reported that customers are
refused banking services just because some characters used in their names
cannot be found in the national standard code sets for information
exchange – under the terms and conditions of the Chinese banking system,
Chinese names must be precisely identified in Chinese characters (Wang
2002). This kind of policy is now widely known as ‘Identification Policy’
(Shi Ming Zhi – 实名制). It has been rapidly extended into more and more
service sectors over recent years, such as ticket/hotel booking or Internet/
mobile phone registration. The policy has been criticized as another form
of tightening control on people’s activities in name of public security (to
avoid cheating) under new context. To implement such a policy, it is
required that all names must be computable, thus highlighting the import-
ance of LPP. Examples that often catch the nation’s attention include
many students’ results on national university entrance examinations being
delayed due to the lack of some characters in computer system. For
Chapter 4 145

instance, the University of International Trade enrolled about 200 students

in Beijing, but 11 students’ given names on the admission lists printed as
black boxes just because their parents named them using rare characters. In
another recent incident reported by the newspaper Xin Bao (2006), during
the ID card updating process for the 9.8 million people living in Beijing,
231 cards could not be renewed because of characters on their ID cards are
not available in the updated character database. Even if these characters
could be created locally, the uncoded characters would not be displayable
and transmittable on other computers or Internet, which would mean
endless trouble for these people when they try to use such public services
as banking, the mail or travel in the future. The examples given here are
just the tip of the iceberg. Thus, it is not too hard to image the serious
consequences that may be caused in other areas as more social services go
online.
Most languages have dictionaries of different complexity to deal with
rarely used words in different specialties, but alphabetic scripts are not
faced with as many problems as those confronted by those using hanzi
script. In discussing the difficulties that seriously constrain computers
from playing a larger role in automatic information processing, Xu (1993:
86-87) has noted, “the administrative institutions that deal with the
management of ID cards, geographical names, machines and chemical
industries, are constantly bothered by the characters’ unavailability within
the GB 2312-80.” In addition, the overly large character set is the first
obstacle that the researchers encountered in developing programs for the
automatic recognition of printed text (Wu and Ding 1992: 96). The issues
related to efforts to restrict RC will be further discussed in a subsequent
section.
There has been a lot of talk over a long period of time about creating a
fixed number of characters. But, for those concerned with hanzi’s future
and the welfare of the whole population, this has seemed to be a forlorn
hope. However, the time has come for change as any further delay is not
affordable if the hanzi are to survive in the increasingly digital world.
Some believe that keeping characters within the prescribed range could be
accomplished by restricting the number of characters to a reasonable
number, say 20,000. As early as 1950s, Zhou Youguang (1979: 331), the
most prolific Chinese LP researcher, had conceived of the notion of
verifying and overhauling the hanzi to develop a complete table as a first
step in an embryonic notion of a fixed number of modern characters. When
questioned about the possibility of whether such a complete list could be
created, he said, that if no new character is allowed to be created in the
future, “it is estimated that the total number would be somewhere between
146 Standardization as a Solution

6,000 and 8,000 in the table, including the most used and less frequently
used characters. But this number is too large for the whole society” (Zhou
1980a: 112).
Yang (2000: 198), while acknowledging that a complete table will be
“almost impossible” to make 100 percent accurate, suggested the follow-
ing mathematical equation: the Complete Table = (special characters
+ most used characters) – shared characters. As for the exact number, the
two high profile tables, Table of the Most Used Modern Characters and
the Table of the Common Modern Characters (see proceeding discussion),
provide parameters for developing such a list. Turning to past experience,
the Draft Scheme of Common Modern Characters, published by the CCSR
in 1956, included 5,390 characters. A more widely accepted statistic is the
General List of Print Font of Chinese Character of 1965, which has 6,196
characters; 40 years of experience has shown that this number basically
meets the demand from entire printing industry. Therefore, Su Peicheng
(2001c: 50), the president of the Association of Chinese Language Modern-
ization, says that total number for modern Chinese should be around
7,000. Zhang and Xia (2001) emphasize that number standardization is not
about deciding the total number of characters, but the characters for
current and future use.

2.1.3 Beyond the Language – Sociolinguistics Dimensions

From the previous discussion, a natural question that arises is, as the
characters used in modern written text are quite limited, what prevents
putting an upper limit on the number growing?
The system of Chinese characters is a heavily culturally charged
writing system, where the individualism is manifest in the use of written
forms, and where deviation from the norm has been extensively tolerated
both historically and in modern times. Putting a limit on people’s use of
characters, in most circumstances, has long been seen as constituting a
form of behavioral control. The early research about hanzi’s number was
confined to internal factors, but currently LPers have come to realize that
the solution to hanzi’s misleadingly large number should be looked from a
broader perspective. Roughly, there are two forces at work in preventing
putting a straitjacket on the expansion of total number of characters:
people’s inclination for the language novelty and cultural obsession.
It is generally agreed that, in addition to the aforementioned RC,
obsolete characters and variant forms (yiti zi) are another two major
reasons which make the total number of hanzi uncontrollable. Obsolete
characters refer to all those that ever existed in history and for recording of
Chapter 4 147

historical events. Zhou (1992: 208) remarks, “The register of Chinese

hanzi records only births, never deaths”. Yiti zi have accumulated and been
deposited in the dictionaries. These characters are one of the important
factors that account for the explosion of the quantity of hanzi found in
some dictionaries, but except for a small number of historical characters
categorized and discussed in the following section, most have died out
forever and thus do not pose a threat to modern usage. The following
analysis focuses on yiti zi and RC.

2.1.3.1 Variant forms

As we saw in Section 2.1.1, Chapter 2, yiti zi refer to several characters
having the same meaning and pronunciation but different forms. Yiti zi
contribute to two kinds of increase in hanzi’s total number; positive
increase stems from a requirement to meet accuracy of expression, while
negative increase relates to unneeded variant forms. Linguistically hanzi
are categorized as a morphemic script. It closely traces and copies in a
straightforward manner the way humans understand the world, so every
change that occurs in the world and human’s comprehension of it are
discernibly mirrored in hanzi, which results in an increase in the number of
forms. This kind of increase is necessary to make the script function as an
accurate reflection of social development. Negative increase is mainly
caused by the accumulated variant forms of the same character. There is
general agreement that in current terms these absolute yiti zi, resulting
from a long tradition of historical development, are the sediment in hanzi,
producing purely meaningless and superficial redundancy that adds
nothing except an unnecessary burden for users’ memories. But once
created, they generate the possibility of finding a niche for themselves1.
Wang (1989: 573) observes there is a ‘backward principle’ that has existed
historically concerning standardizing the shape and limiting the numbers
of characters:
The authorities in all dynasties were found to be tolerant of the existing
yiti zi in ancient texts and have imposed stringent restrictions on newly
created yiti zi that were in current circulation, thereby a large number of
yiti zi were shielded under this policy of ‘stress the past and suppress
the present’, which inevitably led to a sharp increase of hanzi numbers.
The reasons for and types of these character complications are an
interesting topic worthy of further exploration (see Kan 2000). Since
ancient times, writing hanzi has been a means of self-expression, showing
personal inclination. Some inventors are primarily interested in the occult
nature of hanzi, while others simply want to show off their scholarliness or
148 Standardization as a Solution

pedantic temperament by choosing or coining characters. 工人 provides

a typical example of yiti zi. When criticizing some educated dilettante
officials who indulged their fancy and deliberately wrote 工人 (Gongren,
worker) as when painting slogans on walls, Mao Zedong (1968:
793) said in his Oppose Stereotype Party Writing, “These comrades seem
to take great delight in turning simple things into mysteries and deliber-
ately make a play upon tricks to befool the masses”. Thus, the artistic and
recreational nature of hanzi is one of the important reasons that nurtures
new character creators. Because ordinary people find it enjoyable to amuse
themselves by dismantling and assembling unlimited units to coin their
own characters at will, a large number of phonetic-semantic characters
have been created. Creating new unique characters is not only a hobby and
pastime for the whole Chinese population, but people are mesmerized by
the opportunity to imprint history with their own inventions. Variation
from accepted norms can be observed with virtually all languages, parti-
cularly idiosyncratic writing, spelling and pronunciation. It is the same
psychological quirk that creates numberless new English words, like the
shorthand ‘sox’ for socks or ‘nite’ for night. The difference is that in
Chinese, when a new character is created, it adds to system complexity if it
is retained and has the possibility of causing systemic change in the whole
writing system, rather than just being a new combination of letters making
up a lexical item.
In order to predict the future development and to propose reform pro-
grams for hanzi, one must look at the internal and external interplay of
forces, or in other words, at the sociolinguistic dimensions or extra-linguistic
factors and linguistic possibilities. Most of the time, these two factors
are intertwined in determining the developmental direction of hanzi. When
drawing up a workable configuration for hanzi, LP success tends to happen
when the government acts to balance two factors – external pressures and
the linguistic rationale. While this chapter chiefly dwells on the latter, i.e.,
how hanzi need to be physically optimized on a micro level, external
factors are dealt with in the next chapter on macro dimensions.

2.1.3.2 Rarely used characters

Rarely used characters or infrequently used characters include ones that
have existed or have been created for special purposes such as newly
found chemical elements. The number of RC is some twenty times the
number of common characters and are the most important contributing
factor in preventing character reduction. These characters, differing greatly
in frequency of usage, with most appearing only occasionally, but they can
appear at anytime, acting like submerged rocks in an ocean of reading and
Chapter 4 149

writing. It is worth noting that a RC is a subjective condition, i.e., some

RCs, or the so-called dead characters, can be revived and even become
popular under certain conditions, such as when people take a renewed
interest in ancient culture. Another example occurs when a character is
used in somebody’s name – it is not rare to find ordinary parents who are
keen to make their children’s names sound or look unique – and then if
this person becomes well known, the usage of this character may become
highly used. The same thing can happen to characters related to geographic
names. Some geographic name-specific characters are commonly used
locally, but under certain circumstances, they can become common char-
acters over night. Broadly speaking, RCs can be discussed under two
rubrics: specialty characters (特殊/专业用字）and literary characters (文
学色彩字).
Specialty characters are necessary for specific topics and purposes. It is
generally agreed that there are six to nine areas that are the source of these
characters, but these can be considered under two broader headings:

• Characters for proper names, including characters for foreign proper

name translations, ethnic minorities and religious purposes; and
• Characters for science, technology, animals and plants.

Apart from personal names and geographical names, proper names also
include the characters employed to record well-known historical events or
phenomena that have existed previously. Most of the historical characters
are seldom seen in modern life, but some, names for traditional medicines,
for example, are still in frequent use. Characters for geographical names
form an important part of this category. One successful attempt to delimit
specialty hanzi has been the replacement of geographical names that
occurred from March 30, 1955 to August 29, 1964.
During this period the Chinese government issued nine orders to
replace the 36 RC in 35 geographical names with reference to features
higher than the county administrative level. Changing these characters, be
it their physical shape or their pronunciation, was an extremely emotional
and controversial issue, particularly for names with historical implications
or those used by ethnic minority groups. But the government achieved a
satisfactory outcome by adhering to eight principles, set by the State
Council (Fei 2000a, Fu 1991). There is still room to carry out further
reduction as there are more than 3,000 geographical names above county
level. Characters for personal names are another area that curtails any great
reduction in the total number.
150 Standardization as a Solution

The proposed list for naming that is being developed intends to include
12,000 characters (including their traditional and variant forms), although
research on names shows that 2,500 hanzi can cover 98 percent of modern
names (Su 2004). Currently, before the List of Characters for Naming
formally goes into effect, to accommodate the minute number of rare
naming characters, the Character Database for the Second Round Citizen
ID Card, developed by the Ministry of Information Industry in collaboration
with other government departments, has to include 72,000 characters
(Yang 2003), which is about ten times bigger than the normal character
database. A very heated nationwide debate revolving around ‘Shall we
have restrictions on name giving rights?’ was triggered off when the Table
of Standardized Characters for Naming was included in the list of national
language research programs (see Section 3.3.3, Chapter 6).
Science and technology are developing rapidly and the additional char-
acters being added in these domains are predominantly characters for
newly discovered chemical elements. Scientists estimate that, when all
substances on the earth have been discovered and synthesized, their
number could be in the multimillions (Zhang 1988: 56). Attempts have
been made to end the creation of new characters for new scientific
discoveries (Wu 1995: 77), but it has proved to be impracticable as they
cannot all be effectively and accurately expressed by creating multiple
syllabic words with existing characters. The State Commission of Techno-
logical Terms was set up to take charge of this matter, and the new coinage
of terms continues2.
Characters for translation refer mainly to those characters used to
translate foreign and Chinese ethnic names, particularly, when the sound is
not common in the Mandarin phonology system, requiring the creation of
RC or new characters. The issue has been discussed for some time3 and
now, thanks to the pressing need from the IT sector, the official Table
of Standard Characters for Transliterating Foreign Proper Names has
been listed as a key linguistic research topic in the national research and
development plan.
The purpose of literary characters, as its name suggests, is to make
literary writing stylized and attractive to readers. The archaic hanzi and
dialectal hanzi make up a big part of this constituent body. Archaic
characters are the characters carried over into modern texts from classical
Chinese in the form of archaic words and expressions, found predom-
inantly in proverbs and idiomatic phrases. Well-known for the richness
of its vocabulary, Chinese has created myriads of works in its dynastic
history since jiaguwen. It is believed that at least 8,000 ancient classical
Chinese texts have survived into the modern times. This influence of
Chapter 4 151

the ancient heritage on standardization should be looked at from two

perspectives: On the one hand, as these texts were recorded in traditional
characters, they act as a force in opposition to simplification. On the other
hand, they are a source of RC in general texts. Like classical literature and
traditional characters, a lot of characters that are inherently associated with
classical works but not semantically needed in modern texts enjoy high
prestige and authentic status as they pay homage to a time-honored
heritage.
From this discussion it is clear that literary characters are in essence an
exemplification of manifest archaism and cultural obsession, rather than
linguistic necessity. Spoken Chinese and its written language are markedly
dissimilar. The degree of disparity in lexicon and syntax range is so wide
that they might be almost unintelligible to each other. Even a century after
the ‘Vernacularization Movement’ had been completed (see Note 2,
Chapter 1), a large number of characters from classical texts still have
survived, posing a major destructive factor in efforts to bring a uniform
standard to the written language using only a fixed number of prescribed
characters. Despite their generally low frequency, under certain conditions
these characters have the potential to become highly used characters. To
complicate matters still further, there is a deep-seated feeling of literary
superiority in employing millennia-old expressions to add an aura of
elitism to contemporary texts. Whenever an attempt has been made to limit
their use, the long-standing prestige of classical Chinese literature comes
into play. As DeFrancis (1984b: 286) notes, “attachment to characters
which boast a vast body of literature, a system so deeply embedded in
Chinese society, is naturally far more resistant to change”. Since the
1990s, there has been a healthier attitude towards the traditional heritage
which had been seriously undermined during the Great Cultural
Revolution (1966-1976). This has given rise to a ‘Back to the Ancients’
sentiment in popular culture with a large number of classical works being
reintroduced into school education, increasing the reemergence of archaic
usage in written communication.
This indicates that rather than treating the character as a means of
written communication, people, particularly some scholars, use it as a
faculty to display their scholarship and intellectual superiority. Although
literary characters are an alternate, and not absolutely necessary for
writing, the urge to use them is almost irrepressible and undermines
restraints on character number. Japan has confronted a similar problem.
Japanese scholars are also obsessed with classical texts and their writings
are replete with archaic characters used as an intellectual exercise. Twine
(1991: 215) notes that “It was a favorite ploy of scholars wishing to
152 Standardization as a Solution

display their erudition to pad out the text of their discourse with
unnecessarily complex characters …” However, Japan was quite success-
ful in regulating the legitimate number of characters for modern use to an
upper limit of 1,8504 (Table of Contemporary Characters) in 1946, plus an
official list containing 92 extra characters for giving names to children
born after May 25, 1951 (He 2001).
From the point of controllability, these RC differ a great deal in terms
of the activity and visibility. As the proceeding discussion has shown,
except for yiti zi and literary characters, the possibility exists for all others
to be fixed in number, and LP authorities have never actually stopped
trying to manage RC to bring the total number of hanzi under control.
Wang Tiekun (2003: 2), the Vice-Director of Language and Information
Management Department of Education Ministry, argues that “the work to
standardize characters for personal names, geographical names and techno-
logical terms has never been so important and urgent”. These three types
of specialty characters are the easiest component parts to start with as an
overhaul of all kinds of RC. RCs in other domains, although also large in
number, have specific uses and are subject to being included in a future
plan. The research projects to standardize them are a substantial part of the
Applied Linguistics Research Scheme and Project Guidelines for the Tenth
Five-Year National Social Development.
Unfortunately, very few empirical research studies5 have been done on
the differences among the various types of RC. In Table 4-1 the specific
features of seven types of RC are listed and a subjective estimate of the
strength of each characteristic is provided. The table captures the
specificity of each type of RC and provides an indication of why each
category should be treated individually.
In summary, at most, 3,500 characters are sufficient for the lexical
representation of the language for general purposes. It is obvious therefore
that the real impediment to the restriction of the total number of characters
rests in users’ attitudes rather than being a linguistic problem. As long as
characters were hand written, these attitudes made very little difference as
writing characters was understood to be a personal thing where parallel
forms co-existed, and people were accustomed to using a wide range of
diverse forms of characters. However, technology, with its requirements
for specificity, has changed what is required from a written communication
system.
Chapter 4 153

Table 4-1. Intensity levels for different types of rarely used characters

Purposes of Number in Stability Activity and Potential Necessity for

rarely used modern in number visibility in productivity modern life
characters publication common use in the future

Yiti zi ••• •••• ••• •••• •

Literary style ••••• • ••••• •• ••••
History and •••• ••• •••• •• ••••
geography

Proper names •••• ••• •••• •• •••••

Religion and ••• ••• ••• •• ••••
minority

Science and ••• •• •••• ••• ••••

technology

Translation ••• ••••• ••• ••• •••

2.1.4 What Is the Solution – Previous Attempts

and Past Experience

Reducing the total number of characters and checking the constant urge
to create new ones have been vital parts of a century of script reform.
Japan was generally regarded as the forerunner in hanzi number reduction.
But, prior to Japan’s reform, there had been one or two earlier occasions
when archaic-style characters in literature were examined. Lu Feikui in his
1921 paper – “My suggestions on collecting and collating hanzi” – was
perhaps the first scholar to see the importance of delimiting the commonly
used characters before simplification. He suggested 2,000 characters for
general purposes, a number considered sufficient to satisfy the basic needs
of actual use for ordinary people at that time. Hong Shen, a famous play-
wright, was another person who actively advocated reducing the number of
modern hanzi, but to an even smaller number. His method employed the
coinage of multiple-syllable words by using prescribed characters to
replace the ones that are structurally complex and rarely used. In his book,
Teaching Methodology of 1,100 Basic Characters (1935), Hong attempted
to delimit 1,000 characters for general purpose use, with 250 characters for
special use, for instance, using ‘湿土’ (wet earth) to replace ‘泥’ (mud).
154 Standardization as a Solution

An even more radical reduction advocate, Zhai Jianxiong, in 1939 wanted

to employ only 454 characters as syllables to transliterate Chinese writing.
However, all these proposals strayed too away far from script reform as
they invariably affected the lexical system and resulted in limiting the
expressive power of language, leading to a wordy and artificial dumbed-
down style for the less educated readers. As Su (1994: 50) has said, the
writing system is the instrument to serve the language. When a large, new
vocabulary is created to accommodate delimited characters, it reverses the
functions of language and script. It was not surprising that these efforts
were futile and failed to gain support from the population they were
designated to serve.
Nevertheless, the previous failures did not prevent other scholars from
continuing the ambitious course to put a limit on character use after
Liberation in 1949. Because the radical change of the political climate
ruled out an environment that was conducive to experimenting with indivi-
dual schemes, scholars’ efforts focused on exploring theoretical possi-
bilities. In 1964, Lin Handa published Can Ten Thousand Common
Characters be Cut by Half in the Guangming Daily (June 24, 1964). About
a month later, Zhou Youguang wrote his Delimiting and Reducing
Characters in Modern Chinese for the same newspaper, appealing to the
public only to use hanzi within a 3,500 character limit.
Unfortunately, these suggestions were made just before the Great
Cultural Revolution started, and they did not draw much attention from
either the authorities or the public. In 1982, Zheng Linxi, a well respected
senior LP professional, brought out an influential work on the topic, The
Practice and Theory of Reducing the Total Number of Hanzi. He proposed
eight ways that could be adopted as part of a future project, and
emphasized the possibility of reducing numbers through the combined
efforts of the public, LPers and the government. In addition to these
suggestions put forward by individual scholars, there were two other
serious attempts by groups and these were more significant in a practical
sense. In 1953, the CCSR had launched an experiment to test if a List of
1,469 Characters would be sufficient to deal with the wide variety of texts
in twelve areas of modern life, but the results were found to generate more
problems than they resolved. Despite of the negative evidence that had
accumulated, at the end of the Cultural Revolution, another set of standard
hanzi was created by publishing house workers and tested with a variety of
samples. The outcome showed that the misunderstandings that occurred in
the sample texts (mainly because of homophonous replacement), printed
with the prescribed 3,260 characters, were beyond acceptable limits.
Chapter 4 155

2.1.5 Tentative Summary

Reflecting on a century-long pursuit of a writing system with a small

number of fixed characters, Su (2001b: 56) points out that despite the
failures, in an era dominated by increasingly frequent information exchange
over the Internet, creating a writing system with a relatively small number
of characters is even more desirable than it was previously, and cutting
the numbers “would be one of the most important tasks in LP for quite a
long period into the future”. However, in comparison to half a century
ago, this goal has become even more difficult to achieve today for the
reasons set out in the following section.
In Chapter 2, we saw how the Chinese characters’ cultural movement
directly influenced the strong resurgence of traditional characters. In order
to make the Party’s slogans, icons, policies and language use more accept-
able to the masses, the traditional heritage has been revitalized to combat
the negative influence of the Western capitalist spirit, and its products
which have monopolized the cultural market. The public’s cultural life has
been recognized as equally important as education in the war of ideologies.
There has been an official push to strengthen the legitimacy of present
policies by looking back to past glories and this traditional pantheon is
reflected in publications, celebrations, films and other visual arts. Taken
together with the spirit of nationalism, the whole population appears to be
devoted to its cultural heritage. Historical epics, depicting past glories of
dynastic China, are shown nightly on TV and bookshops are flooded with
various forms of traditional publications which have had deleterious effect
on language planning. These activities have had such an intense impact on
young people that a national newspaper invited a 98-year-old linguist to try
to persuade writers to give up their fondness for old style hanzi (Zhou
2003). Traditional revisionism can be seen in other domains, such as
architecture, dress and economic activities, and it is probable that this trend
has not yet peaked.
The relationship between character reduction and the public’s attitude
towards their cultural heritage and their culture consuming habits has
drawn a lot of attention from the LPers. When speaking about the use of
political manipulation of the traditional culture, i.e., moving from an anti-
traditional to a pro-traditional view, Wang (2002: seminar; Note 10,
Chapter 1) briskly and acidly criticized the campaign to promote classical
literature by organizing Classical Work Recitation Competitions6 saying
that encouraging children to over-focus on these dead things was a kind of
historical regression.
156 Standardization as a Solution

2.2 Shape – Developing a Higher Standard

for Physical Uniformity

Broadly speaking, there are two issues related to physical uniformity:

structural consistency and the co-existence of more than one variant form
for the same character, i.e., yiti zi. The issues related to structural
consistency, which are quite technically complicated and would require a
lengthy and complex explanation to fully investigate here, are summarized
in the next section (But, see Zhao 2005). This is followed by a discussion
of issues related to the standardization of yiti zi.

2.2.1 Fixing the Structural Component to Improve

the Internal Consistency

Stroke and component consistency is a recent concern arising out of a need

for higher levels of standard forms to meet technological requirements. It
refers to the minuscule differences in stroke length or the composing
position in different characters. These may not make much difference to
the human eye and would not have become an issue if not for computer
applications. As shown in Figure 4.1, there are only subtle differences in
similar parts of component pairs, but the computer, which is very sensitive
to structural differences, will put them in different categories. Some
strokes or components might not have been originally identical or related
in any way, but it is better that they be unified as a single standard unit for
accurate computer processing. For instance, for the second and the third
examples listed in the left column, if the two similar components in two
characters are made identical, for input schemes it would mean less
complex hardware and software storage and retrieval, and the OCR
software recognition rate would also be much improved. Much of this type
of inconsistency occurs between the characters when they are used as
separate independent characters and when the same element is used as a
radical or component in other compound characters. Merging these similar
sets of strokes and components has been considered an effective means to
disambiguate the graphic representations. Because structural distinctions
have increasingly become a focal concern as handwriting activities are
being replaced by more extensive use of computers, these changes would
also improve the quality and efficiency of OCR.
Deng Caiqin and Zhang Pu (1997: 116) consider that the very large
number of forms, the complex structure and the indistinct shape are three
big obstacles that make Chinese one of the most difficult scripts to which
Chapter 4 157

to apply OCR technology. Inconsistencies that are of little consequence for

handwriting and human reading can pose a grave threat to computer
recognition. According to Fei and Xu’s (2003) research, out of 7,000
characters listed in the Table of Commonly Used Characters (1988), there
are over 400 characters (6%) that need to be re-standardized from the
technological point of view. To unify the discrepancies and standardize
them would require just a mini surgical treatment as the right column in
Figure 4-1 suggests. But as emphasized in previous chapters, the hanzi
system as a whole has developed over a long period of time and is an
interrelated and interdependent structure. Any small individual alteration
risks destroying this fragile balance, possibly resulting in undesirable
outcomes. Therefore, this kind of standardization could only be accom-
plished as part of a well-coordinated overhaul of the whole system.

Possible forms
Shared part Shared part Differences
after standardization
Lower horizontal
美 stroke is shorter 美 or
美 Lower horizontal
羹 stroke is longer
Left-falling stroke
北 does not break
through the vertical
七 stroke 七 or 匕
Left-falling stroke
宅 breaks through the
vertical stroke
夕 Inside stroke is a dot
夕 Dot breaks through or 夕
窗 the left-falling stroke
Touches; last
床 stroke is right falling
木 Doesn’t touch; last 木 or 朩
茶 stroke is left falling
Left corner stroke is
玩 a tick 王 or
王 Upper left corner is a
琴 horizontal stroke
Up and down
辱 structure
辱 Right side is half
or 辱
褥 enclosed

Figure 4-1. Examples of structural inconsistency in Chinese Characters

158 Standardization as a Solution

Many of these discrepancies stem from differences between hand-

writing and printed forms. Since the Song Dynasty (960-1279), when
typographic printing technology was invented and began to be extensively
used, the character font mould has been modeled on handwriting styles, so
handwriting forms have had a strong influence on forms of printing.
Another important source is the difference in the range of stylistic printing
fonts. In 1965, the promulgation of the General List for Printing Font of
Chinese Characters brought the chaotic state of font style in formal
publications to an end. The standard form for 6,196 characters in Song
style (originating during the Song Dynasty) was fixed in this list. Since
then, only the standardization of the shape of the Wei- and Li- style
characters have been commissioned by the SCLW (2004a, b) and the
Education Ministry (1999). There are several other well-developed, highly
used font styles. This standardization has proven to be extremely complex,
because it has involved compiling a standard from a very rich body of
historical and modern publications. This has necessitated interdisciplinary
collaboration between hanzi specialists, psychologists, calligraphy masters,
industrial art experts and font designers (Zhang W.B. 2003).
To improve the internal consistency of the hanzi system has been an
abiding endeavor of LPers, but it is technological development that has
broadened the context of this task and makes it an urgent matter that
cannot be further delayed. Component optimization requires systematically
reducing and standardizing some components, the aim of which is to make
the building blocks or units that are simple and distinct.
By doing that, it will enable both humans and machines to ‘spell’
characters in the way alphabetic scripts are used letters to spell words. For
instance, in the following examples, the lower part of the first character
and left parts of the second character do not act as indicative symbols for
general users, and they are not consistent within the system either, i.e.,
they are only used for these two characters. So, to make these two parts
more rational, they could be replaced by existing frequently used compo-
nents.

夜 (ye, night) 亠 (a component) + 但 (dan, but) = 亱

殷 (yin, surname) 白 (bai, white) +力 (li, strength) + 殳 (a component) =
Reformed structures such as these have been discussed for quite some
time, and this change was first suggested by Hu Qiaomu in a closed-door
discussion in 1982, but met strong resistance from some participants as
Chapter 4 159

well as from a few SCLW members. The reason was “they do not look like
hanzi anymore” (Fu 2002: personal communication). At the same meeting,
Hu pointed out,
The current script we are using is neither phonetically spelled script nor
physically spelled script. If we want to reform the way hanzi is
structured, we should try to make it spelled by its graphic shapes, or by
independent components, thus facilitating the teaching, information
process and mechanization (Wang 1995: 112-113).
A number of scholars have explored ways to make hanzi more
structurally logical and mechanically accessible over the last decade or so.
Chen Abao (2000: 176-177), for example, suggests three ways to achieve
this:
Unify some components: 隙 (the right upper component
changed to 小, which is a whole character, meaning ‘small’). Also 周
(zhou) to . Because the inside component of 周 is an ‘non-character’,
but the suggested replacement 吉 not only can stand for itself as an
independent character but is a composing unit as well.
Reform some infrequently and hard-to-write components: 兰
(the reformed upper component is a highly used semantic compound
meaning ‘weed/grass’). Using the same rational, also 粤 (yue) to .
Amalgamate some similar components: Combine ﾘ with 刂, so 师,
帅, 归 , , .

2.2.2 Reducing/Merging Variant Forms of Characters (Yiti zi)

To reduce yiti zi has been the fundamental undertaking in the

standardization of the physical shape of characters. To understand the
complexity of the task, it is necessary to look at how difficult it is to tell
the differences between the absolute yiti zi and other kinds of yiti zi, which
may have their own semantic values. Thus, the argument arises as to
whether they should be eliminated from the lexical system.
The type of yiti zi is categorized by the relationships between the
characters in the same group. Supposing a range of different forms of a
lexical entry (hanzi) were found to exist in various sources, the prospective
standard character is A, and the remaining ones are B, then the three
possible relationships between them are as follows (the entries for each
character are listed according to the Modern Chinese Dictionary, Beijing:
Commercial Press, 1989; and Ciyuan（《辞源》 ）, or Etymological Diction-
ary of Chinese Characters, Vol. I, Beijing: Commercial Press, 1997):
160 Standardization as a Solution

• Absolute Yiti zi. A is identical to B, both semantically and phonetically.

The B characters are those that were discarded as variant forms of A,
e.g., where:
A – 床 (chuang, bed) = B – 牀; A – 窗 (chuang, window) = B –
窓, 窻, 牎, 牕.
• Containing a Relationship. A is more extensive than B in meaning but
all the meanings of B are included in A.
A – 布 (Bu): 1 Clothing; 2 To declare or to issue; 3 To spread or to
distribute; 4 To arrange or to plan; 5 A kind of ancient currency; 6
Surname.
B – 佈 (Bu): 1 To declare or to issue; 2 To spread or to distribute;
3 To arrange or to plan.
• An overlapping relationship. A and B are overlapping semantically or
phonetically. In the following example, 媮 can be pronounced in two
ways. When A is pronounced as ‘yu’, its meaning is not included in B –
偷 (tou).
A – 偷 (tou): 1 To steal; 2 Stealthily; 3 To spare time; 4
Perfunctory, being content with temporary comfort.
B1 – 媮 (tou): 1 Perfunctory, being content with temporary comfort.
B2 – 媮 (yu): 1 Delightfulness; 2 To look down upon, to despise.

Absolute yiti zi represent the pure duplicates without any functional

role in semantic differentiation from its standard counterparts. In 1950s
and 60s, removing a large number of such yiti zi was done in parallel with
efforts to reduce structural complexity and lower the number of characters
in use, but these efforts hit a snag when lexical factors were involved.
Hanzi users have idiosyncratic ways of expressing subtleties. This
makes a large number of such characters a necessity and thus is an
important contributing factor constraining the effectiveness of character
reduction. As Coulmas (1989: 242) has pointed out, “character standard-
ization is hence first and foremost a lexicographic task”. Doing away
with yiti zi is essentially a matter of striking a balance between distinctness
in meaning and simplicity in number, as the following two intriguing
examples show:

• 背 (beì) means ‘back’, or when read as ‘beī’ means to carry on one’s

back. Some people add a semantic compound (the hand compound) to
indicate that this is an action that also involves hands (揹);
• Following the same reasoning, 叉 (cha, a fork or fork-shaped thing)
has evolved three variants to signify a ‘vent or slit in the sides of a
garment’ (衩: 衤 = cloth compound), a branch of a river (汊: 氵=
water compound), a tree branch (杈: 木 = wood/tree radical).
Chapter 4 161

Because it is very simple to create a new character by adding a readily

available radical to an existing character, many people are tempted to do
so. While many such yiti zi may be coined to signify what are considered
to be necessary differentiations in meaning, more often than not they are
created to show off erudition and skills in discerning subtle semantic
differences.
To optimize Chinese characters, the CCSR and the Ministry of Culture
jointly promulgated the FTVVF in 1956, and 1,053 yiti zi were eliminated
through careful selection. (Some 26 have since been resumed.) This
number represents only the commonly used modern characters, and
increases dramatically when all characters are examined. For example,
there are 47,035 characters in the Kangxi Dictionary, of which over 20,000
are yiti zi, accounting for 40 percent of the characters (Gao 2002: 276). In
the Great Dictionary of Modern Characters (Hanyu Da Cidian), well-
known for its inclusiveness in amassing as many characters as possible, of
the over 56,000 characters presented, approximately 20,000 are yiti zi.
Given these dramatic statistics, eliminating or merging variant forms
has been seen as an effective way of reducing the total number of charac-
ters. But if too many are deemed to be yiti zi and are eliminated from the
writing system, the ability to make distinctions may be curtailed, increas-
ing ambiguity in meaning, and potentially limiting the expressive power
of the language. The most discussed issue is the handling of a number of
variant forms that have their own semantic or phonetic value. Discharging
the less prestigious and more complex variants inevitably gives raise to
homophonous substitution, so the essence of the matter is to test to what
extent the general population would tolerate semantic ambiguity. For the
majority of yiti zi, the semantic compound that bears the subtle difference
in meaning or category is involved. In terms of actual operational proce-
dures, to identify the relationships between the components is unimaginably
complicated. For instance, the pure or absolute yiti zi is the least complicated
type, but Qiu Xigui, one of the best-known hanzi specialists in modern
China, sub-divides this category into eight further sub-categories. Over-
simplified and ideological ways of dealing with different categories of yiti zi
have been blamed for creating many problems7.
The FTVVF was the first and only attempt to rectify yiti zi in hanzi’s
evolving history, and after nearly fifty years of use, the rationalization has
proven to be basically successful. However, in the new linguistic environ-
ment, its deficiencies have become more and more apparent. Zhang Shuyan
(2003) mentions three reasons that account for this increasing inappro-
priateness. First, in the past half century vast changes have occurred in
China and, as a result, every new thing must be reflected in the vocabulary
162 Standardization as a Solution

and be recorded in hanzi. Yet, the standard is not regularly updated and,
consequently, we should not be surprised that things go wrong when we
use a 50-year-old standard to control today’s character use. Second, the
major original purpose of the table was to improve the poor quality of
printed characters through the elimination of the non-standard ones, thus
ending the chaotic state of character typecast used by the printing industry.
This goal was achieved long ago. Third, the FTVVF had no intention, nor
ability, to systematically overhaul the more problematic forms occurring in
publications more generally, so it should come as no surprise that clashes
occurred with other official tables/lists subsequently promulgated by the
government (Editors 2001). The first two factors should be examined in
their historical perspective; only the third reason has as its root short-
sighted guiding principles. As the FTVVF targets only the modern highly
active characters, it gives little consideration to the older contexts,
blatantly ignoring the fact that variant forms are phenomena shaped by
history. There has never existed a clear-cut boundary between different
historical periods in the hanzi forms.
Currently, Unicode is being gradually established with every visible
unit in the writing system being given a unique space. For Chinese, this
means any new reforming plan about hanzi will no longer be limited to
2,000 or 3,000 characters. The flaws of previous yiti zi, rationalized in the
1950s, have been looming large as the vision for reform has expanded to
examine a much wider range of characters. To review the FTVVF is,
inevitably, an imminent undertaking in any forthcoming government
mandated measure to standardize hanzi. The three outstanding difficulties,
regarding the physical shape and composition of hanzi are: Complex forms
vs simplified forms; standard forms vs variant forms; and old print fonts vs
new print fonts. Verifying the standard form and eliminating other variant
forms involves a complex identification and selection mechanism.
Therefore, to define the variant forms of characters has become the top
priority in creating the Comprehensive Table of Standardized Characters
(see the discussion that follows in this chapter), the most important
language planning activity currently being undertaken.

2.3 Sound – Reducing Pronunciation Variation

In the Prologue, we saw the evolutionary process of Chinese characters

from pictogram and ideogram to phonogram. This tendency to move from
meaning-representation to sound-representation was realized through the
increase in the number of semantic-phonetic characters. Although the
Chapter 4 163

phonetic compound in semantic-phonetic (or picto-phonetic) characters

provides some degree of pronunciation for the character as a whole, its
accuracy ranges from perfect to negligible. Hanzi is a writing system that
cannot by itself provide for accurate pronunciation since like its physical
make-up, its pronunciation is also marked by instability and unpredict-
ability, and thus needs to be standardized. Two issues arise with regard to
the standardization of pronunciation: heterophonic characters and region-
alects.

2.3.1 Heterophonic Characters

Yin and Rohsenow (1997: 162) are right in saying that the majority of
hanzi have a fixed, generally agreed upon pronunciation among putonghua
speakers, “so the main object of standardization is the remaining minority-
polyphonic characters.” In the following discussion, while ignoring the
other more complex issues concerning polyphonic characters, we focus on
the central concern related to heterophonic characters, those Chinese
characters which express the same meaning using different pronunciations.
Because sounds related to Chinese characters cannot be phonically deter-
mined from their form, as with alphabetic languages, the same character
can be read in different ways. Broadly speaking, and leaving aside for the
moment the most important factor – geographical differences, how a
person reads a character is determined by the three following factors:

• Age. Pronunciation has changed radically, but older people tend to keep
the pronunciation they learned when growing up. This is evident from
the discrepancy in pronunciation between the old generation and
younger people in daily communication.
• Education. Pronunciation is related to ways of speaking and writing.
There tend to be two standards: oral sounds for oral communication,
and reading sounds for written language. The well educated are much
more conservative in their pronunciation, while the illiterate say a
character as they like, using the ‘least effort principle’. For example,
the polyphonic character 呆 is pronounced differently in different
contexts making slight lexical demarcations. A large number of char-
acters have more than one pronunciation – while these are discerned by
intellectuals, commoners do not pay much attention to, or just ignore,
such peculiar features.
• Misleading information provided by the phonetic compound. Skilled
adult Chinese readers use the phonological information found in the
phonetic compound of the hanzi to assist with pronunciation, making
164 Standardization as a Solution

their pronunciation more accurate. But there is a growing tendency for

the phonetic function to weaken, to the extent of becoming misleading8.
Yin and Rohsenow (1997: 170) noted that “of the three situations in
which characters are liable to be misread, this drawing of false analo-
gies from the phonic component is the most common cause of mispro-
nunciation”. The degree to which hanzi provide phonetic representation
and effectiveness in pronunciation is a matter of disagreement, and is
further elaborated in the discussion which follows in this chapter.

In an analogy to yiti zi in terms of hanzi’s writing form, a character that

has more than one variant form for the same meaning is called yidu zi, or a
heterophonetic character. Yidu zi form the main focus for the standard-
ization of characters, and the difficulty of the problem is just as great as that
of yiti zi. As part of modern LP activities, the government has enacted two
sets of official standards aiming at unifying the pronunciation of yidu zi.
The first standard, The First Draft of Three Combined List of Authorized
Pronunciations for Heterophonic Words in Putonghua9, took seven years
to finalize. It was completed in 1963, but it was never shown to the public,
although it serves as the official standard that is incorporated in most
dictionaries. The second standard was jointly published by SCLW and the
Ministry of Radio and TV in late 1985. This is the revised version of the
first one. The biggest change in principles of appraising pronunciation is
that it adopted a pragmatic or ‘masses line’ approach that recognized
societal realities by giving more importance to popularly accepted usages,
rather than those based on etymological rationality and systematic logic.
The discrepancies in principles of fixing the pronunciation, as illustrat-
ed by the differences between the two tables, have resulted in confusion
among both the general population and professionals (i.e., actors, broad-
casters, TV presenters). Furthermore, the government standard manifested
in the tables and those used in dictionaries, also contradict each other.
Thus, when it comes to unifying pronunciation, the following questions
remain unresolved:

• Which should carry more weight: popular pronunciation which is pro-

mass but very irregular or systematized pronunciation which is rather
‘scientific’ and consistent with the historical development? The Second
Table of Official Pronunciation Standards (1985) cited previously
gives greater consideration to the mass line than the earlier standard.
That is, once a new pronunciation is well established among the
masses, it should be acknowledged by the authorities, even if it is found
to run counter the evolutionary direction of the Chinese phonological
Chapter 4 165

system. This also results in a widening the gulf between the younger
and older generations and with other regions, predominantly Taiwan.
• Should dialectal pronunciation continue to be tolerated? In the past,
‘Speaking Putonghua, Maintaining Dialect’ has been the propaganda
strategy used to defuse resistance from local areas to the promotion of
putonghua. However, in the digital era, hard and fast standards are
needed to deal with the unforgiving nature of machine usage. This is a
problem that will be brought up again in the discussion which follows
and in the next chapter as well.
• How to enforce the government-sanctioned pronunciation norms? Even
the dictionary compilers and editors have not paid much attention to the
governmental standard. For example, the government sanctioned and
largest selling dictionary for many years, the Xiandai Hanyu Cidian
(Modem Chinese Dictionary) reflects state-set standard, but did not
adopt this latest sanctioned standard until 1992 (Peng 1999). According
to the same research, most dictionaries now on the market still use the
old pronunciation standard decreed in 1963. Peng reported that only 6
of 22 dictionaries surveyed that were sold in bookshops adopted the
1985 official standard. This demonstrates the conservative nature of
dictionary compliers and the editors who have failed to take up the
1985 governmental standard10.

Each of these questions itself raises further questions – each of which

points to important issues which can help us to better understand this
major problem. One thing is clear; the disregard of the official standard by
the public is a reflection of a more general problem: that most reform
programs are implemented without a maintenance mechanism. In examin-
ing the history of language planning in China, one finds that in the
programming, coding, legalization, execution, evaluation processes that
complement the language planning program, scholars have done excellent
research at the stage of coding the norms (their implementation basically
can be completed by government organs), but the subsequent evaluation
and assessment of the implementation has been the most neglected area.

2.3.2 Regionalects

The standard pronunciation for modern Chinese characters is putonghua,

or Guoyu (Mandarin or, national language), as it was called before 1950s –
this is still the official name used in Taiwan, and a more popular name than
putonghua among overseas Chinese communities. The modern standard
pronunciation is based on the phonetic system of a local dialect, i.e.,
166 Standardization as a Solution

Beijing dialect. During the last three Chinese imperial regimes – the Yuan
(1206-1368), Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1616-1911 10) – or for over
700 years, Beijing was the national capital. In dynastic times there was no
attempt to spread the use of a national language throughout the empire.
Despite the fact that since the 13th century the language spoken in the
North in the area surrounding Beijing has become a sort of administrative
and intellectual lingua franca, its official status was not formally esta-
blished until 1923 during National Language Movement when the desir-
ability of having a standard vernacular to reduce language barriers
became self-evident as the various parts of China were becoming more
economically interdependent and politically integrated. The term of
putonghua was first put forward and defined at the second conference of
the CCSR in 1954. It was defined as consisting of the pronunciation of the
Peking dialect, the syntax of the Northern dialects, and the vocabulary of
modern well accepted literature (Baihua). It was to be the single language
for teaching in the Han region regardless what local dialects were spoken
and was to serve the purpose of communication among speakers from
across the country.
Linguistically, seventy percent of Han Chinese speak a variety of
putonghua; the area covered stretches from the Northeast bordering on
Russia and Korea to as far as the region south of the Yangtze River in the
southwest. However, even among the four major sub-groups of putonghua
speakers, there is evident divergence in their speech that often poses a
great barrier to oral communication. The rest of the Han Chinese people
speak a variety of regional Chinese dialects that are unintelligible to other
groups.
Frustrated by the unbalanced achievement of the spread of putonghua
in different regionalectal areas, and as well the increasingly evidence that
showed that it was unrealistic to expect that even many Northern Mandarin
native speakers would observe all the phonological distinctions in Beijing
speech, a debatable new term – mass or local putonghua – was developed
in late 1990s (Yao 1998). Thus, the discussion on the extent to which the
local accent can be tolerated in putonghua promotion has been a com-
bustible topic in LP circles, and as accent is important in accurate
computer input, this debate is likely to deepen.
There are a wide range of explanations about what the Mass Putonghua
should be, but the central point is that the standard should be more variable
so as to pertain to different people with different occupations in different
regions. Those advocating the use of Mass Putonghua at the local level get
strong support from eminent LP researchers such as Zhou Youguang and
Wang Jun. The idea of Mass or Local Putonghua is nothing new. In fact,
Chapter 4 167

the need to adopt a set of flexible standards for different learners according
to their professions has been long acknowledged since the very beginning
of putonghua campaign (Barnes 1977: 259). What makes this issue signi-
ficant is that it is being raised after half a century of putonghua-spread
experience. Given the lukewarm support that the government gets from
regional China in its putonghua promotion, incorporating Mass Putonghua
promotion into the national LP work is a pragmatic policy worthy of being
further explored. The emergence of a more flexible and universally
respected norm across dialectal regions has already been given official
recognition, and a multi-level model of putonghua standard testing system
has been in use for some years.
However, dialectal variation has become an impediment for pronuncia-
tion-based software. Unlike English and most other alphabetic scripts,
where spelling errors can be either tolerated or automatically checked and
corrected, characters, encoded in phonetic-based input programs, are
represented by the exact pronunciation, thus requiring a high degree of
precision in pronunciation – misspelling results in different characters
appearing on the screen. This leads to problems when the concept of multi-
level standard putonghua is applied. For instance, the vast majority of the
population, including most parts of the Mandarin-speaking areas, are not
able to tell or pronounce the differences between ‘z, c, s’ and ‘zh, ch, sh’.
Which means when using word processing program, the users from the
area where there are no retroflex sounds ‘zh, ch, sh’ will fail to get the
desired characters on the screen if their first guess is wrong – a rather
annoying experience for every dialect speaking user. However, despite
strong opposition from LP regulators, almost all phonetic-based input
systems are designed to accept standard pronunciation with dialectal
accents, which is considered a flagrant violation of the national language
policy. From a language planner’s perspective, the tolerance of dialect
pronunciation in the software market discourages the people from further
improving their putonghua level, leading to disastrous long-term results by
potentially undermining language planners’ efforts to unify the national
language. These provisions contrast sharply with other professional efforts
at language unity in the rapidly marketizing China. For example, The
National Centre for Putonghua Testing Training, which is comprised of
research staff from the Putonghua Promotion and Research Section in the
Research Institute of Applied Linguistics and other linguistic academics,
is the highest level institution authorized at the ministerial level to regularly
organize nationwide putonghua testing activities for language intensive
professions, such as school teachers, tourist guides, bus conductors, and
waitresses/waiters in star-graded hotels. A certificate issued by this centre,
168 Standardization as a Solution

showing the level of the holder’s putonghua standard, is an asset in

applying for a range of professions.
In sum, the putonghua promotion campaign that started in 1950s is a
continuation of 1920s’ National Language Movement. Unfortunately,
putonghua popularization perhaps has been the least successful aspect in
the modernization of the Chinese language, and the nation-wide populari-
zation of putonghua by 2050 is only an optimistic goal (Li 2004c: 65).
“[B]efore we could say ‘to popularize Putonghua’, now we do not dare to
say ‘popularization’, we only say ‘promotion’”, complains Zhou Youguang
(2004: 71). Therefore, the ultimate goal of pronunciation standardization of
putonghua on a nation-wide basis remains a long term goal. The urgent real-
world objective of pronunciation standardization is to standardize the
characters with divergent pronunciation that cause the greatest confusion in
oral speech among the whole population, and particularly those that create
endless troubles in the area of education and technology.

2.4 Ordering – Standardizing the Referencing Methods

As Gao Gengsheng (2002: 351) arguably points out, “[character]

ordering standardization is a prerequisite of [Chinese] language moderni-
zation. It is a precondition for dictionary compiling, library cataloging,
character databases devised for computers and Chinese language automatic
processing”. Ordering is an issue related to computer technology in two
respects: information processing and character input. Linguistically, the
word is the most basic unit of information and in the Chinese language,
words are composed of characters. In other words, in the classification
system of any dictionary or vocabulary inventory, words are grouped
under the heading characters11. Therefore, the character is the sole entity
providing access to information in an IR system or corpus, or a library
catalog, to look up a word in a dictionary, or even to find a personal name
in roll book12. As for character input, the essential task in designing a hanzi
input scheme is to devise a hanzi ordering system. In this sense, like the
categorization of input methods, we can categorize hanzi ordering methods
into two streams: the phonetic and ideographic approaches. The phonetic
approach is the most convenient and popular method among the general
population, as a character/word can be instantly located if one knows the
character’s pronunciation and has a functional knowledge of pinyin, or any
other alphabetic system used for classification purposes. Just like the
disadvantage of phonetic input schemes, the biggest problem with this
method is that it is only valid for pronunciation of known characters, but in
Chapter 4 169

many cases, the characters or words people want to check are not common,
and a major purpose for using the reference may be to check pronun-
ciation, this being a common purpose for non-putonghua speakers.
Therefore, many medium size or big dictionaries and reference book are
not indexed phonetically, although most dictionaries come with more than
one index method. The Table of Commonly Used Characters (7000
characters, 1988) and GB 2312-80 (6763 characters, 1981) use a pinyin
index for half of the more often used characters and a stroke index for
another half less used characters.
While it should be acknowledged that the introduction of pinyin has
provided an important alternative way to sequence Chinese characters, for
various reasons, including the shortcomings just mentioned, Chinese char-
acter referencing is an issue that is far from being resolved, and sequencing
has become even more problematic with the increase in popularity of
computer use.
Among the traditional ideographic methods, the dominant one is the
so-called radical method. As the name suggests, this method classifies
characters by the radicals they contain. More than eighty five percent of
hanzi are semantic-phonetic characters, and all other compound characters
also are semantic in nature, thereby containing at least one semantic
component13. This aspect of hanzi’s structure creates the conditions where-
by almost all individual characters can be classified according to a more
limited number of radicals, creating groupings of tens and often hundreds
under the same radical. For example, in the Modern Chinese Dictionary,
which is a medium size dictionary, there are more than 400 entries under
the radical 口(kou, mouth) and more than 100 entries under 目(mu, eye)
(including traditional forms), so other structural features of hanzi such as
stroke number and stroke shape to have to be employed to locate a specific
characters. Hanzi was first classified using 540 radicals for Xiaozhuan
characters by Xu Shen in his Shuowen jiezi, and this ordering system
continues to be used. But, there is no universally accepted standardized
system. The most long standing and influential system consists of 214
radicals. This system was the result of the radical reduction from Xu’s 540
by Mei Yingzuo in his Zihui (Glossary –《字汇》) in 1647 and was
retained by a more prestigious Kanxi Dictionary which was collectively
compiled in 1716. This de facto standard continues to be used by major
large-sized reference books today in Chinese character using countries
including Taiwan. But, in mainland China the newly published lexicons
and dictionaries use a range of radical systems. Most follow one of three
systems: 250 radicals represented by new edition of Cihai (Ocean of
Vocabulary), or 189 radicals represented by Modern Chinese Dictionary,
170 Standardization as a Solution

or 201 radicals standardized and recommended by LP authorities. How-

ever, in today’s China, reference book publishing is a big and flourishing
industry, and no one can tell how many systems are used by countless
dictionaries and reference books. Even greater divergences are seen in ideo-
graph-based computer input systems. To accommodate the features and
novelties of their own schemes, everyone devising a new system creates
an input scheme to meet their specific technical requirements, adding
virtually hundreds more systems to the existing stock.
Insofar as official standardization is concerned, in 1961 the CCSR,
supported by the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Education and the
Linguistics Research Institute of China Science Academy, set up special
task team – Working Group to Rectify Character-Referencing Methods,
and after three years of intensive research and consultation with those
concerned, the research team recommended four systems of character
referencing methods. They are i.) the radical method, ii.) the four-corner
code method, iii.) the stroke method, and iv.) the Pinyin method. Then, in
1983, in collaboration with organizations from editing and publishing
institutes, the Working Group to Unify Radical Referencing Method,
authorized by the SCLW and the Ministry of Culture, put forward a
modified 201 radical system that aimed to serve as the standard system for
both simplified and traditional characters. But, once again, this was not
embraced even by government-sponsored dictionaries. For instance,
Modern Chinese Dictionary, which is the most authoritative dictionary in
promoting the standard usage of lexical codification, pronunciation and
writing in modern Chinese, has come out with its own set of 189 radicals.
As we have just seen, the radical method is not self-sufficient; it
depends heavily on the other two determinants – stroke number and the
stroke shape – which can also stand as independent ordering methods in
their own right if one is dealing with a small number of characters. But in
actual use, most of the time a character or word can only be located
through the combined use of all three of these methods. Thus, if one wants
to look up a character, identifying the radical is the first step in a typical
process. Then, one has to count the stroke number because there are too
many characters under the common radicals. If the intended character can
not be defined by these two elements, then the third element – stroke shape –
has to be used. The stroke shape method puts characters in a sequence
according to the order of the five basic stokes, i.e., the horizontal stroke
(一) goes first, the vertical stroke (丨,亅) second, left-falling stroke (丿)
third, the dot (丶, ⎝ ) fourth, then curving strokes (乛,乚) fifth. This order
is typified by a character 札 (zha), so this ‘five-stroke’ referencing
method is also known as the Zha Method.
Chapter 4 171

Thus, searching for a character can be a time-consuming task that often

ends up in failure. A minor error in any part of the whole process may lead
to a breakdown of the entire effort. In real life, checking for unpronounce-
able characters is something that individuals try to avoid. But in an increas-
ingly digitalized society, there is a frequent need to access such characters
by a growing segment of population either when using computer input
programs or to access electronically stored information. As part of IT-
oriented LP standardization activities, relevant standards to facilitate the
application of character referencing methods and hanzi education have
been formulated by language authorities. In 1997 the SCLW and the
Department of Media and Press jointly commissioned the GB 13000.1
Standard of Character Components for Information Interchange – GF
3001-1997. Two years later (on 1st October) two further national stan-
dards concerning hanzi ordering, the 13000.1 Standard of Stroke Ordering
of the General Modern Characters – GF 3002-1999 and GB 13000.1
Standard of Chinese Character Order (by stroke) – GF 3003-1999, were
also put into effect by the SCLW in conjunction with the relevant depart-
ments. But these standards are applicable only to characters included in
Standard Character Set GB 13000.1, i.e., for 20902 characters. However,
perhaps not unexpectedly, character ordering is still a problem. For
instance, in Xinhua Chinese Character Dictionary (1998 edition) and
Modern Chinese Dictionary (2002 edition), the two most influential diction-
aries, three stroke characters under the same component ‘丿’ are found to
be arranged in different order (Gao 2002: 352), i.e.:
Xinhua Chinese Character Dictionary: 乞川几义么九丸及
Modern Chinese Dictionary: 千毛川九么及
Some standardization work has proved to be sociolinguistically
complex. The divergence and confusion about how to call the radicals and
components of hanzi are major obstacles in using the radical referencing
method. Since the 1960s, it has been accepted that there has been a need
for a convention on how orally to refer to hanzi components, particularly
for educational purposes (see Note 6 in Chapter 6). On February 26, 2001,
in the course of drafting the National Standard for Components’ Calling
Names for Standard Character Set GB-13000.1 for Information-Pro-
cessing, to further solicit public opinions on the debatable issue, an open
letter stating this need was published under the heading of ‘Norms and
Standards’ on the government website ‘China-language.gov.cn’. But no
further new developments have been reported on this standard (for further
discussion, see Section 3.3.3, Chapter 6).
More complex work on standardizing hanzi’s ordering relates to how to
regulate people’s handwriting. In ancient times, brush writing was effecttively
172 Standardization as a Solution

governed by the models in works of calligraphy masters. In modern times,

no standards targeting peoples’ handwriting have been attempted in
mainland China14, despite the repeated calls by scholars for this to happen
(e.g., Fei 2000b), and it might have remained this way were it not for the
demand generated by technological advances. As stated in Chapter 3, OCR
input technology has a promising future in the Chinese IT software market.
Various OCR products have been on the market for quite some time and
have proved to be most welcome by particular segments of population,
such as old generations, cooperation managers and non-putonghua speak-
ers. But, to further upgrade the recognition speed and accuracy of OCR
programs requires considerable input from linguists and LP involvement.
Particularly for the simultaneous OCR method, users’ handwriting beha-
vior is sometimes central in improving the system’s operating quality.
Handwriting irregularities and individual peculiarities, such as unpredict-
able stroke ordering, are major factors that account for the reduction in the
OCR success rate when trying to reproduce hanzi on screen (Gu 1997).
The operating principle of the simultaneous writing OCR method is
that the computer can only process strings of lines. In the process of trans-
forming the stroke trace into single dimension signal (a string line), the
machine has to pick up all information sent through the special stylus (a
kind of light pen). The influential factors include: the stroke number and
direction, the stroke ordering and writing speed, even the pressure of the
pen point. “By constantly gauging such abundant graphic aids and moving
signals, the simultaneous OCR gains a higher quality than the scanning
OCR method, thus upgrading the recognition speed” (Zhao 2005: 355).
However, if something unexpected happens during this process, then “one
character can be recognized as two or more different characters if a non-
standard stroke order is input” (Wu and Ding 1992: 176). We illustrate this
process with following figure:
Y Y

扌 才

X 0 X 0
4 3 2 1 4 3 2 1
Figure 4-2. The principles of recognizing Chinese character by OCR
Chapter 4 173

Figure 4-2 illustrates the importance of standard ordering for OCR.

When the computer is trying to read the graphic signs ‘扌’ and ‘才’, they
both have a stroke ‘ﾉ’ which can be seen as a 45-degree oblique line. The
correct stroke order for the former is left-down to right-up, for the latter it
is the other way around. The machine distinguishes these two lines by
measuring values on the X axis. If the machine reads a trace from big to
small (4 0) on X axis, it can easily and quickly identify it as right-rising
stroke, and matches it with the correct one, stored in the internalized
character database. Otherwise, if the numbers on X axis change from small
to big (0 4), then it must be a left-falling stroke from top-right to bottom-
left (Gu 1997: 107). Wu and Ding (1992: 177) consider the unstable stroke
shape and writing order to be “two key issues for simultaneous OCR”.
They argue that “it is necessary to impose somewhat standardization on
people’s handwriting habit” (p. 147). Otherwise, “it would be very
unlikely that the system can yield any high quality OCR products on those
unrestrained handwritten text” (p. 150).
In recent years researchers have concentrated more on emerging
non-keyboard developments. A growing number of computer software
manufacturers have been promoting input by voice and input through
handwriting, and it is predicted that non-keyboard input will be the best
and most popular method, although this solution seems most unlikely to
arise any time soon, given the current fact that it is still too slow and too
error prone. However, OCR technology is seen as ‘return to nature’. As
Gu Xiaofeng (2000: 44) observes, the international input trend is ‘pen-
computer-pen’. Some vendors claim that with computers becoming smaller
and smaller, the keyboard is increasingly just inconvenient equipment.
One unique feature of Chinese characters is that the handwritten
representation of thousands upon thousands of different graphical signs
can generate billions of ideolectical configurations of these characters.
There can be no question that with the emerging generation of more
powerful computers it is theoretically possible to program billions of
individual writing types, one for each of the billion individual writers. But
this is obviously an impractical process. Somehow, to make possible
accurate pattern matching, grouping of forms of writing needs to occur in
order to reduce the number of variations. This is precisely the area where
LP can contribute to the modern handwriting technology through the
standardization effort. Standardizing stroke ordering, whether targeting the
printed form or handwriting habits, is the type of principle-based LP
planning that needs governmental coordination. But, this is a weak area of
national LP work partly because of its complex nature. The unofficial, self-
proclaimed standard found in the dictionaries in the marketplace has been
174 Standardization as a Solution

an important step towards removing the inconsistency caused by non-

standard handwriting, but whether such dictionary publishers should be
allowed to claim their individual work as a “Dictionary of Standard …”
goes back to the foregoing debate concerning LP.

3. CURRENT STANDARDIZATION PROJECTS

While it is important to identify some of the issues facing character

development, it is also important to look at what projects the government
is currently undertaking to address these problems. China is a country that
has a long tradition of state normative intervention in language development
(Shi 1997; Chen P. 1999), and this has been considered one of the factors
that has enabled hanzi to survive throughout history.
Historically, government-initiated reform measures fall into two general
categories: (1) standardization and unification by setting up the models
while keeping the physical shape of hanzi intact; and (2) optimization
and systematization through alteration, or surgical operation in meta-
phorical terms. Although these two types of reforms are often inter-
connected in their implementation, the latter takes greater effort and is
more risky to implement. This is because writing is a set of conventions
that, once they have been established, develop slowly and mature over
centuries, and even thousands of years. To make the majority of people
change or give up their ancestral writing heritage and adopt a reformed
writing system is perhaps one of the most difficult jobs in the world.
However, a writing system is a tool for communication, and historically
there have been a number of successful cases of script reform, e.g.,
Turkish (Dogançay-Aktuna, 1995).
Since the beginning of the new millennium, it has become clearer that
to release the immense constraints put on the Chinese IT industry by the
deficiencies of the Chinese writing system, some more fundamental LP
work needs to be done at the national level. This section focuses on two
such government endorsed projects developed to meet that objective. One
aims to formulate a comprehensive table of standardized characters to
further a clinical treatment to some of Chinese hanzi, and the other, to
launch a series of research programs to overhaul Chinese ancient scripts.
Chapter 4 175

3.1 Systematic Optimization and Modification:

CTSC15

By putting all standards and tables together, the ongoing Compre-

hensive Table of Standardized Characters is actually the embodiment of
the foresaid Four Fixations. The composition of a complete table of hanzi
started in earnest as early as the 1960s (Chen 1981), and this is the third
time that it has been formally established as the key LP research project at
the national level. Being the foremost national language task for many
years to come, the plan has been implemented according to well-defined
research objectives, an overall framework, and fieldwork operational
principles. Since its inception in April 2001, task research teams have been
in full operation, nation-wide conferences have been conducted consecu-
tively16, pilot projects, such as hanzi for personal names, have started to
solicit opinions from the public (see Section 3.3.3, Chapter 6), and a few
draft tables of separate standards have been presented to academics across
the country for comment.
As we have already seen, quantity reduction has long been regarded as
a hard nut to crack in hanzi research. As the ultimate summary of the all
standards and tables promulgated by the national language authorities about
hanzi, the CTSC has been the most significant LP program ever developed
for Chinese characters. To arrive at a fixed number by delineating what
characters should be included in the table is the first step and the foundation
for the three other fixations. However, when considering the total number of
hanzi to be included in the CTSC, differences exist among the key
protagonists (see Li 2004b, Wang T.K. 2004, Zhang 2004). In short, there
are two competing views on total number determination: 1) a number of
scholars are of the view that the chief purpose of the CTSC is to serve the
modern hanzi users, i.e., there is no need to standardize the RC, so the total
number should be restricted to a fixed number ranging between 8,000-
12,000; 2) another group argues that the CTSC at least should be able to
cover the extant standard codes for information exchange. The following
number of characters, totaling 12,000 and arranged in three hierarchical
stratified levels, have been suggested by Li Yuming (2004c):

• Grade I, 3,500 highly used characters, roughly commensurate with the

Table of Most Used Modern Characters published in 1988;
• Grade II, 4,000 commonly used characters; and
• Grade III, 4,500 rarely used characters for special purposes such as
proper nouns.
Chapter 4 177

added to discriminate between homophonous characters, when in its early

history Chinese was dominated by single syllabic words. In modern Chinese
an overwhelming majority of words are polysyllabic, so these additional
strokes no longer have lexical significance. Moreover, the methodology
used to distinguish homophonous characters makes characters structurally
complicated, failing to comply with the general trend toward simplifi-
cation.
Influenced by Liushu tradition, logical elements of Chinese characters
have often been improperly exaggerated by hanzi reform opponents and
other linguistic purists. A dispassionate examination of the evidence
reveals that the predictive ability, of both the semantic and phonetic com-
pounds, has become weakened rather than strengthened during the process
of language development. For some characters, the information conveyed
through their graphic make-up and the way they are constructed only
serves to mislead, or impedes judgment the meaning and sound from their
composite elements. For example, the horse was very important in ancient
life, and a large number of characters contain the horse components, but
neither the meaning nor pronunciation have anything to do with horses
in the modern context, or if they do, they have only a very remote
relationship with the intention for which the characters were originally
created. Some characters with wood and stone compounds are also
difficult to explain by looking at their visual composition. The ration-
alization of the compound, to make the semantic indicator more logi-
cal and acceptable to modern life, although not a stated outcome was
extensively used in the TSC. For example, when simplified from 驚 (jing,
startle/surprise) to 惊 , the 馬 (horse) was changed to psychological
radical 忄(heart/mind); the semantic compound in the character 護 (hu,
to protect) was also simplified from 訁=讠(word) to 扌(hand), thus 護
护. Many characters were formed or (mistakenly) reformed based on
previous perceptions of the world, or due to a lack of linguistic sophis-
tication. To understand or write these characters now causes a great
deal of difficulty for people, despite their anthropological and archaeo-
logical significance17.
While there are vast resources available to improve these malformed
and defective characters at the disposal of reformers, the number of char-
acters to be physically repaired should be limited to a minimum, and this
can only be done on the basis of a thorough and systematic study of the
characters. For instance, Qi Chongtian (1997: 394) discussed 25 characters
in the Table of Standard Shapes of Modern Characters (1988) that are in
conflict with other standards, those in dictionaries or have aspects that are
subject to re-evaluation. The CTSC project provides a valuable opportunity
178 Standardization as a Solution

to correct defects in hanzi, regardless of whether they rooted in their

original creation or come from more recent developments.

3.1.2 Making Phonetic Signifiers More Accountable

As explained in the Prologue, hanzi are normally a combination of both

ideographic parts and phonetic parts, with the semantic element providing
information about the meaning and the phonetic element an indication of
the pronunciation. Experience shows that the dynamic phonetic compound
is the logical element in hanzi to be used to create new simplified charac-
ters, but this characteristic has not yet developed sufficiently to make
every hanzi acceptably accurate. Fei (1991: 116) indicates that
it has been suggested for quite some time that, to make them more
precise in signifying the meaning and pronunciation, the phonetic and
semantic compounds need to be systematically rationalized, to enable
80–90 percent of compounds to be more suggestive without ambiguity.
Today, the people doing research on this are by no means rare.
Hanzi are ambiguous because “it has not been manipulated and refined
like the Japanese syllabaries but throughout its history right down to today
has evolved in a more or less haphazard manner” (DeFrancis 1989: 111).
According to Xu Chengmiao (1974: 29), in classical Chinese the ideogra-
phic-phonetically meaningful characters accounted for over ninety percent
of the total. In modern Chinese, the degree of haniz’s phonetic repre-
sentation and effectiveness is a matter of disagreement. Yuen Ren Chao
(1976: 92) says hanzi are only 25 percent phonetic, Zhou (1986c: 144)
claims 39 percent, and the claim of 49.9 percent is a relatively new
estimate (Wang 1998: 33). Gradations depend on differing definitions of
what a phonetic compound is and how many hanzi are to be evaluated.
Nevertheless, in terms of modern standard characters, around 40 percent
would be an approximation acceptable to most scholars. Li Yan’s (cited in
Su 2001b: 103) study shows that out of 7,000 commonly used characters,
only 56.6 percent are ideographic-phonetic characters, with the phonetic
side pronunciation indicator ranging from 100 percent accurate to merely
providing a faint hint. As part of character systematization, the semantic-
phonetic characters should be optimized as much as possible to make the
phonetic part a more accurate reflection of modern pronunciation, and
more effective in its ability to represent the pronunciation of the whole
character.
Zhou (1979: 332-338) proposed three ways to enhance phonetic func-
tion. He saw the use of new semantic-phonetic characters as a promising
Chapter 4 179

method to create new characters and an important idea that deserves

encouragement. Although it appears unrealistic to restructure characters in
a way that indicates each syllable by only one phonetic marker, this
ambitious goal has been mentioned from time to time in relevant discus-
sions, and perhaps is not too whimsical to suggest as a possibility. Yang
(1999) and Chen Ping (1999) draw our attention to the possibility of
recreating a “modern phonetic-semantic system”. Chen notes that “to improve
the sound and meaning indicating capability of characters” is one of three
ways to optimize hanzi.
The so-called New Semantic-Phonetic Characters scheme, first envisa-
ged by Tang Lan (1949), proposed a reclassification of the totality of
characters, and a reform of the phonetic side using a prescribed number of
the best-known characters, so as to achieve the goal that characters with
the same pronunciation have the same phonetic compound and that the
same phonetic compound in different characters is always pronounced
alike. Wang Li (1938), who was very instrumental in the editing of the
revised list of the SSS, was not supportive of this idea but did not rule out
the possibility that Chinese characters, at least to some extent, could be
restructured in a logical and systematic way. These attempts have faced
various difficulties, but they have also given some valuable inspiration to
the production of new characters. A number of semantic-phonetic charac-
ters in the TSC were based on these principles and some weak phonetic
ones were improved. It has been subsequently shown that these are the best
ones in the Scheme (Gao 2002; Qiu 2004). At the same time, some were
adversely effected by being arbitrarily created by the masses, thereby
creating a need for amendments at the next opportunity, e.g., by the CTSC.
Theoretically, there are two difficulties that need to be overcome before
new semantic-phonetic characters can be put into practice. One is the form
of the phonetic indicator. Wang rejected one that would create an obvious
problem, the long proposed hybrid form, i.e., using Latin letters in Chinese
characters as a phonetic indicative. The second difficulty is more critical
and complex. Because of thousands of years’ development in a vastly
complex and changing set of circumstances, the sound compound has long
ago lost its function for a majority of character users. As Chao (1976: 92)
notes, “The so-called phonetic compounds represented sounds fairly
closely when they were first developed, but often are no longer appropriate
for modern pronunciation.” In other words, the same sound compound has
taken on a different pronunciation; with the example given by Wang Li
being 耻 (chi, shame or humiliation). If it is restructured as ,
Mandarin speakers can precisely predict its pronunciation, but to people
from at least six other provinces it is not a sound compound as 止 and 尺
180 Standardization as a Solution

have nothing to do with pronunciation. But Wang was optimistic about a

resolution to work out a kind of standard sound compound. He listed three
conditions, which must be met to give sound compounds similar
pronunciation by the entire population. Despite his lukewarm attitude,
Wang admitted that, theoretically, New Semantic-Phonetic Characters
would be more acceptable and would succeed more easily than Romani-
zation, since it would only be character reform rather than a revolution.
From current perspectives, when looking at the problems faced sixty years
ago, Wang’s worry about dialectic divergence is rapidly disappearing
under the relatively successful Putonghua promotion scheme. In discus-
sing ways of modernizing hanzi in the information era, Hung Hin-chung
(1997: 150) enthusiastically considers it “as the future direction for hanzi
development, because it serves as a bridge leading to phonetic characters,
when the new semantic-phonetic character throws away its semantic cap”.
However, if to comprehensively renovate or optimize the entire system
of hanzi has traditionally been seen as too idealistic (Fan 2000: 165-166),
it does not mean that something systematic can not be done to improve the
system. Following international experience, there have been cases where
remedial reform measures were taken to narrow the existing divergences
between the language and its phonetic representation, such as in Korean in
the 16th century and in Finnish and Czech in modern times (Gelb 1979). In
fact, it is such a fascinating topic, so fantastic and irresistible, despite the
acknowledgement that it has little chance of getting off the ground, that
interested researchers have never stopped exploring the feasibility of at
least partially making the hanzi system more rational, particularly in view
of the constant technological change (see e.g., Zhou 2004; Wang 2004a).

3.1.3 Optimizing Input Schemes Through Standardization

It is expected that the completion of the CTSC will also provide the
environment to end the unhealthy competition between the overly large
number of input programs. Xu Shouchun (Xu and Zhao 2000: 385-391)
lists deficiencies of hanzi that severely constrain computers from playing a
larger role in automatic information processing. He contends the foremost
problem is the unavailability of one, or a few, highly efficient input pro-
grams. Decades of fruitless efforts to optimize the national input scheme
have resulted in a malicious impact on society, and with the increasingly
wide-spread use of computers, the problem is creating a social dilemma.
Zhang Pu (1997: 41) calls the situation of a plethora of co-existing
different schemes in a chaotic state, “input scheme pollution”.
Chapter 4 181

The current bewildering variety of schemes to input/output hanzi script on

computers is definitely an unusual phenomenon. The public and education
system still anticipate that there will be a single widespread scheme, which
should be user friendly, conform to compulsory education standards, and
have an overwhelming advantage over others. With more than twenty
popular schemes in China competing in the software market, there is a
need for comprehensive standards to govern language use. If the notion of
‘letting the market sort it out’ was appropriate as part of the solution in the
initial stages of IT development, it does not work in the current context as
the various self-defined software standards for using hanzi, pinyin and
keyboards have added to public confusion and resentment. To make
progress on these issues any new round of standardization must remove
these arbitrarily devised schemes from the market place and reward those
that comply with official prescribed standards. Since the mid-1990s
computing activities have expanded from an individual enterprise to
a social behavior, with a future tendency toward internationalization.
Individual contributions to the IT industry have greatly diminished and are
virtually disappearing, or have become an impeding factor if they are
in conflict w ith national or international standards 18. It is particularly
important to realize that, although the IT related language standard is not
always identical to the written form used by the public, in some respects it
can function as a cohesive bridge between the relevant sectors.
Currently, there is a fundamental discrepancy between the two camps;
input software developers focus on technical convenience and commercial
interests, whereas school textbooks and dictionaries tend to take a ration-
alist position, giving more importance to rigid principles, explanatory
logic, established practice and etymological origins and correctness. As a
result, the skills and rules that students are taught in classes differ from the
training courses or operational manuals offered by software companies
(Xu C.A. 1999: 132). It is inappropriate and inefficient that the same
character can be described in different ways in the classroom, in society, in
the dictionary, and on the keyboard; or that the same component is given
different names by different constituencies. The problem emerges most
clearly when software buyers are confronted with differences between old
knowledge about writing hanzi, and the method for operating their
software. Wan Yexin (1999: 95) reports that the ideograph-based software
users “are very irritated when, in order to type, they have to get rid of all of
their established knowledge and habits about hanzi”.
To ensure that the current script is the effective instrument required by
a modern society, there is a need for an interdisciplinary consensus based
on a universally accepted standard of how to treat the discrepancies in
182 Standardization as a Solution

hanzi. Fei Jinchang (1996: 444) notes that due to the lack of inter-
disciplinary communication, “there is a tendency that the differences of
understanding about what are the basic hanzi units and how to disassemble
them between the IT industry and linguistic circles are widening”.
Standardization, in this context is in its essence a set of rules to enable
a member of a given community to reliably communicate their written
utterances through an encoding/decoding process on a machine. An effect-
ive approach would be to create guidelines for the official requirements,
with dispute procedures so disagreements could be resolved once the
relevant standards had come out. These operational standards have to
apply universally in three domains: the IT industry, public writing and
literacy education, requiring the authorities to subject the market to
rigorous central control of usage. A natural outcome should be that the
number of input schemes is gradually reduced as IT-oriented standards
establish themselves more fully.

3.1.4 Some Thoughts about the CTSC

Since the announcement of the plan to draw up the CTSC, there has
been an enthusiastic response from the public, and a number of laypersons
(through unofficial channels, e.g., Chen M.G. 2004; Li 2004) and scholars
(through formal channels) have put forward their opinions and suggestions
(e.g., Gong 2004; Liu 2004). Prompted by the evolving discussions, as
summarized in the previous sections, and more generally by the issues that
we believe the CTSC should have been considering, we make the follow-
ing comments, noting, however, that the CTSC project is nearing comple-
tion. Readers interested in this topic may want to compare the CTSC
mandated outcomes against these suggestions.

3.1.4.1 Flexibility and pragmatism

A standard is characterized by its rigid and top-down nature; all too
frequently, change is prone to undermine the standard. By contrast,
standardization is a process. Given the dynamic nature of language, we
cannot expect, nor do we want these standards to ever become finalized as
there will always remain some relevant questions to be answered. A
practical solution is to set up a model to be followed, leaving room for it to
develop over time and allowing users to choose, as some limited flexibility
would make the standard more acceptable and its implementation easier to
operate in practice. Specifically, whenever a dispute on indeterminate
divergence arises and a choice has to be made, there is no harm in leaving
it to users as long as there is no obvious possibility to erode the status of
Chapter 4 183

the standard. To strike a balance between flexibility and the standard’s

status is a vital part in the entire process of making standards. Therefore, it
would be very useful to list alternative forms or sub-standards under the
standard for some period of time, and by doing this, remind the public
which hanzi are non-standard variants as a way to help develop a defini-
tion of what is standard.

3.1.4.2 Public involvement

The enthusiastic public response to some sub-projects of the table has
enforced the notion that LP activity is quintessentially a social process. It
now seems certain there is a climate of social expectation that people will
be treated as a stakeholder on big issues that affect every one. There are
many ways to provide an appropriate role for public participation while
standards are being developed. One can propagate them through public
media, such as by holding public hearings or news briefings on a regular
basis by a representative spokesperson, as has been the practice in Taiwan
and Hong Kong. The purpose is to extensively involve as much of the
population as possible, in addition to the usual closed LP circle of teachers,
linguistic experts, dictionary makers and calligraphy artists. Second, it is
important to work out appropriate ways to use public opinion as a
sounding board. Admittedly, given the sheer size of the population, and the
fact that the majority of Chinese are not mature or experienced democratic
participants, the public opinion pool can only serve as a starting point and
their participation could be seen as a symbolic or token. Nevertheless, a
limited discussion is better than none as there is an essential distinction
between public opinion and expert comments. This is particularly the case
since there have been lessons to be learned from dealing with the
pronunciation of some hanzi. Unfortunately, in all three of the key papers
presented by official scholars about the tentative plan, little mention has
been made about measures to guarantee public acceptance, or about
maintenance mechanisms as part of implementation.

3.1.4.3 About SSS characters

As previously indicated, over two decades after their wholesale
rejection, some SSS characters “have already taken root in the hearts of the
people. At least some of them should be listed parallel to official standard
characters in state-sanctioned dictionaries” (Wang 1992: 19). This has also
been acknowledged in the Tentative Plan of the CTSC, which states that
“some SSS characters are quite successful”. Furthermore, from the find-
ings of the handwriting style investigation (Chapter 3), it is tempting to
assume that ordinary people’s acceptance of SSS characters is not an
184 Standardization as a Solution

isolated event, but pervasive, found in nearly every rung of society. This is
also strongly and vividly supported by the photographic evidence in Huang
Peirong’s (1992: illustrations on pages 5-21) research taken across China
over a span of three-and-a-half years, from August 1988 to April 1992.
The CTSC offers a good opportunity to re-think and re-assess the SSS.
Some of the best-accepted SSS hanzi obviously deserve recognition in
some form, even if they cannot be accorded full official status.
Unwillingness or further delay in recognizing these facts fails to reflect the
reality of character use in the current context, and risks creating public
vexation if other seemingly implausible characters are likely to be included
in the would-be standards. This suggestion reflects the fact that while
standards provide ‘leadership’, they also need to reflect public usage if
they want to gain widespread acceptance. A delicate balance needs to be
struck. Public resistance to LP change can undermine standards and their
use. This issue is further discussed in Section 3.2, Chapter 6.

3.1.4.4 Computability and internationality

IT motivation and international compatibility have been repeatedly
cited as the major reasons for this project, but no concrete actions to
address these two objectives can be found in the three aforementioned
articles, despite there being constructive and insightful proposals put
forward as early as 1982 by Hu Qiaomu (Editing Team 1999: 288-289,
299). In order to make the hanzi components more transferable, convey-
able and decomposable, the most desirable outcome is to reduce the total
number of components through merging, altering or discarding some
variant forms. Hanzi’s internationality is another topic that has attracted a
lot of attention in recent years, and the project’s first and seventh opera-
tional guidelines were that “the CTSC should have no effect to broaden the
discrepancy with other hanzi-using communities” (Zhang S.Y. 2003).
Since in the medium term, a unified system is not an achievable goal, a
small step in that direction could be taken by unifying the physical shape
of some commonly used hanzi, i.e., to standardize traditional characters
and the so-called inherited hanzi in conjunction with LP authorities in
Taiwan. However, it is noticeable that no overseas standards have been
mentioned in any publication discussing the Table. Although in theory
nobody doubts that conscious efforts will be made to narrow the graphi-
cally based differences, without tangible measures, such as a liaison body
to tackle the issue through explicit coordination, it is reasonable to
cautiously predict that divergence across the Strait may unavoidably widen
and permanently fossilize. As will be discussed in the following section, a
hanzi standardization operation of a similar scale is going on in Taiwan,
Chapter 4 185

and it will be too late to coordinate these projects if it is not done at this
stage. The reason is simple, putting political factors aside, because both
sides have invested a great deal of effort and manpower, and a huge budget
as well, the outcomes, if they are allowed to develop separately, are almost
irreversible.

3.2 Overhauling the Repertoire of Chinese Writing

System: Corpus of Whole Chinese Characters

Paralleling the CTSC, another even more ambitious LP infrastructure

project – the Corpus of Whole Chinese Characters (CWCC) – was
conceived at about the same time. As part of the modernization process, a
number of corpuses have developed through linguistic statistics in the
different domains of its use. The following discussion examines the
building a corpus of Chinese characters. The purpose of this project is to
build a platform to standardize all Chinese characters not included in the
CTSC and to secure a place for them in the future extension of Unicode.
As Zhao (2005: 365) has observed, the ultimate aim of the CWCC is to:
assemble all signs and symbols that have ever existed, and then to
standardize them in a systematic framework. It is hoped that one day,
through the overhaul and integration into an international standard,
scholars will be able to turn all characters from oracle bones, bronzes,
silk and bamboo, into a magnetic and optical format of a Unicode
system.
While mainly targeting the ancient scripts of Chinese writing system
(e.g., jiaguwen, jinwen; see Prologue 2.1.1), the character corpus also
includes the obsolete hanzi-derived scripts of all the non-Chinese
minorities that have ever existed in Chinese history, Chinese dialectal char-
acters and all those symbolic signs containing vital historical information
that are considered to be of importance in recording the Chinese cultural
heritage. From an organizational point of view, although listed as one of
the working agendas of SCLW in 2004, it is different from the CTSC in
that it is not being carried out by a well-coordinate research team, and the
final outcome of the CWCC will be one, or a number of corpuses that
integrate the outcomes achieved by the relevant projects that had been
going on for quite some time. These projects “have been spread over a
number of universities and research institutions across the country, and are
being carried out in a piecemeal manner by researchers in different
academic areas” (Zhao 2005: 365).
186 Standardization as a Solution

Every one agrees that human written communication is experiencing a

revolutionary transformation from paper-based data to magnetic and
optical formats, from a static to a flowing and changing existence, where
existing forms of data are constantly being transmitted around the world
over international communication networks. For this transmission to occur
in the international community, all scripts that want to participate in this
transmission circle have to be encoded using certain conventions and
standards. At the moment, the emerging standard designated to breaking
down the language barriers erected by the divergence of orthographies is
Unicode, although there are a number of rival standards (see Section 4,
Chapter 7). For those scripts that plan to be included in Unicode, no matter
how ancient or modern, they need to get permission to enter the Unicode
family. A standardization-oriented overhaul is the first step in this process
as the Unicode Consortium has determined that it does not accept non-
standardized scripts.
Starting with GB 2312-80, in collaboration with offices of techno-
logical standards and the departments concerned, Chinese language LP
authorities have promulgated a series of character tables and standard
character code sets in the 1980s and 1990s. If one takes into account of
submissions from other Chinese character-using countries and regions, it
can be said that basic parts of the massive hanzi system have already been
Unicoded. So far, the joint research team of ideographical orthography
under ISO 10646, consisting of scientists from China, Japan and Korea has
completed over 71,000 hanzi for codification purposes. At present, these
East Asian ideographs are encoded using abstract characters instead of a
glyph, which could be conveniently understood as the actual character in
print medium (i.e., paper, screen). The future direction for Unicode is that
it will be able to provide a language-base glyph for defining distinct
graphic peculiarities for every individual character of each specific hanzi
system. To use Cook’s term (2001: 3), this approach is called “text-based”
or “source-based” encoding, which seeks to document the historical
context from whence the glyph used is derived, so that the individual shape
of each character in specific texts and inscriptions can be preserved in
cyberspace. To provide Unicode with a glyph description of those special
hanzi requires a great deal of standardization and typologization revi-
talization work. As stated previously, a core part of the CWCC project is
providing standard forms for either local dialects or historical hanzi. The
majority of these characters, plus other unorthodox folk hanzi and culture-
specific symbols, are facing extinction as most are not available even in
the paper-based medium. It is clear that we are rapidly approaching a
Unicode-based society in which a lack of standardization is fatal. Li
Chapter 4 187

Yuming (2004a), director of the RIAL, aptly points out that the only way
to preserve these unique graphics in their original form is “to integrate
them into the Unicode system, and to assign each sign a sole and
individual code point”.
The sheer scale and complexity of the proposed CWCC can be seen
from the diverse sources of characters:

• All currently used hanzi, specifically and scientifically, all hanzi used
as written communication tools to record mainstream Han culture after
the Li-Change (see Section 2.1.6, Prologue), i.e., simplified and com-
plicated characters as well as legacy characters. Noteworthy is that
SSS hanzi, which are supposed to be listed in this category, are
intentionally not mentioned here.
• Unofficial but popular hanzi and locally used hanzi in some areas,
including dialectal hanzi, unorthodox/folk hanzi, whether historical or
in current use, even the variants, miswritten/mis-structured hanzi by
accidental error and adulterated or irregular form hanzi, found on stone
tablets and rubbings, which are an important source of unofficial hanzi
in history.
• Archaic/ancient characters, including jiaguwen, jinwen, Warring States
characters, characters on bamboo slips, silk and seals, Small Seal
Characters (213-206 BCE.) and all other hanzi before the Li-Change.
• Derivative hanzi, used by other nationalities living in China in ancient
times or today, e.g., the ancient script of Zhuang, Western Xia script
(existent in Northwest China from 1038 to 1227), big and small
characters of Khitan, which were derived from hanzi.
• Non-hanzi characters used by other ethnic groups in ancient and
today’s China, for instance, the Nakhi nationality (inhabiting parts of
Yunnan Province).
• Phonetic scripts of minority nationalities such as Mongolian script,
Tibetan and Uygur (or, Uighur) scripts (Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous
Region), etc.
• International phonetic symbols annotating Chinese ancient and modern
languages (putonghua, dialects, Archaic Chinese and scripts for minor-
ities), as well as other phonetic symbols unique to China’s languages.
• Strokes, components, radicals and all other composing units of all
ideograms.
• Culture-relevant signs and symbols, such as signs found on pottery
ware, divinatory symbols in the Book of Changes (Yijing, Chinese
classical philosophy; its hexagram symbols already encoded in Unicode
4.0), signs and symbols for Daoism (the only Chinese indigenous
188 Standardization as a Solution

religion formed during the Tang Dynasty on the basis of Daoist theory),
signs and symbols in Chinese ancient mathematics and music.

So far, only Women’s Script and Tao’s hexagram symbols have been
encoded in Unicode. The ambitious plan of the CWCC, characterized by
its inclusive marshalling of all representations of the Chinese ideographic
system is in its very essence the encoding of the past for the future. It
recodes the life experience of the Chinese writing system from the oracle
bones to the computer. In this sense, it is a major LP revision of the
language to make it accessible in the information age. It is indisputably
the most important infrastructure project ever established for the Chinese
writing system. The best way to understand why the launch of the CWCC
as a platform to deliver Chinese culture online is becoming an adminis-
tratively determined target, and has become a hot topic for the past few
years, is through its implication for national pride and political sensitivity.
While taking account the political implications for national unification, if
China wants to integrate into the international mainstream the various
ancient forms of non-Han culture, represented by hanzi-derived characters,
it must make sure that none will be ignored or missed in its continuing
efforts to secure more space in Unicode.
Unicode’s growing impact on the development of IT has also entered
the political arena. The authors predict that political considerations will
inevitably be encountered with a pluricentric language, where the same
orthography serves as writing system in more than one polity. For most
nation-based writing systems, standardization can be successfully done
without causing much trouble in relation to legitimacy and ownership, but
in pluricentric languages the possibility arises for hostile confrontations
because of inherent ideological antagonisms or historical complications. A
specific example in the case of China would be the formulation of the first
international hanzi encoding standard CCCII. The CCCII, which was
unilaterally submitted by a semi-official research team in Taiwan in 1981,
and was kept secret from those on the Mainland until it was published and
came into force (Hsieh and Huang 1989: 5). These days, playing the
cultural card is a newly emerging feature in the fight to win over the public
across the Strait. Taiwan has always seen itself as the legitimate owner of
the Chinese traditional heritage and the Communist Mainland as its
destroyer. On the linguistic front, the competition was previously played
out over simplified hanzi vs traditional hanzi, and now the two rivals are
competing with each other by claiming to preserve Chinese traditional
culture in the digital media. A project similar to the CWCC, a 5-year
national project (2002-2006), called the ‘National Digital Archives
Chapter 4 189

Program’ (NDAP), was launched in Taiwan on January 1, 2002 (Hsieh

2002).
The output of NDAP will be a centralized database called ‘the Taiwan
Digital Archives (TDA)’, which is technically compatible with inter-
national databases, and readily collaborates “with any project that cares
about cultural heritage and digitalizes it as shareable precious resource for
all mankind”. A tentative comparison found that while the Mainland’s
CWCC is still in its embryonic stage, Taiwan’s NDAP is already partly
available, probably because it is relatively modest in scale, while the
CWCC is too ambitious and ambiguous to see any concrete result in the
near future (see Zhao 2005: 365). It was also found that major parts of the
two projects overlap with each other, and both are targeting the potential
market of encyclopedic referencing and archiving, the two top-ranking
areas in a list of ten functions of the World Wide Web of the future
(Crystal 2001).

4. TENTATIVE SUMMARY

Generally speaking, as a common code for communication, a writing

system is different from other tools serving human use. To ensure
communicative efficiency it needs to be standard with as little variability
as possible; yet, since language is a dynamic process and is continuously
being subjected to change and diversification, it needs to be flexible.
Wright (2004: 53) has summarized the dilemma saying, “there is a per-
petual tension as centripetal forces of convergence compete with centri-
fugal forces of differentiation”. Hanzi is a writing system that is notorious
for its variety and irregularity in shape, but instability of structure aside, a
still greater problem is its unstable number of characters because of its
openness to invention, making it impossible to rule out new, instantly
created members of the system. Lin Yun (1988: 147) makes the point that
new characters are created and used by the public whenever they want
every day. In Wang Fengyang’s (1989: 573) words, “stability is only
momentary [in historical terms], change is invariable and never-ending.”
This suggests that the openness of the hanzi system requires some
degree of standardization in order to maintain communicative efficiency.
In most cases this is seen as a gradual process that occurs automatically.
Yet, it also opens the possibility that in some rapidly changing situations
there may be a need for outside intervention because changes are greater
than natural development can accommodate. In history, as Huang (1956:
190 Standardization as a Solution

33-38) observes, in order to control the chaos in character creation and

use, Chinese governments have carried out orthographic modifications and
rectifications every few hundred years, and it has been common practice to
implement these standards through legal requirements. An example of this
occurred in 1986, when urgent technological demands pushed the govern-
ment to reassess its LP agenda, and IT-oriented standardization was identi-
fied as a priority in the new context. Important as it is, there seems to exist
a perpetual conflict between the standardization required by mechanical
application and the flowing nature of language as a human communication
system. As a result, standardization is on the one hand conditioned by
various external factors of human activities, and on the other hand, by fact
that the planned outcome of standardization has to be acceptable to the
target population. These two topics will be addressed respectively in next
two chapters.
Chapter 5
INFLUENCING OUTCOMES
Sociolinguistic Analysis of Non-Character-based Issues

1. INTRODUCTION

In the last chapter, the possible future directions for hanzi change were
examined from a linguistic perspective. However, to plan language is to
plan society, and this chapter focuses on the socio-political factors that
provide the environmental conditions for programs to be planned and
policies to be implemented. As Cooper (1989: 177) indicates, “to under-
stand the impact of any given instance of language planning one must
understand the general social context in which it is embedded”. Baldauf
(1990: 16) identifies some of the intervening variables which have been
suggested as influential in planned language change or language mainte-
nance as they are related to LP. He further points out that “in differing
situations, these variables may influence to varying degrees the character
and development of language planning policy”. The intervening variables
suggested were:

• perceived economic demand (e.g., trade, tourism, Grin 2003);

• the need for information and scientific exchanges (e.g., Grabe and
Kaplan 1986, Jernudd and Baldauf 1987, Ammon 2001);
• nationalism (Fishman 1973; Maata 2005);
• ethnic identity (e.g., Edwards 1985);
• religion (e.g., Das Gupta 1971; Schiffman 1996);
• historical circumstances, the growth of urbanization (Jourdan 1990);
• bureaucracies and education (Shuy 1988, Sommer 1991, Moore 2001,
Baldauf and Ingram 2003).

191
192 Influencing Outcomes

As can be seen from the previous chapters, since 1949 Chinese lan-
guage reforms have followed a zigzag course. The past years have witnessed
many a reversal of policy and official pronouncement on the issues being
debated. While many may be only short detours from the main course,
some shifts seem to be a change of direction. The developing course has
been largely a result of interaction between Chinese language characters’
features and other complex but relevant influential factors. However, what
aspects should be taken into consideration when further reform becomes
necessary in the new century remains to be explored. While acknow-
ledging that formation and development of script reform have been
conditioned by numerous factors, seven of these have been identified here,
which we suggest can be arranged along a cline related to the degree of
profoundness of change.

Less profound
7. International
Environment

the 6. Domestic Politics

more
profound 5. Socio-cultural
the change in Context
dimension, the
more likely the influence 4. Political Climate
across the Strait

3. Demographic Picture

2. Technology and Economic Impact

More profound
1. Achievement of the Relevant LP Work

Figure 5-1. Hierarchical layers of seven sociolinguistic dimensions

The seven sociolinguistic dimensions1 presented in Figure 5-1 are not

all equally important to character reform. In the following discussion, an
attempt will be made to demonstrate how each of these sociolinguistic
dimensions might be associated with each of the possible programs of
reform. It is generally agreed that for script reform to happen, it is the
Chapter 5 193

external enabling conditions that determine internal permitting conditions,

rather than the other way around. In the Chinese context, it can be
contended that the likelihood and degree of character change totally
depends on some combination of these external enabling factors. A sound
technical base is certainly crucial for any attempt at script reform, but the
impact or resistance that could lead to failure is most often related to
factors that are less profound in the hierarchy of the seven dimensions. In
the past, when reform programs were initiated, inner-linguistic, or techni-
cal factors were given the most attention by planners. In the future, more
weight will need to be given to the societal constraints, particularly those
less profound factors which are easily ignored but tend to have a big
impact in certain circumstances, particularly in an unpredictable polity. For
instance, users’ attitudes are closely related to cultural values and socio-
political settings, which also have been important in script reforms imple-
mented in other parts of the world. But some seemingly trifling matters
that may not pose a problem in other polities have the possibility to create
catastrophic consequences under certain circumstances in an implicit but
fundamental manner in the Chinese context. This can best be understood
by following a careful analysis of the characteristics of the Chinese
situation and a variety of Chinese linguistic features. Thus, each dimension
is examined by applying one of the following research methodologies: 1)
generalizations from historical experience, 2) an examination of the current
trends and future directions using analytic approaches, 3) international
comparisons, or 4) empirical evidence.
The influence of these non-linguistic factors may be quite uneven on
each of the specific reform dimensions, with some having more weighty
consequences in conditioning the proposed changes, or in some cases, the
relationship might be distant or have a neutral effect. In other words, it
may be that the existence of an impinging factor is more apparent in some
cases than in others, depending on the particular sociolinguistic circum-
stances. Generally speaking, overt change is more explicit than covert,
while indirect change seems to be more implicit.

2. LINGUISTIC RESEARCH AND

ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF LP

This section examines how the bottleneck in hanzi computerization can

be addressed to a significant extent through a linguistic approach, the
effectiveness of which in turn depends on how successfully putonghua
194 Influencing Outcomes

popularization, one of three major tasks of LP since the 1950s, can be

accomplished. But before proceeding to see how computer technology is
related to linguistics and LP issues, it would be beneficial to provide some
relevant background about the phonological features of Chinese characters.
The phonetic system for Modern Official Chinese is composed of three
spelling elements: 21 initials and 39 finals plus four tones. The combina-
tion of these three elements can produce a total of 417 valid pronunciations
for modern Chinese. In other words, a limited number of sounds need to
represent over 3,000 (most frequently used characters), or nearly 80,000
(the total number in a published dictionary) graphically different character
forms. Given Chinese characters are monosyllabic, and the tremendous
discrepancy between the number of characters and the number of syllables,
it is only to be expected that there are a vast number of characters that are
represented by homophonous syllables2. This suggests that when char-
acters are phonetically input by using the 26 letters on the international
standard keyboard, the result would be an unintelligible conglomeration of
strange or irritating homophonous characters, i.e., chongma, as highlighted
in Section 2.2.1, Chapter 3. In the following section, attempts are made to
see how the chongma dilemma can be partly resolved through develop-
ments in linguistic research and computer applications.

2.1 New Functions for Pinyin and Putonghua

After nearly three decades of chaos and market competition, people

have increasingly come to recognize that among the various types of input
systems, the phonetics-based software is more productive and therefore has
been gradually gaining the upper hand in the competitive marketplace (Lu
and Xie 1995). But the ultimate success of phonetics-based schemes
depends on a population that has a good command of putonghua and can
easily use pinyin on an international keyboard. This is a new phenomenon
that enables both pinyin and putonghua to gain a place in public daily life.
To be able to use typing software based on putonghua, the speakers of the
myriad forms of non-Mandarin Chinese first have to adapt their pronun-
ciation to the official norm. In these terms, the popularity of phonetics-
based input software is becoming instrumental in the spread of putonghua,
and conversely, the popularity of putonghua is in turn becoming very
critical for IT popularization. Another IT sector that strongly highlights the
importance of pinyin and putonghua is the development of speech recog-
nition technology (SR). SR is one of the most interesting future develop-
ments, as just like pen input, SR provides one more alternative to keyboard
Chapter 5 195

input for Chinese users. Its great potential could be another factor to fuel
the urgency of standard pronunciation promotion. In this context, the
importance and necessity of putonghua promotion for the national deve-
lopment has never before been so acutely felt.
Another by-product brought about by computer applications is the
emerging function of pinyin. Thus, the long debated issue of digraphia
(see Section 2.1, Chapter 7) – the partial move to an alphabetic system –
will be strongly boosted by the rapid increase of computer users. In an
information intensive life, as shown by the findings from our online sur-
vey, pinyin is unquestionably the handiest tool for either using the
computer as a character processor and/or for the purpose of information
search through the Internet. Chinese LPers are welcoming this opportunity,
as an ever-growing computer population is going to greatly facilitate
pinyin education. At the same time, given the current status of pinyin, there
is also a great deal of work to be done in improving its technical aspects
(Zhou 2004: 243). This is because the official orthography for spelling
pinyin still is not firmly established, as errors can be seen even in linguistic
journals and on the most important national TV programs, and are more
widespread in the general population.3
The unimpressive outcome of the pinyin and putonghua promotion over
the last five decades has attracted extensive criticism, but the advent of the
IT age has unexpectedly brought a renewed focus to Chinese LP work.
This reminds us of an interesting recurring phenomenon in LP history: it is
not uncommon that what has been gained by conscious but fruitless
efforts appears insignificant in comparison with a groundbreaking outcome
accomplished by unexpected outside forces. As a result, under certain
conditions, a seemingly insurmountable difficulty in LP is not a problem at
all. For example, people talk about Bollywood’s unexpected yet vital role
in spreading Hindi. In contrast, the Indian federal government’s promotion
of Hindi has suffered repeated defeats, often developing into bloody
fighting in non-Hindi-speaking areas (De Silva 1998). We see a similar
scenario in Taiwan (Tsao 2000: 77), where in comparison with the
government’s coercive measures, the 2-year compulsory military service
requirement, together with other such outside LP or covert factors, has
become a more important part of the successful Mandarin promotion
policy. The strong impact that Thai TV has had on the unintentional but
unstoppable spread of Thai in Laos serves as another apt example (Keyes
2003).
196 Influencing Outcomes

2.2 Implications of Linguistics Science

The conflict between the technological development and the Chinese

language is characterized by the constraint of character/word processing on
the wider application of AI and CIP. Around the mid-1990s there had been
a widespread recognition, in the linguistic domain that a hanzi encoding
(input) and decoding (output) technology was the first step for AI and CIP
development. But the obvious is often easy to miss, leading to the failure
to give adequate attention to the relationships between AI development,
input method upgrading and linguistic study. AI benefits linguistic studies,
whereas enhanced input efficiency in turn pushes AI development forward –
it is a chain reaction effect for the development of the IT industry.

2.2.1 The Ultimate Solution to the Homophonous Quandary

As described in Chapter 3, a major problem to be faced by all phonetic

input schemes and natural language processing systems is that of resolving
ambiguity, namely, the selection from two or more possible orthographic
transcriptions of a match for a given acoustic input. The problem of
chongma used to be regarded as a fatal disadvantage and an irresolvable
drawback for phonetic schemes. Thus, how to disambiguate the homo-
phonous syllables has been the biggest hindrance that IT developers have
been trying to overcome. There are two underlying principles that can be
used to automatically differentiate the homophonic syllables: statistics/
corpus-based and principle-based. Prior to the mid-1980s, character differ-
entiation was mainly done through the statistics method. The system’s
ability to distinguish the desired characters from other phonically identical
syllables depended entirely on the character’s occurrence rate in the static
text. The statistical system works, because unrelated characters are unlike-
ly to come together to form lexically correct words or phrases. There is a
statistical likelihood that characters paired in the internalized data bank
(dictionary) with other characters are the ones most likely to be linked with
them. In corpus linguistics, these are called collocations, which are statis-
tically significant because the articulate unit can be identified through
collocational probability, or co-occurrences of words in the corpus.
The linguistic principle-based method is also known as the Intelligent
Encoding Scheme (Zhineng Fa), because of its ability to intelligently
identify the specific characters with a relatively high accuracy rate, and
this is achieved through understanding the wider coherence of input texts.
The development of this kind of input system is based on the linguistic fact
that the majority of ambiguous symbols can be easily disambiguated in
Chapter 5 197

context. Intelligent schemes pick characters according to their under-

standing of whole sentences by using linguistic principles involving a more
sophisticated process of automatically analyzing the syntactic structure of
the whole sentence, such as a large size parsed corpus (grammatically
annotated) that is fairly accurate in dividing input strings of phonetically
represented hanzi into syntactically correct units, or applying the pre-
internalized grammar tree which provides a labeled analysis for each
sentence to show how various words function in context.
The best way to illustrate how this process works is by looking at an
example. If the following sentences are phonetically input into the
computer, statistics-based systems would fail to identify the individual
characters due to their inability to disambiguate each pinyin syllable,
which usually represents more than ten characters. Intelligent schemes do
not attempt to guess individual characters until the last word is input. In
other words, once the whole sentence is completed, the computer, through
its built-in global knowledge database and automatic processing algorithm,
can systematically identify the syntax structure of the whole sentence.
Once ambiguity is automatically ruled out, the program immediately will
be able to translate and transcribe phonetic pinyin input into Chinese
characters in one pass.

A. Ta kan shu kan dao le ban JIE.

他砍树砍倒了半截.
(He chopped the tree and half of the tree was cut off.)

B. Ta kan shu kan dao le ban YE.

他看书看到了半夜.
(He was reading until midnight.)

The collocational nature of the Chinese language is linguistically

significant in deciphering acoustic input strings. There has been an incre-
asing awareness of the potential which linguistics can offer for tackling a
number of problems in phonetic disambiguation; this quickly emerging
method has succeeded to a great extent and is the most promising one
among all existing input schemes. The designers’ confidence in this effort
is based on the observation that since the homophonous characters have
never been felt to be an obstacle in oral communication, they should not be
misunderstood by computers either, as computers eventually gain human-
like intelligence. In 1996, Zhou (1999: 224-225; 232-233) observed that
input methodology could be considerably enhanced by applying four
intrinsic linguistic features of the Chinese language:
198 Influencing Outcomes

• Syntax study will reveal more rules about how Chinese sentences are
being generated;
• Frequency statistics help the system to narrow down the most probable
characters that the homophonous syllables may represent;
• Context has one of the most important roles in accurately identifying
the intended characters;
• Convenience, present initials and finals. In pinyin orthography, each
hanzi is phonetically spelled by two parts: initial and final. Most
schemes use only initials to transcribe disyllabic and polysyllabic
words. If more phonetic information were input, chongma would be
greatly reduced.

Jernudd and Das Gupta (1971: 205), believe that “[o]rthographic

innovation is fundamentally a speech problem. This is so because ortho-
graphy is primarily motivated by phonological and morphological rules, in
case of alphabetic or syllabic scripts; or by derivations, in case of logo-
graphic scripts”. Concurring with this view, Zhou holds that homophones
are a linguistic problem rather than a problem of the script, so the homo-
phone-related chongma problems can be effectively dealt with by
linguistic means. With the exclusion of the following four categories that
should not be considered as homophones, the number of homophones that
worry people is not as enormous as has been assumed:

• Characters that are not independently used as a word. In modern

Chinese, only a relatively few of the most-used characters are actively
employed as monosyllabic words4. Research shows that disyllabic input
by words or phrases reduces the problem of ambiguity that comes with
homophony by thirty percent;
• Characters with different tones. For example, there are 48 characters in
the Modern Chinese Dictionary with the sound ‘shen’, but if tones are
input, ‘shen3’ matches only two characters;
• Homophonous characters exclusively used in classical texts should not
be seen as homophones in modern Chinese5;
• Words and phrases that happen to be pronounced alike.

2.2.2 From Corpus-Based to Principle-Based

The growing importance of principle-based input schemes in CIP

parallels the general trend that is occurring in language study; modern
linguistics has developed from treating language as a static system to
considering it as an active system which takes meanings as crucial. This
change has led to a growing consensus in computing linguistics circles in
China that in the future, AI is unlikely to take significant steps without a
Chapter 5 199

quantum leap in Chinese linguistics research, specifically in semantics and

pragmatics, or to use a more recent term, lexical pragmatics.
Unlike the corpus-based approach that determines characters in words
or phrases according to their frequency of occurrence, the principle-based
approach identifies the characters in a sentence according to their gram-
matical functions and syntactic relationships, which are more similar to the
way humans understand a sentence. The fact that Chinese is not less effici-
ent because of so many homophones in the actual oral communication
presents people with the exciting possibility that the homophone dilemma
ultimately can be overcome with a breakthrough in the area of linguistics
(Xu J.L. 1999: 124-129). The integration of linguistic knowledge has
made the phonetic input approach appealing and effective, and moderate
success has been achieved over the last decade or so. More accurate and
efficient systems are waiting for the solution to fundamental questions of
the dynamic theories of computational linguistics. This is an instance that
shows how linguistic research will affect the quality of the input method.
Bates and Weischedel (1993: 7) argue that “the modeling of context
and using context in understanding language is the most difficult, and
therefore the least well-understood area of natural language processing”.
The notion that linguistic science is indispensable to hanzi automated
processing has been manifested in the heavy reliance on how many rules
about the language can be discovered and to what extent the nature of
language is revealed. Many experts in the area of hanzi processing and
Chinese AI have noticed that every step the CIP takes goes hand in hand
with achievements made in the study of language per se. Previously, this
kind of study had concentrated on the lower level statistics, such as stroke
incidence, corpus building and the so-called expert knowledge bank
construction. This kind of work was basically completed during the 1980s
and 1990s. To make fuller use of linguistic achievements calls for further
collaboration, for which the academic circles have not been ready, because
few computer professionals have training in linguistics, and the existing
computing linguistic methodology, developed abroad, has little application
value because of the unique features of the Chinese language. Now, for the
second time, the IT industry has turned to linguistics science to jointly
overcome language difficulties as a long-term strategy. Therefore, “starting
to focus on teaching the syntactic rules that were intended for the human
brain to an electronic brain (computer) was an important turn in strategy
for hanzi encoding studies” (Zhang 1997: 80). To restart from a more
fundamental level, training the so-called amphibious talents with double
degrees in linguistics and computer subjects, has been stated as a goal of
LP decision makers, and has become a hot topic.
 200

Sentence

Phrase/vocabulary
Character Sentence Text
Dependent

Character Phrase/Vocabulary

1970s to 1990s After the 1990s Future Tendency

Knowledge Used Analysis Corpus/statistics Linguistics Integrated

Input System Character-based Phonetic-based

Organization/ Individual Collective International

Developer
Multipurpose
Orientation Character Focused /Compatibility Systematic View

Technology Dependency on advance in computer science increased

Figure 5-2. The development of input methods and linguistics research

Influencing Outcomes
Chapter 5 201

The diagram in Figure 5-2 provides a brief overview of the develop-

ment that Chinese input researchers have undertaken. It also demonstrates
the role that linguistic study plays in enhancing character input systems in
the future.
All in all, the limited results achieved in this area, using traditional
corpus-based models of language, have led to an increasing interest in
linguistics models. Previously this was based on drawing upon proba-
bilities that were calculated based on frequencies in corpus data, but the
real attraction of the computer of the future lies in intelligent systems, and
the computer will gain its intelligence for these systems predominantly
through the achievements of linguistics research. The rapid advances in
computer science provide enough high-speed operation and very large hard
disk storage and memory to enable computers to technically gain limitless
power and capability. The aggressive intervention of cyber culture into
people’s daily lives makes processing hanzi on the computer ever more
important. In this sense, it might be appropriate to say that the future of the
IT industry in China is more or less determined by linguistics rather than
by computer science per se. In saying this, we understand that hanzi
modernization is still at the initial stage of providing ideal solutions for CIP.

3. TECHNOLOGY AND ECONOMIC

DEVELOPMENT AS A CATALYST

3.1 Conflict between the IT Industry and Hanzi

Technologically inspired change can be understood from the pers-

pective of the Instrument Determinate Theory (see Section 2.3, Chapter 7).
In rebuking the attack on the 1956 simplification, Lin Yanzhi (1995: 1),
the former vice-director of the SCLW, said: “The gain and the loss of
character simplification can only be judged by the computer”. Chinese
character computerization includes three composite parts: input, output/
display and CIP. As the examples in the chapters of this book illustrate,
the conflict between the latest technology and the oldest surviving writing
system (along with ancient Hebrew), is to a greater or lesser extent manifest
everywhere.
It would be very hard to find a country other than China that has spent
a comparable amount of time and intellectual energy on modernizing its
202 Influencing Outcomes

writing system. Chinese AI projects have been included in the national

development plan since 1956 (Feng 1989: 6). It is widely acknowledged
that computational linguistics began no later in China than in any other
country, but the limited results achieved in computer science are not only
disproportional to the manpower and effort Chinese scientists have
invested, but also are in sharp contrast with Chinese scientific ability. As
an international study report shows6, Chinese scientists have thorough
competence across many fields of inquiry and do well in international
comparisons. However, while the world has moved into the electronic age,
benefiting from the storage, retrieval and manipulation of script-based
knowledge, Chinese people – in the home of printing technology and paper
making – are still struggling with how to get an intelligible representation
of their script on the screen. The cost of this is beyond quantification.
As early as the 1980s, Qian Xuesen, one of the major architects of the
national defense research infrastructure in China, said, “computer software
pertains to the work of language and script”, an insightful proposition
signifying the close correlation between technology and LP. Computer
popularization not only presents new opportunities for input software
developers, but will also act as a driving force in speeding up script reform
progress, and standardization in particular.

3.2 Conflict between the IT Industry and LP

The conflict between the market-driven forces and the credibility of the
state language policy is a matter of concern in LP circles. One topic of
debate is the unintended encouragement of unofficial pronunciation by
phonetics-based input systems, targeting certain groups of users, but at the
cost of compromising the authenticity of the standard pronunciation of
putonghua.
In order to cater for potential users in the vast dialect speaking areas,
pinyin-based input software developers make their products tolerate a
variety of accents reflecting dialectal pronunciation, the very problem that
language teachers in schools, universities, and the putonghua training
centers are helping their students to overcome; such as the differences in
pinyin between zh : z, ch : c, sh : s, n : l, f : h, an : ang, en : eng, in : ing,
or j : q. More ironically, in some schemes, when there is a character with
more than one pronunciation, the user is often forced to use the wrong
spelling in order to get a ‘right character’7. This is like saying that in order
to effectively type Chinese on a computer, you need to learn and get used
to using incorrect or inaccurate pronunciation! This creates the potential
Chapter 5 203

risk of unnecessary future problems when the level of language standard-

ization improves.
Some of these shortcomings are mistakes caused by the linguistic
ignorance of the scheme developers, but most dialect-tolerant software is
deliberately designed to accommodate the uncertainties of those customers
who do not have confidence in using pinyin because of their poor
putonghua ability. Dialect tolerance is promoted as a sales incentive and a
system feature in advertisements, in much the same way that American or
British speech recognition is touted for English speech recognition pro-
grams. Although no investigation has been made to assess to what extent
the position of putonghua is influenced or devalued in the public’s eyes by
the compromised version of putonghua adopted by the IT industry, LPers
in China are not only just standard setters and norm definers, but their
work is also vital in the spread and management of the coded products. For
officials in the National Centre of Putonghua Testing and Training and
experts in the Putonghua Promotion and Research Section in the RIAL,
this malfeasance is a flagrantly mischievous challenge to the national
language policy. However, while Chinese language management author-
ities are upset, these violations have not been shocking enough to cause
genuine public concern. So language standardizers repeatedly warn that
the national commitment to unifying the language is now in danger of
being jeopardized by the de facto recognition of dialectal pronunciation in
the software market. “[T]he state promotes putonghua as the national
standard speech” was enshrined in the 1982 Constitution and was
reiterated in the Law of the National Common Language and Script of the
P.R. of China (2000).

3.3 The Outcome of Economic Development

Nothing has played a bigger role in shaping China’s LP landscape than

the rapid economic transformation that has taken place over the last two
decades. Talking about the impact of economic development on LP in
China, Yao (2001: 135-136) noted that in the past, national policy could
efficiently get to every basic social cell through administrative means and
propaganda campaigns, and this was the major reason for the success of
previous language reform movements. This highly institutionalized social
structure is currently in the process of disintegrating, and people’s beha-
vior is more governed by economic mobility. In comparison with voca-
bulary and pronunciation, the relationship between economic development
and hanzi change is not as noticeable or straightforward. However, the
204 Influencing Outcomes

writing system was born out of social need and the economy is the
foundation of society. When pondering the new social background of
character standardization, Wang Tiekun (2003) argues that the rapid tech-
nological and social development stimulates an ever more active linguistic
life.

3.3.1 Economic Activities and Character Use

Li Junqun (2000: 184) describes three characteristics of the market

economy that had not been seen before China’s embarkation on the road to
economic reform: unification, openness and competitiveness. In applying
these emerging characteristics to analyze the impact of economic develop-
ment on hanzi reform and evolution, it can be seen that during the period
when the last standardization campaigns were carried out in the 1950s and
1960s, the Chinese socialist economy was best developed. This not only
created the preferred conditions for implementing a series of reform
activities to modify characters, but the resultant simpler standardized
orthography was also a positive contributing factor in the country’s rebuild-
ing process. Today, the Chinese market economy has entered its third
decade and the current LP program is the outcome of trying to address the
contemporary requirements for social development. LP will face even
bigger challenges as it has to address more drastic change in economic
areas. These changes can be seen in the three challenges mentioned previ-
ously: unification, openness and competition.

(1) Unification means nationalization and integration in an economic

sense. A unified economy will eventually bring an end to piecemeal local
and individual economic activities. Xu (1998) and Yao (2001) note that, as
a result of economic development and market maturity the people are no
longer confined to their native location as they used to be, living there for
generations and generations. Ager (2003) observes that in the development
of English standardization history, “the urbanization and the population
shift from an agrarian society toward industry [meant] drastic changes”.
China has seen an ever bigger and dynamic circulation of the whole
population with extensive travel and frequent interaction of a large number
of migrant workers (70 million) requiring an ever higher level of language
and script standardization to guarantee competent communication. Printed
products have never before played such an important role in facilitating
economic activities. This is creating a favorable environment for written
communication, and will put increasing pressure on regional influences,
predominantly the dialectal characters and rare characters for geographical
Chapter 5 205

names. At the same time, this also provides opportunities for some neces-
sary dialectical words to enter putonghua, as well as for a number of local,
culture-specific characters to gain currency (Lin 1998: 13-19). The result
of economic integration and ever more frequent regional contacts may
have the potential to change the status of some characters (e.g., Wang
2004a: 42). For instance, while some rare characters may lose their fertile
environment and finally fall into disuse, a number of uncommon hanzi are
likely to become more frequently used in daily life across the nation. Thus,
the likelihood of their promotion to higher use positions in a future table of
standard characters has increased.
(2) Openness refers to economic internationalization. Mutual linguistic
influence is in essence an economic competition. It is always the case that
the language of the dominant economy has the advantage over that of a
less developed economy. This has happened again and again, both within
the country and in contact with the outside world. Zhou’s (2001a) study
shows that promotion of Putonghua in the Shanghai and Guangdong areas
has experienced greater difficulty than in any other regions in the country.
He attributes the conflict between local speech and putonghua to economic
reasons. As Chen Songcen’s (1991: 31-32) study reveals, since the open-
ing-up policy was adopted in 1978 through to the 1990s, the Cantonese
accent was fashionable and traditional hanzi flooded the country.
Character standardizers in LPP authorities have always been alert to the
impact of character forms from outside, mainly from Taiwan and Hong
Kong, including non-Chinese hanzi. In the future, overseas investment will
continue to increase rather than decrease. However, it is too early to say
whether an insurrection of traditional forms, on the scale seen in the 1980s,
will happen again. On the other hand, with the radical growth of the domes-
tic economy, the indigenous industrialists have become more aggressive
in seeking overseas markets. This will lead to wider geographical distri-
bution of simplified characters and spread their influence beyond China’s
borders.
(3) Competition. As the Chinese economy continues to mature, the
increasing competition in the economic arena will force the industrial and
commercial sectors to care more about overall quality in order to promote
their commodities. There is no doubt that linguistic factors, particularly
writing, can win a company the competitive edge in a cost-cutting market-
place. The linguistic role in building up the company’s image, the cor-
porate culture and product reputation has been increasing. The decorative
character is used as the face of the company and its product. It is commonly
believed that non-standard characters are associated with shabby and
fake brands made by small businesses. Increasingly, quality-conscious
206 Influencing Outcomes

consumers have come to understand that one important practical method of

judging a commodity’s quality is the degree of standard character use.
Script quality also affects the advertising and propaganda effort; ignoring
it risks dissuading the public from buying the product. Misuse of
characters on advertisements and instructions tends to have a deleterious
effect on product sales. Therefore, hanzi use increasingly is becoming an
issue that business cannot afford to ignore. On the other hand, characters
used in commercial areas, despite their small number, contribute signi-
ficantly to the nation’s language policy due to their high visibility. The
commercially motivated misuse of characters is an important battlefield for
social awareness campaigns that promote standard hanzi. This topic is
touched on in the sections which follow, e.g., in examining the role of
calligraphy in shaping the image of character forms.

3.3.2 Economic Development and the IT industry

The economic effect on script reform can be related to more specific

examples. When talking about the public’s preference in choosing
phonetics-based or ideography-based input software, Mair (1991: 2) notes,
“the availability of virtually unlimited cheap labor means that cost effect-
tiveness is not yet a significant factor within China proper ...”. This
situation has changed. While there used to be a time when some ‘fast’
input schemes required up to a year of sustained training and memorization
(Thompson 1991: 124), increasing competitiveness in economic activities
is speeding up the pace of life, making people more hesitant to spend time
attending computer input training courses. Thus, the appetite for ideo-
graphic input schemes has significantly diminished due to people’s unwill-
ingness to invest time just to gain typing skills. This scenario will
undoubtedly give a new boost to the mainstream position of phonetics-
based input methods, and then give a significant push to the three basic
tasks of LP.
At a higher level, the more the economy develops, the more important
linguistic affairs will become. It was impractical to expect the government
to vigorously initiate more meaningful LP operations before the economy
was about to take off. In the following discussion about the effect of
economic prosperity on Japanese LPP, Gottlieb and Chen (2001: 11)
outline a relationship that is perfectly applicable to the Chinese situation:
Economic prosperity can be a factor in determining the degree of
importance which governments attach to language planning. A govern-
ment bent on turning around a failing economy is unlikely to consider
Chapter 5 207

language planning a high priority, unless it can be shown that a direct

economic benefit is likely to result.
More significantly, as economic reforms are going to intensify the
demand for IT products, the outcome of LP has in turn begun to carry
increasingly greater weight in building up national strength. With the
distance between the computer and the average population narrowing, due
to the improvement of living standards, IT development has increasingly
become an essential attribute of a country’s economic success, especially
the capability of a country’s competitiveness in the international economy.
It is hard to imagine that a modern society can develop its potential
without a sound foundation in the IT industry. As identified in the Fifth
Annual Conference by the National Association of Chinese Information
Processing (Feng 1995: 87), “CIP is the foundation and core of the
Chinese IT industry, and the basic building block of CIP is the technology
of Chinese character processing”. In order to participate fully in the
international information network as a modern state, obtaining a means to
facilitate smooth and rapid transmission of information must be the most
important motivating force, leading to the ultimate resolution of the script
issue.
The evidence available lends support to the claim that by 2010, China
will have one of the most advanced telecommunications networks in the
world. If we look at the key elements of developing the IT industry, China
has trained a large number of qualified programmers (some 325,000 new
engineers were graduating from Chinese universities every year in the
1990s) and has the potential to produce international standard hardware.
China aims to “match and eventually exceed other nations in the region as
a prime exporter for software development, IT services and product
testing” (Shidner 2004). The obstacle that has yet to be overcome is the
writing system. Being regarded as the weak link in the IT industry’s
development, hanzi has long been prone to criticism from specialists and
society as a whole (Feng 1997).
After a century of struggle to modernize the Chinese language and
script, in Chinese intellectual circles the following simplified linear model
of the effect of hanzi inefficiency on national modernization has long been
accepted.
Inefficiency of script system (mass illiteracy) Difficulties of hanzi
computerization (incompetent automatic processing of information,
unimpressive achievement in AI) IT industry bottleneck Poor
performance in science and technology Impact on economic deve-
lopment Slow-down in national modernization process.
208 Influencing Outcomes

The passing of time has seen a fundamental shift in the way that LPP
has been related to the nation’s economic endeavors. Before the advent of
computers, the central concern of hanzi’s impact was on the quality of
manpower – a modern nation cannot be built by an illiterate population.
Today, LP’s massive directional impact on the economy takes a new form.
It contributes to the nation building more through technological develop-
ment than literacy rate, although a mass-accessible script system is equally
desirable. Therefore, current script reform shoulders a two-fold task: first,
the vast rural areas are still dominated by a large population of illiterate
peasants. Thus, the problems facing the LPers in the 1950s still need to be
addressed. Second and more importantly, given the centrality of the IT
industry for the national economic future, educating all computer illiterates
is the new mission of technology-centered and future-oriented LPers,
which is no less difficult a problem to solve than the former assignment.

4. SOCIO-DEMOGRAPHIC FEATURES

As we have seen in this monograph, a top-down LP model has domi-

nated in the past as language reforms were always initiated by intellectual
elites or dictatorial authorities on behalf of the entire society. Since the
beginning of the 1980s, as a result of economic development, an over-
whelming change has occurred in the population composition and social
structure. Among these changes are a higher literacy rate, greater educa-
tional opportunities and, most obviously, a democratic awareness of the need
to defend collective rights and to be able to access information, to protect
the local culture and even to gain legal rights for greater freedom of speech.
The success rate of LP programs depends on a number of demographic
variables based notably on group solidarity and the cohesiveness of a
community. The following discussion explores how these new difficulties
can be confronted by ever widening segments of the population.

4.1 Widespread Literacy

The most evident and direct factor in the demographic dimensions that
tend to exert an effect on a writing system is literacy. Population make-up
and literacy have changed due to the government’s commitment to birth
control and the improvement of living standards, combined with efforts in
mass education to eradicate illiteracy. These changes have created at least
three new scenarios in the area of script reform.
Chapter 5 209

4.1.1 Questioning the Basic Reasons for Simplifying Characters

When New China was established, it is estimated that the illiteracy rate
was above eighty percent. Since then the illiteracy rate has been steadily
reduced from 38.1 percent of the population in 1964, to below 15 percent
at the end of last century, with the current illiterate population being
mostly non-urban elderly. Vast illiterate masses have been the target of
every literacy education campaign, and simplified characters were most
welcomed by the less educated population. By the year 2000, according
to an official figure, China had basically obtained a universal 9-year
compulsory education, with youth illiteracy reduced to 4.8 percent and
adult illiteracy down to 8.72 percent (Ministry of Education 2002: 101-
102)8. The reduction of the illiterate population has greatly reduced the
desire for simplification (see the following section). Related to this, new
studies indicate that the ‘three difficulties’ of learning traditional charac-
ters are only applicable to beginning learners, and members of the most
supportive group of simplification are predominantly those who have only
a mediocre command of character reading and writing. Li (2004c: 64)
asserts in a recent research paper that “illiteracy elimination will no longer
be the major concern in a new round of hanzi overhaul”.

4.1.2 The Overall Desire to Change the Script Might Dwindle

Because previous script reform beneficiaries oppose any further reform

that would make their acquired skills obsolescent, wide-spread literacy
may possibly have a reverse effect on further character reform. The literati
are considered a reactionary force in the cause of script reform in any
polity, and low literacy, as a factor favoring reform when such reform is
being considered, has been shown to be a key factor contributing to the
successful accomplishment of script reform. For example, Totten (2004:
349, also see Nie 1998: 208) observes that when the pro-masses phonetic
Hangul was adopted in Korea in 1443, it was opposed by the conservative
bureaucracy (literate class of Chinese hanzi), since “it would undermine
their monopoly of reading and writing”. Zhou (1986c: 182-183) comments,
“Quite a few people, who used to support simplified characters two
decades ago, change their mind nowadays. The implication of this kind of
change is worthy of research.” He goes on, “Once a person is in command
of characters, he would like them to be standardized and stabilized.”
Zhou (1986a) and Yu Xialong (1978: 128) hypothesized that the un-
acceptability of the SSS occurred because of the success of the previous
simplification – a large number of the current generation have been
210 Influencing Outcomes

educated in this scheme and got used to it. In Geerts’ (1977: 230-231)
terms, the ‘possession-instinct’ plays some part in this kind of writing
conservatism: “Spelling conservatism is a very natural thing: its adherents
fight for the maintenance of ‘their’ spelling, i.e., a spelling which they
have learned, which they have ‘mastered’, and of which they ‘have a
perfect command’.” A well-known account, written by Hu Shi (1923: 1-2),
can be regarded as another supportive argument: “in my studies in history
and the writing evolution, I’ve found a common rule: in language reform
history, more often than not, ordinary people are the reformers and
scholars and literati elitists are conservatives”.
The analysis of attitudes of acceptance or rejection of language reform
shows that attitudes among different social groups toward script reform
may vary greatly. Generally speaking, less literate people and those in
lower occupational strata are radical reformists, while professionals are
rather moderate and cautious toward any change made to the script. It
seems that a direct correlation exists between resistance to simplification
and the education one has. This fact was also reflected in the then Premier,
Zhou Enlai’s comment to a French educationist: “In the 1950s, we tried to
Romanize the writing. But all those who had received an education, and
whose services we absolutely needed to extend education, were firmly
attached to the ideogram” (DeFrancis 1984b: 258).

4.1.3 Adding a Factor to Character Stratification

Frequency of use is the first criteria needed to formulate various char-

acter tables; a society with a high-rate of literacy requires a larger pres-
cribed number of commonly used characters9. The steady increase of the
literacy rate and education level of the general population provides a new
dimension in character table formulation. Not only the number of the
commonly used characters has to be reviewed and enlarged, but more
significantly, the matrix positions of some characters may have to be
adjusted. For instance, some less used characters should be upgraded to a
more prominent position. Noticing this, Wang Tiekun (2003: 5) pertinently
points out,
[N]ationwide compulsory education, an apparent uplift of education
standards for the general population and also a higher level of cultural
life for the whole nation has been achieved. All these factors provide
new parameters and context to stratify the number of hanzi by their
frequency.
Chapter 5 211

Continuing improvement in more people’s cultural wellbeing has

heralded a change in perceptions of the nature of hanzi. One benefit is that
an increasing number of the literate population is liberated from pro-
duction-related activities, which makes it possible for them to allocate
more leisure time to cultural activities. Furthermore, traditional heritage
appreciation tends to play an emphatic part in an individual’s life, which
may cause a complete turn around towards the value of traditional culture,
and likewise traditional characters. The sole justification for Chinese script
reform lies in its benefits for the majority, the vast illiterate working class.
Peng Xiaoming (2001), a Germany-based Chinese LP critic, is probably
right in saying that this majority, as defined in the past, has now steadily
become a minority. He further points to a world-wide trend, where people
spend less time on basic survival needs and more time on education and
cultural activities. Increasing freedom from compulsory, laborious working
hours is expected to create an impact on hanzi reform in at least two
respects: First, it will enable people to have more time to acquire writing
skills, either through formal education or self-study. Secondly, consid-
erable time and money are available for spiritual pursuits indicate a degree
of comparative leisure to reflect on one’s own past and culture, including
an appreciation of Chinese classical literature and other valuable tradi-
tional heritage, which, for some, would prove impossible to access without
the requisite knowledge of traditional hanzi.

4.2 Awareness of Democracy

Another emerging relevant consequence of the improvement of living

standards, brought about by the economic development is that awareness
of democracy among the general population, and their desire to participate
in national affairs, will make character reform even more complex. The
rising awareness of indigenous languages and cultures, as well as the
resurgence of local dialects (e.g., Min speech) in Taiwan after the lifting of
martial law, serve as a striking example (Tsao 2000: 101; Chen 1996: 234-
235). Another notable case is provided by the movement, unleashed by the
break-up of the Soviet Union, to remove all traces of Russian influence
from the languages of former non-Russian speaking communities (Thomas
1991). The theme of current LP in China focuses on standardization
programs, but democracy is synonymous with diversity and pluralism.
While technological advancement requires society to engage more with
standards, the population at the same time has become increasingly
eager for diversity and more set against uniformity. Take the situation of
212 Influencing Outcomes

hanzi use described in Section 2, Chapter 2 as an example. The initial

years of the 1980s, when economic reform and opening-up were first
launched, saw a decline in the use of officially sanctioned characters
with a greater tolerance towards writing mistakes and individual writing
peculiarities.
Language is a national resource and public property as well, but in the
past, language affairs were arranged and disposed of by default, as it
were. As Yang Duan-liu (cited in Barnes 1988) has argued, writing reform
depended entirely on a favorable consensus, secured from the favor of a
tiny social elite composed of a disproportionate minority. In an infor-
mation-driven society, new technology advances have been a leveling
force in the information monopoly. This has not only created a new breed
of youthful and restless citizenry, armed with a fashionable consciousness
of distrust in any authority, but the common citizens are also better
informed and suspicious about the propaganda fed to them. There is a
prevalent assumption in Taiwan that “the Mainland has become more open
and progressive. A democratically conscious and wealthy population will
come to realize the simplicity and vulgarness of the simplified system and,
in consequence, return to the orthodox forms” (Huang 1992: 83).
Since, the decision-making process is now more democratic, the one-
way top-down tradition of LP is no longer compatible with the new ethos.
Radical change in the qualities of the population plus easy access to
scholarly research and public opinion have also enabled the general popu-
lation to articulate their personal concerns. Much more openness now can
be found even if one goes to the official government website (www.china-
language.gov.cn). Even fairly lengthy ‘reactionary’ arguments can be
found on this government-sponsored publication whose declared aim is ‘to
spread governmental language policy’.

4.3 Regionalism

Chinese are known to share a sense of linguistic and cultural unity.

However, as a result of unbalanced economic development, the gap bet-
ween different regions is widening. Scattered geographically and defined
by monolingual topolects and dialects of extensive divergence, regional
loyalties have very deep emotional roots in China. To a considerable
extent, these are proving to be the greatest deterrent to any state-mandated
measure aimed at advancing homogenous unification and cohesion. Local
sentiment is another controversial topic that cannot be overcome easily
without sparking a sharp debate. An extreme example of this is the Old
Chapter 5 213

National Pronunciation. In the conference of National Language

Unification in 1913 – a chaotic period when the Manchu empire had just
been overthrown and the disintegrating country was ruled by constantly
shifting, short-lived governments, maneuvered by regional warlords – the
representatives from across the entire country were plagued by quarrelling
and decided that the National Standard Pronunciation should be settled by
allocating one vote to each province. Over a period of more than a month,
phonology experts were engaged in recording pronunciation variants for
6,500 sounds (each associated with a particular character) provided by the
provinces, and the so-called Old National Pronunciation was fixed by
casting ballots on each one (Wang 1995: 16). This example illustrates that
LP is a vulnerable institution, subject to many influences including
regional feudalism10.
In recent years, one of the side effects of regionalism has been a
dangerous undercurrent boosting the enthusiasm for local characteristics,
particularly in the relatively rich regions. Local culture preservationists use
dialect as vehicle to emphasize local distinctiveness; as a result, standardiza-
tion is seen as an unnecessary constraint. The manifestation of localism in
putonghua promotion is the proposal for an adulterated putonghua with local
accent; local/dialect putonghua has been a hotly debated topic since the
beginning of 1990. The strongly contested question of the legitimacy of
substandard putonghua, in the wake of a heightening regional awareness,
has forced the pragmatic national language authority to develop compromise
criteria for the pronunciation standard, and the previous mono-norm has
been categorized into six grades on three levels on the putonghua profi-
ciency test. However, when lower level putonghua is used for input with
software applications, this new classification system only promotes more
incompetent computer users.
Regionalism also has an impact on the physical shape of hanzi. Dialectal
characters are non-official characters and there is an official straitjacket to
confine their use in the modern Chinese language. However, their actual
existence in local publications is widespread and dynamic, and their gradual
permeation into official texts is increasingly unstoppable in some regions.
The question of how to absorb the dialect-specific characters into common
speech has been a long debated topic with no consensus ever being reached.
Cantonese characters are the only dialect-specific characters used in printed
publications in Hong Kong. When official censorship was loosened during
the 1980s and 1990s, regional sentiment, stemming from rapid economic
development, brought these non-official forms to every corner of the
country. This created an important paradox in the new era. While machines
demand were demanding a more precise linguistic standard, society was
214 Influencing Outcomes

becoming more democratic and diversified, creating momentum to resist

any form of standardization. The confusing situation of different character
sets being designated for the local dialect characters in Hong Kong offers a
good lesson. Meyer (1998: 35) says, “[a]s if the shortcomings of existing
standards and systems were not enough”, the various standard character
sets, trying to accommodate the local shapes of characters, released by
industry and government offices, “further aggravate the situation, … even
a complete implementation of Unicode would not be the solution for the
problems …”.

4.4 Down to Reality

An important emerging demographic factor that is very relevant to LP

is the high growth rate of the computer literate population in recent years.
The growth of families with computers and the expanding number of
websites have had an impact on Chinese LP in two respects: First, for the
urban population, which accounts for 40 percent of the total, the need to
produce handwritten manuscripts is rapidly disappearing, whereas the time
they spend on reading websites is increasing daily. This implies, “With the
increasingly widespread use of personal computers equipped with Chinese
word processing facilities, learning and writing characters may well be less
daunting now than it used to be” (Chen 1994: 377). But making hanzi
intelligible and displayable on the computer screen has become a practical
concern. Second, the impact of technology on most ordinary Chinese
should not be overemphasized. If to serve the majority population is still
the central task for today’s LPers, demographic figures need further
analysis. Thus, the revolutionary change in the national graphic life,
caused by the computer, is very limited in the vast, remote rural areas. It is
also important to note that in the cities omniscient and ubiquitous
telecommunications and other media technology have had an impact only
on the computer-literate young, while the older members of society are
reluctant to embrace know-how that threatens their established habits
(Wang 2001).
In essence, script reform is a LP job serving the disadvantaged, and is
considered the right course for the majority of the population in a devel-
oping country. Just in the very recent past, only a tiny minority of Chinese
could afford a computer and even fewer people could get access to the
Web. According to an internet source (Yesky.com), the latest survey that
sampled 48,704 families in some major cities, found that only 11.7 percent
of urban families have computers. The rate of installing a modem, the
Chapter 5 215

internet and email is 7 percent, 18.4 percent and 13 percent respectively,

showing that computers at home are underutilized. According to the World
Almanac and Book of Facts (2004), there are 5.9 million internet users.
This analysis suggests that while future-oriented technology-based LP
policy is the focus of reform activities, there is a danger of loosing sight of
the objective if the wider realities and issues are not kept in mind.

5. POLITICAL CLIMATE ACROSS THE TAIWAN

STRAIT

While having basically the same language and script, the variation in
language use between the Mainland and Taiwan has a multitude of
linguistic manifestations, among which the most visible and controversial
is the discrepancy in character form. The extent of the difference between
those on either side of the strait is an area of dispute among the common
people and among scholars. Those on the Taiwan side exaggerate the
divergence while those on the Mainland understate it11.
The beginning of the new century saw a desire for unification and
leveling of differences. In their elaboration of the future, both sides have
agreed that outright acceptance or rejection is not practical. Instead, they
should each cling to their own standard and future unification should be
carried out on the basis of integrating the best elements of the existing
standards based on neither wholesale adopting nor starting again from
scratch. The basic consensus is that the two sides are longing for a unified
system and that the academic and semi-official contacts to achieve this
goal are becoming more frequent. Differences in how to accomplish the
goal of orthographic unification exist, but the gap is getting smaller rather
than larger.

5.1 The Source of the Difference: Political Rift

The central differences in LP policy across the Strait lie in the choice
between traditional and simplified forms of characters. In political terms,
simplified forms or traditional forms of hanzi are related to the issue of
legitimate ownership. The Nationalist party fled to Taiwan in 1949, but has
never officially given up its commitment to resume rule over China proper,
at least in terms of its propaganda. Both Chinas, the Republic and People’s
Republic, claim to be the legitimate government of China and call each other
‘bandit’ (communist/red bandit vs Chiang (Kaishek) bandit). Simplified
216 Influencing Outcomes

characters were branded as ‘bandit characters (fei zi – 匪字)’ in Taiwan,

while orthodox characters were linked to the orthodox government. For the
Nationalist Party, which sees itself as the savior of Chinese traditional
culture and the owner of the national language, to legalize simplified
characters is tantamount to recognizing the legitimacy of the Communist
Party. By way of contrast, the absence of politics in LP is perhaps the
major reason why Singapore had the self-confidence to simplify hanzi in
the 1950s and 1960s, eventually adopting wholesale the Mainland scheme
of simplified characters. Taiwan has refused to give official status to
‘bandit characters’ – It did not lift a ban on the unconditional importation
of publications in simplified hanzi until very recently. Ironically, since
the first free presidential elections in 1996, Taiwan’s political outlook
has changed dramatically: the Mainland-rooted nationalist party is now
sitting in opposition, and the current government refuses to identify Taiwan
with the Mainland. As the language is a recognizable facet of nationhood,
the pro-independence ruling party spares no effort to root out any Mainland
influence. The change of power has made LP issues doubly complex.
Some scholars hypothesize quite reasonably that the Communist
government in Mainland China would have had a similarly embarrassing
situation in accepting the simplified characters had the Kuomintung
government promulgated them first. This hypothesis supported by the
latest rejection of pinyin as the official Romanization system in Taiwan in
2002. Given the unshakable international position of pinyin, this
reactionary language policy has produced a great deal of brouhaha within
the island. In spite of the various justifications given, it is apparent that in
formulating LP policy, politics still overrides any other consideration,
including economic benefits. The chasm of the orthographic difference
across the Strait has been widened because of ideological disputes.
Divergence appears in even the least debated areas of how to define the
modern national standard. Two decades ago, Chao (1976: 105) crowed that
the language “has been largely independent of political development … In
matters linguistic, therefore, nobody even raises the question of ‘two
Chinas’.” Today, phonological and grammatical standards are also moving
rapidly apart. Undoubtedly, under the current circumstances, the inter-
mingling of national unification with LP issues makes doing LP messier
and more explosive12.
Feng Shouzhong (2006), the president of the Research Association for
Common Script, a non-official organization composed of scholars from
both Mainland and Taiwan, might be right to some extent in saying that
“whenever a new [language planning] scheme is drawn up on the Mainland,
Chapter 5 217

there would be one coming out from the Taiwan side to counteract it”.
Politically, as long as Taiwan remains apart from the Mainland, groping
for a new national identity, the case of simplified vs complex hanzi will
remain a point of disagreement. Looking at the factors that may influence
the LP reform in Mainland China, the Taiwan issue may be far from the
script reformers’ minds. Yet at times it can be a decisive influence –
national security or unification can suffice as the most eminent reasons for
decisions whenever special or unexpected circumstances arise.

5.2 Stability and Unification: From Maintaining

the Status Quo to Moving Closer

As we have seen, during the hanzi culture debate “writing unification

before the national unification” was one of the slogans that the tradi-
tionalists vehemently promoted, and the two sides made some ground-
breaking linguistic contacts during the 1980s and 1990s. This mutually
welcoming climate was maintained for a period prior to 1996, after which
the relationship between the Mainland and Taiwan came to a standstill
because of missile testing, and the previously frequent contacts were
suddenly interrupted. Since then, although from a Mainland perspective
unification is an issue of ‘when’ rather than ‘whether’, in official
discourse, the Mainland side has taken a laissez-faire attitude to avoid
further sensationalizing the problem. This was expressed in a speech by
the former Chinese president, Jiang Zemin, made on December 14, 1992,
where he indicated that “both sides should adhere to their own standards,
discrepancy should be left to future discussions” (Education Office 2001:
293). Considering that the difficulty of working out a unifying list of
standard characters across the Strait is more about ideological differences
than sheer linguistic appropriateness, this declaration is obviously a prag-
matic strategy.
Notwithstanding this position, two factors have made scholars rethink
their position over the last few years. Firstly, there is the inconvenience of
dealing with Chinese communities outside China. Both, Hong Kong and
Macau, have come under Chinese sovereignty, but in terms of characters,
the two regions resolutely cling to the traditional system. The need for a
unified standard is increasingly becoming an unavoidable topic since the
contact between the two script-using areas is, in every respect, increasing
at an unprecedented rate – the same trend applies also partly to Taiwan.
Before contact was resumed and then increased, people living on either
side of the Strait had little idea about the language use of the other. Now,
218 Influencing Outcomes

that the public is fully aware of the differences, there are hopes that the
academics involved will bring change in the direction of unification rather
than alienation from each other. As Huang Diancheng (1988: 121-122) has
argued:
Now that the Mainland and Taiwan have been separated by human
intervention, the things that can unify the two sides are language
(putonghua and Min dialect) and writing (must be traditional charac-
ters). If we do not make use of the existing conditions to link the two
sides, it will add another man-made barrier.”
The second factor that can be attributed to writing unification is more
urgent. In the globalized era, characters are becoming increasingly inter-
national, thanks to economic regionalization and the free flow of infor-
mation over the Internet. The necessity to have a unified standard for each
script, imposed by the Unicode consortium, demands immediate action.
Despite the prediction that as long as there is political rivalry, language
integration is unlikely, the forces at work to unify the hanzi across political
boundaries are more vigorous than ever before. In saying this, however,
technological reasons have, in the last few years, been playing a growing
role in pushing the two sides toward narrowing the gap.

5.3 Looking into the Future: Planning for Unification

The study of language planning requires an identification of major

language problems facing a national community, and the situational
imperative, generated by developmental needs of the national community,
may lead to possibilities of language uniformity by a conscious choice
(Jernudd and Das Gupta 1971). In the new era, a positive change on the
Mainland side of the Strait has already begun. There has been a growing
awareness that a small number of traditional characters were unnecessarily
simplified in the first place, of which only eight were resumed in 1986.
Since then, there have not only been traditional character lovers that would
like to see more elements of the original forms come back into use, but the
call to resume at least some carefully selected original characters also
comes from a wider range of different specialist areas, especially from IT
experts. Hu Shuangbao (1998: 52) points out, “The traditional character
can promote the exchange between the two sides, and benefit the peaceful
unification of the motherland; that is the pragmatic role and contribution of
Chapter 5 219

the traditional character. This was probably the thing we did not think of in
the 1950s, but we will be more perceptive in the future”.
From a Mainland perspective, the importance of the unification with
Taiwan is a political cause. Therefore, surprising latitude can be allowed in
order to woo compatriots from across the Strait, sometimes stretching the
imagination a little bit, as when Fei (1991: 122-123) proposes:
If, in the future, the need arises from our Great Course of Unifying the
Motherland, we may have to carry out a larger systematization of sim-
plified characters. My personal premature opinion is, that our Mainland
can re-simplify those improperly simplified characters, even returning
to their traditional forms, while, at the same time, adopting the sound
elements from the experience in Taiwan and Hong Kong.
In the new historical conditions, simplification or complication will not
be a question when it comes into direct conflict with the greater course of
national unification. In a high pressure situation, idealism is forced to give
way to more practical pursuits, where something else may be of higher
priority, rather than the physical forms of the writing system. As Wang
Fengyang (1989: 683) argues, “It is always true that at any time the
interest of state and nationality comes first …” It can be presumed,
therefore, that hanzi could be put to a newer and higher purpose than has
hitherto been the case. If a resolution of the writing form was one of the
first things on the agenda leading to national unification, it will be easy for
the Mainland side to reach a compromise at any time.
It appears that those on the mainland have been more active in
narrowing the differences needed to standardize hanzi, since compatibility
between simplified characters and traditional characters was adopted as
one of seven basic principles for formulating the CTSC (Zhang 2004:
230). Another important example is evidenced in the preface of Stan-
dardized Stroke Order for GB 13000.1 Character Set (1999), the national
standard. It clearly states that “as for some complex characters of 20902
[characters], while taking traditional factors into consideration, where
possible, the stroke order should be established under the guidance of the
principle of being the same as those existing practices in Taiwan and Hong
Kong” (Gao 2002: 360). However, so far, no liaison office or organization
has been set up for formal and regular contact. No official personnel or
specialists have visited the island, but there have been frequent discussions
among linguists about the best way to work out a unified list of modern
Chinese hanzi.13 Symposia, concerning the Chinese writing systems, have
been held in academic circles from time to time over a number of years.
Some non-governmental specialist organizations have been established by
220 Influencing Outcomes

scholars from both sides (see Note 10 in Chapter 6) with the hope that
Chinese, living on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, can unify their scripts
before they come together politically.

6. POPULAR CULTURE – SHIFTING ATTITUDES

TOWARDS CULTURE AND CHARACTERS

The culture-related factor in LP is one of many manifestations of

linguistic purism in its most obvious form. Zhou (1986c: 182-183) argues
when we look at the implications of people’s attitude shift toward
simplified characters, “we probably should not simply impute methodo-
logical flaws to some individual cases, … In my opinion, we should
broaden our horizon and delve into people’s popular culture and the social
effect of simplification.” Any proposal to reform the writing habits of the
people without reference to the value system of the entire society would
send the wrong message to the masses. Most typically, cultural elements
function through a kind of unconscious self-censoring mechanism. The
probability to engender this mechanism is higher when the change comes
into conflict with the psychological stereotype of cultural perception.
It has been a tradition in China to manipulate cultural issues for
political purposes. Ji (2004: 283) said that “when the communist party
came to power in 1949, it was determined not merely to rule [by force], but
to transform the lives and consciousness of the Chinese people”. Modern
Chinese history has been characterized by incessant political campaigns,
which have invariably ended up as social and cultural movements. Since
the beginning of the last century, China has seen two cultural revolutions
that have broken cultural continuity and, consequently, have resulted in
remarkable progress in language modernization.
The first revolution was the May Fourth Movement in 1919, which was
initially politically motivated, but eventually developed into a cultural
movement aimed at strengthening the nation, and resisting further infil-
tration of Western culture. Intellectually, it was characterized by the search
for the underlying causes of China’s backwardness. Traditional institutions
and ideology were found responsible for a series of national humiliations
at the hands of the Western powers, and the result was a drastic
reformation of the culture, starting with language and script.
The second upheaval was accompanied by the establishment of the
PRC and reached its peak during the Great Cultural Revolution, ending in
1976. Confucianism and tradition were denounced as the sources of the
Chapter 5 221

most vicious values of society, which the Party sought to replace with new
socialist thought for building a brand-new modern country, guided by
genuine Marxist-Leninist theory. This provided ideal conditions for radical
changes in the language, and three language reform tasks were accom-
plished without much difficulty in the 1950s and 1960s. Later on, the more
radical SSS was developed, at a time when revolutionary zeal reached its
peak, marked by the Red Guards’ toppling of everything old.
In contrast to the two previous political upheavals, in the wake of the
June Fourth Movement of 1989, culture has been seen as a resource for
national unity and national rejuvenation as part of an undeclared cultural
renaissance movement. The enthusiastic revival of past glory in the mid-
1990s as a political tactic, has characterized this period. The extent to
which the official propaganda of patriotism can be attributed to tradition-
alism is an open question; it is at least partly the result of a shift in the
Party’s strategy to minimize the negative influences coming from the
West.
Except for the interest generated by traditional characters, the new
trend in popular culture has had a negative impact on the latest efforts to
reduce the overly large number of hanzi. The flame of reviving enthusiasm
for teaching and learning classical texts has been rekindled by the urban
elites and has rapidly gained momentum since the 1990s. Traditional
culture goes hand in hand with traditional writing. Characters in classical
publications are the most elusive ones among eight registries of rarely used
characters, and as a result, they have made the efforts to delimit the
number of characters enormously difficult. Quite contrary to the situation
prior to the 1990s, the emerging archaic style writing, in the form of dry,
bookish erudition, has now been regarded by readers as well-intentioned
and harmless pedantic eccentricity. In the 1950s, simplified characters
were not intended for use in classical publications. A fundamental princi-
ple of simplification was to defuse the claim by conservatives that simpli-
fied characters incapacitate the spread of traditional culture. But facing
the aggressive trend of reviving the past, it has to be acknowledged that in
reviewing simplification, “we not only have to make it convenient for
modern language, but also conducive for the use in classical texts” (Su
2003: 122). As cultural factors work in an implicit way, their prominent
influence on script reform is apt to be ignored. Policy makers have not
given adequate importance to matters such as what factors of popular
culture are related to script reform, and in what way these cultural factors
are going to affect the discussion of reform programs. Recently, Li
Yuming (2004c: 64) wrote,
222 Influencing Outcomes

[w]ith the globalization of the world economy, people are ever more
aware of cultural diversity, and the research and study of traditional
culture has attracted considerable interest. There should be no need for
reticence; the role of hanzi in preserving the traditional heritage had not
been given appropriate consideration in the previous script standard-
ization.
This is the first time the impact of cultural trends on hanzi reform
programs has been recognized by a LP decision maker.
Second, this cultural trend has created obstacles to elevating pinyin to a
parallel position with characters, or replacing them, where pinyin is more
appropriate or effective. Wu Wenchao (2000), the President of the North
American Association of Chinese Language Modernization, notes that
today’s Chinese society has not been ready to psychologically and
culturally accept pinyin as a writing system. “Generation after generation,
deeply rooted in everyone’s mind is that characters are seen as prestigious
and an important indicator of scholarship. Many people are very proud of
being able to use rarely used characters, whereas pinyin is regarded as
a second class skill.” It is in this sense that Su (2002: Seminar; see Note
10 in Chapter 1) says, “In the past one-and-a-half decades since the
Conference in 1986, the general direction has been backward. Today is not
the time to take a big step forward”.
LP professionals should look into how the shift in popular culture has
changed people’s perception of the traditional culture and the potential
impact that change may have on script reform. Zhou (1992) and Taylor
and Taylor (1995) believe that the new social values are mainly respon-
sible for the failures of the second reform scheme of 1977. Much more
investigation is needed to reach a better understanding of the nature of
of these intricate mutual interactions.

7. THE IMPACT OF THE INTERNAL POLITICAL

CLIMATE

The fact that LP has to serve political ends in various ways has long
been recognized by LPP researchers. Political needs and context are
central to LP in any country. In China, political presence is perhaps
stronger in magnitude and exemplified in a more explicit but diversified
form than elsewhere. Yiqie wei zhengzhi fuwu (‘Everything must be in the
service of politics’) is the key piece of communist jargon for understanding
the way that things happen in China, and academic activities are no
Chapter 5 223

exception. The political factor in LP manifests its presence in three forms:

First, ideology indoctrination is the most explicit way in which LP works
and was seen as a constituent element in the Party’s ideology. This was
clearly evidenced in the description of the background of the SSS in
Section 5.1, Chapter 1. The second form works in a more indirect and
passive way. Although politics does not influence LP work itself, the
change in Party power structures or policy shifts in the Party propaganda
agenda provide the conditions for drastic changes in LP policy. Most often
this situation was exploited by a particular interest group for their own
political ends. This form was typified in the manipulation of the political
situation by the CCCF in the Hanzi Culture Debate and is examined a bit
further in the following section. The third form integrates LP issues into
political tasks and thus makes them relevant to the current political
circumstances as a whole. In the past, this was called zhengzhi guashuai
(politics in command). In most situations, as we will see in Section 7.3 of
the current chapter, there is an art of knowing how to keep the balance
between political policy and LP policy. In the following discussion,
emphasis is placed on personal influence and individual intervention in
shaping hanzi planning policy as we assume that the strong presence of
personal power and individual influence can be seen as a very unique
aspect of Chinese LP.

7.1 The Shift of the Party’s Propaganda Strategy

Since the early 1980s, there has been a marked tendency to update the
style of Party propaganda, and the post-June-1989 development of a more
diversified cultural atmosphere has received an increasingly enthusiastic
response. Guo (2004: xi) has pointed out that “[t]he focus has clearly
shifted from the liquidation of ‘backward traditional culture’ and the ‘ugly
national character’ to the ‘reconstruction of the national culture’ and ‘the
rediscovery of the national spirit’”. As we saw in Chapter 4, the image of
traditional knowledge as valuable cultural heritage, in need of careful
cultivation, is a popular theme in the Party’s ideological strategy. While
struggling to manipulate hearts and minds of the masses, the Party
propaganda machine has been anxious to exploit the mass wave of
nostalgia for the past that arose in the l990s.
This can be seen very clearly from Jiang Zemin’s letter (Dai and Gong
2001: 3) to Bai Shouyi, a top Chinese history authority, congratulating him
on April 25, 1999, upon the completion of his Complete History of China:
224 Influencing Outcomes

Both the entire society and the Party should attribute appropriate
importance to the study of Chinese history, particularly the promotion
of the spread of basic knowledge about history among the younger
generation, in order to equip them with the excellent heritage of
Chinese nationality, to firmly consolidate their patriotic spirit, and to
acquire a correct world outlook and the right view of values, thus
helping them draw inspiration from traditional culture, impelling them
to contribute to the great revival of China’s past glory.
As suggested in Section 2.3.2, Chapter 2, the direct reason triggering
the 1990s debate on hanzi’s future was an expression of political
expediency rather than an isolated linguistic event. The repercussions of
this debate on national language policy can still be felt from time to time,
and many believe that this drama can be reopened at any time should the
political climate change. For example, there was a ‘Pinyin Incident’14 in
2000, which re-enforced the notion that LP was nothing but a handy
instrument, easily changed under certain social circumstances, reminding
people of the fragility of LP in the current political confusion in China. It
was frightening for LPers to think that a proposal threatening pinyin in
school education could be taken seriously by the education authorities and
nearly be adopted nationwide. This happened at a time when it was
manifest to them that the acquisition of pinyin was widely seen as a
precondition for the entire population’s transformation into an information
society.
It can be said that in China language struggle is a political struggle, and
Chinese intellectuals have yet to develop collectively as an independent
force. Despite the close relationship between script reform and national
development, language affairs are unpredictable – all principles and
policies will be unhesitatingly compromised or even sacrificed if they run
against a perceived higher interest. In China, in contrast to the general
direction in other countries, politics has a determining role, but is strongly
influenced by the traditional heritage. The socio-cultural aspect is also
more noticeable and influences script reform more than it does in other
countries. The economic factor plays a role only where it is in line with the
political need, or in other words, it does not contradict the Party’s ideo-
logy, which is the superstructure and determines the economic found-
ations.
Chapter 5 225

7.2 Leadership – Political Individual Involvement

at the National Level

Internationally, the positive promotional role that politicians play has

been widely acknowledged by LP researchers, and sometimes rhetorically
supported. Such instances include Lee Kuan Yew’s role in Mandarin
promotion in Singapore (Shepherd 2005: 59), Ataturk’s revisions and
innovations in Turkey in the 1920s (Landau 1993), Sukarno’s charismatic
influence in unifying Bahasa Malay (Anwar 1980: 176), and Julius
Nyerere’s role in promoting Swahili in post-colonial Tanzania (Wood
1985: 13, 89). More examples of high-profile individual’s role in language
promotion in a number of other countries are given in Gonzalez’s (2002:
18) observations. While arguing that “it is difficult in general for
individuals to influence language policy”, Kaplan and Baldauf (2003: 224)
cite a number of cases in Pacific Basin countries where high status
individuals linked to government power have had powerful positive or
negative effects on language policy development. The unfortunate impact
of particular political actors has less frequently been examined. In what
follows, we will discuss some instances in the Chinese context, but there
are no shortage of comparative cases in other countries, including two of
China’s neighbors, for example, Kim I1 Sung’s extensive and intensive
intervention in Korean, based on his interpretation of Marxism-Leninism
and personal preferences (Moon 2000; Kaplan and Baldauf 2003: 41-44).
Even in democratic systems, pernicious eventual failure can befall political
figures. To give two examples, in 1954 Syngman Rhee, the first President
of the Republic of Korea, ordered that the 1933 unified orthography be
simplified, but the beleaguered Rhee “had to rescind his decree within a
little over one year” due to a public outcry (Kaplan and Baldauf 2003:
34-35). In 1999 the Prime Minister of Japan, Keizo Obuchi, appointed a
Commission which came up with a plan to make English an official
language of Japan. This unrealistic goal was quietly dropped in 2000,
following the death of Obuchi, perhaps because it committed some grave
mistakes “that would be obvious to any language-qualified specialists”
(Baldauf and Kaplan 2003: 23).
Dennis Ager (2001: 175) points out, language policy making represents
the actions of those who hold power in society. The power, exercised by
those influential individuals, often reflects a quite personal view of what
should be done, or, at a less extreme level, a key member with a particular
interest can exercise considerable influence. These individuals’ policies
depend on their own ideologies, preferences and likings, and sometimes
226 Influencing Outcomes

even on their quirks. In Chinese LP history, there are many examples

illustrative of Ager’s argument that politically powerful individuals have
the capacity to impose their personal likes and dislikes on the script issue.

7.2.1 Personal Influence vs Public Interest

The issues of “who are the planners and actors” and “what are their
roles” in planning language have generated wide interest in LPP since it
was first raised by Cooper (1989). Individual politician’s powerful roles in
language policy implementation are an interesting topic and have drawn
some attention over recent years. In the modern history of Chinese LP,
there have been about a dozen individuals, either persons with legitimate
power (politicians) or individuals with social status (intellectual elites),
who have played crucial roles in shaping LP in some momentous ways.
There are no clear-cut differences between persons with political power
and individuals with social status. The critical point that separates the two
groups of individuals is the nature of the decision-making. While the
former has the legitimate power to take decision-making action, the latter
does not. However, as LP is a complex, long-term process aiming to
change human behavior, it is hard to say who is more powerful in creating
effective outcomes in this process. The two dominant central themes in LP
are decision making and power. Power is not confined to the power of
being able to impose. If power can be seen as the ability to influence the
behavior of others, insofar as language planning attempts to change human
behavior, it is useful to examine the role of elites in their ability to
influence others. Furthermore, the elite class, called intellectuals in China,
is, to some degree, inevitably engaged in political affairs. A significant
number of towering intellectuals hold positions in the administration,
typically at various levels of Zhengxie, or the Chinese People’s Political
Consultative Conference – composed of the so-called Eight Democratic
Parties.
Insofar as script reform is concerned, these roles vary from intervention
(e.g., roles of Dai Jitao, Chiang Kaishek, Mao Zedong), involvement (e.g.,
roles of Zhou Enlai, Hu Qiaomu), to influence (e.g., roles of Qian
Xuantong, Luxun, Guo Moruo). It would be worthwhile to study the
magnitude of these individuals’ ability to influence the direction of
Chinese script reform. We are aware of only four such case studies. The
most recent one is a historical study, done by Yu Jin’en (2003), that
assessed an education minister’s role in the vicissitude of the Phonetic
Symbol (Zhuyin Zimu, 1918) promulgation and concluded that the
“politician’s ideological value is the determinative factor in the failure or
Chapter 5 227

success of the particular LP program’s implementation” (p. 99). The other

three cases are related to Chen Guanyao’s major efforts in collecting and
promoting simplified characters before and after the FSS (Barnes 1988);
Guo Moruo’s role in starting the process of the SSS (Milsky 1973) and
Mao’s extensive involvement in script modernization movements from the
1940s to the 1950s (DeFrancis 1979). The following two cases show the
magnitude of the influence that a powerful individual, consciously or
unconsciously, can have in character planning work.

7.2.1.1 The case of calligraphy culture

Regarded as a means of personal communication, handwriting is
immune from simplification and standardization (the Office of Standard
Work 1997: 11; Education Office 2001: 7). However, it becomes a debat-
able topic where the handwriting of national leaders is concerned. Tici is a
kind of calligraphy or handwriting for public demonstration, written by
leaders (sometimes cloned from the handwritten texts of ex-leaders),
calligraphers or social celebrities, and it is a unique form of Chinese
traditional art derived from Chinese characters. Tici can be found on
institutional name plates, or as a few words of encouragement and comme-
moration by the most influential members of society. Individuals, parti-
cularly business people, industrialists and power-brokers, cherish the
opportunity to obtain tici for its great potential commercial value or other
personal ends. Tici are most frequently used in the names of journals,
magazines, periodicals, tourist spots, trademarks, institutions or corpor-
ations. For instance, almost all university’s names in China have hand-
written tici by luminary personalities. The iconic handwritten characters
are a traditional heritage and are so loved by the general population that
they have become a part of people’s lives.
Both the TSC in the 1950s and the Law of the National Common
Language and Script of the P. R. of China have included a clause, stating
that calligraphy is exempt from the rules governing simplified characters –
but this ruling has not gone unquestioned. It is disputable whether tici
should be seen as a kind of calligraphy and how many officials should be
defined as ‘national leaders’. In the 1990s, the dispute about tici developed
to the point that a secretarial office of the central government had to
announce a policy, dictating at which level national leaders were allowed
to use traditional characters in their tici (Luan 1992: 14). Some LP propo-
nents (Wang 2001, 2002: personal communication) strongly oppose
ubiquitous traditional and non-standard characters written by state and
Party leaders, simply because of the bad impression it creates among the
public as a result of their high visibility in sensitive domains of language15,
228 Influencing Outcomes

and because it makes ‘Writing Standard Characters’ campaigns much

harder. As noted by Huang Peirong (1992: 51), a hanzi reform researcher
from Taiwan, “Nowadays, after thirty-seven years’ promotion of simpli-
fied characters in Mainland China, most books, journals and newspapers
use standard hanzi. Exceptions are only seen on commercial brands,
advertisements and on signboards.”
Jiang Zemin’s tici have been criticized repeatedly by LP officials for
his overuse of traditional characters. With fourteen years in the top posi-
tion, his tici far outnumbered even Mao Zedong’s, who ruled the country
for 27 years16. As a result, the central government had to set up a tici office
to deal exclusively with such affairs (Sun 2003). It is not an exaggeration
to say that the tici written in unofficial hanzi by China’s president have
been a force for reversing the permanent removal of non-standard cha-
racters.
When talking about how hard it is to deal with the tici culture, Wang
(personal communication 2001, 2002) said that, during his directorship of
the SCLA, he wrote letters to the office of the CCP and State Council
leader respectively, and the leaders’ secretarial staff promised to raise the
matter with their bosses. Wang feels displeased that tici written in
traditional characters remain unchanged and can be seen everywhere. But
he was happy that in the campaign to wipe out miswritten characters in the
country’s capital, he was able to remove the nonstandard characters from
the shop sign of Wangfujing Department Store, the country’s Number One
shopping center for nearly one century.17 But Wang failed to achieve the
same result with the Xidan Department Store, which is second only to
Wangfujing in popularity. “Because its name is [written in] the tici from
Dong Biwu [a widely respected former leader], so it is still there today”.
The display of language transmits a symbolic message about the legi-
timacy, relevance, priority and standard of languages. Shohamy (2006:
111) points out, “the public space as a focus of attention in language policy
as well as in language use is a relatively new area of attention, as most
research on language use tends to focus primarily on speakers and not on
their environments”. Elaborating on Landry and Bourhis’ (1997) notion of
Language Landscape, which originally referred to the visibility of lan-
guages as objects that mark the public space in a given territory, Shohamy
(2006: 110) argues that “the presence (or absence) of specific language
items, displayed in specific language, in a specific manner, sends direct or
indirect messages with regard to the centrality versus the marginality of a
certain language in society”.
Chapter 5 229

According to Shohamy, language in the public space refers to all

language items that are displayed in a variety of contexts in the environ-
ment. The public space is therefore a most relevant arena to serve as a
mechanism for creating de facto language policy, so that the ideological
battles that are taking place in the new nation-state can be turned into
practice. Thus, language in the public space needs to be recognized as one
of the major mechanisms affecting policies, to effect, manipulate and
impose de facto language practices in hidden and covert ways. While
Chinese calligraphy and tici are probably more ubiquitous, they largely
overlap with Shohamy’s examples of language landscape, such as names
of buildings, places and institutions, advertising billboards, newspapers,
the Internet, titles of books, documents, names of streets, commercial and
personal visiting cards, labels, instructions and public forms, names of
shops and public signs. The number of such language items to be found in
the public space is almost endless and unlimited. An important charac-
teristic of language landscape is that it is shaped by public authorities as
well as individuals, associations or firms. Accordingly, the language land-
scape of a country, region or urban setting may function as an informational
and symbolic marker of the relative power and status of the linguistics
communities. The case of Chinese calligraphy culture’s impact on hanzi
standardization, particularly tici use, highlights the significant implications
of language landscape arguments and the issue of public space as a focus
of attention in language policy implementation.

7.2.1.2 Name crisis

Another example, illustrative of a powerful individual’s personal
influence on script policy, is the crisis of former PM’s name. As men-
tioned previously, the FTVVF in 1955 dictated that except characters for
surnames, all yiti zi used for given names in the table, including historical
figures, should be replaced by the standard characters. One character
(rong) in Zhu Rongji’s given name is a discharged character in the above
table. This character is in some media publications replaced with another
homophonous character, but one that has an opposite meaning, with
explanations in brackets, indicating that rong here should be the one with a
metal compound – other publications just leave it blank. Right to use
names are culturally charged taboos in Chinese culture, and Zhu Rongji
wanted to keep intact the original character’s meaning, ‘to lay down the
foundations’. When he was still the Mayor of Shanghai, he opposed the
way his name was written in official characters in newspapers, because it
could be taken to have the opposite ominous meaning.
230 Influencing Outcomes

By 1993, when he became the second-most powerful man in the

country, it inevitably had become a public issue, attracting national and
international attention. In September 1993, the language management
authorities adopted a low-profile approach, adding it into the GB 2312-80,
without declaring a change in the total number of 6,735 characters18 (Fu
2002: personal communication; Hu 1998: 50). This incident is indicative
of personal agency because the national standard had to be amended just to
include a character in a high ranking personal name. Zhu left Chinese
politics after the 16th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party,
held in November of 2002. Although he was one of the widely respected
prime ministers in the Republic’s history, now people seldom hear his
name. In critiquing the impropriety of making alterations to the national
standard to accommodate an individual’s name, Wang Ning (2004b: 6), a
renowned hanzi scholar, uses Figure 5-3 to illustrate this character’s
(Rong) rapid decline in social use, during a span of three months, in the
national media.

32

17

11 2

0 A B C D

A: One month before the ‘16th CCP National Congress’

B: During the month of the ‘16th CCP National Congress’
C: One month after the ‘16th CCP National Congress’

Figure 5-3. Drastic change of the frequency of use of a character over three months

7.2.2 Current Pain

In discussing the bureaucratic structures of Chinese script policy-

making, Blachford (2004: 101) says, “the top leaders of the CCP have, no
doubt, shaped the general directions of any given policy in the PRC. Rule
by absolute power of an individual or a group of individuals has long been
the Chinese tradition.” In the milestone NCLW, there was a sharp debate
on how to deal with the problems found in the GLSC after three decades’
use. The arguments were polarized among the delegates. The conservative
Chapter 5 231

side insisted that it should be maintained intact as it was, but republished,

in order to show the government’s determination to maintain the status quo
and clear up any confusion in society. The radical advocates, on the other
hand, contended that since this table was the outcome of that special era
and a large number of characters were poorly simplified, we should make
use of this historical occasion to carry out a substantial amendment (the
initial proposal was sixty characters) after an overall review, including
the incorporation of 111 characters of the SSS. The final consensus was:
make either a big change, or not change anything at all. However,
according to Chen Zhangtai (2001: personal communication), only six
characters were reintroduced in the republished GLSC, which was pro-
posed by Hu Qiaomu, China’s unquestioned czar of propaganda and
cultural affairs. As expected by opponents, this decision caused endless
trouble and chaos in society. These six characters, although statistically
insignificant, have become an important source of character use confusion
in today’s publications. It has attracted trenchant criticism even by some
official scholars since the death of Hu Qiaomu in 1992 (Yu 1992; Gao
2002). Fan Keyu (1996: 7) is at great pains to describe the injudicious
withdrawal of the SSS and the change made to the promulgated GLSC as
“unforgettable heartbreaking pain” and “pretty soul destroying”.
The official explanation of why the badly needed amendments failed
to get approved was that there were worries and concerns about public
confusion and the technical inconvenience. But this justification was not
convincing and was greatly weakened by the way the change was made as
only the six characters proposed by Hu Qiaomu were added. If the failure
to make major modifications was about preventing unnecessary public
confusion and loss for the typesetting industry, or about opposition from
some major dictionary and reference book publishers, what difference is
there between six or sixty characters? In criticizing the theory that big
changes would result in a huge waste of published books, Lin Yanzhi
(1996: 9), the vice-director of SCLW between 1994-1995, asked,
Which kind of loss is bigger: several ten thousands of books, or the
communication convenience [for the entire population]? … Is there any
parent stupid enough to say, ‘Oh, baby, I don’t want you to grow up; if
you grow taller, all of your shoes and clothing will be of no use
anymore’.
Fortunately for our understanding of events, that episode and dispute
have been well documented and copies were published following Hu’s
death. Ordinary readers are now able to get access to the details about the
intense argument between Hu and some language policy makers, as well as
232 Influencing Outcomes

Hu’s incredible stubbornness in forcing the SCLW to accept his proposal

to resume six characters (Editing Team 1996: 291, 353-357). A number of
letters and research material, written by Hu Qiaomu, that were discovered
in 2002 by Chen Zangtai (2002: personal communication), the then vice-
director of the SCLW, provide us with a very interesting insight into
Chinese LP history and provide a good case study of the role of individuals
in LP decision making.
Hu’s displeasure with the SCLW’s work had been long-standing, he
was very critical about the latter’s manner of work (see e.g., Editing Team
1996: 301, 338, 343, 350). This tension came to a head during the TSC
revision period, leading up to and including 1986. The dispute between Hu
and SCLW, on the inclusion of six resumed variant or traditional
characters in the republication of the TSC, became so fierce that it finally
had to be put to the top national leaders, including the Chairman of the
CCP and Premier, for resolution. The case was discussed in the regular
meetings of the CCP and the State Council (Journalist 2006). The stand-off
was superficially broken through the principle of “Democratic Centralism”
(Minzhu Jizhong Zhi, the organizational tenet of the Party and the state,
namely, centralism on the basis of democracy and democracy under
centralized guidance). However, as national leaders had neither the
knowledge nor interest in linguistics or LP that the previous generation of
leaders before the 1980s had had, it was no surprise that Hu’s opinion
prevailed at the highest levels. Baldauf and Kaplan (2003: 20) point out
that while language specialists are involved when the plan is being
contemplated, “it is an entirely different group of people who actually
make the policy decisions that constitute the language policy, both explicit
and implicit”. A further series of events that happened during the revision
of the TSC in the 1980s serves as another case in point.

7.2.2.1 Mao’s Personal View and Influence on Language Reform

Mao Zedong was Chairman of the CCP for 27 years. In examining his
personal role in conditioning the direction of Chinese LPP, it is clear that
no one has wielded more direct authority or exerted a greater influence
than Mao Zedong. His influence and intervention was extensive and
dynamic, varying from the policy level to the fate of a specific character19.
Mao Zedong had shown great interest in script reform, in spite of his
intensive agenda during the first days of the PRC. One of Chairman Mao’s
better-known quotations was, “Characters must be reformed and we should
follow the common direction of phoneticization adopted across the world”
(1951). This pronouncement was the guideline for Chinese script reform
Chapter 5 233

and it sparked a lot of speculation about the future of Chinese characters

until 1986, and the continuing confusion it caused has yet to be cleared up
today. His statement, “Our script must be reformed under certain conditions”
(1940), had started language reform movements in Communist-controlled
areas in the 1940s. As we saw earlier, the problems subsequently dis-
covered with the SSS, stemmed from the belief that simplification was
not the ultimate reformation of hanzi, which emanated from Mao’s
aspiration for Romanization. “Phonetic orthography is a comparatively
convenient writing system. Chinese characters are too difficult and
complex and the current reform focuses on simplification, but sooner or
later there will be a fundamental reform” (1955). For these phoneticizers,
simplification was just a temporary measure before the embarking on the
predestined road to alphabetization.
It was Mao’s persistence on the national form for the Chinese
Alphabetic Scheme that delayed the adoption of the Western alphabet for
pinyin letters in the 1950s. Premier Zhou Enlai admitted, “Beginning in
1952, the Committee on Chinese Writing Reform devoted three years to
the task of creating our own alphabet (including revising the Phonetic
Alphabet), but without being able to achieve satisfactory results, and only
then was the decision finally reached to abandon it and to adopt the Latin
alphabet” (DeFrancis 1979: 146).
Before pinyin, two of three predominant alphabetic systems, Luomatze
and Latin sinwenz, designed by Chinese scholars in 1928 and the 1930s
respectively, were Latin based and were of historical importance in
China’s Romanization history. Thus, it appears that Latin letters were a
natural choice for the phonetic transcription system when the Communist
Party decided to promulgate a new alphabetic system. But the proposed
Latin-based pinyin scheme was turned down several times when it was
submitted to the highest authority, until in 1953, Chairman Mao agreed to
give up his request that pinyin should be indigenous in its form. The
confusion over what kind of forms – Western letters or character strokes –
should be used to transcribe Chinese characters was not cleared up until 27
January, 1956, when a clandestine official document of the Central
Committee of the CCP declared, “the Central Committee of the CCP holds
that Latin letters are suitable to be adopted in designing the Chinese
Phonetic Alphabet”. It is for this event that Mao’s role in Romanization
during the 1950s was dubbed, by DeFrancis (1984b: 257), as the ‘great
leap backward’. This information was first released in the 1980s by Ye
Laishi (1981: 60), a life-long pinyin activist and one of the early key
leaders in the LP organization. Before this, even people inside the LP
circle did not know that the reason why the pinyin scheme was delayed by
234 Influencing Outcomes

three years was purely because of Mao’s personal preference for an

indigenous writing script20. Ironically, in retrospect, some scholars attribute
this delay to the wisdom of national leadership (e.g., Wang 1995: 3),
ignoring the fact that the opposite might well be true.

7.2.2.2 Leadership in linguistics

Perhaps no other country in the world but China has an IT industry so
closely interrelated with its writing system and its study of linguistics. LP
has become increasingly sophisticated and an interdisciplinary subject. To
obtain a high quality system of CIP, the IT industry is unlikely to generate
any substantial results without the coordination and cooperation of LPers.
This requires not only the financial support from government participation,
but also large-scale interdisciplinary cooperation for which linkages
initiated by higher-level leadership, have proved to be very essential. It
should be made clear that fundamental research, with its non-profit
orientation, cannot produce straightforward results nor be done by using
industry partnering. The success of the linguistically inspired CIP
programs depends vitally on the ability of the leadership within the LP
circle to communicate the strategy and vision of projects on a continuing
basis to national policy makers, and at a political level, to lobby for the
resources and support for some strategic projects. The initial achievement
of encoding hanzi for computers was largely due to a few individual
pioneers such as Qian Xuesen. In recent years this tradition has continued
and there are some like-minded LP policy makers who play a beneficial
role in pushing script reform forward, such as Xu Jialu, the linguist-turned-
national-leader, and Li Yuming, the director of the Language and
Information Department in the Education Ministry. They themselves have
a strong personal interest in LP and the capacity to get easy access to the
top leaders to argue for support for these issues. Xu (2000: 490) argues
that, “Only when CIP is going ahead on the basis of linguistics, can we say
that the Chinese language can be automatically processed”. As early as
1996, Xu (1996: 44) pointed out:
The government’s and public’s growing awareness of the applied value
of language research to the IT industry will lead us to the discovery of
the importance of linguistics. This is the condition creating the ground
for linguistics to flourish and helps to make it one of the leading
academic subjects in the new century.
Zhang Zhigong, a senior language educator and the late president of
China’s Language Modernization Association, said in the spring of 1992,
Chapter 5 235

at the Symposium of the Fortieth Anniversary of Chinese Linguistics

Study, if he gets the opportunity to talk to the national top policy makers
for half an hour, he is confident that he is able to strengthen their
determination to carry out language reform (Ma 2000: 108). According to
Liu Yongquan (1997: 393), an AI pioneer in China, an individual’s letter,
being passed to Deng Xiaoping and Hu Qiaomu, was one of the
coincidences that led to the organization of the hallmark First National
Conference on Input Schemes in Qingdao in December 1978. The saddest
thing in Chinese computing linguistics has been, that in the last quarter of
a century, due to the lack of communication between linguists, IT experts
and leaders at the highest level, similar research projects have been carried
out by individual units isolated from each other and scattered across the
country. Research projects, funded by government but carried out in
guerrilla style, overlap at the research level, resulting in huge waste. A
number of the first author’s key informants felt somewhat disappointed
about their unsuccessful efforts to convince and draw leaders’ attention to
this issue. Li (personal communication: 2002) was particularly aware that
it was a critical time for obtaining governmental support in order to
achieve some constructive results. He argues that after decades of develop-
ment in CIP, it appears that the time has now arrived to return to funda-
mental studies on some theoretical issues.

7.2.3 A Tentative Summary

The discussion in this section shows that after 1949, largely because of
the political implications and ideological foundation, the Communist
leaders have taken a keen interest in language issues and have played an
active and substantial role through heavy-handed official LP bodies. These
individuals have either had compelling political power or a high prestige in
society. While persuasive influence is a positive factor, most of the time
individual intervention has had a malicious effect on LP. It is also a fact,
though, that not all individual influence by a politician or a prestigious
society member is consciously exerted, as, for example, the change of the
character ‘Rong’ made to accommodate Zhu Rongji’s given name.
However, individual intervention, despite of its negative and unfavor-
able connotations, is not necessarily always a harmful element, and the
observations made in the aforementioned cases should not be taken as a
universal condemnation of intervention per se. While being fully aware of
the potential danger of such individual intervention, it should be pointed
out that in Chinese LP history, active involvement of some national leaders
has played a conducive role, ensuring the smooth implementation of some
236 Influencing Outcomes

LP programs. In January 1958, for example, the Premier of the State

Council, Zhou Enlai, made an important speech titled Directives on
Language Work in the New Era, delivered to the National Political
Consultative Conference. This speech has been seen as the most
authoritative official document in script reform history, and “provided a
major boost for language reform work” (Seybolt and Chiang 1979: 5). On
another occasion, Zhou’s role was even more direct and concrete, since
“Without Zhou Enlai’s personal intervention, no pinyin would have
appeared in the 1971 version of the Xinhua Character Dictionary” (Zhou
1982: 6).
Nevertheless, ideally, decisions concerning language issues should be
made on the basis of scholars’ advice based on a careful analysis of the
situation. In a totalitarian system, where language struggle is a form of
political struggle, and where Chinese intellectuals have yet to develop
collectively as an independent force, decision making power is still
invested in individuals, and unfavorable reports are often suppressed. Too
much power in too few hands is still a potential threat in the future. In
comparison with the older generation of leaders, present national leaders
have reduced their responsibilities to a minimum, as has been acknow-
ledged by Hu Qiaomu when talking with the five major LP academics
working on script reform work. “Not only are the central leaders too
busy to care about the LP work, at the provincial level there are even fewer
leaders concerned with script reform” (Editing Team 1999: 301). In
retrospect, ambiguous and inconsistent remarks from the highest levels
of the decision-making apparatus were also responsible for the strong
comeback of traditional complex hanzi in the 1980s. This uncharacteristic
high level political apathy has, over a lengthy period, made language
officials too indecisive to take substantial action and respond forcefully
to their critics.

7.3 Integration of Ongoing Political Campaigns

into LP Work

In a highly coercive political system, the general public learns to adapt

to political practice in order to survive. To be successful in life, it is
customary to identify the course to be taken in one’s field with the party
political line, and what is going on in a particular field can be best justified
by the current propaganda and must fit into the terms used by the Party,
even if it is only done as a form of lip service. The constant repetition of
revolutionary formulae through the use of political slogans and stock
Chapter 5 237

phrases that expressed ‘correct’ thought, which was used to penetrate

people’s minds and engender belief in the value of Marxism, has been a
successful part of what Ji (2004) called ‘linguistic engineering’. DeFrancis
(1979: 151-152) has pointed out, that discussions of the complex issues
underlying all aspects of language reform rarely went beyond the polem-
ical level of quoting a few phrases from Mao in support of a particular
stand, and attributing to those currently in disfavor a few phrases in
opposition to the currently accepted position. During the hanzi culture
debate in the 1980-1990s, the long winded ‘scholarly papers’ written by
both sides were centered around the question whether a rival’s view was in
accordance with the Party’s line on language and script affairs, rather than
if it was factual or accurate. This was perhaps truer for the CCCF side,
since Yuan Xiaoyuan (1992: 11-24) and Shi Fan (pseudonym, 1992: 57-
58) quoted leaders’ speeches or official documents at some length to either
justify their positions or to support an argument. In rebutting the
accusation that he was deliberately obstructing the national LP policy, Xu
Dejiang (2002: 5-6), a central figure involved in triggering the debate,
defended himself by saying, “Our effort to spread Chinese culture nation-
wide and worldwide well complies with the policy of vigorously promo-
ting Chinese traditional culture [put forward by the Party propaganda after
the June Fourth Movement in 1989]”.
As we have seen, language problems in China are, like art and
literature, components of the superstructure, hence they are generally
viewed as political vehicles. The relationship between political ideology
and linguistic dimensions began to be established in the mid-1950s, when
intellectuals were targeted by the Anti-Rightist Movement. During this
period and later in the Cultural Revolution, linguists could not say
anything without referring to quotations from Mao’s works, which was the
source rationale for every kind of action. It was the characteristic of
Chinese linguistics of that special period; it was also a basic skill for
individual survival.
Even after constraints on people’s lives and academic issues had
loosened, justification of the importance of a specific area needed to be
aligned closely to precepts laid out in an ideological treatise set on the
current political theme. In today’s China, linguistics is in a fortunate
position in that it is associated with CIP and hence with economic deve-
lopment, which, together with the so-called Knowledge Economy, is also
the central concern of the Party. The dominant overarching ideology
operating at the moment (2006) in China is that of the Three Repre-
sentation Theory, a political ideology designated to be the core of the
CCP’s leadership by former Party head, Jiang Zemin, and embodied in the
238 Influencing Outcomes

official document of the CCP’s 16th Congress. This ideology is over-

arching in the sense that it permeates and defines all socio-economic
relations in the society. Alongside and frequently connected to this
overarching ideology are a range of other dominant ideologies, concerning
education, culture, minority work, family planning and so forth, and their
accompanying practices coexist with other marginalized ideologies. People
from all walks of life discuss and try to find a way to make the Three
Representation Theory central to their respective trades and professions.
The first representation requires, that what we are undertaking should
represent the forward direction of the productive forces and the progress of
the social development. Its manifestation in LP is to directly associate the
outcome of LP with this representation, as language issues make an
important contribution to facilitating economic activities.
The following is a translation of the Principles Guiding the Working
Agenda (2002) of the Department of Language, Script and Information
Management of the Education Ministry. It is a typical, heavily politically
tinted statement, setting out the goal of science research (SCLW 2004d),
and showing how a particular academic subject takes its cue from the
Party.
Holding higher the great banner of Comrade Deng Xiaoping’s theory
and working under the guidance of the important thought of ‘Three
Representations’, [we are] to carry them out in the spirit of the impor-
tant speeches delivered by Comrade Jiang Zemin in the 5th and 6th
plenary of the 15th National Conference of the Chinese Communist
Party, and to further enforce the ‘Law of the National General Lan-
guage and Script’ 21. Steadily implementing the Language and Script
Development Plan in the 15 th National Economic and Social Devel-
opment Plan by liberating thought, seeking the truth from facts,
focusing on the infrastructure, reforming the working culture, progres-
sing with the time [these are political slogans – author], enabling the
language and script standardization and information work to better
serve the IT industry, also education and social language life, striding
to achieve outstanding achievement to usher in the opening of the 16th
National Conference of the Chinese Communist Party.
The political climate is unpredictable, but being adaptable to political
circumstances and watching for the alignment between the LP activities
and party politics and political correctness, is a skill that Chinese LPers
have had to learn. In the future, whether Chinese LP can develop along its
own track in solving language- and script-related problems depends to a
very large extent on how language affairs fit in with the political ideology.
Chapter 5 239

8. INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENT

The international factor is probably on the lowest rung of the hierarchy

that drives script reform, but from a historical perspective, under certain
circumstances it has had a decisive influence. Many of the significant
shifts that happened in Chinese script reform after the end of the Cold War
cannot be imagined without taking into account the radical changes in the
world, although most of the time these influences may not have been expli-
cit and straightforward. Generally speaking, having only mild fluctuations
in the international political environment can provide favorable conditions
to ensure that the language reform movement continues unimpeded.

8.1 International Comparison and Cooperation

Writing system reform (i.e., simplification) was justified by hanzi’s

impeding role in building the national economy. But, from a comparative
international perspective, there is no definite link between hanzi and
national development. This can be best exemplified by the experience of
North and South Korea: the former abolished Chinese characters after WW
II while the latter did not. The same applies to Taiwan and Hong Kong,
where original Chinese characters were kept in current use. Vietnam is a
good example illustrating the reverse effect, while Turkey is a further case
in point from a non-character-using polity. Looking over a longer time
frame, the high literacy rate in character-literate Japan and a low literacy
rate in countries that have used alphabetic scripts for centuries, such as
Bangladesh (over 70 percent), India (over 60 percent) and Indonesia (over
40 percent), make it very doubtful whether scripts are a determining factor
in producing mass literacy. Even some relatively developed countries do
not have vastly superior literacy rates to those in China. Countries such as
Portugal and Peru have illiteracy rates of over twenty percent. Although
the coming of the digital age may change the impact of these comparisons
as the definition of literacy changes, if taken at face value, this kind of
international comparison has the potential to put the brake on any further
language reform.
Chinese is a pluricentric language with several interacting centers, each
providing a national variety with at least some of its own (codified) norms.
The influence of international experience can be seen at both theoretical
and practical levels. Script reform experience gained in other countries was
extensively explored as a reference point in the 1950s. At that time, LP, as
a subject, was just beginning and research about LPP was in its embryonic
240 Influencing Outcomes

stage. Weinreich first coined the term LP in 1957, and from then on a great
deal of experience in LP has accumulated, both within and outside the
country (Eastman 1983: 130).
When carrying out planning programs in the past, linguistic factors
from the neighboring regions, including Taiwan and Hong Kong, have
been largely ignored – the regrettable result can be felt today. Presently,
the script reform issue in Chinese character-using countries is closely and
complicatedly intermingled with that of China. It can be predicated that the
developments in writing reforms, seen in other hanzi-using regions, will
have an increasing impact on China’s script reform. In the future, any
reform proposed for the Chinese writing system, be it simplification, stan-
dardization, or its possible replacement by a Romanized script, is going to
be an important issue in the Chinese-speaking world and in the world at
large. No matter how dramatic political shifts may appear to be, no script
reform of a pluricentric language like Chinese can be carried out
effectively solely within its own polity borders.
More dynamic interaction is needed from all groups on the hanzi
culture rim, and in particular the participation from the approximately 30
million overseas Chinese scattered across the world, who are equally legi-
timate character owners. People are increasingly questioning those in
power about their continuing lack of concern for this steadily more
influential group of Chinese. Although they are a very small minority
quantitatively, their significance is undeniable in an era of digitalization
and globalization, and this tends to lend weight to their inclusion in the
official considerations of LP policy makers (Li 2004c, Wang T.K. 2003,
Zhang S.Y. 2003). Joint consultation in spelling reform by Germany and
German-speaking countries can be cited as a good example in regard to
international deliberations for pluricentric languages (Clyne 1995). Coop-
eration and adjustment among Chinese language and Chinese character
using countries, which were not possible during the cold war era, have
become inevitable for the future. This is a very complex, but equally, a
very desirable development (Zhou 1986a), eloquently argued for by Kaplan
and Baldauf (1997: 300):
LP activities need to consider the language situation not only in the
polity for which planning is under way but also the language situation
in proximate polities as well. Further, it is important to consider the
relative permeability of the border between the planning polity and the
proximate polity.
Chapter 5 241

8.2 Ideological Factors from a Historical Perspective

One event, related to the international influence on the history of

Chinese LP, is the decision-making process underlying the graphic repre-
sentation of pinyin in the 1950s. Until very recently, few people, including
the majority of LP experts who were directly involved in devising pinyin,
knew what the real reason was for the decision to adopt Latin alphabetic
letters as the basis for pinyin orthography, and why that decision changed
from using the Latin alphabet to character strokes, and then back to
alphabetic representation again (see VI 8.1.3).
Recent information (Zhou 1999: 195; Wang 2001: personal communi-
cation) has revealed, that Mao’s idea about a national form for repre-
senting Chinese phonology came about as the result of his first trip to the
Soviet Union in the 1950s, where Stalin suggested that China should
develop its own unique script form. Another cause that delayed the Latin-
based pinyin proposal was the persistent self-interested effort of some
academics from the Soviet Union’s Academy of Sciences, who worked as
academic advisors in the China Academy of Sciences. They did not miss a
single opportunity to lobby those in power to adopt Cyrillic letters instead
of Latin ones (DeFrancis 1972, Chen P. 1999, Zhou 2004). The standoff
was tactically resolved by Chen Yi22. The proof that the pinyin scheme was
the product of the international communist movement comes from Wang
Xuewen (1974: 21), who contends that it was adopted because of the high
praise of Latin letters in a Russian advisor’s speech, made at the First
Nationwide Conference of Language Reform, that “ruled out the possi-
bility of adopting indigenous forms”. In any case, it appears that foreign
influences played a big role in the discussion and selection of the phonetic
form of Chinese Romanization23.
Ideologically, the Soviet Union was the yardstick for Chinese Com-
munist policy in the 1950s, and language was no exception. Repeated
quotations of Lenin’s “Latinization is the greatest revolution in the East”24
and Leninist predictions of an age when all languages will be written
phonetically, made people mistakenly believe that the Communist govern-
ment was going to abolish characters sooner or later. Another international
ideological event, discussed in Section 5.1, Chapter 1, was the impact of
the academic debate on linguistic theories. The comment from the world’s
greatest proletarian leader (Joseph Stalin), holding that language does not
serve one class to the exclusion of other classes, lent timely and author-
itative help to the ‘non-class nature’ camp of linguists, reducing the
endless arguments and paving the way for the 1950s reform (Barnes 1974:
460). The impinging effects of the international ideological struggle on
242 Influencing Outcomes

defining the language and dialects during the 1950-1960s, were also
evidenced from the involvement of foreign experts from the Socialist
Block (DeFrancis 1972: 462-465).
However, it should be pointed out that even though a particular reform
was significantly influenced by the international environment, major
programs of Chinese script reform were often followed by a period of
reflection and subsequent modification, to bring them in line with tradi-
tional Chinese values and the country’s political ideology.

8.3 Coping with Recent Reality

Two events of worldwide significance have happened in China

recently: China’s entry into the WTO and its successful bid for the 2008
Olympic Games. Related to these two occurrences are imminent LP tasks.
Obviously, in the preparations for the 2008 games, providing linguistic
services is a key concern. There is a tremendous challenge to reduce the
language barrier for the Olympic athletes and those attending the games. In
discussing how to take up the challenge, Li Yuming (2002: personal
communication) said, China’s further opening up and internationalization
should be taken as an opportunity for LPers. CIP can serve in a leverage
role, as he further explained:
The ultimate goal of what we are trying to do for Olympic athletes
coming to China in 2008 is, in the short term, to provide linguistic
convenience, such as interpreting facilities, and to assure them of
relatively free communication, wherever and whenever, at least for the
purpose of daily life, sports and traveling. In the long run, we must play
a key role in substantially reducing the script- and language-related
occupations. For example, the number of secretaries has been decreas-
ing owing to the progress made in CIP technology.
China’s further economic incorporation into the world economy forces
Chinese character standardization to come into contact with international
practice. One urgent job of the Department of Language and Information is
to provide policy guidance on issues such as character use for commercial
trademarks and printed instructions for imports from hanzi-using regions.
China is one of few countries where foreign investors are not allowed to
register their company and product names in their own languages (the
government also imposes a ban on imported products without Chinese
instructions). Another controversial topic is whether imports from Taiwan
Chapter 5 243

and Hong Kong, and the products produced in the Mainland, must use
simplified characters in their labeling.

8.4 National Interest

The globalization has made LP more complex and sophisticated. As

Yao (2001: 130-131) aptly pointed out, in today’s digitalized world, with
international competition increasingly switching from the military, poli-
tical and economic arena to ‘soft areas’ (culture and religion via language),
there has been a silent war on the linguistic front. “The cultural infiltration
and anti-infiltration has become a major content of scrambling for national
power and interest among countries.” This is simply because language is
the vehicle for information, and information is an important source of
national wealth as well as an important sector for the national defense
industry. In this sense, Li Yuming (2004b) has dubbed language expansion
on the Internet as language imperialism or script supremacy. In China,
moreover, orthographic effectiveness is very closely related to the techno-
logical advance.

8.4.1 Script Reform and National Security

In the course of implementing economic reforms and the opening-up

policy, China has sought to lift its scientific capacities and economic levels
to equal those of developed nations. The initial motivation in developing
CIP was in the interest of national security, and was initiated in the early
1970s by military technology scientists, such as Qian Xuesen and Qian
Weichang. At that time, research received support from the top because of
its importance for the national interest, and its results were not applied for
civil use until the 1980s. Not coincidentally, the need to develop a Chinese
character codification system in Taiwan also arose out of its application for
military purposes25.
Extensive infiltration into all aspects of the Chinese IT industry by
foreign interests, particularly from the US, has deeply worried the
government and CIP community (Xu 2000: 494). More and more people
are becoming skeptical whether the core technology of the CIP will be in
Chinese scientists’ hands if the present situation continues. This opening
up has left China virtually economically defenseless as it moves in the
direction of a free market, and this sense has been heightened by China’s
admission to the WTO which requires further openness and free access.
One more disquieting topic, which has been talked about for quite some
244 Influencing Outcomes

time, is the fear that the Chinese information software market is being
dominated by foreign products. This would not only be a great economic
loss, but also a humiliation to the country and its intellectual elites. What is
happening to the lucrative input software market shows this concern is
becoming painful reality26. In general, of course, this trend is a reflection
of the nature of the modern globalized world, where large businesses often
have become more powerful in terms of economics and intellectual pro-
perty than many countries.

8.4.2 Microsoft’s Role: Marketing Strategy or Strategic

Conspiracy?

At the turn of the last century, discussions about the so-called harmful
impact of Microsoft’s activities in China were very heated. Of great
interest in this connection is the account given by Mi Alun, an American-
Chinese IT analyst and column writer, who was particularly critical of
Microsoft’s Chinese marketing strategy. Mi (1999) argues that Microsoft
should be held partly accountable for the unimpressive development of
Chinese IT. Microsoft’s involvement in character processing was blamed
for having intentionally misled both the government and the general
public, into believing that hanzi were no less efficient than any other
writing system for computer applications. According to Mi, Microsoft’s
real intention is to monopolize the Chinese software market. Mi (1997)
convincingly warns that Microsoft’s activities in China do more harm than
good to Chinese IT development, and has inferred that this may go beyond
economic implications. It is worthy of special attention from the perspec-
tive of international strategy, in the sense that an information war is the
most likely form of an actual war in the future. His view has been mirrored
by other scholars. Zhang Feipeng (2001: 5), an active young language
modernization promoter, contends, “The efficiency speed of hanzi is much
lower than that of phonetic scripts, and easily breaks down or crashes
when it is applied in information processing. The outcome is unimagin-
able, once a war breaks out.”
Zhang is one of the fiercest critics of Microsoft’s activities in China,
accusing it of seeking short-term profits at the cost of the Chinese IT
industry’s future. Zhang (1999) states:
The direction that was shown by the allegation of Microsoft is: this
firm has already overcome all the difficulties [concerning hanzi
processing]. What is left to be done is to decide how to market the exist-
ing software products. ... This engages many other Chinese software
Chapter 5 245

developers in a fight for survival, leaving no time for doing infra-

structure work and the whole Chinese IT industry has been stifled.
Mi Alun (2001) has said that there was some evidence to show that
Microsoft, when it first entered the Chinese market, had a ‘two birds with
one stone’ marketing strategy: i.e., through manipulating business situ-
ations, it deliberately egged on Chinese developers to commit copyright
infringements and then resorted to court action. Its two-pronged goal has
been to promote its products by spreading its reputation during the legal
process, and on the other hand, to swallow numerous small and medium
size software companies. Through this process it has tried to draw public
attention to intellectual copyright disputes rather than to infrastructure
construction of language research projects.
The idea that hanzi script would be a great military disadvantage for
China and, by implication, that Chinese defense modernization is some-
what impeded, is also very popular among other computing linguists and
defense experts. Giving expression to this conviction, Qian Xuesen (Zhang
F.P. 1999) says, “How to improve Chinese language information effect-
iveness is a big matter related to national security”. As information
control has increasingly become the focal point in global power politics,
China is facing a monumental task in building up a viable system of
information networks and to bring in much-sought online information.
From a broader perspective, in a digital war, information is the critical
resource for war and the most fatal weapon. In this sense, the military
significance of China’s effort to free itself of dependence on imported
technologies is self-evident.

8.4.3 Interaction Between External Change and Internal Politics

The analyses in Chapter 3 and previous discussions in this chapter have

shown that the debate in the 1990s on hanzi’s superiority was actually born
out of traditionalism, which was fashioned by propagandists as a weapon
to counter Western cultural expansion. Chapter 4 emphasized that the first
difficulty in putting restrictions on the total number of hanzi are the rare
characters, occurring in literary expressions and archaic words, which had
been flourishing in the stepped-up nationalistic sentiment occurring since
1990. Thus, nationalism and traditionalism are two issues that are vulner-
able to the influences of the international environment.
International political change is one of the major contributing factors
that has shifted the public’s awareness of their traditional heritage. In the
past few years, increasing evidence has shown that Chinese nationalism
246 Influencing Outcomes

has been stimulated by a concatenation of international incidents. The fore-

most is the ending of the cold war, which has created new forms of
national aspiration and interest throughout the world. Following the
dismemberment of the Soviet Union, CCP culture designers eagerly
cloaked the Party in traditional dress to bestow legitimacy on the present
regime, thereby keeping the population immersed in a sense of Chinese-
ness. Furthermore, national confidence has strengthened because of rapid
economic development, improved living standards, and the remarkable
economic achievements by Chinese-culture-influenced countries in East
and Southeast Asia. Guo Yingjie (2004: xii) considered the ‘booming’
economy and the “success of the ‘four small dragons’ in Asia” as attri-
butable to the ‘positive aspects’ of Confucianism. Undoubtedly, the
previously mentioned political and economic events, happening in an
international context, are the fundamental factors that have propelled the
whole population into a wave of blind nationalism, leading to the
renaissances of indigenous culture and native knowledge, and hence to a
renewed interest in archaic-style language and traditional characters. The
nostalgic remembrance of Mao’s time has also been reflected in these
popular sentiments. This was particularly evident from the overwhelming
popularity of fictional works like A Beijing Man in New York, China’s
most-watched television series in 1993, and the heavy-handed political
reportage, China Can Say No, in 1996. These kinds of cultural products
express an irritation among segments of the population, the intelligentsia
and young students in particular, about their perceived position in the new
world order and the attitude of the West toward China.

9. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

Chapters 4 and 5 have explored the internal and external factors related
to Chinese hanzi reform. In Chapter 4, we examined in detail the four
fixations, their technical requirements and the difficulties encountered in
efforts to repair the unstable attributes of Chinese hanzi. This linguistic
examination of the future prospects for hanzi did not take into account
social enabling factors that are found in current language planning theori-
zing, i.e., language change does not occur in a social and cultural vacuum,
but is part of a linguistic ecology, a social and political ecology (Kaplan
and Baldauf 1997; 2003).
This chapter was devoted to influential external outcomes. There are
two sets of forces that influence the future directions of Chinese script
Chapter 5 247

reform: one is to sketch a future scenario related to specific language

reform-based programs and schemes; another is to look into the factors
that are likely to influence the future trends in a more general sense. This
chapter identifies seven sociolinguistic dimensions that are believed to be
valuable for constructing a trend line for predicting hanzi development and
reform measures. We have shown that these seven areas are not merely
different in terms of their significance to the future script reform, they are
also different in the ways (implicit/explicit) they will affect particular
aspects of this reform. The discussion of these seven dimensions is
presented through an examination of a combination of these interdepen-
dent factors, aimed at identifying cause-and-effect patterns that might be
anticipated to result. Having looked at the variables that contribute to the
directions such changes might take, we look in the next chapter at how
some of these changes might occur.
Chapter 6
ENVISIONING THE FUTURE
Trends and Strategies

1. INTRODUCTION

This chapter is devoted to addressing the foremost issue in the current

set of LP undertakings – standardization, and how standardization can be
achieved. In Chapter 4, we have analytically described the main content of
standardization – the four fixations, and their technological implications
for Chinese computerization. In addition, elsewhere in this volume we
have suggest that standardization is not only the key for enhancing all
types of language software products, particularly those facilitating hanzi’s
input and output, but that it also is a significant factor in the increasingly
essential computerization of hanzi. Thus, the standardization issue has
become the central tenet of modern Chinese LP. To address the question
on how to make the LP compatible with socio-political changes, and the
products of LP acceptable to an increasingly savvy population, this chapter
synthesizes historical experience and the current situation, providing to a
theoretical and descriptive framework for a further examination of the
standardization issue.
The major portion of this chapter deals with four important issues
related to standardization:

• The difficulty of standardization in terms of its compatibility with

social development and technological advancement;

249
250 Envisioning the Future

• Standards categorization and their compatibility with societal condi-

tions, with a multi-standard model being advanced;
• A discussion of the latest thinking about standardization and an attempt
to find a theoretical model in order to address the practical problems
arising from standards implementation; and
• An exploration of the alternative ways to make standardization-oriented
LP work compatible with the new historical conditions.

Briefly, this chapter is structured around two main themes: the useful-
ness of a new standardization model in explaining the past and ongoing LP
ventures, and the importance of building a consensual model for language
standard complementation. We first propose a pluricentric set of standards
and argue that these and other standardization changes will only come
about if there is a more open attitudinal consensus building approach to LP
in China as part of the new socio-political context. Then, drawing upon
historical experiences and international references, we explore the possibi-
bility of establishing a stable and reliable mechanism that guarantees demo-
cracy and transparency for future reforms in a normalized fashion.

2. TOWARD A PLURICENTRIC STANDARD

MODEL

The most notable phenomenon in modern life has been the commoditi-
zation of products where business and governments increasingly impose
greater regulations to standardize the practice of social activities. In an
attempt to enhance the linguistic environment for modern computerization
technology to serve society better, Chinese language authorities have iden-
tified standardization as one of the major options that LP can contribute to
the national technology development. However, the desire for language
standardization is somewhat irreconcilable with the inherent human nature
of pursuing novelty in language use. As noted by Wright (2004: 53):
The political and institutional influences that lead us to acceptance of
standardization (education, conscription, bureaucracy, patriotism, etc.)
are in constant contradiction with an individual’s decision to employ
poetic and creative styles that deviate from imposed norms, and the
group choice to employ codes, registers or jargons that mark it as
distinct.
Chapter 6 251

Standardization activities risk being seen as robbing the public of free-

dom by enforcing laws just for the convenience of computer applications.
This suggests that trying to standardize people’s die-hard writing habits is to
inevitably run into conflict with social trends, as standardization activities
are seen to impose unifying standards that will inhibit language use,
particularly in a society that is rapidly changing from a totalitarian polity
to democracy, and where individualism and creativity are highly cherished.
These qualities, people fear, will be diminished or lost if rigid standards
impose sameness and normative rules over an increasingly colorless life.
As the creative use of language, or literary language, is in its very nature
antithetical toward rigid standards, it has become fashionable to concoct
standard-challenging language.

2.1 The Socio-political Context: Diversification

and Democratization

In this section, the relationships between standardization and moder-

nization are examined in the context of the conflicting trends found in
China.

2.1.1 Standard – Precondition of Modernization

Language researchers are cautious in using the term modernized

language or language modernization. Ferguson (1996: 41), for example,
while pointing out that judgments on “backwardness or limited develop-
ment of a language cannot be made on the basis of linguistic structure”,
also adopts the view that “there are at least three dimensions relevant for
measuring language development”, standardization being one of them. In
China, many LPers take a developmental point of view that a language
without sets of clearly articulated and stated standards on language and
script use cannot be a modern language. In Chapter 4, we have seen the
technological implications for hanzi’s computerization at the micro level.
From a macro level, language standardization and codification are the
prerequisites for the development of a new industry. Jernudd and Das
Gupta (1971: 203-205) argue that orthographic reform and change of the
written discourse are also functions of modernization. Orthographies are
reviewed successively during the development of modern society. The
kind and intensity of the relationships (see Figure 6-1) will change as
society develops.
252 Envisioning the Future

Modernization

Standardization Language

Figure 6-1. Fundamental relations between modernization, standardization and language

In the context of living in a world characterized by globalization and

digitalization, standardization is the basis for today’s modern society. If we
take a further and broader look, standardization is an inexorable trend in
the history of modernity, happening in all aspects of society. It is expected
that the globalization of information exchange on international communi-
cation networks will have a growing homogenizing effect on orthographic
repertories – a trend many purists would like to see reversed. Standardizers
believe that the inherent defects of the Chinese script in mechanic applica-
tion can be partly counteracted by standardization. As noted previously,
international communication networking in Chinese is more effective
when there is a certain degree of writing homogeneity among the Chinese
character-using world. Standardization means quicker and more reliable
exchange of digital messages, and such regional unification can only
be accomplished on the basic premise of national or international standards.

2.1.2 Conflicting Trends in Society: Moving and Developing Hanzi

Nevertheless, human language functions in a paradoxical manner, with

two of its most fundamental characteristics diametrically opposed. On the
one hand, language must be systematic and static; consistency and stability
are basic requirements for a communication system, and all languages
need users’ support to maintain those conventions. On the other, it is
subject to constant change and to an obsession with the idea of newness
and oddness. This paradox is intensified by the contradictions between
technology-oriented standardization and the democratic development in
China’s modernization process. Talking about this inevitability, Thomas
(1991: 207) points out that the pressures to identify with homogeneity tend
to evoke a powerful emotional reaction in which traditionalist and local
viewpoints may be paramount:
Chapter 6 253

Conversely, modernization has brought pressures on people of many

cultures to conform to a single, homogeneous, international culture
dominated by a unified world economic system, based on a universal
technology and obsessed by a materialist, utilitarian philosophy.
One the one hand, the sociolinguistic consequences of the IT impact
present an unprecedented opportunity for LP workers to have a thorough
look into what should be done to overhaul the total stock of characters; on
the other hand, standardization involves many disciplines and all social
levels; it is more socio-political than linguistic. It goes without saying that
a flourishing democratic LP culture needs strong public involvement in the
decision-making system (a topic to be discussed in the following section).
This implies that when Chinese people are about to embrace democracy on
the way to modernity, LP efforts will face more resistance. Standardization
and governmental intervention have always been a hotly contested topic
that has polarized both laypeople and scholars. Given the phenomenal
change that has occurred in the past 15 years in people’s cultural life, the
public is left with the impression that the culture of LP belongs to a past
age, that it is not appropriate for the new era.
If we see standardization as occurring on a continuum (i.e., a standard-
izing process) of research, propagandizing, implementing and assessing,
it can be argued from the Chinese experience that LP is, at most, con-
cerned with the less important part of that process. The evidence discussed
in this volume suggests that propagandizing and implementing, which
mainly involves the management of societal consensus, was a weak link in
the whole process. One very important social factor that should be taken
into account is the repercussions of the Cultural Revolution, which are still
very visible in every aspect of Chinese life. Having analyzed the social
resistance, Su (2004: 2) reminds us that in the mid-20th century, Chinese
people’s spiritual life suffered severe inhibition through an extreme form
of Chinese-style collectivism. “Since the policy of economic reform and
opening-up was introduced, human personality and creativity is now being
released and the old restraint broken. Currently, the problem is to prevent
it from changing to the opposite.” This adds a new dimension to
standardization-centered LP activities. Diversity and localism obstruct an
ever more pervasive tendency for nationalization and internationalization,
thus effectively leaving the society in many instances faced with a choice
between cultural pluralism and technological efficiency. The correlation
between technological development and the socio-cultural settings needs
to be treated as a philosophical inquiry. Coulmas (1992: 241) proposes
four positions that show the people’s attitude towards societal norms:
254 Envisioning the Future

First, from a norm-positive point of view, it is more important that

there is a norm than that there is a good norm, whereas the adherents of
a rational-normative view insist that a norm should be well motivated
in order to be accepted. Plain conservatives, on the other hand, hold the
opinion that the traditional is worth preserving as a value in its own
right, no matter how cumbersome or irrational it may appear from a
synchronic point of view. Finally, there is the anarchistic position
which holds that norms are unnecessary constraints of individual
freedom and creativity.
In an increasingly diversifying society, LP work is expected to confront
various forms of reactions that may go well beyond Coulmas’ cate-
gorization of standard implementation. It would seem clear, however, that
finding a more viable approach to standard planning should be deemed
very desirable.

2.2 Framework of a Pluricentric Standard

Script standardization must be appropriate for the times and be a

servant of the times rather than its master, as it previously was. In the past,
standardization practices assumed standards to be static “once-and-for-all”
and to reflect prescriptive norms, regardless of the fact that language is a
system subject to a constantly changing world. Rigidly prescribed stan-
dards, as well as flexible ones, are found to exist in parallel by nature
within societies. Hanzi is in the process of entering a more diversified
social and educational system as a result of the far-reaching social-
cultural-political changes that are occurring in its speech community, and
these changes invariably create disruption of the classical planning pattern
to accommodate the increasingly diversified structural needs. The standard-
ization movement of the 1950s worked well along with the political
structure of that time. But, in a digital society, the notion of language
standardization is required to go beyond what was previously required, and
furthermore, standardization is many times more difficult to achieve in a
heterogeneous society than it was in a homogeneous one. While LP
implementation could be successfully carried out as a mass movement in
the 1950s, in the more open and heterogeneous society of today’s China, it
is important to take into account hanzi’s diversified social use. This social
reality provides the justification, from this broader perspective, for
examining the feasibility of planning for a multi-standard for the script’s
future (see Table 6-1). This is also in line with the planning of multiple
Chapter 6 255

standards that exist for other languages, e.g., English, where highly
standardized language is required for specific purposes.1

Table 6-1. Relationship between sociolinguistic context and standardization

Society Homogeneous Heterogeneous

Political Environment Highly central controlled Democratic, diversified

Vision Static conservative, relatively Dynamic, radical, in constant

stable change

Goals Status quo Future oriented

Linguistic Base From historical linguistics From sociolinguistics

Policy/Methodology Prescriptive, covert, rigid Descriptive, overt, flexible

Table 6-1 contrasts the various aspects of present-day conditions with

some of the major reasons why script standardization was able to take a
traditional approach in a very homogeneous sociolinguistic environment.
In the new historical context, pluricentric or multi standards are the trend,
not only in the script reform, but also for the definition of the standard for
putonghua. Mass putonghua is comprised of a flexible standard, charac-
terized by local dialectal phonological features, taking into account such
factors as region, sector, occupation, school, and age (see Section 2.3,
Chapter 4). The old standard has been further divided into three bands and
six levels (for a detailed description of levels and proficiency degrees as
measured by the National Putonghua Proficiency Test, see Sailard 2004:
176). Old standardization was concerned only with a standard that was as
historically accurate as possible; it failed to note that it was supposed to
deal with more than one goal. In light of the diversity of modern society,
orthography reform practice has been seeking to find the best solution to
the current problem. Ferguson (1996: 268-269) points out that establishing
a standard can be very complex because of the varying degrees of
difference between the standard form and all other varieties of it. The
‘ideal’ standardization “refers to a language which has a single, widely-
accepted norm which is felt to be appropriate with only minor modification
or variation for all purposes for which the language is used”. Where
this ideal condition does not exist, the standard “requires considerable
subclassification to be of any use”. This is the situation Chinese character
standard setters have to face, as we can see from discussions in the
subsequent sections – Chinese characters are increasingly used in wider
256 Envisioning the Future

areas at different levels for varying purposes. Ferguson suggests that “in
case of more than one norm, the nature of the norms must be treated”. So
the standardization can be unimodal, or bi- or multimodal.
Socio-political grounds would suggest the necessity for creating
separate standards or systems of writing for different domains, with there
being a need for no less than three distinct standards. The proposed multi-
standard model in Figure 6-2 has as its aim the modification of old
practices, rendering them more fit for the new functions required of the
script. To actually implement such a model, a sociolinguistic survey needs
to be done in order to find out what scripts are being used for what pur-
poses to provide a sound basis for policy development. In this framework,
the script reform direction turns predictably to a multi-standard model to
accommodate diversity. The possible relationships among standards are
illustrated in Figure 6-2.

2.3 Deliberation on the Notion of Standardization

In the sections which follow, we examine the three minimum standards

needed to meet China’s script requirements, these being ‘Standard A’ for
the general public, a substandard for personal use and a substandard for
machine use. To make the proposed tripartite standards of what we call the
‘pluricentric model’ more workable, they also might be defined in terms of
a function specific multilayered process that included socio-political sets
of characters for areas like classical studies and specialist disciplines.

2.3.1 ‘Standard A’ for the General Public

Much has been done in China in the area of theoretical construction and
normative codification for a ‘Standard A’. This traditionally human-orien-
ted standard can also be defined as the General Standard, and the standard
that has codified characters for computer use as the IT-Oriented Standard.
In Zhou’s (1986c: 50) terms, our Standard A can be understood as his
Basic Standard (BS), and all our remaining standards can be put under his
Application Standard (AS). The Standard A is the centre of standardization
work and serves as the central common denominator for other sub-stan-
dards. As to the relationship between the two categories of standardization,
Zhou (1986b: 51) argues that, while AS should be defined on the basis of
BS and should cluster around it, AS is allowed to “adjust to some extent”
to satisfy the various requirements in specific application areas. Furthermore,
 Stylized Handwriting Substandard for Personal Use
Chapter 6

Parts of Second Scheme

Parts of Traditional Forms

Standard A

General Public

Official Publication
(Official Standard Characters)

GB2312-80 Code Set

IT-Oriented Script

Other international Pinyin and other

Standard sets alphabetic systems

Substandard for Machine Use

Figure 6-2. Pluricentric model for Chinese script standardization

257
258 Envisioning the Future

“AS can be formed prior to BS. If AS is found at variance with BS when

the latter becomes available, then AS can be amended accordingly in due
course.”
No government has ever attempted, or been able to provide, a complete
official table of hanzi, even though the hanzi inventory has been system-
atically modified many times throughout history. This lack of a complete
official table of all characters makes agreement on the definition of the
official form of standard characters almost impossible. But this dis-
organized state of hanzi does not deny or negate the existence of the historic
notion of standard hanzi; rather, it demonstrates that the notion of
standardized hanzi has been variously defined in different dynasties.
Standard characters, necessitated by computer application, are a modern
idea, with a history of only some sixteen years (Wang T.K. 2003). Various
definitions can be found in different research publications. The circulars
concerning the issuance of the “Guiding Standard for Assessing the
Management Work of Public Character Use in the Cities” (on a trial basis)
and the Management Decree of Character Use in Publications (the Office
of Standard Work 1997: 65, 73) are the first official documents that have
attempted to define standard and non-standard characters. In 2000, this
issue became a major problem in formulating the Language Law (1/2001)
(see Appendix D). The attempt to give a clear and official definition in the
Law was abandoned, and a covert policy was adopted. The consensus
reached during these discussions was documented in the official reports,
and the agreed-upon definition (Education Office: 2001: 43-44) is as
follows:
Standard characters include two types: simplified/verified characters
and characters having a historical legacy. The latter refers to historical
characters still in active use in modern Chinese; they constitute the
major part of standard characters and do not need to be verified.
Simplified and verified characters include those in the five subparts
decreed by the Mainland government from 1955 to 1995, with the aim
of regulating official publications. They are:
• Simplified characters in the General List of Simplified Characters,
approved and reissued by the State Council in October 1986;
• Rectified characters in the First Table of Verified Variant Forms,
decreed by the Culture Ministry and the CCSR in March 1955;
• The Table of Common Chinese Characters, issued in March 1988
by SCLW in conjunction with the State Department of Press and
Media;
Chapter 6 259

• Characters replaced by rectified characters in the nine tables of

Verified Rare Characters for Geographical Names above County
Level, released between 1955 and 1964 by the State Council;
• Characters replaced by rectified characters in the Announcement of
Unified Characters for Some Names of Measurement Units (metric
units such as kilometer, kilogram), broadcast in July 1977 by the
CCSR, in conjunction with the State Bureau of Measurement
Standards.

2.3.2 Substandard for Personal Use

As a descriptive standard, recognition should be given to popular forms

that are already in current use; it is less rigid and more flexible and
encompasses a wider variety of hanzi forms for use in certain social
domains. The Substandard for Personal Use provides everyday users with
a legitimate and standard form, but it should not be seen as a restriction on
personal usage. On the contrary, it gives more freedom to choose one’s
own way to write in a characteristic style. Another advantage in having a
descriptive Substandard is that it is a good way to raise public awareness
about standardization. In a sense, it legalizes the unofficial hanzi, and thus
is a pragmatic means to recognize the actual situation. As discussed in
Section 2.2, Chapter 2, a number of non-official characters have been in
wide use for quite some years. Scholars have called for years for these to
be collected, described and to be promulgated in order to regulate the
laissez-faire state of their use. Many popular SSS characters, for instance,
are still widely used but have been kept out of the official standards. Li
Jianguo (2000: 11), a language standardization researcher, is also very
critical of the ineffectiveness of LP policy in addressing the change of
public hanzi use. He points out, the official standard Modern Chinese
Dictionary was the standard in the 1960s, and there is no mechanism to
modify it to take into account new norms so that it can keep abreast of
language development.
From a technological perspective, the first beneficiary of a Substandard
for Personal Purposes would be the prospective users and developers of
OCR technology and handwriting input software. As previously stated,
OCR technology is very attractive to the majority of the population who
are pinyin illiterates, poor putonghua speakers, or those older people who
are unable to cope with the alphabetic keyboard. But those working in the
field assume that it will take at least a decade before OCR is working at
essentially the same level as keyboard typing, because of the irregular
nature of handwriting, with everyone having their own handwriting
260 Envisioning the Future

features, including personal preferences. A thousand people may write a

character in a thousand different ways, but underlying these thousand
variants there is a basic outline that defines the essence of the character
which can be and should be standardized. Traditionally, the recommended
standard guiding people’s handwriting was based on popular calligraphy
copybooks. Developing a Substandard for Particular Purposes requires
some well-coordinated and planned systematic work. The opinion is that
the basis for the Substandard should be the most commonly used forms
selected from among the people, and that scholars should set about the
codification of that norm in semi-official dictionaries to provide recom-
mended alternatives, so that there is an orthographic convention to which
users can refer. This was done through an Official List of Handwriting
Characters in Taiwan two decades ago, but no steps have been taken in
this direction in Mainland China.
To solve the dilemma of how to maintain the official norm while there
is more than one form for the same character, particularly when the sub-
standard has become more acceptable than the official norm, is an impor-
tant task of standardization.

2.3.3 Substandard for Machine Use – IT-oriented

Rather than clear-cut boundaries there would be a great deal of overlap

between the standard for humans and the IT-oriented standard for machines.
The latter may be defined as a system of technologically implementable
features with static and quantifiable elements, concentrating particularly on
those features that are indispensable to technological development. The IT-
oriented standard has been regarded as working at a basic level and the
standard for human beings as a sort of superstructure for any language
community. The pro-machine standard is embodied in the general standard
(Standard A) with its attributes of flexibility, ambiguity, accommodation
and adaptation to particulars. The machine, on the other hand, functions on
principles opposite to these: it demands an absolute and higher-level
standardization of form. In many cases the machine is zero-tolerant of
divergences and deviations, and, having been constructed for industrial
convenience, follows coercive and prescriptive rules. The differences
between the general standard for humans and the IT-oriented standard
reflect the use of characters in differently functioning spheres and domains
– IT-oriented protocols are overtly pegged to quantitative criteria and
precise measurements. In contrast, although standards play an essential
role in human communication, people can accommodate variation, so that
the standard for humans will always be more nebulous, relativistic and
Chapter 6 261

subjective, and may often involve a choice between alternatives, and the
abandonment of less qualified candidates.
Most IT-oriented standards, despite some being more linguistically
neutral, are based on conventional standards. In other words, an IT-
oriented standard also requires linguistic justification to make hanzi more
logical and acceptable. Therefore, most IT-oriented standards are formu-
lated on the basis of society-targeted standards. Within the Chinese legal
framework, a sub-commission (the Approval Commission of Standard-
ization Work) was established under the SCLW in 2003, and detailed
provisions were developed for how a standard is proposed, submitted,
assessed and approved. But a language standard does not become an
industrial standard until it is passed by the State Standards Bureau and is
put into effect in the market. If the process of making the standards for
human use is seen as normalization and for computers as standardization,
the relationships and differences between the two categories can be
described with reference to a number of criteria as set out in Table 6-2.

Table 6-2. Differences between norm and standard

Normalization Standardization
Methodology choose from existing set up quantitative features
variants
Orientation human and society machine and industry
Complementation flexible and changeable stiff and fixed
through propaganda through market
Locus/context domestic International
Definition describable and qualitative prescriptive and operational
by researchers by engineers
Emphasis system and process detail and result
Consideration rational and acceptable Computer-friendly and
mechanically convenient

There are three kinds of IT-oriented standards in terms of their

relationship with the General Standard:

1. The first kind is a purely IT-oriented standard that is defined in terms

of quantitative measurements without any linguistic consideration, so a
significant part of these standards falls completely outside the linguists’
concerns; e.g., the GB/T14720-93 256X256 Grid Code of the Bold
262 Envisioning the Future

Characters for Information Interchange, issued by the State Bureau of

Technology Supervision in 1993.
2. The second kind has nothing to do with public language use and has
little implication for human language activities. This standard is
defined on the basis of linguistic description, but is supposed to ensure
that software programmers work in accordance with generally recog-
nized standards, thus enabling their products to serve all members of
the community effectively; e.g., the Standard of Stroke Ordering of the
General Modern Characters, issued by the SCLW and the Department
of Media and Press in 1997, and the GF3001-1997 Standard of
Character Components for Information Interchange, issued by the
SCLW in 1997.
3. The third kind is intended to facilitate IT development and its major
function is for technological convenience. There might have been no
need to enforce these standards had they not been demanded by the IT
industry, but once fully in place, they also restrict human language
behavior. For example, GB 2312-80: the characters included in the code
set are official standard characters that are also circulated in society. On
the other hand, in order to accommodate the need to automatically
process large texts on machines and to provide an interface between
domestic standards and in international standard in cyberspace as well
as in some of the so-called Big Set encoding standards, such as the
series of GB-2312’s supplementary sets that was put in use in the mid-
1990s, GB 13000.1 and some other character standard sets mentioned
in Appendix F, the characters included are well beyond the official
standards for human use, i.e., a large number of traditional characters
and variant forms are integrated.

Figure 6-3. Sample page of GB 2312-80

Chapter 6 263

During the past 47 years, LP workers and IT experts have done

important work in using the power invested in government to fix the
language problems. Starting in November 1954, with the Directive on
Discussing the Chinese Character Simplification Scheme, issued by the
Centre of the CCP through October 2001, when the Law of the P.R. China
for General Chinese Language was promulgated, various government
agencies at the state level have issued 101 laws, regulations, directives,
decisions and guidance on the use of language and hanzi (SCLW 2004c).
By 2001, eighteen laws had provisions about language use. In May 1981,
the first IT-oriented standard, GB 2312-80, was formulated (Figure 6-3),
and by December 2001 The Chinese Character Turning Stroke Standard of
GB 13000.1 Character Set came into effect. Over a period of 20 years, 81
IT-oriented technical standards have been promulgated. (A few of these
standards concern non-hanzi scripts such as Mongolian and the Uygur
orthography.) There are seventy ‘Class GB Standards’ issued by the State
Bureau of Technology Supervision, or by the Chief Bureau of National
Standards, eight ‘Class GF Standards’ issued by the SCLW and two ISO
standards.
The new link between the detailed standards for hanzi use and IT
advancement has gained an increasing degree of recognition. Standard-
ization has never before been as pivotal to the success of digital survival.
A report from the American Embassy in Beijing (US Embassy 1997)
observed that:
Poor technical standard compliance resulted in inferior character
alignment and display of the wrong character … Greater compliance
with PRC national technical standards will improve the Chinese-
language information product quality and make these products much
easier for people to use.

2.4 The Ongoing Exploration – Toward a Framework

for the Future

Some years after this pluricentric model was advanced, similar views
about the nature of language standards were becoming predominant among
some key language policy researchers. The change originated primarily
through the necessity to address the practical problems arising out of
defining standards for various aspects of hanzi, particularly to deal with the
criticism that the current framework was inadequate to accommodate excep-
tions in standards formulation. As an example, let us take the difficulty of
264 Envisioning the Future

standardizing total character numbers in the Comprehensive Table of

Standardized Characters.
Since 2002, the ongoing effort to formulate the CTSC has been the
foremost task for LP practitioners. Important as it is, the quantity deter-
mination has proved to be a hard nut to crack as discussed in Section 2.1,
Chapter 4. According to Wang Tiekun (2004: 190-191), there are three
key factors that define the characters to be included in any standard table:
whether they are: i) for common use in modern times, ii) for general
communication purposes, and iii) within mainland China. Based on this
assumption, Wang proposes that instead of trying to work out a one-fits-all
standard, the characters included in the CTSC could be clustered into three
hierarchic levels: characters in Level-I (approx 3,500) are the commonest,
Level-II (approx 4,500) are less frequently used characters and Level-III
are designated to serve for the special purposes.
Considering that the CTSC would be the most important national
standard governing character use for both human and machine for at least
several decades to come, a relatively small number of characters is conven-
ient for general hanzi users, but computers are expected to be able to
process all characters in a world characterized by a borderless information
flow. However, either case would inevitably lead to an apparent paradox: a
small operational number, say about 3,500 from an educational point of
view, would undoubtedly cover more than 99.99 percent of modern publi-
cations. But this number would be error prone if the written text extended
to wider domains. For example, for computer applications, it would be
inadequate to reproduce ancient texts, or it would appear awkward in
dealing with the hanzi-wrapped information circulating on international
communication networks. On the other hand, technologically speaking, a
bigger number – in which most hanzi are only necessary for very special
purposes – would not only waste cyberspace resources, but also create an
unimaginably large piece of work from the perspective of LP. To include
more characters (some standard code sets range between 20,000-30,000
characters) in the national standard would result in not only bringing more
RC, variant forms and non-Mandarin characters into circulation for
common use, but would also require reviving a large number of obsolete
characters which long ago ceased to be used in modern life. One aspect
which was not discussed previously is that, once a government-mandated
standard is put into force, it tends to trigger a ‘the more, the better’ com-
petition (largest is best) among dictionary compilers, input program devisers
and software venders, because the inclusiveness of dictionaries and the data
processing ability of a larger number of hanzi – while practically valueless –
offers a selling point and mark of differentiation in the marketplace.
Chapter 6 265

Faced with this kind of paradox and particularly with frequent criti-
cisms of the failures of various official standards to deal with increasingly
diverse situations over recent years (and after extensive reflection and
review of previous practices in managing character use, as well as fore-
seeing possible problems deriving from more complex circumstances in
the new historical context), a new model of what can be called function-
specific multilayered standards has become accepted among mainstream
LP decision makers and has been received very positively by many
researchers. First proposed by Wang Tiekun (2003), it was elaborated in
greater detailed by other predominant scholars such as Fei and Xu (2005)
and Wang Ning (2004b). The multilevel approach attempts to provide
theoretical explanations for understanding the limitations of previously
published tables, as well as to develop a paradigm to define the characters
that are going to appear in the CTSC that is being formulated.
The best feature of such a function-specific multilayered standards
model is that it discerns the previously intermingled relationships between
the past and the present, the inside and the outside, the majority and the
minority and the human and the machine in character use. Take the
General List of Simplified Characters (2235) for example. The table,
which was created in the 1950s and officially promulgated in 1964, was
originally targeted at the common user who was struggling to gain a basic
ability to read and write characters encountered in daily life. Due to a
failure of understanding the functional area and the sociolinguistic under-
pinning of the table in question, some scholars inferred by analogy the
principles of simplified components and used them to simplify a rather
large number of characters in compiling dictionaries (Wang 2002: 62).
Likewise, reprinting classical texts, which are normally read by a relatively
small number of so-called intellectuals, requires many times more
characters than the 2,235 that were simplified. As a result, a number of
‘simplified characters’ – that were neither included in the official
simplification tables nor have existed historically – were coined through
overgeneralization, causing a great deal of misunderstanding and confu-
sion among readers. Similarly, in machine applications, people currently
are frequently annoyed by the inability of simplified characters to match
their traditional counterparts on a one-to-one basis in automatic conver-
sion. Again, according to the model of function-specific multilayered
standards, this occurs because character simplification is designed for the
convenience of human written communication which covers only the
most-used hanzi. Computer applications fall beyond the functional area
they intend to serve, which includes the expectation of processing texts of
large size. Fei and Xu (2005) emphasize the notion of level specificity, and
266 Envisioning the Future

argue that most of the previously formulated standards about character use
are in essence aimed at the level of the majority, i.e., public users. These
standards have no responsibility, nor the ability to regulate exceptional
occurrences which applied most commonly only to a minority of priv-
ileged social groups. This notion has never been explicitly articulated by
the standard setters, but within a framework of this kind, using a relative
and multidimensional model, many usages that were considered illegal or
inappropriate in the past can now be treated individually, and thus the
discrepancies between the majority and minority are readily resolved.
The fact that the new model has been cogently expressed in a number
of recent articles shows that, in order to address a discrepancy between the
prescribed standards and the variations found in real life, the problems
born out of earlier transformations need to be looked at from a new per-
spective. However, a number of issues are far from being settled, and some
of these relate to rather fundamental questions. For instance, in a digital
society modern day users are exposed to a body of written communication
of unlimited scope, which cannot be defined or constrained by a fixed
number of characters. Even so, having only a fixed number of characters
that define this domain tends to overly restrict the needed variations. The
specific interest in the multilayered theory is to a large extent due to the
fact that it defines the role of standards for more flexible development,
giving due consideration to individual rights in character use and recog-
nizing the need to strike a balance between four sets of relationships, i.e.,
the past vs the present, the inside vs the outside, the majority vs the
minority and the human vs the machine. The authors believe the model has
become popular because the notion of functions and levels has been
understood as offering a particularly useful solution for the unsatisfactory
outcomes of previous standardization practices. New paradigms for new
concepts could lead to new ways of thinking about these demarcations in
an increasingly diverse and complex society. In this sense, it is quite
legitimate to proceed in this manner and to operate temporarily with a
relatively defined concept of hanzi. This description highlights the com-
mon ground between our pluricentric model and the thinking currently
being explored in academic circles. It shows that this multilayered
standards approach shares insights with the framework proposed in Figure
6-2, enabling LPers to reflect on the more profound principles needed to
standardize hanzi.
Chapter 6 267

3. LANGUAGE REFORM MODERNIZATION

In this chapter, the socio-political aspect of standardization has been

emphasized by drawing attention to the conflict between language use
standardization and societal diversification. Xi (2004: 81-85) has argued
that Chinese language modernization includes four dimensions: (1) to
modernize the language and script per se, (2) to modernize language
application, (3) to modernize research methodology, and (4) to modernize
linguistic theory. He notes that to accommodate the changing social
environment, both ways of implementing standardized forms and the role
of the standard setter have to be redefined. In this section, we put forward
the fifth modernization – to modernize the way to modernize language.
After 1986, the focus of LP work has shifted from creating (simplification
and Romanization) to selecting (standardization), a process which has been
getting evermore sophisticated. Standardization work normally involves
making a decision where choices have to be made from more than one
variety of the same occurrence. As Kaplan and Baldauf (1997: 123) point
out, “the ‘standard’ language is really no one’s ‘first’ language. On the
contrary, the ‘standard’ language must be acquired through individual
participation”. This shift has made it essential to get as wide a consensus
as possible from the targeted population on the selections made, to gain
acceptance of the new products of corpus planning. A new type of survey,
propagation and evaluation mechanism is required to accommodate this
change. However, the official functions of LP agencies do not accommo-
date this as they remain basically unchanged within the current LP
framework. A description of this official policy toward standardization can
be gleaned from Deng Xiaoping’s famous saying: “Crossing the river by
sensing the stones” [mo zhe shitou guo he]. It would be desirable to have a
legislative procedure that would act to prevent higher-level power
struggles from interfering in LP and using it as a political weapon to abuse
the ‘people’.
Given the economic and social changes that have occurred in China in
the 1990s, finding appropriate mechanisms for script reform are now the
central concern of LP modernization.
In the following discussion a number of representative issues, critical to
character standardization in this context, are examined. But first, Cooper’s
(1989) accounting scheme is used to summarize the changes required in
current and future LP work, as a way of relating knowledge about complex
relationships to the social environment and LP ventures in the Chinese
context.
268 Envisioning the Future

3.1 Theoretical Framework

In pursuance of a descriptive, predictive, explanatory and theoretically

adequate framework for understanding LP, Cooper turns to four instances
in human science disciplines that generally had previously not been seen as
related to language study, including: (1) the management of innovation, (2)
the instance of marketing, (3) language as a tool for the acquisition and
maintenance of power, and (4) the instance of decision making. Based on
the similarities in the purposes and operational principles between LP and
these four overlapping disciplines, Cooper proposed a framework which he
called an accounting scheme for the study of LP. In this scheme, he sets
out eight components which, omitting the sub-rubrics, are: (1) what actors
(2) attempted to influence what behaviors, (3) of which people, (4) for
what ends, (5) by what means, (6) and with what results, (7) under what
conditions and (8) through what policy making process. If we map the
Chinese LP process into Cooper’s eightfold accounting scheme, we can
compare the nature of the new historical LP conditions after 1986 with
those prior to this period (see Table 6-3).
The comparison shows, multiple changes have occurred that clearly
characterize script reform under the new historical conditions. Corpus
planning operates in real-world contexts in conjunction with the social,
cultural, political and economic forces (see Chapter 5). Among the
challenges created by the interaction of these forces is that the impact on
hanzi planning, made by communication technology and computing,
seems to have been foregrounded, which has necessitated a shift in the
focus of hanzi planning from reforming (simplification and phoneticization)
to standardization, where the latter means making choices between
varieties. The promotion of standardized forms has become the new task
put before LPers. This requires the “planning authorities to engage more in
active promotion of the products and standards among the potential user
public” (Das Gupta and Ferguson 1977: 5). As Fishman (1983: 112) has
argued, “to have a ‘model of goodness’ accepted, liked, learned and used
by the target population”, the audience “needs to be told why what is being
offered is desirable, admirable, and exemplary”.
This task would seem to be more challenging in the current context,
with a population that has a growing awareness of its rights, which
presupposes that the exercise of power in today’s China is being increas-
ingly achieved through democratic means, involvement and consensus.
The authoritarian support and compliance for policies that could be
Chapter 6 269

Table 6-3. Changes to the Chinese LP process after 1986 according to Cooper’s framework

Before 1986 After 1986

What actors High level government bureaux Basically the same as before 1986, but
and institutions, largely with wider participation of official or
‘bottom-up’ with limited users’ semi-official organizations and
participation academics

To influence what Interpersonal communication; Humans’ interaction with computers

behaviors masses’ access to knowledge

Of which people The majority population – Literate young and urban population,
illiterates and semi-illiterate future oriented
adults, most reside in rural areas

For what ends To liberate huge productive To empower the significant citizen
human resources for nation with technological advantages;
building; language reform; standardization; international
domestic

Under what Typical agricultural economy; Market economy; society is getting

conditions socialist system; highly diversified with a new dimension of
controlled society; cultural life culture; revitalization and preservation
is simple of tradition

By what means Large scale; radical change; Status cultivation and institutional
political campaign; state promotion
mandate

Through what Centralization and coercion; Developing toward democracy and

policy decision- top-down model transparency; involvement; bottom-up
making process model

With what effects Simplification and Standardization; mechanical efficiency

phoneticization; a simple and of hanzi is improved and hanzi is more
convenient modern script digitally maneuverable
system was obtained

generated in a totalitarian society, now involves tremendously complicated

socio-cultural sensitivities that most LP professionals are ill-equipped to
deal with. Working in this area must inevitably involve the use of prestige
and image planning, which are largely unheard of in the Chinese LP
community. (see Ager 1999, 2001, 2005, Baldauf 2004, Haarmann 1990,
270 Envisioning the Future

Kaplan and Baldauf 1997, 2003; and related theoretical concepts such as
‘communicative competence’, ‘language intellectualization’ and ‘high
prestige domains’) It may be useful, therefore, to briefly describe the
importance of these issues to provide a theoretical base for the second
theme of this chapter – LP modernization. This, then, may lead us to think
that prestige and image planning might be, in fact, of some practical value
in the Chinese context.
LP activities can be examined from different perspectives. Haugen
(1966a) conceived the LP process as a four-stage activity, and his well-
known fourfold problem areas arranged in matrix form have been widely
accepted and applied in LP practices. He subsequently revised his model
(Haugen, 1983), taking into consideration the two additional dimensions
suggested by Neustupný (cultivation, 1970) and Rubin (evaluation, 1971).
In 1989, Cooper argued for acquisition or language-in-education planning
to be made a separate activity, while in 1990, Haarmann (1990) suggested
a fourth range of activities – prestige planning, to supplement Haugen’s
fourfold problem areas model. Kaplan and Baldauf (1997, 2003) argue that
Haarmann’s typology enforces the notion that LP occurs at different levels
and for a variety of purposes. Corpus and status planning represent the
productive venture at the one end of the continuum, while prestige
planning serves as a receptive or value function.
Nevertheless, some significant changes have begun to emerge since the
1990s. Scholars have come to look at LP implementation as a two-way
model: the planner and the recipient, where emphasis is now given to the
acceptance of language products, the recipient’s attitude and to methods of
persuasion. Cooper (1989) draws an analogy between the market pro-
motion of commercial produce and the societal acceptance of the planned
language product. Haarmann’s (1990) prestige planning dimension attaches
importance to those factors that influence how the varieties chosen are
accepted, learned and used by the target population and, emphasizing the
assessment of the value of stakeholders’ views, particularly the process
of participation. In his words, “[t]he individual’s control of planning
measures is the most basic force in the language-planning process in terms
of acceptance and rejection of its implications” (p. 121), and “a planned
standard variety finds its genuine support in a positive evaluation by
its potential users who may attribute prestige values to its structure and
function” (p. 118).
Haarmann’s arguments concur with psychologists’ research on
people’s perception on the fairness of policy making. Policy success shows
that “individuals tend to perceive that policies are fair, not if outcomes of
Chapter 6 271

the policy are fair and equitable, but whether they have been adequately
consulted in the process of constructing the policy” (Schiffman 2004: 6).
The ramifications of this emerging tendency raise the need for us to
seek an alternative understanding and interpretation of the related planning
efforts. In the context of today’s China, the major content of LP modern-
ization, required by the new feature of script reform, involves a functional
transformation from productive and regulative planning to indicative and
promotional planning (see e.g., Das Gupta and Ferguson 1977: 5), or
prestige cultivation and image building of the planned products – various
officially sanctioned standards. The future success and effectiveness of the
planning endeavor depends to a great extent on this transformation. Image
and prestige planning is a long, delicate and arduous process (Ager 2005:
1041). In the Chinese context, this also suggests that image and prestige
planning may need to be undertaken at a local (Canagarajah 2005) or
micro (Baldauf 2006) level to deal with regional issues (see Section 4.3,
Chapter 5).

3.2 The Importance of Language Planners

and Stakeholders Agreeing on a Standard

It is difficult to evaluate the effectiveness of language planning for

determining either the degree to which goals have been fulfilled, or the
relative contribution of various factors to the outcome since its ultimate
effect can only be shown by social use over a long period of time (Kaplan
and Baldauf 1997: 4-5). However, the unpredictable nature of script
reform should not be taken to suggest that little or nothing can be done to
reduce the risk. An ideal decision-making model should maximize the
advantages of a democratic process and public involvement. The rationale
for conducting a large-scale public opinion survey in a systematic manner
can also be justified by the following points:

1. There is no such thing as a minor issue when it comes to script change;

even the trial use of some feature has a great impact on society. As
Cohen and Kraak (cited in Geerts 1977: 202) have said, “the problem
of so-called spelling simplification can hardly be called simple”. When
a writing system remains unchanged, few people think about the
problems inherent in it. But, if an alteration is made, be it major or
relatively minor, it will draw nationwide attention and trigger a debate,
e.g., the recent debates over spelling reform in France and Germany
(e.g., Ball 1999). The controversial nature of even small changes to a
language’s orthography can be seen from the German example where,
272 Envisioning the Future

despite extensive consultation and relatively minor changes being

made, controversy over the changes remains strong (Coulmas 1998;
Ohlendorf 1997). The case of efforts to alter some American spellings
for words related to the metric system also shows “how much heat can
be generated by even a minor change in our habits of English spelling”
(Haugen 1983).
2. Geerts has (1977) demonstrated that “In spelling matters much more is
claimed than proved” (p. 180). No hard and fast criterion can determine
a clear-cut advantage or disadvantage for script reform. “Discussions of
spelling are notorious for generating more heat than light”, lamented
Gregersen (p. 421).
3. Script reform is a very sentimental issue. Language problems are
discussed in every community, by linguists as well as non-linguists,
and every stakeholder has a strong point of view and some expertise
(Baldauf 1994: 82). Coulmas (1989: 241) aptly concludes, that discus-
sions “often resemble a religious war more than a rational discourse”,
because the “writing system is the most tangible part of a language,
often being the subject of emotional attachment and irrational attitudes”.

3.3 Challenging Existing Practices – Experiences

and Realities

Chinese linguists keep in mind the well-known saying about the

process of standard formation: once a few peers do it, it is done to all (wu
bei shu ren, ding ze ding yi – 吾辈数人，定则定矣).2 The implication of
the saying is that sometimes it is almost impossible to come to a consensus
on creating a standard. Furthermore, past experience shows that sometimes
it may not be a simple matter of democracy and representation, like it is in
politics, where things can be settled by voting. The case of the Old
National Pronunciation illustrates how a democratically arrived standard
for pronunciation met a devastating fate (see Section 4.3, Chapter 5).
However, the subsequent experiences of pronunciation standardization
demonstrate that its validity will be challenged by the public if an agreed-
upon standard is not based on sound support from the masses. To appre-
ciate this, one only has to examine the two major pronunciation standard-
ization programs in New China, those of 1957 and 1985. The top-bottom
approach is a common feature of both of these pronunciation standards and
the principal reason why they have drifted away from demotic speech. The
resulting confusion, seen in the glaring difference between the official
standard and the common parlance, highlights the huge gap between the
Chapter 6 273

standard on paper and actual use in society. For example, the evidence of
divergent reading of characters is too obvious to ignore; it is very common
for public figures to appeal to the community to correctly pronounce their
names when using them in the media.3 After grouping some highly used
characters with contentious pronunciation, Li Yuming (2004c: 67) asks an
important question: Should we re-standardize them, and if so, on what
basis?

3.3.1 Misusing ‘the People’

The success of script reform is commonly recognized as being highly

dependent on the societal preferences, or the masses’ attitude, to use
Communist terminology. In a sense, the effectiveness of script reform is
actually a matter of the majority embracing it – as they did with the
reforms programs in the 1950s, so the extent and the manner in which ‘the
people’ are represented becomes truly important, at least for non-technical
standards. An immediate empirical task of LP should be to find out under
what conditions and to what extent decisions regarding the implementation
of LP programs are determined by public feeling. ‘The masses’ is a very
important entry in the Communist dictionary; without a theory-based and
large-scale survey or experiment, the indiscriminate use of ‘the masses’
and ‘the people’ becomes vulnerable to serve political ends. In the
literature discussing the social acceptability of previous reform measures,
the Second Scheme in particular, ‘the people’ and ‘the masses’ are the
most frequently recurring terms, but they are used without supporting data,
indicating that the use of these terms is not well grounded in fact.
Broadly speaking, the need to reform the language is decided by two
groups of people in China, the vast ‘masses’ and the ‘Central’ (govern-
ment). No attempts are made to give a clear definition of either of these
two vague concepts. History shows that conflicts about linguistic affairs
are customarily resolved by a high profile speech by a national leader, as
was the case in the debate about the hanzi’s future that was discussed in
Chapter 2. Most of the time, this kind of speech is collectively written by
the official scholars. When such directives from the top are delivered to
scholars for implementation, it is always a guessing game as to whether
they come from the Central Committee (zhongyang) or from the
Leadership above (shangbian). As Kaplan and Baldauf (1997: 55) aptly
point out, we just know that “these are people with power and authority
who make language related decisions for us, often with little or no
consultation with the ultimate language learners and users. Exactly who
274 Envisioning the Future

these planners are is often left in general terms [emphasis added by

authors]”.
In 1950, the people could be more certain: the versatile and multi-
talented Mao did not hide his interest in language and script affairs, neither
did the premier Zhou Enlai, who was actively involved and was the
ultimate authoritative source. But from 1986 onwards, the people were
unsure who the ultimate decision makers were. While it is politically
appropriate that various schemes are commissioned and given final
approval by the Leadership, the people cannot help but question who in the
Leadership is making the decisions when schemes are unexpectedly
rejected.
The term ‘vast masses’ (guangda qunzhong), a much loved catchphrase
by language planners, has been so habitually misused and is so ambiguous
that no one pays any attention to it any more. It is analogous to the term
‘the Australian people’, used so casually as a justification by politicians in
parliament house. In the Chinese context, without an effective means to
channel public opinion, only the views of highly organized minorities are
effectively presented through the printed page, radio and television. In
some circumstances, if the terms were used in a relative sense, ‘vast
masses’, in the broadest terms, represents the people working in the cliques
of linguistics, education, the media and IT industry, such as language
teachers, relevant scholars and experts, dictionary compilers, media
workers, and so on, who have frequent contact or are in close relationship
with LP workers. The term would be confusing to the real masses, when it
is used as a synonym for this cohort of professionals. In sum, the
validation mechanism currently employed by LP authorities is at best
tokenism when implemented on this basis.

3.3.2 Exploring the Possibility of a Public Opinion Poll

Those involved in theorizing LP recognize the need for wider

involvement, for example, Kaplan and Baldauf (1997: 55) observe that
A number of authors have questioned the role of traditional language
planners or actors and have argued for the inclusion of a broader
participation base, i.e., the people for whom language is planned should
have a say in its actual planning and implementation. The use of
sociolinguistic surveys or other such methods means that the traditional
planners have the means to collect information about the impact of
potential planned language changes at the macro level. Whether there is
a polity will to do so, is another matter.
Chapter 6 275

Schiffman (2004: 6) criticizes the ignorance of the public about

language policy formation as a ‘father knows best’ approach. He points out
that “[e]ven in societies where language policy formation is thought of as
more ‘democratic’, the policy rarely involves consultation”. Based on
cultural and political analysis, users’ feelings about script reform can be
cautiously forecast. The most scientific and reliable way, however, is un-
doubtedly through public opinion polls. Public support prior to implemen-
tation can reduce the risks of rejection to a minimum. In China, where all
propaganda apparatuses are almost entirely financed by the state, it is
particularly important to find a mechanism through which public feelings
can be channeled. An opinion poll conducted by the media is a widely
adopted means used in a number of countries to do this.
Before proceeding with further discussion on the importance of public
involvement in Chinese script reform, a historical example might be
helpful. In order to collect competing public views about the script reform,
the Language Weekly section in the Shanghai Times conducted a key
informant interview in July, 1947, and written feedback was obtained from
28 influential members of the intelligentsia in various relevant fields on ten
questions about hanzi Romanization. The result was that all respondents
chose the adoption of Latin letters, instead of Japanese Kana, a self-created
hanzi stroke scheme, or Cyrillic script (Ye 1949: 519-555). When the
Romanization issue was put forward in the first days of New China, a
sharp debate arose on what form should be chosen for the forthcoming
phonetic scheme. None of the papers mentioned the Shanghai Times
survey, suggesting that this potentially valuable information, collected just
a few years earlier, was ignored. Because Mao Zedong and some pres-
tigious scholars insisted on a nationalist-style scheme, three years were
wasted in devising a hanzi-based national script form (see Section 7.2.2,
Chapter 5). Today, with hindsight, Chinese feel fortunate to have chosen to
use Latin letters for pinyin, but may regret that useful empirical infor-
mation was bluntly ignored.
There are many international examples of LP where decisions are
arrived at with input from public opinion polls, particularly when there is
disagreement on some aspects of script reform within the community. For
example, Ferguson (1996: 273) argues that:
In fact, decisions on language questions are notoriously influenced by
emotional issues such as tribal, regional, religious identifications,
national rivalries, preservation of elites, and so on. They may even go
directly against all evidence of feasibility. The fact remains that the
availability of accurate, reliable information on the language situation
276 Envisioning the Future

of a country can be influential in making policy decisions and is of

tremendous value in planning and carrying out the implementation of
the policies.
The importance of public surveys has been emphasized anew over
recent years (e.g., Baldauf 2002; Baker 2006), but language attitude and
language-use surveys (known as sociolinguistic surveys; see Whiteley
1984; Kaplan and Baldauf 1997) are a tradition in LP research and
implementation. The majority of articles in Language Planning Process by
Rubin et al (1977) were devoted to LP surveys, although how they were
used, and the role they played in the policy-making process, depended on
the socio-political setting of each country. When, during the early 1990s,
spelling reform was proposed in Germany, a series of public opinion
surveys were conducted. Based on the results, the authorities were initially
dissuaded from continuing the reform program (Clyne 1995: 248-252).4 In
Turkey, those involved in the “reform went to great length in consulting
the public, for example through questionnaires published in the media”
(Boeschoten 1997: 375). Attention should also be drawn to Japanese
examples. During the formation of the Table of Common Characters, the
authorities convened 202 meetings within a span of eight years, and two
surveys were conducted. In order to get the ordinary peoples’ opinions
about the desirable total number in the table, the Propaganda Ministry
carried out a public opinion poll among ten thousand people in 1977 (He
2001: 128, 131). In 1995, concerned with the public’s complaints about the
unavailability of the traditional form for some Kanji, such as 鸥/鷗 (used
for personal names), the Culture Ministry launched a survey to see if the
public would accept computer processing of rare characters on a limited
basis (He 2001: 162).
Poll (1973: 55-56) sees the attitudes of the masses as playing two
crucial roles in implementing language planning: First, in all situations,
mass attitudes will have an effect on the degree to which policies calling
for change in mass language behavior are implemented; and second, in
certain situations, mass opinion will have an effect on the initial official
adoption of various language policies. He goes on to say that the latter
situations presumably exist whenever two conditions are fulfilled: (1) the
country is governed by competitively selected politicians who respect mass
opinion; and (2) language policy is one of the salient political issues
discussed by the mass media at the time. The conditions described by Poll
are certainly not present in China currently, but public opinion polls are
nevertheless a fascinating topic that has attracted increasing attention from
LP workers since the SSS.
Chapter 6 277

The Communist Party grew out of a social movement; thus its rule was
characterized by an emphasis on mass propaganda. Liu (1986) points out,
“after 1949, almost every policy was accompanied by a campaign to
involve all the population in its implementation. Most were highly orche-
strated affairs instead of genuine involvement”. The present politicians
attach more importance to building consensus rather than on pure political
mobilization and administrative coercion. Technical specialists, employed
by the state ministries, are also given more authority than they were
granted in the early extreme leftist atmosphere. In the new century, as the
iron curtain-style rule in China draws inevitably to a close, the democratic
forces are more vigorously at work than ever before. Applying public
opinion as a modern measure of risk reduction in LP projects would be a
logical consequence of current directions in socio-political change.
An overall review of the various forms used to seek public consensus
when an obvious divergence of opinion has occurred, revealed that since
1949 the following five approaches have been taken:

1. Organizing symposia and seminars: This is the most common form of

consultation, by bringing all those involved together. Normally, it is
done at the initial stages to conduct a feasibility study. Typically, the
conference is under tight government control and is confined to lin-
guists and relevant experts. In the formulation of the TSC in the 1950s,
a large number of linguistic experts were fully consulted using this
mechanism.
2. Convening an informal discussion forum (zuotan hui – 座谈会) or tea
party (chahua hui – 茶话会): During the 1960s, in order to repair the
GLSC, over 300 non-communist members from the National Demo-
cratic Political Consultative Organization attended nine informal
forums, convened by the Modifying Team of the Table of Simplified
Characters. It organized six Teachers’ Forums with over 100
participants to discuss the modified table (Wang 1995: 151). In October,
1956, the Examination Commission of the Pinyin Scheme, under the
State Council, organized a forum with invited representatives of lan-
guage education, literature and the arts, journalism, the press, science and
technology, translation, the army and non-governmental organizations,
to discuss the scheme (Zhou 1980b: 72-73).
3. Sending out notices, circulars and directives: At the end of September,
1950, during the preparatory work leading to the TSC, those in
authority sent out a Registry Form of Most Used Characters, and the
Principles of Collecting Simplified Characters, to the relevant insti-
tutions and language-related professionals. Eleven institutions and 52
278 Envisioning the Future

language-related professionals responded with a specific feedback

(Zhang et al 1997: 21). To canvass specialists’ suggestions, the author-
ities collected written opinions from 100 language educators in 39
cities before the Pinyin Scheme was submitted for promulgation (Zhou
1980b: 72-73).
4. Conducting interviews and investigations: In 1962, the CCSR esta-
blished a research team responsible for summarizing and mending the
TSC. Apart from some luminaries, such as Dong Biwu, Guo Moruo
and Hu Qiaomu, the team also went to interview workers, peasants,
businessmen and teachers living in the Beijing area (Wang 1995: 151).
In December, 1984, Wang Jun and Chen Zhangtai, the Director and
Secretary, personally went to visit members of the Standing Commis-
sion of the National People’s Congress and the National Political
Consultative Conference, to solicit their comments on whether 111 SSS
characters should be retained (Wang 2002: personal communication).
5. Distributing or publishing surveys through the media: It was reported
that before the TSC was issued, 30,000 copies of the pamphlets were
distributed to survey public opinion. Over 20,000 people from all walks
of life throughout Mainland China participated in the discussions, with
97 percent of them favoring the table. In addition, in a period of about
six months after the Draft Table of Simplification was issued in January,
1955, the CCSR received 5,167 letters from interested members of the
public (Chia 1992: 212; Fei 1997: 220).

A detailed description of the opinion collecting process shows that

what makes the above five approaches different from the public opinion
surveys we have seen in most modern democracies, is their token nature. A
former Director of the SCLW (2002: seminar; Note 10, Chapter 1), has
uncharacteristically acknowledged that opaque references to the public are
actually
… confined to certain select groups, mostly to academic circles, and
the targeted correspondents know very well that the purpose of the
meeting is to praise the issue, or at least to say something positive and
encouraging about it. As a result, even when we genuinely like to know
their true feelings, most of the general public customarily agree rather
than disagree, or simply shut their mouths.
Even for opinions within academia, transparency is very limited,
something which was criticized by some linguists in the first debate on LP
issues in the 1950s: “the CCSR did not publicize the divergence on some
heatedly debated issues – this is a grave loss” (Wang 1995: 476). And
Chapter 6 279

more than that, when key issues were unable to be resolved, more often
than not they would be turned over to ‘leading comrades’. This can be seen
best in some of the decision-making processes in the 1986 NCLW. There
was unquestionably a huge sense of discontent about some of the regres-
sive changes made at the Conference, and when grumbling LP workers
announced their dissatisfaction with the Conference decision to tone down
the phoneticization direction, the organizers gave the following explan-
ation (Chen 1986: 52):
About the decision on this matter, the SCLW has already asked for
instructions from the leader comrades in the CCCP and State Council.
As for the participating comrades’ opinions, we also reported to the
CCCP and the State Council, and yesterday afternoon, the SCLW
received the written instruction from the above (author emphasis) saying
they agreed with the decision.

3.3.3 Two Cases of Current Efforts at a Public Opinion Poll

The first case was the Table of Standardized Characters for Naming, one
of the important sub-projects under the CTSC. It is debatable whether it is
practically possible to standardize every character for everybody’s name in
such an enormous country with such a long recorded civilization?5 To
propagandize the Table, the Education Ministry set up an online forum
(http://www.china-language.gov.cn/webinfopub/list.asp?id=1042, 30/8/2003)
that invited Chinese Internet citizens to give their opinions and to provide
examples of the rare characters from their own names, or of names they
know. In the meantime, soho (com.cn) and sino (com.cn), two of the
country’s most popular websites, conducted a public opinion poll on June 2,
2000 (www.shyywz.com/page/jsp/showdetail.jsp?id=1080, 30/8/2003), on
‘Shall We Have a Restriction on Name Giving Rights?’. In just a few days,
30,000 of the Internet constituency cast their votes.
The second case was an online bulletin, launched to solicit nationwide
public opinion on the unified, logical and convenient set of names to call
hanzi’s component roots. The variant names, indicating the composing
units of hanzi, often cause confusion in a range of areas: education, oral
communication and dictionary indexation (Fu 1986: 97). It also causes
problems for hanzi-based input systems for which the components are used
as basic blocks to reconstruct hanzi. On February 26, 2001, in the course
of drafting the National Standard for Components’ Calling Names for
Information-Processing Hanzi Code Set GB-13000.1, an open letter was
published under the column of ‘Norms and Standards’ on the government
280 Envisioning the Future

website at ‘china-language.gov.cn’. It was more symbolic than practical,

as it largely targeted scholars and experts, and allowed only two weeks to
respond. However, given the borderless power of the Internet in spreading
information, it can be regarded as the first time that a LP agency openly
canvassed public opinion on script reform issues from the broader society.
Unlike the forums or meetings held for similar purposes, this approach was
not limited to a closed circle of selected insiders.6
These cases are just two of many standards that require public
consensus, and technological advances make it technically operational and
financially efficient to canvas opinion in this manner – although this does
limit the poll to computer users. The first nationwide LP survey in China
was carried out in 1999 under the joint sponsorship of the State Council
(Chinese Cabinet), the Ministry of Education and the SCLW. The objec-
tive was to assess the LP achievement in the past five decades and the
current situation of language and script use, to provide evidence for LP
policy making in the future. Another stated purpose was to help to predict
trends by gathering information about the actual situation of nearly 100
Chinese dialects and over 60 languages of other ethnic groups living in
Mainland China. The target population was 600,000 Chinese citizens aged
between 15 and 69. The survey was completed at the end of 2004, three
years after its projected completion date. This is a well publicized national
research program. However, except for a news briefing at a grand cere-
mony celebrating its completion and acknowledging the survey workers,
its outcome remains unanalyzed and unreported (at the end of 2006). It
was supposed to be used in LP policy formulation and to inform the
Language Law, which was passed in 2001. Therefore, a suggestion should
be presented to the authorities to establish a public opinion office,
preferably placed in the RIAL, with the aim of dealing exclusively and
expertly with public opinion as a valuable source of input for LP issues.

3.4 Looking for a Way Forward

IT-oriented standardization is the new central feature of Chinese LP.

Any possible future reform of the functions of the LP agency should focus
on two aspects: 1) minimizing the harmful intervention of non-professional
factors, and 2) deregulating LP agencies and management to make the
standardization work transparent and acceptable.
Chapter 6 281

3.4.1 More Freedom, Less Intervention

It is a well-worn cliché that the state intervention in language is a

powerful force in language planning. Language planning theory has given
a lot of importance to the role of the state in the decision making process.
Schiffman (1996: 13) points out that “[I]nterventionism is also inevitable
where an overt model of language planning is accepted”. But intervention
is an issue enmeshed in politics. The political environment has been a key
element in the definition of the actors in the language planning process.
Undoubtedly, in a totalitarian polity, there is no difference between state
intervention and personal intervention, and this attests to the necessity of
depersonalization in the future. Most LP decisions are ultimately political,
or in Baldauf and Kaplan’s (2003: 21) words “the underlying motivation of
language policy is almost invariably political rather than linguistic”,
although the degree to which this is the case varies. In fact, political inter-
vention is not always a necessarily harmful element, and if the political
environment is healthy, it can become a much-desired force. Lewis (1982:
250) says, “in an authoritarian or a democratic country, it is the attitude
and effort of the state which are most influential in promoting or restricting
the spread of a language”. In a highly coercive political system, external
interference constrains the work of competent scholars, particularly when a
reform program is being forced to go in an undesirable direction. This
undermines the role an LP agency should be playing in creating various
standards that are well-devised and documented.
In China, the national LP agency has been reorganized many times, and
partially due to the lack of a definition of responsibility, disorder in the
leadership has caused confusion among those involved7. Under the current
political structure and bureaucracy, a higher level LP or independent
governmental organ is also desirable. The current top level LP agency has
two obvious disadvantages. After the 1998 restructure, the SCLW was
placed under the Education Ministry, but its LP activities have nothing to
do with the language-in-education planning work. At present, the SCLW is
not a self-defined administrative body. Its activities, as previously men-
tioned, are mostly confined to research in the area of linguistic application
and research funding administration. It is not able to promulgate any LP
program without the concurrence of the relevant bureaucratic offices. What
is more, LP researchers emphasize the continuous progressive develop-
ment of LP practice, in which the last stage of planning is an evaluative
check to determine whether the change planned for occurred and the plan
worked. But as the regulation setter, the SCLW, under the current adminis-
trative bureaucracy, has no power to monitor implementation or to evaluate
282 Envisioning the Future

the outcomes. Pan Defu (2004) is critical of the fact that each time
different standards are decreed by more than one authority, it makes these
standards look weak and ineffective. For instance, the SSS was
promulgated by the State Council, but suddenly nullified by the Ministry
of Education only a few months after its promulgation, which violated the
basic principle that when a reform program is cancelled, it has to go
through the same legislative procedure that promulgated it (Wang T.K.
2003; Zhou 1983). This uncertainty at the highest levels of the decision-
making apparatus shares a distinct similarity with North Korea’s abolition
of its characters (Moon 2000).
Another unprofessional external force is the internal fight among feudal
political forces or interpersonal conflicts that put LP affairs in a vulnerable
position. In Chapter 1, the authors have argued that the final withdrawal of
the SSS was partially a consequence of conflicting forces, between the
protagonists and antagonists of the Scheme, within LP circles. A classical
case in Chinese LP history were the personal verbal attacks that occurred
among the regional representatives in the National Conference of Pronun-
ciation Standard in 1913 (DeFrancis 1950: 58; Yu 2003: 103). LP always
involves a certain degree of collaboration between specialists and admin-
istrators, and rapport between them is crucial for its success. Fishman et al
(1971: 296) argue that the nature of interpersonal ties (within and between
agencies) influences agency goals and operation. Yu Genyuan (1996: 179)
is also aware of the “destructive force of inharmonious interpersonal rela-
tionships” and warns, it “is an aspect of great importance among the
factors that cause a setback in the progress of Chinese language work”.8

3.4.2 Proposed Solution – Deregulation and Diversification

Experts assign great importance to spontaneous support from the social

elites in forming and spreading the standard. Su (2001b: 219) categorizes
the standard as: (a) governmental standard; (b) expert standard; and (c)
societal standard. He contends that during the formative period, when all
three kinds of standards are formed by establishing the specific require-
ments, only the governmental standard is coercive, but its success depends
heavily on whether the target population is supportive. While corrective
and prescriptive standards are manifest in dictionaries, a societal standard
forms and exists unconsciously in people’s language habits, supporting the
living language of the people. Above all, it is a reflection of deeper historical
factors. Therefore, the societal standard, with its wider implications and
effects, is more fundamental in the long term. It has spontaneously taken
shape over a relatively long period, in which social practices by prestigious
Chapter 6 283

personages are followed and imitated. Dai Zhaoming (1998: 190-191) also
sees automatic standardization through self-regulation as an important
device to advance the natural development of new standards. Dai (1998:
155-156), as well, categorizes a standard in terms of its standardization
process. In his system, there is a spontaneous and a regulated standard, and
the former is spread through the influence of prestigious writers and
literary works. In Bambose’s (1990: 105) three-type framework of lan-
guage norms (code norm, feature norm, behavioral norm), Su’s societal
standard and Dai’s spontaneous standard can be roughly equated to his
behavioral norm, which refers to the “expected patterns of behavior while
interacting with others, the mode of interpreting what is said, and attitude
in general to others’ manner of speaking”.
As repeatedly emphasized in this volume, IT-oriented LP activities will
remain a fundamental feature of most of the ensuing language reform, and
development to date already indicates that technology has increasingly
become a major dynamo for this linguistic growth. Corresponding to this
transformation, the focus of LP work after 1986 has shifted from
reforming (simplification and Romanization) to standardization, which
involves a decision to make choices from more than one variety of the
same occurrence. As one of the most important factors for successful
standardization is the consensual decision and acceptance of the standards
by the public, if future reform activities are not to be inhibited by a largely
unwilling and ever better-informed populace, a participatory model for LP
policy deliberation will become an ever increasing necessity. Promotion of
the standard requires efforts to persuade potentially targeted users to adopt
the one variety over others. A new type of survey, propagation and
evaluation mechanism is required to accommodate this change. Because
the LP agency is an agent of the state, it gets used to employing the
coercive power of the state to enforce decisions. Cooper (1989: 78)
stresses that “the coercive power of the state rests, in the long run, on the
consent of the governed, even in totalitarian states”. Transformation from
regulator and standard setter to promoter and trend-setter is the road that
must be taken in LP modernization, which implies that the planners need
to consider how they will create a climate of opinion favorable to the
adoption of the planned innovation.
In the future, the possible reform of the functions of the LP agency
should focus on two aspects: minimizing any harmful intervention of non-
professional factors; deregulating the administration and diversifying the
agencies to include the non-governmental sectors, and encouraging public
involvement. The existing ‘top-down’ structure was designed when China
was an authoritarian and simple society. The centrism, or what Schiffman
284 Envisioning the Future

(2006: 120) termed the Jacobinism and dirigisme, might have functioned
well with the gullible population in those credulous years before the
opening up to the outside world. DeFrancis (1979: 152) observes that “the
major decisions regarding writing reforms have been made essentially on
the basis of discussions within the confines of the government or the Party
and beyond the purview of the public at large”. In the past, the LP pro-
grams were imposed by coercion solely depending on official promotion
(activities of government), while in an increasingly opening and demo-
cratic speech community, the need to apply Haarmann’s (1990: 120-121)
typology of prestige planning, including institutional promotion (activities
of agencies), pressure group promotion and individual promotion, would
be not only viable, but may be unavoidable. To foster and propagate the
new language use, it is necessary to encourage and cultivate the non-
governmental or semi-governmental organizations, and to foster locally-
based organizations.
Lehmann (1975: 44-45) was one of the first researchers to see the
drawbacks of the Chinese LP agency, and envisaged the need for an
autonomous and prestigious organ. He pointed out that other countries
carry out their LP activities through different types of LP agencies. In
some instances, the principal agency is an autonomous, prestigious aca-
demy consisting of a limited number of outstanding individuals selected
for life. Quasi-governmental sectors are often represented by long-standing
national language academies and language planning boards or councils
with great prestige. From an international perspective, it may be worth-
while to explore the possibility of introducing Academie Française-style
bodies (French Literary Academy)9, that serve to assure certain kinds of
standardization through prestige and image building.
An unofficial agency with such a purpose could parallel the existing
SCLW, be complementary to it, and be relatively independent from heavy
political interference. Chinese society is characterized by its patriarchal
and oligarchic traditions. In terms of Bem’s (1970: 79-88) Modeling
Theory,
we are heavily influenced by the views of groups with which we
identify, whose approval we want, or we regard as authority. There are
reference groups to which we refer for cues when we are deciding what
to think, groups whose frames of reference we adopt as we analyze the
world.
Language practice represented by influential citizens serves as a refer-
ence point for the whole society, because it provides the population with
prestigious models to imitate. Such a voluntary organization should be
Chapter 6 285

composed of highly prestigious personages and well-known citizens in the

fields of arts and sciences, and must be designated to provide chiefly cultu-
ral and social input.
To break the organizational monopoly governing the Chinese LP appa-
ratus and to provide a wider opportunity to air diverse views, including
divergent voices, is another important form of deregulation. Lü Guanxiong
(2003), a freelance LP critical commentator, openly criticizes the way
state-controlled LP bodies deal with non-linguist scholars’ opinions, and
he calls for opening research journals and even government funding to test
individual schemes. The top-down modus operandi of LP decision-making
has caused concern even for some official scholars (see e.g., Wang 1989;
Su 1991). It is not surprising, then, that so many unofficial voluntary
organizations relating to Chinese writing reform have come into being,
such as Yuan Xiaoyuan’s International Association of Chinese Character
Studies and Research Institute of Language, Culture and Science (1980,
Beijing); the Common Script Association (1997, Shanghai); and the
American Association for the Promotion of Chinese Script Reform (1997,
New York).10
Ducke (2003) has pointed out that the Internet provides new, informal
and horizontal ways of communication on an unprecedented scale, bet-
ween the powerful political actors and the masses struggling below.
Although most communication is currently still screened and sometimes
censored in China, the Internet provides a convenient channel for more
robust individual involvement that enables ordinary script reform activists
with limited power and resources to compete with larger, well-financed
organizations. For countless maverick intellectuals and amateur enthusiasts
who are interested in LP and struggling to find a democratic voice, Internet
use is a sign of public empowerment in domains that were previously
monopolized by official bodies.11 As they are random individuals, working
independently rather than as a coordinated force, it is as yet too early to
foresee how long it will take to produce results, or whether they will be
widely accepted by the academics and society. However, it can be pre-
dicted that this process will foster greater transparency and allow for the
creative imagination of the vast masses. Although these emerging non-
governmental organizations and websites have been developing very fast,
with some eventually growing into a force that cannot be easily ignored, in
general they work virtually unnoticed and few big names from the
mainstream LP community participate in any of them. This shows that the
individual participation in non-official promotional roles has not been well
recognized.
Chapter 7
SOME CRITICAL ISSUES
Historical and Current

1. INTRODUCTION

In the preceding chapters, we have looked in some detail at the

development of the major episodes in modernizing the Chinese writing
system. This chapter draws together and describes three seemingly dis-
parate but essentially interactive threads: the revised interest in expanding
areas of pinyin; the possibility of further simplification by bringing some
of the banned traditional characters back for technological convenience;
and hanzi unification in cyberspace with other hanzi-using polities. These
issues have been touched on briefly in previous chapters, and the repetition
of that information here would serve no purpose, nor do we wish to
rehearse the many arguments and debates that have already been discussed
and understood. Rather we wish to highlight some outstanding critical
issues that have ebbed and flowed as elements of successive movements in
recent history, affording us an opportunity to reflect on them in depth from
a broader perspective. These are also issues that may need to be addressed
as part of the approach to standardization proposed in the previous chapter.
Two of the three topics set out in this chapter, simplification and
Romanization, are century-old questions. The conclusion of the 1986
Conference superficially brought about a degree of closure on these two
unsettled issues. Nevertheless, this closure should not be understood as
being an ostrich-like policy, based on top-down dictates. The topics are
still ongoing and central to the LPers’ concerns, and theoretical research
and debate on these two complex and contested issues, by both academics

287
288 Some Critical Issues

and policy analysts, have never stopped. It is not surprising, that people
feel a need to rethink these old controversial questions in the new broader
context. This chapter details some of the critical issues that have arisen,
seeking to explain how these new developments are being underpinned by
changes occurring in the socio-political domain and on the technological
front. Hopefully, this analysis will cast some new light on, and provide a
better understanding of, these old questions.
Since the 1986 conference, language policy has undergone some subtle
changes with the stress on stability for the foreseeable future. However,
due to the strong combined effects of technological impetus and political
change, these problems continue to come to the fore with increasing fre-
quency. At first, the three issues we deal with seem to reflect the conse-
quences of technological problems, but as our analysis will show, a final
resolution of the issues – almost without exception – ultimately directs us
to the underlying sociolinguistic dimensions associated with the manifest
ideologies.

2. ROMANIZATION – OLD QUESTION, NEW

CHALLENGE

Since the start of last century, tossed on the tide of modernity, hanzi’s
future has been regularly questioned. The Romanization movement in
China reached its peak in the 1920s and 1930s, with the explicit goal of
replacing hanzi with an alphabetic system, but the debate about the nature
of a Romanization system lasted up to the 1950s. It was just before the
formal promulgation in 1958, when the official name of the current pinyin
system was changed from ‘script scheme’ (Wenzi Fang’an) to ‘annotation
scheme’ (Pinyin Fang’an). But speculation on phoneticization remained
rife until the mid-1980s, when a halt finally was decreed on a century’s
efforts to alphabetize the writing system. Of all the radical criticisms of
hanzi, none was more sharply expressed than the warning by Lu Xun, a
great modern Chinese writer, when he said in the 1930s, “either Chinese
characters die out, or China dies out”.1 Lu Xun devoted all of his life to
fighting Chinese traditional culture. Although his words on this topic may
sound overstated today, they inspired Romanization advocates well into
the 1950s.
As we have seen in this volume, in the 1950s simplification was
treated, at best, as a palliative, not a definitive cure. No one opposed the
official prescription that the ultimate solution to China’s orthographic
Chapter 7 289

problem lay in the direction of a phonetic script. But since 1986, the
government has held officially and firmly to the decision for an indefinite
postponement of alphabetization. Nevertheless, historical experience shows
that more often than not the simple reiteration of immutable principles by
authorities does not ensure consistent policy. There exists a possibility, even
the likelihood that Romanization will again become a Chinese LP priority.
Today, the advocates of Romanization see an inherent conflict between
the oldest writing system and the latest advances in technology, providing
China with the opportunity to plan a solution to the problem through the
introduction of a ‘two-tier system’ of ideographic and phonetic scripts.
Such a system even could provide another layer to the multi-standard
scheme proposed in last chapter (see Figure 6-2 in Section 2.3, Chapter 6).
Radical IT specialists would like to see characters eliminated altogether
and the adoption of a completely phonetic script. Their adamant stand was
reflected in the much-quoted position of Chen Mingyuan (1980: 71), a CIP
researcher, “The computer is the gravedigger of the square-shaped charac-
ter, and midwife of the alphabetic script”.

2.1 Renewed Interest in Romanization and Digraphia

First coined by DeFrancis (1984a: 59), “Digraphia is the use of two or

more different systems of writing for the same language”. This has
occurred in some languages, for ethnic or religious reasons (e.g., Hindi –
Urdu; Serbian – Bosnian). In today’s China, the imminent decision to
adopt digraphia is purely based on technological considerations, prompted
by the maleficent impact of hanzi on the IT industry. Su (2001a: 120)
makes the position on digraphia at the present time very clear, “Chinese
characters will be the first writing system and hanyu pinyin will be the
second system”.
Unofficially, some individual schemes of phonetic writing have been
vigorously propagated. A few even have had intellectual rights registered
inside and outside of China, and are using the Internet to get easy access to
national and worldwide media attention. In an exact replication of the
1950s trend to devise alphabetic schemes (Zhao 1998: 155), some newly
devised schemes are poorly designed and show a general hobbyist
approach, which often appears to lack any sense of direction.
In reality, much of the effort in devising an alphabetic writing system is
directed at making better use of the existing pinyin system. This was
consolidated by the issuance of the CF 3006-2001 Standard for the
 290

Table 7-1. Four functions of some major Romanized systems

Functions Representative Schemes Designers/Proponents Year Explanations/Examples

Chinese English

Auxiliary Pinyin Phonetic Alphabet A group of linguists and 1958 To facilitate the learning and use of Chinese characters
renowned scholars mainly by providing a set of phonetic symbols that
organized by the indicate the pronunciation of the characters in a clear and
Education Ministry straightforward fashion. Other major roles of this system
include:
to deal with the place names and personal names;
to aid the spread of putonghua;
to store and retrieve information with traditional printing
materials and computers;
to encode hanzi in telegrams; etc.

Supplementary Zhuyin Zimu Sound-Annotating Collectively/government 1918 To be used together with the traditional script in the texts,
Alphabet seeking to improve on the latter or performing functions
for which the latter is ill-suited.
Gwoyeu National Linguists appointed by 1928 There are two different ways: Phonetic symbols are either
Romatzyh Language the Government in juxtaposition with characters, creating a new kind of
Romanization symbol that is composed of two parts (i.e., the character
and the phonetic symbol to annotate its sound); or they are
used in partial replacement of characters, resulting in a
mixed writing system in the same text, which can be best
exemplified by kana in Japanese.
Some Critical Issues
 Chapter 7

Alternative Guanhua Mandarin Wang Zhao 1892 To serve the full range of purposes expected of a
Zimu Alphabet writing system, thus enabling it to stand as an
alternative to the traditional script.

Superseding Latixua Sin New Writing of A group of Communist 1931 To supersede the traditional script, making it
Wenz (LSW) Latinization scholars in exile in the obsolete, following the example of the Vietnamese
Soviet Union Quoc Ngu and the Korean Hangul, which purged
Chinese characters from their respective languages.
291
292 Some Critical Issues

Scheme of Chinese Phonetic Alphabet Input with Universal [Standard]

Keyboard, by the Chinese LP authority, on February 26, 2002. However,
pinyin was not designated as a writing system. Its inability to discriminate
accurately between homophonous syllables poses the foremost problem to
its elevation to a full-fledged orthography.
From a historical perspective, there has been the lofty aim of liberating
the vast illiterate population from the cumbersome ideographic writing
system (Su 2001a). According to Chen Ping (1994), during the heyday of
the Romanization movement, before the establishment of the PRC,
phonetic writing schemes that intended to offer the masses of illiterates an
alternative reading and writing system, ended up having one or more of the
following four functions: auxiliary, supplementary, alternative and/or super-
seding the traditional logographic script. These functions are summarized
in Table 7-1, but only those intended for an auxiliary role have achieved
success. Because “schemes to perform each of the other three functions
would affect the traditional script in one way or another, they have to
overcome the resistance stemming from linguistic, psychological, pedago-
gical, political, and socio-cultural factors” (Chen P. 1994: 368).
There are valuable lessons in historical experiences. When the Chinese
Phonetic Alphabet Scheme was proclaimed, Mao’s well-known propo-
sition was that Chinese writing “should follow the common direction in the
world of phoneticization”. Thus, it was designated as ‘phonetic spelling’
(pinyin) instead of ‘phonetic writing’ (pinyin wenzi), as originally strongly
advocated by some radical pioneers of the Romanization movement. This
affirmed China’s monographic policy of Chinese character use: pinyin is
only employed where hanzi is inconvenient or cannot be resorted to,
mainly in the following seven areas:

• For teaching pronunciation to Chinese children and substituting for

characters that are too complex to write;
• Teaching Chinese to foreigners;
• Trademarks, street signs, and signage at railway stations, bus stops,
etc.;
• Telegraphic codes, broadcasting and TV system;
• Braille for the blind and figure spelling for the deaf;
• Dictionaries and indexes;
• Creating scripts for minorities and documenting the previously
unwritten languages of many ethnic groups.

Interestingly, the most used area today, mechanical application, was not
included. Even at the 1986 Conference, at which LP was reoriented toward
Chapter 7 293

computer application, no document or research paper emphasized pinyin’s

use in the IT industry. In the ‘Language Law’ (2000), pinyin’s status was
not only legitimized, but its application area was also officially expanded
to “all areas where hanzi is not convenient or unable to meet the need”.
Since then, expanding the application area of pinyin has become a
recurrent topic among scholars (e.g., Fan 2003: 173-174).
The two-script system for IT in China was first initiated in 1997
by Feng Zhiwei,2 a distinguished computing linguist. The fact, that this
proposal appeared as the lead article in the first issue of Chinese Language
and Linguistics in 1997, signaled two messages: Romanization is a topic
that can be openly talked about, at least in the academic community, and
second, there is no strong official objection to the idea of developing an
independent alphabetic system exclusively for computer applications.
Considering the fact that pinyin is the most convenient interface to use
with computers, including public and personal Internet domain names and
email addresses, phoneticizers claim that digraphia is already a daily
reality in cyber life for every Chinese computer user. This is partly true as
well for the overwhelming majority of computer users who employ pinyin-
based methods for facilitating Chinese character computer input. It is in
this sense that Zhou Youguang (2001: personal communication), said,
when talking about the graphic situation in China today, “[N]o matter
whether you acknowledge it or not, today the ‘two-script system’ is a self-
evident reality on computers”. This observation is true to some extent
as Unger (2004: 12) notes that “[T]hough not officially acknowledged,
digraphia is a practical fact of life for Japanese and many other Asian
computer users even though they seldom read texts in their native language
in Romanized format”.
Currently, the indispensability of a digraphic writing system for IT
convenience is also manifest in solving three concerns:

• Inputting and outputting: Encouraging achievements have been obtained

in speeding up hanzi computer input. However, even in this most
successful area, there is still a great deal of work to do before it can
satisfactorily serve the needs of the whole population. Outputting refers
to decoding and displaying hanzi on the Internet. With the unexpec-
tedly massive increase of the Internet population, the global flow of
Internet information encoded in hanzi has exploded, making computer-
ized transmission and display of hanzi more important than ever.
• Higher level applications: In comparison with encoding and decoding
hanzi, little has been achieved in addressing the conflict of hanzi with
AI (artificial intelligence) and CIP (Chinese information processing).
294 Some Critical Issues

After so many years of development, Chinese AI scientists and

linguists are still struggling with segmentation, which is the prere-
quisite in parsing Chinese sentences and automatically understanding
Chinese text. The current dissatisfaction in dealing with computerized
hanzi data has given rise to a small but widely recognized campaign of
promoting interworded texts,3 which has the twofold goal of facilitating
text automation and laying down the foundation for an alphabetic
orthography.
• Computing with hanzi: Computer technology works most effectively in
an alphabetic language environment. In order to make software
originally written in alphabetic script usable on Chinese language
computers, Chinese IT engineers and international software vendors
have to hanzi-nize (localize) new software products, which even today
is still a major undertaking.

Su (2001a: 109) argues that “some forms of digraphia between Chinese

characters and hanyu pinyin Romanization is imperative for China’s
success in the twenty-first century”. Rohsenow (2001: 137), a Chinese LP
researcher from America, has shown greater interest in China’s digraphic
future than anyone else and optimistically outlines a possible scenario of
hanzi and pinyin digraphia for the future:
[I]f computers with Latin alphabetic keyboards become more and more
widespread throughout China, and if the general knowledge of Mandarin
and of Hanyu Pinyin continues to improve such that the general
populace decides to elect to use Hanyu Pinyin input systems, then it is
possible that Chinese writers may begin to ignore the conversion
function of Pinyin input into Chinese characters and simply commu-
nicate using Hanyu Pinyin itself … Thus Hanyu Pinyin might finally
attain a working status as an alternative writing system equal to
Chinese characters for the population as a whole.

2.2 Technological Impact and Technological Issues

The early Romanization advocates, such as Lü Shuxiang (1946), saw

that, while hanzi is attached to classical Chinese (wenyan) and dialects of
the past, Romanization is indispensable for vernacular Chinese in modern
society. The new interest in Romanization stems totally from the frustrat-
ing experience with Chinese computerization in the information age.
Central to the argument is whether hanzi have already been successfully
Chapter 7 295

computerized or not, which is a topic no less arguable than the merits and
demerits of a logographic script. Conservative ideologues argue that the
hanzi input issue was resolved long ago, that the IT industry is a
developing industry, and that technology will, at last, be powerful enough
to resolve the problems currently facing hanzi. Abandoning hanzi for
pinyin would be doing something like cutting the feet to fit the shoes (xue
zu shi lü). Furthermore, they claim, just as there is no necessary correlation
between the alphabetic system and the literacy rate, the correlation bet-
ween IT advancement and the writing system is another murky question.
However, the argument on the other side of the debate is that in the
new technological setting, the underlying basis for Romanization has
changed from eliminating illiteracy in the population to catching up with
the latest developments in the information era. The consensus that has
already been reached is what is known as technology or instrument
determinant theory. The theory holds that the future of hanzi depends to a
great extent on hanzi’s compatibility with the computer. Hanzi have
hampered the progress of the information processing and as long as it does
so, other advantages become trivial. There is nothing in language work that
cannot be reversed if that is the only alternative solution to the
irreconcilable clashes between traditional heritage and modernization. A
noteworthy characteristic of Chinese linguistics is its pragmatism, as an
American linguistics’ commentator has observed (Orleans 1980: 490). He
points out that linguistic studies in China are nearly always justified in
practical terms, which usually means that they must have immediate and
practical relevance to China’s needs.
These contextual factors suggest to phoneticizers that because of its
critical role in all areas of science and technological development, the script
issue has never before been so closely associated with the fate of the nation.
If the Chinese IT industry is to stay abreast of international developments,
hanzi faces the stark choice of adaptation or abandonment. Reflecting on the
Japanese experience, Unger (2004: 147 wonders “whether Chinese can ever
become a language of international electronic communication unless Roman-
ization becomes an alternative to customary script, at least in cyberspace”.
The effort to survive in an increasingly competitive and technologically
world has generated an inevitable pressure to adopt such pragmatic considera-
tions. In addition to senior LP practitioners and intelligentsia in academic
circles, who, in the late fifties and early sixties, did an enormous service for
LP, another group of specialists from the IT industry has been acting as
uncompromising promoters of phoneticization. This group has proposed to
either further develop the pinyin scheme of 1958 into a full-fledged
296 Some Critical Issues

orthography or to create a new phonetic system, on which many currently

are actively engaged.

2.3 Romanization or Hanzi? Still a Question

Two hypotheses have served as the driving force and theoretical

groundwork behind the Romanization movement: the ‘Three Developing
Phases Theory’ before 1986, and the ‘Instrument Determinative Theory’
after 1986. Before the 1986 conference, partly under the influence of
Mao’s belief that phoneticization was the general direction of script
development for all languages in the world, “in discussing writing reform
in China, it is an unchallenged axiom that all languages have developed
from pictograph to ideograph to phonetic script” (Seybolt and Chiang
1979: 17). Zhou Youguang and some other central figures in the LP
administration believed that this Three Developing Phases Theory is a
generalized rule for script evolution, taking it for granted that hanzi will
evolve through the three phases, proceeding towards an alphabetic system
(see Prologue 3.1).
Arguing that development of hanzi’s shape has been determined by the
evolution of writing tools, Instrument Determinative Theory views the
movement towards simplification and phoneticization as the natural result
of the requirements for the means for evolution of human visual communi-
cation. From a historical perspective, this interactive relationship between
script change and the evolution of communication instruments can be
summarized as in Table 7-2.
Pan Defu (2004), a freelance Chinese LP online critic, proposes that
in the information era, notions about software and hardware should be
introduced into the study of Chinese script development:
Script, as the tool to record and transmit information, can be seen as the
software, and the pen, paper and printing machine the hardware.
Looking back at history, Chinese people used knives to engrave and
inscribe on bamboos. This kind of script is called Zhuanshu, and after
that came the paper and brush. Zhuanshu was replaced by Lishu. In the
Song Dynasty, movable type case was invented, thereby the Song-style
characters evolved. Historical experience shows that the change hap-
pening to the hardware was bound to cause a revolution to software.
The emergence of computers is a kind of hardware revolution.
 Chapter 7

Table 7-2. Instrument Determinative theory about Hanzi’s change and script evolution

Era Writing tools and materials Writing Style change (samples)

Shang Dynasty Knife (of stone and jade), Jiaguwen (Oracle bone inscription) Writing at its embryonic stage and character shape greatly varied
(1600-1100 BCE) turtle shells, bronze utensils Jinwen (bronze inscription)
Zhuanshu (seal script)

Qin Dynasty Brush, Lishu (clerical script) From round to square, from picture to symbol, greatly reduced the
(221-205 BCE) bamboo, wood, silk, character complexity and made writing faster and easier (transient
natural color paintings period from pictograph to ideograph), the shape was confined by
wood texture.

Eastern Han Dynasty Brush, paper, Caoshu (grass style writing) Caoshu is a running-hand writing style used for rapid writing. This
(25-220CE) Chinese traditional ink became possible due to invention of paper (soft fabric) in 105. This
made cursive style connect many of the strokes and simplified
elements technically possible. Less stylized Kaishu is basically the
traditional form used today.

Song Dynasty Huoban printing Kaishu (square script) and Songti The use of movable printing blocks, type case, invented by Bi Sheng,
(960-1279) (typographic printing) made the official standard possible.

Modern China (Qing Dynasty) Pen, modern ink Traditional and simplified characters Writing had become easier with high quality tools. Writing became a
(1644-1911) way of daily life for every one. Simplification was generally required.

21st Century Computer (keyboard and mouse) Standardization? Unicode, web pages, internet…?
297
298 Some Critical Issues

Admittedly, in the current situation the ‘Three Developing Phrases

Theory’ and the ‘Instrument Determinative Theory’ face two major chal-
lenges: culturally, the immovable societal resistance, and technically,
homophone disambiguation. Even so, some encouraging progress has been
made. On the one hand, there was the official acceptance in 1996 of the
‘Pinyin Orthography’, which is the prerequisite for a full-fledged
alphabetic writing system. This was seen as a significant step in furthering
pinyin’s role in national cultural life. On the other hand, numerous
Romanization schemes have been devised by both professionals and edu-
cated dilettantes, and, over the past two decades, these have been widely
propagated with the aid of the borderless Internet. While most of these
systems were developed for computer typing purposes, some were
proposed as alternate graphic systems. All of this, including the successful
pedagogical experiments4 and the growing importance in expanding areas
of pinyin’s indispensability for Chinese computerization, attests to the
explanatory adequacy of digraphia for the present status of pinyin, which
prompts the phoneticizers to argue that the ‘two-tracks’ script system is
already in evidence in reality, if not in name.
When it comes to the societal resistance, there have been tremendous
difficulties in dealing with the complex social and political realities
evident at the start of the new millennium. As Su (2001a: 121) warns, “the
difficulties in realizing digraphia lie not in technology, but in ideology.
First we must overcome the strong conservative thinking about language
prevalent in China.” The demise of Chinese characters is such a specter
among many Chinese, that even Mao Zedong and his rebellious colleagues,
who made so many impossibilities possible in revolutionizing traditional
things, had to abandon the idea eventually.
The continuing question that arises is: which is going to play a larger
role in shaping the future, the socio-political situation or technological
advancement? In modern China, hanzi are supposed to linguistically and
culturally shoulder two missions as a writing system. The politically
motivated cultural arguments have overstressed its culture transmission
role while ignoring its communication function. The latter is an important
component of the emerging world culture in the post-modern age in which
we are living.
From the viewpoint of Instrument Determinative Theory, the past
pursuance of an alphabetic system was to facilitate the use of typewriting,
and to accelerate typesetting for the publishing industry. Today’s IT
industry has developed to a point where the international information
exchange network represents the highest formal level of an information
access system, and also where the computer can contribute most to human
Chapter 7 299

knowledge increase and exchange – which is precisely the most difficult

part of Chinese script integration. However, the view that one cannot
ignore the formal roots of the past legacy with impunity is fiercely held. In
the absence of a major cultural turnaround, future attempts at script reform
will be just as modest and pragmatic; there may be reforms, but only on a
limited basis. Even for ardent advocates of phoneticization, any form of
phoneticization is seen as a distant goal. When criticizing some linguists
for their keenness to go for Romanization in the nearest future, Hu Qiaomu,
the architect of Chinese LP after 1986, says, “In my opinion, a full-fledged
phonetic orthography will not be realized in a hundred years” (Guangming
Daily December 27, 1999). The twenty-first century is believed to be a
time in which idealism gives way to pragmatism. The development from
the idealist monographia of Romanization towards a more achievable
digraphia of pinyin and hanzi is not only a practical solution to meet
personal and technological needs, but also a reflection of prevailing
ideology of the time of a multi-standard pluricentric model. Characters or
Romanization was, and will be, a ‘to be or not to be’ question for all
Chinese in the foreseeable future.

3. CRACKING THE HARD NUT: DEALING WITH

THE RESCINDED SECOND SCHEME AND
BANNED TRADITIONAL CHARACTERS

3.1 Keep the Baby, Throw out the Bath Water: Resume
Some 2nd Scheme Characters

Since the 1986 conference, hanzi simplification has become an untouch-

able topic in LP. Nonetheless, two facts are indisputable: first, never has a
government document or official scholar declared that the simplification
work is completed, indicating that “it is impossible to assure no further
simplification” (Chen P. 1999: 80). Second, it has been an undeniable fact
that new simplified characters, namely, abolished characters in the SSS or
newly created ones, are very common and can be seen everywhere. To
legalize some unofficial simplified characters only “is a matter of time”
(Fei 1991: 124). If the conditions are right and society demands it, further
simplification can certainly be done, although it may take several decades
(Yang 1999: 323). To systematize the totality of hanzi officially has been
projected as one of the pressing LP tasks since the mid-1980s, and what is
300 Some Critical Issues

also worthy of notice is that simplification is still a recurrent theme, and

policy makers again have taken a consistent stand on the need for
continuous optimization and simplification of characters (e.g., Li 1995).
Wang Fengyang’s (1989: 645) suggestion on character reform not only
reflects the depth of his conviction about the need for further simpli-
fication, but also is an assertion that has been uppermost in many people’s
minds:
The first reform was to legalize all existing simplified characters. This
is the general practice we have seen in the past, and as a universal rule
every script reform in history ended up granting the official status to
the handwritten characters. The next simplification will be simplifying
the uncompleted simplified characters by using the methods inferred
from how existing simplified characters got simplified. The second
simplification should focus on dealing with the problems left over from
history, and the number will not be very big, but we must prepare to go
through an unstable period of character use. That is a start-well-and-
end-well choice for the Second Scheme, and we thus can formally
declare that the simplification effort for Chinese characters comes to
a close. Then, character shape will finally stabilize after two major
surgical operations.
In the next four sections we examine issues on which the possibility of
further simplification could be based.

3.1.1 Historical Trends

Zhou (1986b: 14) says, “it is always a natural tendency to simplify the
characters” (see also Wang 1999: 84). Historically, systematic simpli-
fication goes back at least to 213 BCE, when the centralized Qin empire
was established. Scribal work significantly increased for the first time,
many variant forms that had previously circulated across the seven states
were eliminated in writing unification, and the simplest form of writing
was retained as the standard. The trend towards simplification went on
along with the development of Lishu (clerical script) as an alternative to
the official Xiaozhuan (small seal script) in the later Han Dynasty (25 to
220 CE) – it made writing even faster and easier.
Another important justification for the simplification direction is that
the official standard font for printing purposes is based on the hand-
writing form used by ordinary people, and “naturally, over time, there
were more simplified characters created in handwriting than those
officially listed” (Zhou 1979: 2). The physical difference between the
Chapter 7 301

printed and the handwritten form is much greater than that of most other
languages in the world. Coulmas (1991: 230) argues, “All languages share
a number of important properties which can be attributed to the fact that
human beings behave in accordance with the ‘Principle of Least Effort’”.
If we use the horizontal axis to represent time (in years) and the vertical
axis to show the natural change direction of the character simplification
trend, the general relationship between change and time can be demon-
strated on a single graph (Figure 7-1).
The message of this simple graph is clear: Although the differential
acceptance rates between AB and BC should be considered as necessary,
there is a contradiction between the general direction of hanzi development
and the pivotal turn in government policy. General public acceptance lags
behind the factual simplification speed, because the general simplification
scale is the total number of simplified characters covered by vast geogra-
phic and professional use over a relatively lengthy period of time, in which
government policy has increasingly gone from caution to conservatism.
Wang Fengyang (1992: 14) observes that, “Generally speaking, the script
standard supported by the government is often conservative and condi-
tioned by the traditional forces and established practices. The government
and official standard aims at keeping the unity and continuity of the
writing system and checks any deviation from the orthodox mode.”

Direction of Change

Actual Simplification Trend

B

Public Willingness to Accept

Simplified Characters C

Government Policy Change D

Times (Years) 1956 -76 1977-1986 After 1987

Figure 7-1: Analysis of character simplification trends

302 Some Critical Issues

Simplification trends are also supported by the following factual

figures from the period leading up to the First Scheme (Chen P. 1999; Fei
1997). In 1930, Liu Fu and Li Jiarui, two Chinese language reformers,
published A Glossary of Popular Chinese Characters since the Song and
Yuan Dynasties, which was an important database from which the simpli-
fied characters for official recognition were selected. It contained 6,240
simplified characters found in twelve publications in the Song, Yuan,
Ming and Qing dynasties. In 1935, Qian Xuantong prepared a table of
2,400 simplified characters, but only 324 simplified characters were
adopted by the government in the simplification table. Another case in
point, Rong Geng’s Dictionary of Simplified Characters (1936, by
Harvard-Yanjing University Press) included 4,445 characters. In the
following simplification, during the preparatory period for the TSC, over
1,934 simplified characters were included in the draft scheme presented by
the Research Committee for Language Reform in February 1955 (Fei
1997). This number was reduced to 515 when the Scheme was officially
promulgated in January 1956.

3.1.2 The Uncompleted Simplification Job

It is widely acknowledged that some frequently used characters are still

quite complex and need to be further simplified (Bao 1993; Su 2003).
Some forty characters were listed for discussion, but their accepted
simplified forms could not be worked out during the course of simpli-
fication in 1956. Some of these characters in daily use such as 舞 (wu,
dancing), 繁 (fan, complex), 赢 (ying, to win), 疆 (jiang, boundary),
are subject to further but careful simplification. More to the point, when
the SSS was published (draft) by the CCSR on December 20, 1977, 42 of
the most frequently used complex characters, such as 衡 (heng, balance),
髓 (sui, marrow), were again picked to be urgently simplified. A
nationwide discussion was subsequently launched that still remains to be
resolved. Take the Modern Chinese Dictionary (the most popular modern
Chinese dictionary) as an example: there are still fifteen characters that use
襄 (seventeen strokes) as a phonetic compound (Liu 1988: 154). Under
current conditions, as a result of technological development, the number of
characters that need simplification is much bigger than was thought in the
1950s or 1970s. As discussed in Section 4.1, Chapter 5, a growing literate
population and much more dynamic cultural life have exposed the public
to more language and script, and some structurally complex hanzi,
categorized as less frequent or specialty characters may have become
common in the wider population.
Chapter 7 303

There are still a number of characters that cannot be accurately

displayed on the computer. For example, of 6,763 characters in GB 2312-
80, over one hundred characters that do not properly fit in the 16-dot
matrix needed for Latin letters. If the matrix is increased to 25 dots, there
are still 38 characters, such as 量 (liang, weight), 重 (zhong, heavy) and
直 (zhi, straight), that need to be compressed. Furthermore, representing
Chinese characters requires bigger font sizes to ensure readability, “especi-
ally for complex traditional characters. Smaller point size drastically
reduces the ability of the font rendering engine to place discrete strokes
with a character” (Turley 1999: 30). After special techniques are intro-
duced to obtain a higher monitor resolution, Turley continues, “[t]he
TrueType screen font rendering engine that is native to Microsoft
operating systems does a very poor job of displaying Chinese characters in
sizes less than 12 points on screen”. In theory, the screen resolution can be
unlimited, but more space means less speed. So the visual intelligibility is
achieved at the cost of the operating capacity, and in an irreversible
tendency, more information is being transmitted through smaller screens.
In the last few years, strong supportive evidence for further simplifying
character strokes has originated in the reduction of the size of computers
and the new functionality of the mobile phone. Anticipating nanotech-
nologies that will be in place in 5-10 years from now, mainstream IT
assumptions indicate that computer power is also dispersing into small
objects and smart artifacts – this implies that hanzi’s present existing
environment will be totally changed. The poor performance of characters
with complex strokes (above 12 strokes) for displaying information on a
small screen, which often results in unpleasing muddy characters or simply
gibberish, presents a major problem for their use in emerging means of
information transmission.
As a result, information that is sent to and displayed on the mini
screen will be limited due to character unintelligibility, as Lu Chuan (2002:
seminar), a noted Chinese AI expert, has convincingly pointed out:
“Both, the complexity and the size of the computer [electric brain in
Chinese – authors], are getting closer to the human brain”. Some characters,
such as 齉 (see Figure P-5 in the Prologue) in the Modern Chinese
Dictionary, still have 36 strokes – the most complex Chinese character has
64 strokes. They must be further simplified in the next reform simply
because of the impossibility of displaying them on a small screen. The
challenge of size reduction and hence limited character space (about
160 characters), as well as the small keypad, provides the motivation for
the evolution of even more abbreviation in both the language and its
304 Some Critical Issues

script system; an apt example to illustrate how a new technology brings

on immediate linguistic consequences.

3.1.3 The Debatable 111 Characters in the Second Scheme

As discussed in Chapter 1, there were actually two distinct parts of the

simplified characters listed in the SSS of 1977. Since the 1950s, over one
hundred characters were carefully collected and studied free of political
interference. Some were categorized as ‘characters in discussion and to be
simplified’. These characters, together with the previously mentioned forty
characters, formed the core of the SSS, before political enthusiasm expand-
ed it to cover over 2,000 characters. When an ad hoc review committee,
headed by some of the best linguists and senior LP experts, such as Wang
Li and Zhou Youguang, reassessed the SSS, one of their tasks was to see
how many characters in this reform were genuinely and indisputably
welcomed by the masses. As a result, 111 characters were agreed upon for
further consideration. When the Review Committee of the SSS put forward
these 111 characters to the NCLW in 1986 (Chen 2002: personal communi-
cation), there was a heated argument about whether they should be kept
and formally adopted.
The idea to retain them was given up at the last moment, when the
decision was made to republish the GLSC with changes being made to
only six characters. But since these well established, approximately one
hundred hanzi were seen as the ‘core reform’, they needed to be treated
separately rather than be thrown out with the rest. The fact that they have
not been publicized, due to the fear that this would cause confusion and
bring on further chaos, in itself suggests their popularity among the public.
The demand by academics to officially recognize these characters has
never ceased (Chen 1988, Chen 2000, Gao 2002, Jin 1997, Wang 1992).
The authors’ investigation (see Note 12, Chapter 2) into the public’s
writing habits also shows a strong presence of SSS characters in people’s
handwriting, particularly among the less-well educated. For instance, for
890 sample texts produced by a group of farmers, 55 types were SSS
characters, and their occurrence was as high as 1,012 times (tokens) in
these samples. LPers’ efforts to stop the continued social use of some 100
SSS characters has been so far proved to be desperately futile, showing
that re-correcting people’s behavior can be even harder than influencing it.
Internationally, some hanzi have been further simplified in Japan, and
similar cases can also be found in Chinese communities in Southeast Asia.
When analyzing the popularity and the confusion caused by the SSS in
Chapter 7 305

Singapore, Lim (1996: 123-133) points out, “Hanzi simplification has not
reached its limit by far and there is a necessity of further simplification”.
In the current standardization program being undertaken for information
interchange purposes, characters officially standardized and encoded include
characters that are nowhere near as popular or even as widely circulated as
those in the SSS. It is unusual, that the thorny SSS process has become such
a sensitive taboo and has suffered discriminatory treatment in this new round
of changes, just because of their complex background at birth. In his Hanzi
Study, a benchmark book in the field, Wang Fengyang (1989: 645-646) is
very insistent on emphasizing the primacy of the SSS characters in the new
reform programs, and argues that hanzi’s shape will not be stabilized until
the SSS issue is resolved.
As a way of addressing this issue and fitting it in with the multi-
standard model, the authors would argue that before some publicly
welcomed SSS characters gain official status, they should be given ‘sub’-
standard status and be made legally accessible to the public in the follow-
ing ways:

• Included in all dictionaries. Put in brackets in parallel with the standard

characters, in the same way that traditional characters are dealt with in
most dictionaries.
• Promoted as part of the handwriting standard. To recognize and
regulate handwriting, as has been the case in Taiwan since 1988, is a
practical way to create an interface, moving private and public use
closer to each other, and eventually resulting in a unification of the two.
At present, the lack of a standard for handwriting and the worldwide
difference in the graphical shape between handwritten and printed fonts
is a severe obstacle to upgrading the quality of OCR software for
handwriting.
• Made available in the handwriting OCR software. On the Mainland,
neither traditional nor SSS hanzi are official standard characters, but
when it comes to software, the National Bureau of Software Super-
vision allows traditional characters but has resisted introducing SSS
characters.

3.1.4 Questioning the ‘Unacceptability’

The unacceptability of the SSS by the public has been frequently cited
as the most formidable obstacle to their reintroduction. However, the
opponents’ awkward justification that it was not supported by society has
306 Some Critical Issues

been seriously contradicted by some published data provided by its advo-

cates.
Zheng Linxi (1988a) argues that after the CCSR was resumed in 1972,
it solicited public opinion three times. When people from across the whole
country were invited to discuss the Scheme in forums organized by poli-
tical consultancy bodies, the feedback from teachers, workers and peasants
was basically positive. The main disagreements were confined to the
simplification method of twenty or so characters. Tao Lun (an obvious
pseudonym, 1978: 62), who was obviously a defender of the SSS, argued,
“It is true that these characters were not used as long, nor as widely, as
those in the First Scheme. But all of them were from the masses, thus the
Scheme reflected the mass line and mass base.” He revealed that simpli-
fied characters in the SSS were solicited from three sources:

• From the masses and the army in the provinces, municipalities and
autonomous regions across the country, collected in 1960 by the
Education Ministry, Culture Ministry and the CCSR;
• After the TSC was published in 1956, the masses provided new
simplified characters to the CCSR;
• From the provinces, collected by the CCSR in 1972.

In contrast to the claim of ‘unacceptability by the masses’, there is

evidence of the public’s warm embrace of the Scheme. Tao (1978: 62) has
indicated that of the 8,348 letters with opinions and suggestions for revi-
sions received in the first month after its inauguration, the overwhelming
majority was supportive and only three opposed further simplification.
One year after the publication of the SSS, a survey of even greater scope
was conducted to assess the public reaction to the SSS. Of the 10,785
letters received from the masses, over 99 percent were in support of the
Scheme and welcomed the trial use of the SSS characters, and only fifteen
letters, or 0.14 percent, opposing the Scheme. As for the 248 characters in
the first Table, only twelve characters were thought to be in need of
reconsideration (Zheng 1988a: 297-298). Therefore, Zheng’s conclusion
is: “If, in the simplification issue, democracy is what it implies, the
cancellation is groundless; if democracy is applied, then history will serve
as testimony: genuine interest from the masses will carry on the simpli-
fication.”
This quotation might be criticized for presenting a biased view, because
it was published as a token representation in support of the SSS. However,
the divergent views among the experts and the public can also be seen in
some official documents. The report, Request to Abolish the Second
Chapter 7 307

Simplification Scheme (draft) and Check the Chaotic Situation in Charac-

ter Use by the Public, which was prepared by the CCSR just one month
after the Scheme was officially repealed, states (the Office of Standard
Work 1997: 19):
For the past few years, the former CCSR has been collecting opinions
from personages of all walks of life through various channels, and we
have revised this Scheme many times. However, no consensus has been
reached, neither by ordinary people, nor by scholars, on whether this
Scheme [SSS] should be formally promulgated or stopped circulating.
What is important and significant is that ‘unacceptability’ was delibe-
rately avoided in the official explanation for the formal withdrawal. Since
it was recognized that differing views still existed, why was it that the
request to abolish the Scheme was made? Cheng (1979: 3) also concluded
that the articles, published in 1977 and 1978, give both positive and
negative views of the Scheme.
The combined issue of Script Reform Correspondence (13, 14),
published on May 5, 1979, is an important primary source to gauge the
public response at the time, nearly one-and-a-half years after the Scheme’s
publication. This is so far the only publication on the topic and it provides
25 well-documented, factual reports, collected from 24 provinces, directive
municipalities, autonomous regions and the army. This valuable documen-
tary information was blatantly ignored and not mentioned in publications
discussing the SSS. Despite the possibility of serious political bias, the
unique historical value of the document in question is unquestionable. All
statistics showed that a great majority welcomed the SSS, for example, in
Tianjin, 1,5005 people attended 24 forums and discussions; 99.3 percent of
the total participants said they strongly or basically agreed (Script Reform
1979: 7). Different views and even criticism were also extensively pro-
vided in the reports, but these dissident voices should not have been strong
enough to serve as a catalyst to reject the whole scheme.

3.2 Small Compromise for Big Convenience: Partial

Re-Introduction of the Traditional Characters

The most direct concern for the resumption of abolished traditional

forms stems from the so-called unmatched simplified characters, those
which cannot be correctly converted into their traditional forms when the
text is being automatically processed by the automatic conversion software.
Of 6,763 characters in the GB 2312-80, 117 pairs of characters cannot
308 Some Critical Issues

be correctly converted between simplified and traditional text. These

characters are labeled as ‘trouble makers’ by software clients of automatic
conversion software. To correct some of the problems, caused by over-
simplification in the 1950s, a total of 31 original form characters were
resumed when the Table of Commonly Used Characters was re-promulgated
by SCLW in 1988. However, from the point of IT, this has been a kind of
‘treat the head when the head aches, treat the foot when the foot hurts’ (tou
teng yi tou, jiao teng yi jiao), and these passive, stopgap measures do not
provide a solution. To restore one of the original forms, thus making them
different from the source version of simplified characters, seems like the
only plausible option. The problem of how to tackle the unmatched
characters was selected as the central theme for the Symposium on
Common Script across the Strait, organized by the unofficial language
reform organization, Association of Common Script, in Shanghai in 2000.
As previously mentioned, one of the major achievements in simplifying
characters in the 1950s was the reduction of the total number of hanzi.
Despite the moderate scale of the reduction, this was done at the cost of
lexical accuracy. Broadly speaking, the reduction was achieved through
two approaches: one was the elimination of the variant forms of the same
characters; the other to merge different physical shapes of homophonous
characters, for instance, merging 面 (mian, face/surface) and 麵 (mian,
wheat flour) into a single character to stand for two original meanings. To
give another example, originally 發 was for 發展 (fazhan, to develop)
and 髪 meant 頭髪 (toufa, hair). In the simplification, 发 (fa) is the
homophonous replacement for these two forms. In other words, after
simplification, two, or more morphemes in the traditional character system
were represented by only one simplified character. When traditional
characters are needed, simplified text cannot be automatically converted
into the traditional forms, because, at present, the hanzi processing soft-
ware has no capability to identify the intended character in the traditional
system. According to Shen Kecheng and Shen Jia (2001: 107), of the 2,235
characters in the GLSC, there are 102 such simplified characters,
accounting for 4.5 percent, representing two or more traditional counter-
parts that cannot be correctly converted without intervention. This has a
significant negative impact on typing quality where a conversion is
required. Shen and Shen (2001: 279) note that, “If some thirty simplified
characters are slightly altered, an ideal accuracy can be expected”.
But the unmatched numbers would greatly increase if the quantity of
characters examined is enlarged and the investigation is expanded to cover
further domains. The percentage would reach an unacceptably high level if
we were to look at classical texts, as Guo Xiaowu’s (2000) research shows.
Chapter 7 309

Zhengzhang (2003) suggests that misunderstandings in classical public-

ations could be most conveniently reduced through the resumption of
approximately 100 characters, a specific number that is coincidental to
the numbers suggested by other scholars (Ni 2003). However, some re-
searchers are not so optimistic. In another research study, carried out by the
Chinese, Japanese and Korean (CJK) Dictionary Institute, a Japanese-
based non-governmental developer of CJK character processing software
technology, showed that in the first 2,000 most-used hanzi, which cover 97
percent of modern texts, 238 simplified characters (about 12 percent) were
found to be the type of one-to-many hanzi. A more alarming finding is,
that of 97,000 highly used common WORDS (please note, not characters),
more than 20,000 cannot be correctly converted (Halpern and Kerman
2004).
The situation appears to be most severe in dealing with classical texts.
In an experimental study, converting simplified characters to complex
characters by using a converting device attached to Microsoft Word 2000,
which is considered of high quality in terms of its successful conversion
rate, Guo Xiaowu (2000: 80-82) investigated four Chinese classics
(Er Ya《尔雅》, Zuo Zhuan《左传》, Shi Ji 《史记》, Zhuzi Yu Lei 《朱子
语类》). The total number of characters in the four books is 2,265,964
tokens, the number of unconvertible characters is 6,364 types and they
occur 81,585 times (tokens). This implies that in a continuous text
consisting of 2,265,964 characters, the possibility of misunderstanding or
difficulty of understanding caused by inaccurately converted characters is
8.6 percent, which normally would be considered to be unacceptably high.
Remedial correction by typists was found to be necessary in the automatic
processing of classical texts. Their task, which requires considerable effort
from typists, is to identify the unconvertible characters at the input stage
and then make them recognizable by adding ‘determinatives’, to provide a
visual clue for the software in dealing with Chinese classical literature.
The first original characters that should be restored are those that were
replaced by other simple homophonous characters that already had their
own individual meaning. These simple characters now have more than one
meaning, and in some contexts their meanings cannot be easily deter-
mined, e.g., 麵 (mian, flour) was replaced by 面 (mian, face), so the
meaning of 面, whether it means face or flour, cannot be always be
confirmed. 後 (hou, after/behind) which was replaced by 后 (hou,
dowager empress), is another very visible instance that has been repeatedly
proposed to be resumed. In fact, for the convenience of some users, some
input software already has restored these original forms, thereby causing
some confusion, particularly for overseas Chinese learners.6
310 Some Critical Issues

Pondering ways to overcome the difficulty, the first author has

explored other remedial alternatives with the experts he visited during the
fieldwork for this research. For instance, adding an extra element (a
significant stroke) onto the simplified forms, corresponding to their origi-
nal forms, to function as a tag to direct computers to differentiate. This
kind of stroke does not have the usual function of suggesting the semantic
category, but merely serves as a means of visually distinguishing one
identically written character from another. This, however, would be a kind
of extra pro-machine measure, and any artificial human interference in the
hanzi system would risk triggering a public outcry. Another approach that
readily comes to mind is to define the particular character by the lexical
clues provided in the context. This is obviously the best way to solve the
problem, but it depends on the context and involves a morphological
differentiation, which normally requires a device, such as Chinese Morpho-
logical Analyzer (Halpern and Kerman 2004) to segment the text stream
into meaningful units (such as lexemes). The CJK Dictionary Institute
treats the false conversion between two hanzi systems at three levels of
sophistication. Its orthographic conversion method (mid-level) tries to
resolve ambiguities by employing a kind of orthographic mapping table at
the word level, but this involves other difficulties, even more fundamental,
that Chinese computing linguists have confronted and have been currently
trying to resolve in AI areas more generally. As Hannas (1997: 275) has
pointed out, “We are a long way from building computers intelligent
enough to understand the meaning of a text and to make informed choices
on the basis of that understanding”.
Another, equally important rationale for the reintroduction of tradi-
tional forms, is the misunderstanding caused by these characters in com-
munication between users of the two different systems. The general public
has little knowledge about language. Failing to identify the intended
traditional hanzi is the immediate reason that currently ridiculous tradi-
tional forms can be seen everywhere; from subtitles for TV plays targeted
at overseas Chinese, to product manuals for the export of goods; from shop
signs or window displays to official documents. Such usage produces a
bad image of simplified characters, and becomes a public eyesore for
visitors from Taiwan and Hong Kong. In some circumstances, it looks
preposterous and ignorant, and is a professional embarrassment for the
government (Goundry 2002).
There might be a dispute as to how many of such characters should be
brought back into use, but resuming unconvertible traditional characters
appears to be the area of least disputed among those involved in technical
affairs and policy making, and may be an unavoidable undertaking in the
Chapter 7 311

next reform. At least from the Mainland perspective, for some enthusiastic
optimists, it is widely considered a good starting point that the two sides
could use to bring their writing systems closer to eventual reunification.

3.3 Tentative Summary

The two main themes that run through this section seem to contradict
each other methodologically, but the two pairs of contradictions are the
driving force reflecting the dialectal features of the historical development of
hanzi. A brief reflection on past experience identifies some debatable areas
that provide an understanding of the present circumstances. As summarized
in the force field analysis diagram in Figure 7-2, the debate between
simplification and complication has, in the past, focused on three aspects,
that establishes a view of the relationship between language and society.
This chapter emphasizes that, while some forces analyzed in Figure 7-2
will continue to be robustly at work in driving change or supporting
processes, there are others opposing change or restraining developments.
Hence, the advent of computerization brings into focus a new dimension,
which tends to act as an instrument for creating imbalance and facilitating
change. The momentum behind these developments is essentially techno-
logical. When looking at the plausibility of potential contributions for
justifying any further simplification and partial resumption of traditional
characters, we have structured the discussion around some more tangible
matters that may act as catalyst in bringing change into being. The SSS
was not only academically disputed upon its abandonment, but a number
of SSS characters have been taking deeper root in the society, providing
indisputable evidence of their overwhelming popularity and wider recog-
nition among academics. Over-complex characters continue to be subjected
to enormous societal pressure to be simplified in order to be easily written
and clearly represented on the screen; a small number of ill-simplified
characters have created unlimited trouble in automatic conversion between
simplified characters and traditional characters. These characters are not
significant in quantity, but the following analogy helps to make the point:
these wrongly converted characters sit in a text just like a few grains of
sand randomly mixed in a big bag of rice.
As we have argued in preceding chapters, compared to the previous
policy that was preoccupied with idealistic and abstract approaches, the LP
authorities today are increasingly technologically oriented and ascribe
more significance for their work to economy. Therefore, the suggestions
made in this section can be read as a contribution to the debate from a
point of view which is different from some of the old thinking.
312 Some Critical Issues

Figure 7-2. Force field analysis – Pressure vs resistance to change

Chapter 7 313

4. ‘COMMON SCRIPT’ ACROSS CYBERSPACE

Common script (shutongwen) is originally a historical term, first used

when referring to the unifying efforts that occurred after the establishment
of the Qin Dynasty (see Section 2.1, Chapter 1). All governments in
China’s history have regarded setting official standards through state
mandates as one of the most important measures to effectively control and
rule over the vast Chinese territories. In modern times, as the writing
system became polarized across the Taiwan Strait, after the simplification
movement on the Mainland in the 1950s, the term shutongwen again has
gained political currency.
As described in Section 5, Chapter 5, the status quo in current graphic
life across the Strait is more about political tolerance than technical
resolution. Since 1996, the atmosphere has gone from bad to worse,
particularly after 2000 when the pro-independence party took power in
Taiwan. As part of the island’s gradual move away from a Mainland
identity, Taiwan’s government has striven to institutionalize both the
language and script as a separate variety from that used on the Mainland.
More significantly, many scholars have also gone to great lengths to define
and document these differences in dictionaries, style manuals, and
grammars specific to Taiwanese Mandarin. Consequently, in addition to
the ideological complications, there is also a distinction neatly paralleling
the political differences among both official scholars and amateur research-
ers from both camps. Thus, while admitting that it is not a good time to
talk about a common script, all the sides concerned, not only the people
across the Strait, but all stakeholders of Chinese characters in the East Asia
region, see a need to unify script differences to make cyber life for hanzi
users a reasonable possibility.
The Unicode provides Chinese computer specialists with the hope that
a viable solution can gradually be found to overcome the plight of creating
and viewing Chinese hanzi on web pages. However, as Jordan (2002: 111)
has pointed out, “the Unicode standard presupposes that each language has
a script consisting of a finite number of agreed-upon characters”. As a
pluricentric script, Chinese hanzi have grown into a huge and complex
writing system, used in different geopolitical regions of the world.
Unicode has, for the first time, brought hanzi-using professionals together
to work out an initial agreement on hanzi’s number and forms. In the final
section, we examine the difficulty of Unicode application in the complex
socio-political context of East Asia, particularly the special role played by
Japan, another big user of the hanzi encoding standard. While the section
as a whole may seem like a technological digression to the current hanzi
314 Some Critical Issues

standardization movement that is analytically discussed in Chapter 4, it

provides an emphatic technological justification for standardization, and
therefore becomes the driving force and starting point for every step taken
by hanzi reformers. This section also explores some common problems
encountered by Chinese users in decoding Chinese data. It is both a
retrospective glimpse at the past, and an overview of the present.

4.1 Han-Unification – Diversity and Difficulty

When talking about the existent regional disparities of hanzi’s shape in

some major hanzi-using countries, Zhou (1999: 78) says,
now there are differences in hanzi’s form among China, Japan and Korea;
among Chinese people, mainland China is different from Taiwan. This
causes difficulty and waste for learning from each other and for electro-
nic communication. If the unnecessary differences can be gradually
overcome, it will benefit all hanzi-using communities.
In contrast to people’s expectation and as a matter of fact, it appears
that the wider use of computers and the Internet have not brought the
physical differences of hanzi any closer together. Rather, as the result of
the emphasis all developers have place on their own features and identity
when drawing up their own standards, differences in the national character
standard sets of each individual country are being perpetuated. It should be
noted that the encoding standards for each hanzi-using individual com-
munity have been developed “independently, or with only limited mutual
awareness” (Cook 2001: 4). Unicode has come into being in a world filled
with such existing standards for various scripts. The large number of pre-
existing standards in East Asia was perhaps the most complex aspect that the
Unicode consortium had to deal with, underpinning the need for compa-
tibility with existing character standard sets through what was called Han
unification – an international standardization activity to unify all of the
character standard sets into a single large character set. This can be done
through the process of assigning single code points to the Han characters,
with the resulting repertoire of coded ideographs referred to as Unihan.
To carry out Han unification, two international organizations,
composed of IT experts from hanzi-using polities, were set up consecu-
tively7, to work with the over 20 character set standards and telegraphy
codes introduced by the USA, Taiwan, mainland China and Korea that
existed when Han unification started, with 121,403 as the total number of
characters encoded in these standard sets. The considerable work done by
Chapter 7 315

Unicode in collaboration with IRG has so far resulted in 70,207 unique

ideographs. The following information, provided by Lunde (1993: 49-53),
is very helpful in understanding how the Unicode consortium processes
CJKV characters in their Han unification efforts. Unicode mainly applies
two rules to identify a valid character: the Han Unification Rule and the
Source Separation Rule. The former is a process of eliminating redundant
characters, through merging of characters that have identical or near
identical structures and the same meanings, so more of the otherwise
wasted space can be freed up. The sources separation rule states, that
unification of two characters cannot take place if they have different
encodings within a single standard set source (in the case of CJK, there are
four sources from which the Unicode hanzi set is derived). For instance,
the Japanese character 剣 (ken in Japanese and jian in Chinese) has five
variants: 剱 劍 劔 劒 釼, each having its own unique encoded position
in JIS X 0208-1990 (one of the above-mentioned 20 standards), and as
such are not unified. Source separation is to ensure that round-trip
conversion is successful for cross-locale Unicode fonts.
Considering the immensity and complexity of the work carried out to
identify and unify such a large number of characters from so many stan-
dard sets, sometimes compromises had to be made in order to make this
process work well with other script systems outside East Asia. For
instance, the aforementioned source separation rule cannot be carried out
consistently. It is not surprising, therefore, that problems developed during
the unification process and complaints about over-unification have been
frequently raised by users – mostly by users and software developers from
the East Asian cultural hemisphere. Resistance towards these changes
remains particularly high in Japan, as the subsequent discussion indicates.
The most criticized problem, as Topping (2001) aptly points out,
“stems from the fact that Unicode encodes characters rather than ‘glyphs’,
which are the visual representations of the characters”. There are four
basic types of East Asian character shapes: traditional Chinese, simplified
Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. While the original character may be from
the same root for CJK languages, the glyphs in common use for that
character may be different in evolution, and a large number of new
characters were independently invented in each country. Cook (2001: 4)
observes:
Graphic differences emerged between the different scripts, so that
a given character in one locale was no longer identified with the
character to which it was historically related to each other locale. What
316 Some Critical Issues

had once simply been stylistic variations in print or handwriting

gradually crystallized into hard irreconcilable difference.
Although Han unification unifies the codes for abstract characters
instead of the concrete characters per se, the identification depends “on the
sights of unifiers and the version of standard used” (Wada 1991: 4). In
other words, in many cases, the amalgamation/differentiation is deter-
mined by appearance of the character in the code tables of a given version
of standard sets. The separation rules, outlined in the various versions of
Unicode working principles, are just a high conceptual ideal, due to
limitations of both the cyber source and technical resolution that relate to
the operating efficiency – it cannot always be firmly adhered to or strongly
enforced. Therefore, despite the alleged involvement of IRG’s Asian
members, the unification has been frequently blamed for lacking native
familiarity and orthographical comprehension of the subtle variations by
hawk-eyed native users. As a result of constraints within source separation
rules, necessary distinctions, or variants of the same characters at the glyph
level, were typographically unified and then rendered as one ‘character’,
so that they could be assigned a single code point. That is to say, different
forms (glyph in Unicode typology) in the real world or on paper that
should actually be assigned more specific code points (as they might be in
their respective source standard sets), were all put together in Unicode.
Some of these differences are admittedly minuscule and are unidentifiable
to most users in one community, but not in another community, parti-
cularly, in processing inscriptional ancient text produced in different
historical times, where the maximal details of graphical expression are
supposed to be preserved. For example, to ancient canon researchers and
digital library/museum developers, this kind of unification is parallel
to some letters on the keyboard being missing for alphabetic language
speakers. This is presumably the major reason for the refusal of the East
Asians to fully embrace the Unicode. How problematic is it, then, to
satisfy tradition-obsessed individuals and those developers involved in the
digitalization of East Asian ancient heritage? According to Meyer (1999:
2), unification is achieved, “In order to represent the Chinese characters of
the different Asian locales [source standard sets of individual communities
– authors] in a culturally adequate and typographically correct way with
the help of Unicode”. Preliminary research shows that, at least for the
21,204 Unihan ideographs (Unicode version 2.1) in the portion of BMP
(Basic Multilingual Panes), “roughly 50 percent of CJK characters need
more than one glyph representation”. In Mayer’s term, this process is
Chapter 7 317

‘Unihan disambiguation’, to de-Unihan in order to disambiguate those

seemly superfluous but sometimes necessary subtle distinctions.
Related to this ambiguity problem caused by Han unification, is the
inability of Unicode to address the issue concerning font style or typeface
(referring to Prologue). Font style is more language specific than glyph, in
terms of the sophistication level of graphic distinction. China has four
widely used basic font styles (Heiti style, Song style, Intimate Song style
and Kaiti style), and each other hanzi-using polity has a series of fonts of
their own. This implies that even if the character and glyph are all the same,
the characters may look different when displayed by language-independent
browsers. When you read a page in a language-dependent environment, all
the characters will be in the same font style, but if a Unicode application is
utilized, such as to input data online, the characters might be shown in a
totally different style, and one would feel ‘this is not my character’. This is
because if the individuals browser (e.g., Internet Explorer) does not have
the font for Unicode that one is familiar with, “it will map each character
to some other character set, such as GB, CNS, JIS, or KSC, and the web
page appears in a patchwork of styles” (Cheong 1999: 4). People normally
feel irritated when they see alien fonts on the screen, partly because these
characters are less recognizable, but more probably for sentimental
reasons8. The analogy given by a Unicode critic (i.e., Goundry 2001: 12) is
that it is like being like compelled in a Western language setting to use the
French alphabet to write German, or to force the English to use the French.
Some cross-locale font technologies have been proposed and advanced
(e.g., Open Type, Meyer 1999 and Typological Encoding, Cook 2001), but
it is still a serious challenge for Unicoders to make Unicode technology
serve CJKV script users with their diversified requirements well. More-
over, even when technological solutions are available, there are many
external issues that have to be addressed, which we will turn to presently.

4.2 Socio-Political Dimensions

Many issues become problems for non-technical reasons. The best way
to assign numerical codes to characters is a seemingly very straightforward
technical undertaking, but very often socio-cultural, and sometimes, poli-
tical factors are involved. The formulation, adoption, and encoding stan-
dards adopted were afflicted by conflict between various interest groups
right from the very beginning. First it was between ASCII (American
Standard Code for Information Interchange) and the industrial standards
led by IBM due to different marketing strategies, and then it was between
318 Some Critical Issues

the ISO/IEC DIS 10646, supported by European countries and Japan, and
the Unicode Consortium, established by big American computer firms
mainly for geopolitical reasons. When it comes to the promotion of
Unicode in East Asia, Japan stands as the fiercest opponent to its adoption
for two reasons.

4.2.1 Japan’s Opposition

Culturally, Japan’s unhappiness with Unicode is due to the latter’s

inability to prescribe variations of hanzi’s details. As Unihan focuses only
on the shape of Chinese characters instead on the concrete typological
representation-glyphs, this resulted in ‘it’s not my characters’ sentiment
among culturally aware Japanese users. More seriously, the surname-
specific kanji in Japanese is more open to individual creativity than hanzi,
and since Japanese care very much about uniqueness as a genealogical
value, the government actually failed to persuade the population to sacri-
fice any details of the physical variation of these kanji for technological
convenience (He 2001: 162). Japan’s JIS standards prescribe the shape of
the glyphs for each character. Even though Unicode has a ‘Private Use
Area’ mechanism that allows entry of newly coined characters, due to the
lack of an internationally agreed-upon convention among hanzi stake-
holders on how to use such mechanisms, these so-called private characters
are not created and then encoded in the same way. In other words, while
they are only locally viewable (also printable), they can not be digitally
processed. More significantly, they are not transmittable and decodable in
other applications, nor over the Internet. As a result, these characters all
end up as garbage in the course of online transmission. It is from this
perspective, that “Unicode has been criticized as being little more than an
exercise in cultural imperialism on the part of Western computer
manufacturers” (Searle 2004). It has been perceived of as “destroying
Japanese culture with Anglo-centricity thinking” (Goundry 2001).
The second reason that accounts for the lukewarm support from Japan
is more political and economical. Unger (1991: 134) says that “because
national standard are ultimately political in nature, the promulgation of
UNICODE will probably do more to delay than to hasten genuine inter-
national standards, even if giants like IBM decide to opt for it”. As the
leader in technology in the East Asian area, and possessing a couple of
well developed Japanese systems that were precursors and prototypes of
other later-coming standard sets formulated by other hanzi-using polities,
it is understandable that Japan is eager to take the lead in counteracting the
Unicode influence. Some Japanese achievements, such as the TRON
Chapter 7 319

character code and its TRON Multilingual Environment, developed by

Sukamura Laboratory at Tokyo University in the 1980s, is not only a rival
coding system in Asia; it is even in a strong position to threaten Unicode,
vying for worldwide acceptance. There is general acknowledgment that
TRON does have some features that make its approach to multilingual
processing unique and superior over Unicode. It is not only more East-
Asian-script friendly, the TRON character set is also infinitely extendable,
thus it is capable of including all scripts that have ever been used, and will
accommodate even new scripts that have yet to be invented (Sakamura
1992). Nevertheless, so far TRON’s application mainly has been confined
within Japan, “because it has not been given the blessing of certain
American software houses that want to control operating system software
far into the future” (Searle 2004).
Japan is a member of the IRG, but it warns that even if it were to
become the international standard, Unicode “will be solely for multilingual
application, not for domestic use” (Wada 1991: 2, 5). This implies that, at
least within Japan, all software made in Japan will be preinstalled with a
Japanese code system; when Unicode has to be used, the system will be
operable only in an isolated environment. As the only country in East Asia
that has strongly resisted Unicode from the very beginning, Japan’s
negative attitude towards Unicode, at both governmental level and in
industry circles, is in stark contrast with China’s enthusiasm for it.

4.2.2 Rivalry Between Japan and China

Being the home of Chinese characters, China is the most important

stakeholder and naturally wants to play the leading role in this process.
However, China did not draw up its own big set standards during the
1980s (the series of GB-2312’s supplementary sets were not put in use
until much later). Taiwan had developed good standards, but it is
obviously impossible to promote Taiwanese standards on the Mainland.
Turning to international ones, China prefers Unicode over the Japanese
standard and its TRON system. As indicated in the Appendix F, China not
only has a strong belief in the possibilities of the Unicode, but has been a
strong supporter of Unicode promotion since the beginning of the 1990s.
China also has spared no effort in striving to make its various internal
standard encoding sets compatible with Unicode conventions in order to
push internationalization of the standard. Japan has been very disappointed
about China’s extraordinary enthusiasm in promoting Unicode’s spread
outside the Unicode group (Wada 1991: 1). As noted in Chapter 4, in an
attempt to make China’s rich traditional heritage globally digitally
320 Some Critical Issues

deliverable, China hopes that Unicode will provide the platform for
uploading its gigantic set of Chinese classics and archaic characters.
Appendix F shows that China has made a great effort to cooperate with
Unicode through making its existing standard sets compatible with the
Unicode system. Unicode has also been widely adopted in academic and
private sectors, domestically and internationally. There have been serious
commercial commitments to encode a good part of Chinese classic canons
and ancient human knowledge with Unicode characters. For instance, Siku
Quanshu (1772), which has 79,337 volumes and is the country’s largest
surviving Chinese Encyclopedia, has been Unicoded for a number of years
using original character forms (Zhang 2005) as has the Shuowen Jiezi
(Cook 2001).
Another important dimension of the political implications in the
encoding standard issue relates to which set of standards or individual
characters in the international standards is related to membership rights.
Goundry (2001: 3) has pointed out perceptively, “to have your language
left out of the Internet is definitely a case of being ‘denied membership’”.
A very telling story is the competition among Japan, Taiwan and Mainland
China at the end of the 1970s, for the right to represent hanzi-using nations
in international standard-making organizations. In a decision-making
conference, held in March of 1980 at Stanford University, the Taiwanese
system defeated the rival system – lobbied for by an eight-member
Japanese delegation – and succeeded in gaining the right to offer their
hanzi coding system as the international standard system. As discussed in
the last section of Chapter 5, toward the end of the 1970s, both Taiwan and
the Mainland aggressively competed to gain the opportunity to set the
hanzi standard. In his accounts about this first Chinese-initiated Chinese
character encoding system (CCCII), Hsieh (2001) said that in order to
permanently elbow out the potential rival system, proposed by Mainland
China, CCCII include wholesale all simplified characters. However, this
justification was not strong enough to persuade the authority, under heavy
political pressure to withdraw all bandit [Communist] characters, and the
research team had to present another two justifications. The politicians
were finally convinced by two questions: “Don’t we need to process
intelligence from the bandits by computer?” and, “Shouldn’t we conduct
cultural and political propaganda, once we reclaim the Mainland?” Now,
the Mainland has no objection to the inclusion of over 3,000 Cantonese
dialectal characters in Unicode, but it will do its outmost to oppose the
inclusion of any Hokkien dialectal characters, which is the ‘mother tongue’
of 70 percent of Taiwan’s population (Jordan 2002: 127).
Chapter 7 321

In sum, the problems found with Han unification, readily encountered

by its clients, confirm that the ultimate resolution must occur across human
communities before any unification in cyberspace can take place. Over the
last couple of decades, the dangers of each polity unilaterally developing
rival systems have lead to ever-increasing discussions on the creation of an
international standard for hanzi, with the hope of achieving only one
global standard. Unicode provides a starting point for international
collaboration, and the IRG should be seen as a semi-governmental
international expert body. The working members of the IRG are either
appointed by member governments, or are invited experts from other
countries. The authors have not been aware of any serious collaborative
efforts among hanzi-using polities in unifying hanzi’s forms in human
communities. Over the last two or so decades, the standardization require-
ment from the IT industry has spurred a flurry of activities in formulating
hanzi standard encoding sets by different governments in adjacent
countries, which on the one hand share commonalities in script issues and
similar cultural backgrounds, but are simultaneously divided by political,
economic and social developments. These polities have promulgated
legacy standard sets which seem similar at first glance to the code table.
However, considering the extremely complex relationships between the
semantic meaning and physical variation in hanzi (regardless of the
variation in font style), different degrees of compromise in shape and
sound have been applied within each individual country. Then the charac-
ters in the different systems were classified and arranged by different
methods9. It is in fact hard to conceive of a standard as being adequate
when it does not address all of these issues. An ideal versatile mechanism
is clearly at odds in some ways with the practical limits of Unicode.
Moreover, the situation is further complicated by the fact that no
character code standard is able to cover all characters. This is largely
because hanzi have been so widely circulated geographically for such a
long time while the writing system, like language per se, has been
constantly evolving. New characters continue to form and old ones to
change. The unification of encoding standards calls for the input from en-
coding experts, IT engineers, language educators and linguistics research-
ers, which inevitably draws in the polities which sponsor such experts.
In sum, expecting a satisfying long-term solution to the practical problems
of international CJKV encoding issues without further interaction among
all hanzi stakeholders at the international level is not a viable proposition.
322 Some Critical Issues

5. HANZI REFORM: A BATTLEFIELD FOR

SOCIAL FORCES IN LANGUAGE PLANNING

5.1 Rearticulating Some Underlying Issues

In Chapters 1 and 2 of this volume, we called attention to the fact that

“even in the best circumstances, the language planner will be captured in
the inevitable tension between political, linguistic and societal goals in the
language planning environment” (Kaplan and Baldauf 1997: 309). Reflect-
ing this, an underlying thesis of this monograph has been that language
planning and policy, which has as its focus standardization, generally can
be said to be influenced by the societal forces of evolution, revolution and
reaction. In this sense, the monograph raises issues, albeit in a particular
context – China – and with a particular focus – on one aspect of the
language planning and policy process, i.e., script reform – that mirror the
problems with which language planners in a variety of contemporary
contexts struggle. Furthermore, the monograph re-energizes the problem-
atic question of what is meant by ‘language modernization’ – especially
as it is affected and redefined by the quickening pace of technological
change. This issue is highlighted because Chinese writing occurs through
characters (or hanzi) that are part of an open ended logographic script
system that generates unique complex technological problems. Thus, the
study presented in this monograph suggests that issues related to standard-
ization and modernization, which have been traditionally relatively linear
and able to be encompassed by the language planning categories of status
planning, corpus planning, language-in-education planning, and/or prestige/
image planning (see e.g., Kaplan and Baldauf 2003), may no longer be
adequate to conceptualize the field, i.e., examining the language issues
under these categories may not satisfy the new requirements of language
modernization in an increasingly global age of technological communi-
cation.
While one hesitates to suggest yet another language planning category –
technological planning – as another focus for language planners, this
monograph indicates that issues raised by technology go beyond evolutio-
nary ways of working, and therefore, that there may be a need to develop
revolutionary ways of thinking about the impact of technology on the
language policy and planning. While Chinese hanzi may provide an
extreme case of the interface between language – especially writing
systems – and technology, the way that language is used for technological
Chapter 7 323

communication is a problem that all languages and cultures share to

varying degrees – if we believe that the ultimate survival of languages may
depend on their representation in cyberspace. Although there are unique
issues to be resolved, if a large and powerful language and culture like
Chinese is finding it difficult to find its voice in cyberspace, what are the
implications of this issue for other less powerful languages and cultures?
It is in this context that we briefly turn to summarize the three
underlying themes running through this monograph, and their relationship
to communication technology. For Chinese characters, as for other lan-
guage planning sites, evolution, revolution and reaction represent trends in
societal forces which impact on what has traditionally been seen as the
rational and scientific approach to language policy and planning. Although
critical studies of LPP have placed a greater emphasis on the micro or the
local (see e.g., Baldauf 2006; Canagarajah 2005) and on societal issues,
these societal forces and the particular values and ways of thinking about
the role of technological change to LPP still largely remain to be explored.
For many of the less powerful languages and cultures, this is an issue yet
to be realized and yet to be addressed. It is our hope that Chinese
experience highlighted in this volume may aid to understand the issue in
some depth.
Thus, having looked at the detailed process of consecutive attempts at
Chinese script planning and drawing on the background, history, and
processes that have intrigued LP scholars and practitioners for years, in the
following sections we briefly summarize Chinese hanzi reform attempts
through a discussion of the interaction and balance between the three
forces of evolution, revolution and reaction.

5.2 Evolution

Language change is inherently conservative, as language forms a part

of human identity that individuals have some reluctance to change. Left to
their own devices language users change the internal structures of their
languages only to the extent necessary to meet new and emerging needs –
languages evolve slowly over decades or even centuries. For example, the
English of 500 years ago, while somewhat different from that being used
today is still comprehensible to current English readers; Classical Chinese
had served as written vehicle for over 2,500 years until the Verna-
cularization Movement that occurred at the beginning of last century.
While language planning and standardization, and the introduction of
324 Some Critical Issues

various technologies have shaped language and literacy practices, change

has generally been evolutionary.
In the prologue, we described the extreme long process in the evolution
of hanzi’s physical shape. Hanzi as a writing system took root in jiaguwen
about three thousand years ago, changing several times in next one
thousand years. The last major change (kaishu) occurred 1,800 years ago
and since then hanzi physically and officially remained substantially
unchanged until the 1935 simplification. This long-standing stability
provides evidence that any radical change will have the inevitable fate of
meeting reactionary forces as demonstrated in the failure of the FSS. The
failure of the first simplification efforts also shows that, revolutionary
attempts are not only constrained by hanzi’s built-in features, formed
during its historical evolution, but by external forces, or enabling
conditions.
Since the 1986 conference and under the pressure of reactionary forces,
there has been a gradual return to an evolutionary process through standardi-
zation in Chinese hanzi reform. The emphasis has been put on stability
characterized by standardization reorientation, which is required by techno-
logical development. The replacement of reforming measures by standardi-
zation as the core concern about script system is significant. As Zhao (2005:
369) observed, in the past, the masses, which were chiefly referred to as
character learners or illiterates, and users with little education were targeted
by simplification and Romanization reforms.
Now the entire country is in rapid transition from a socialist ideology to
an increasingly elite-dominated society. Language planners are more
concerned with a literate population, or it is perhaps truer to say for a
steadily expanding computer-literate population.
LP implementers previously were driven by a desire to solve social
problems through plan implementation as part of the socialist goal of
simplification for mass literacy to strengthen political power and commit-
ment to the Communist government. Ironically, with the advent of compu-
ter, LP activities are increasingly largely propelled by the technological
demand, the relative success of this revolution and the command of
characters in computation have returned the skill base to the control of the
relatively few in the course of country’s modernization efforts. In this sense,
the LP policy turnaround after 1986 can be considered to be reactionary in
comparison with pre-conference development. In an evolutionary sense, as
the French would say, “the more things change, the more they remain the
same.”
Chapter 7 325

5.3 Revolution

Given the embedded nature of language in culture and human identity,

revolution normally only occurs as the result of some major societal
change, or the urgent need to solve a particular problem, or the cooptation
of the elites into the ranks of the revolution. In other words, there is a
tendency to let nature take its course, or for language development to go
down an evolutionary path without the enabling revolutionary conditions.
The three rounds of character simplification movements that were
carried out by post-imperial Chinese governments (Nationalist and
Communist), had as their ultimate goal revolutionary reform of the script
system. From the very beginning, as one of the three pillars of the grand
tripartite LP project (hanzi Simplification, Promotion of national language
and Romanization) initiated during the early days of the cultural revo-
lution, script reform as a way of simplifying hanzi was deemed to be an
interim method to get from an ideographic writing system to a spelling
system.
However, seeing themselves as the soul of the nation and the saviors of
its cultural heritage, the elite class tends to act as a reactionary force in the
LP process, holding back revolution. When the simplification was raised
again in the 1950s, after its failure in 1935, and the Scheme was
formulated, a significant part of the elite group had become members of
ruling class which was a revolutionary party, leaving the opposing forces
without the intellectual strength to counteract the change. This is the
fundamental reason accounting for the successful implementation of the
TSC. However, the revolutionary forces had not developed to the extent
necessary to allow more radical change to the script system, i.e., full-
fledged Romanization. The Second Scheme in 1977, turned out to be the
central stage where all these three forces were intensively played out. It
was formulated during the period of revolutionary zeal when everything
had to be treated as part of political ideology – a very unusual period in the
history of any polity. The scheme was revolutionary LP at its best as it was
actually the work of language users themselves instead of language
planners as all elite intellectuals had been subjected to physical labor (for
brainwashing) in the remote country areas for a greater part of period of
the Great Cultural Revolution. This created rare conditions where, in the
absence of restraining forces, i.e., evolutionary laws of hanzi development
and the reactionary forces, the revolutionary forces (commoners) prevailed
and the Scheme was passed. When the Great Culture Revolution came to
an end, the SSS Scheme was rejected despite the lack of hard evidence of
public opposition – the principal reason given for the abandonment of the
326 Some Critical Issues

SSS. The 1986 conference was a milestone in LP history in that it was

marked by this conservative feature. The elites had returned and it was
very obvious that some key members of national LP body played reac-
tionary roles in reversing policy direction, i.e., the formal withdraw of the
SSS and abandonment of Romanization pursuit. With the ending of the
revolution through reaction, a moderate evolutionary pattern as shown
graphically in Figure 7-1 emerged, while the seeds of another revolution –
a technological one – were just beginning to be planted.

5.4 Reaction

For most language users, or at least for some of those in positions of

power and authority with regard to language within societies, there is a
desire to either maintain or return to a pure form of the language. The
developing course of Chinese script reform documented in this volume
shows that, in a certain sense, it might be appropriate to say that every
reform goal points to the revolution, but none can overcome the social
reaction that stems from cultural conservatism. Language purism (see e.g.,
Jernudd and Shapiro 1989) movements can be found in many countries,
and are particularly strongly related to religious ideals and other notions of
the language (and its texts) embodying sacred values and meanings
(Schiffman 1996). This is perhaps best illustrated in the belief that God
spoke to Mohammed in (Classical) Arabic and therefore the Koran should
only be read and spoken in God’s language. This phenomenon can also be
observed among many Christians who still prefer the King James Version
of the English Bible to modern retranslations. Formal religion may not
play a substantial role in Chinese life, but as richly enunciated in Section
3.2.2, Chapter 1, hanzi have been long sanctified, and when one’s heritage
is viewed as sacred, it is not an easy thing to give up.
If evolution emphasizes the long term eventual process with history
showing that script development occurs as evolutionary process, revolution
represents a sudden radical change and reaction to resisting forces. How-
ever, if we look at the three major simplification programs, particularly the
failures in 1935 and 1977, it seems to suggest that elite class have tended
to act as a reactionary force against the demands of commoners, who are
almost always are the ones pushing for reform, thus the interaction
between these two forces prevents revolutionary changes from being made
to the Chinese writing system. From the viewpoint of autonomous or
pure linguistics, a script is just the form of written communication and
language can be served well by any form. Thus, revolutionary change can
Chapter 7 327

be made to the script system, i.e., change to another more convenient

system, as occurred in Malay, Turkish and Vietnamese. But in the Chinese
case, although Romanization movements achieved a lot during the 1920-
1930s and the 1950s, it continues to be the most inflammable topic in the
history of Chinese language modernization. The planners failed to
Romanize Chinese script due to strong reactionary forces from a signi-
ficant segmentation of intellectual elite. Even before the appearance of the
Romanization movement of the 1920-1930s, the goal of promoting an
alphabetic system to replace hanzi (“the venerable oldster” in Romani-
zation advocates’ terms) had been seen by traditionalists as a stab directed
at the heart of Chinese culture. Therefore, no alphabetic system, no matter
whether devised by Chinese or Westerners, has gone beyond an auxiliary
role in Chinese graphic life.

5.5 Conclusion

In most societies, the forces of evolution, revolution and reaction have

played a part in the way that languages have developed. What is interesting
in the Chinese context is that these forces have been so clearly in play over
the last 100 years and that their interaction, particularly revolution and
reaction, have been accelerated by technology, and recently by the need for
digital technology for script transmission on the internet.
The analysis in this monograph has focused largely on the linguistic
dimension and its relationship to political issues, but language reform
normally occurs in association with socio-political upheaval, attesting to
the huge revolutionary impact on the language and script system that can
be brought about by social conditions. In the case of China, by the late
1800s after the first and second opium wars (1840, 1859), the military
defeats at the hands of the Western Powers provoked demands within
China for mass education. Educational reform inevitably brings with it
literacy campaigns and script reform. Thus, the debate on language reform
was heard with increasing frequency as the Manchu Dynasty came to an
end in 1912, providing a catalyst for the initial reforms discussed in this
monograph.
When script reform first started during the early days of the Communist
revolution, LPers had no way to anticipate many of the problems the
authors have described in this volume. More recently, advances in com-
munication technology have created a new way to examine LPP in its new
historical context, with broader perspectives extending beyond the polity
borders. The impact of current computer technology described in Chapters
328 Some Critical Issues

3 and 4 in light of the problems of Chinese standardization has raised new

considerations that have become so important that the future success and
even continuation of script reform may depend on them to a very signi-
ficant extent. While the ongoing extensive standardization ventures
(Section 3, Chapter 4) will not be likely to bring a drastic change in hanzi’s
physical shape, they may have a far-reaching impact on character use.
Thus, the forces of evolution (standardization projects), revolution (the
urgent need for a computer friendly script similar to pinyin) and reaction
(the nationalistic forces of traditional culture and writing) are still in play.
In this monograph we argue that how those forces play out may determine
not only the fate of hanzi, but also the ultimate role of the Chinese
language in the world language ecology.
Acknowledgments

This book owes a great deal to many people. We would like especially
to thank the following individuals for their input.
First, the empirical findings obtained from the qualitative research
approaches have complemented the lack of reliable critical information
needed to write a book like this. We would like first to extend our gratitude
to the scholars who accepted an invitation to give key informant interviews
and/or who came to speak at the special focus seminar. They include: Prof.
Zhou Youguang (RIAL, consultant of SCLW), Prof. Hu Mingyang
(Renmin University of China, former Vice-president of All-China Associa-
tion of Chinese Linguistics), Dr. Guo Longsheng (researcher at RIAL),
Prof. Wang Jun (RIAL, consultant of SCLW), Prof. Li Yuming (Director
of RIAL and Department of Language and Information Management of
MOE), Prof. Chen Zhangtai (RIAL, consultant of SCLW, President of All-
China Association of Applied Linguistics), Prof. Su Peicheng (Beijing
University, President of Association of Chinese Language Modernization).
Prof. Yin Bingyong (RIAL), Prof. Fei Jinchang (RIAL), Prof. Dong Kun
(Vice-director of Linguistics Research Institution, China Academy of
Social Sciences), Prof. Fu Yonghe (RIAL), Prof. Feng Zhiwei (Chinese
Information Processing scientist at RIAL), Prof. Lu Chuan (Chinese
Information Processing scientist at RIAL), and Prof. Wu Tieping (Beijing
Teachers’ University). These scholars are all well-recognized authorities in
Chinese language planning and their willingness to share their insights and
experience has made a unique contribution to this book. Of course, we take
full responsibility for any inaccuracies or misinterpretations that may have
occurred.

329
330 Acknowledgements

Our thanks also go to the following individuals who offered their

valuable assistance at various stages of doing the research and writing of
this book: Mr. Rudolf Salzlechner and my colleagues at Nanyang Techno-
logical University (Miss Wang Yimin, Mr. Goh Hock Huan, Mr. Zhao
Chunsheng, Ms. Wendy Toh and Ms. Joan Gan) for proofreading some
draft chapters of the book; Mr. Zhang Dongbo (Carnegie Mellon Univer-
sity) for helping us create all the self-created hanzi characters in this text;
Ms. Bryde Dodd (Instructional Designer at University of Sydney) for her
technical support in the online survey; Ms. Zhao Yanhui (the Principal of
the Northeast Normal University’s Affiliated Primary School), Ms. Wang
Jing (China Central TV and Radio University), Mr. Shao Honghua (editor
of Unity Newspaper), and Mr. He Dingmeng (the chief-editor of Planting
and Raising Magazine) for their help in collecting Chinese handwritten
materials; Prof. Michael Walsh (University of Sydney), Prof. Chen Ping
(University of Queensland), Prof. John Rohsenow (University of Illinois),
Dr. George Zhao (University of Toronto), and Prof. Liu Haitao (Media and
Communication University of China) for their comments on various parts
of the text and/or help in document and information access. Our thanks
also go to Simon Ager, Ellie Crysta, and Imre Galambos for permitting us
to use their illustrations in this book. We’d also like to thank a number of
anonymous referees for their valuable comments on this book and related
materials. These comments have helped us clarify our thinking on a
number of issues.
To undertake this kind of research outside China relies heavily on
Chinese resources. Therefore, we greatly appreciate the excellent library
support offered by the Fisher Library of the University of Sydney. We also
would like to extend our thanks to all the quoted scholars and sincerely
hope that our translations have not seriously distorted their views. In this
book, the translations, unless otherwise noted, have been done by the first
author, including the translations of names in the references to pinyin when
the original Chinese titles were given characters. However, due to the
acute lack of unified standards for Romanizing names for Chinese living
outside Mainland China, the Romanization of names can be quite hapha-
zard and unsystematic. It is very common that the same Chinese surname
has three or four variant Romanized forms. Therefore, in this book, these
authors’ names were written in pinyin when their original transliteration
could not be located. We apologize for not being able to use an
individual’s own preferred Romanized form.
 Appendix

APPENDIX A: THE FIRST SCHEME

OF SIMPLIFIED CHARACTERS (1935)

331
332 Appendix
Appendix 333
336 Appendix
APPENDIX B: THE SECOND SCHEME
OF SIMPLIFIED CHARACTERS (1977)

337
338 Appendix
Appendix 339
340 Appendix
Appendix 341
342 Appendix
APPENDIX C: TABLE OF MOST USED CHINESE CHARACTERS
(《现代汉语常用字表》)

第一部分 常用字 （2500 字）

按笔画顺序排列
Part 1 Most Used Characters (2500)
By Stroke Order
一画
一乙
二画
二 十 丁 厂 七 卜 人 入 八 九 几 儿 了 力 乃 刀 又
三画
三 于 干 亏 士 工 土 才 寸 下 大 丈 与 万 上 小 口 巾 山
千 乞 川 亿 个 勺 久 凡 及 夕 丸 么 广 亡 门 义 之 尸 弓
己 已 子 卫 也 女 飞 刃 习 叉 马 乡
四画
丰 王 井 开 夫 天 无 元 专 云 扎 艺 木 五 支 厅 不 太 犬
区 历 尤 友 匹 车 巨 牙 屯 比 互 切 瓦 止 少 日 中 冈 贝
内 水 见 午 牛 手 毛 气 升 长 仁 什 片 仆 化 仇 币 仍 仅
斤 爪 反 介 父 从 今 凶 分 乏 公 仓 月 氏 勿 欠 风 丹 匀
乌 凤 勾 文 六 方 火 为 斗 忆 订 计 户 认 心 尺 引 丑 巴
孔 队 办 以 允 予 劝 双 书 幻
五画
玉 刊 示 末 未 击 打 巧 正 扑 扒 功 扔 去 甘 世 古 节 本
术 可 丙 左 厉 右 石 布 龙 平 灭 轧 东 卡 北 占 业 旧 帅
归 且 旦 目 叶 甲 申 叮 电 号 田 由 史 只 央 兄 叼 叫 另
叨 叹 四 生 失 禾 丘 付 仗 代 仙 们 仪 白 仔 他 斥 瓜 乎
丛 令 用 甩 印 乐 句 匆 册 犯 外 处 冬 鸟 务 包 饥 主 市
立 闪 兰 半 汁 汇 头 汉 宁 穴 它 讨 写 让 礼 训 必 议 讯
记 永 司 尼 民 出 辽 奶 奴 加 召 皮 边 发 孕 圣 对 台 矛
纠 母 幼 丝
六画
式 刑 动 扛 寺 吉 扣 考 托 老 执 巩 圾 扩 扫 地 扬 场 耳
共 芒 亚 芝 朽 朴 机 权 过 臣 再 协 西 压 厌 在 有 百 存
而 页 匠 夸 夺 灰 达 列 死 成 夹 轨 邪 划 迈 毕 至 此 贞
师 尘 尖 劣 光 当 早 吐 吓 虫 曲 团 同 吊 吃 因 吸 吗 屿
帆 岁 回 岂 刚 则 肉 网 年 朱 先 丢 舌 竹 迁 乔 伟 传 乒
乓 休 伍 伏 优 伐 延 件 任 伤 价 份 华 仰 仿 伙 伪 自 血
向 似 后 行 舟 全 会 杀 合 兆 企 众 爷 伞 创 肌 朵 杂 危
旬 旨 负 各 名 多 争 色 壮 冲 冰 庄 庆 亦 刘 齐 交 次 衣
产 决 充 妄 闭 问 闯 羊 并 关 米 灯 州 汗 污 江 池 汤 忙

343
344 Appendix

兴 宇 守 宅 字 安 讲 军 许 论 农 讽 设 访 寻 那 迅 尽 导
异 孙 阵 阳 收 阶 阴 防 奸 如 妇 好 她 妈 戏 羽 观 欢 买
红 纤 级 约 纪 弛 巡
七画
寿 弄 麦 形 进 戒 吞 远 违 运 扶 抚 坛 技 坏 扰 拒 找 批
扯 址 走 抄 坝 贡 功 赤 折 抓 扮 抢 孝 均 抛 投 坟 抗 坑
坊 抖 护 壳 志 扭 块 声 把 报 却 劫 芽 花 芹 芬 苍 芳 严
芦 劳 克 苏 杆 杠 杜 材 村 杏 极 李 杨 求 更 束 豆 两 丽
医 辰 励 否 还 歼 来 连 步 坚 旱 盯 呈 时 吴 助 县 里 呆
园 旷 围 呀 吨 足 邮 男 困 吵 串 员 听 吩 吹 呜 吧 吼 别
岗 帐 财 针 钉 告 我 乱 利 秃 秀 私 每 兵 估 体 何 但 伸
作 伯 伶 佣 低 你 住 位 伴 身 皂 佛 近 彻 役 返 余 希 坐
谷 妥 含 邻 岔 肝 肚 肠 龟 免 狂 犹 角 删 条 卵 岛 迎 饭
饮 系 言 冻 状 亩 况 床 库 疗 应 冷 这 序 辛 弃 冶 忘 闲
间 闷 判 灶 灿 弟 汪 沙 汽 沃 泛 沟 没 沈 沉 怀 忧 快 完
宋 宏 牢 究 穷 灾 良 证 启 评 补 初 社 识 诉 珍 词 译 君
灵 即 层 尿 尾 迟 局 改 张 忌 际 陆 阿 陈 阻 附 妙 妖 妨
努 忍 劲 鸡 驱 纯 纱 纳 纲 驳 纵 纷 纸 纹 纺 驴 纽
八画
奉 玩 环 武 青 责 现 表 规 抹 拢 拔 拣 担 坦 押 抽 拐 拖
拍 者 顶 拆 拥 抵 拘 势 抱 垃 拉 拦 拌 幸 招 坡 披 拨 择
抬 其 取 苦 若 茂 苹 苗 英 范 直 茄 茎 茅 林 枝 杯 柜 析
板 松 枪 构 杰 述 枕 丧 或 画 卧 事 刺 枣 雨 卖 矿 码 厕
奔 奇 奋 态 欧 垄 妻 轰 顷 转 斩 轮 软 到 非 叔 肯 齿 些
虎 虏 肾 贤 尚 旺 具 果 味 昆 国 昌 畅 明 易 昂 典 固 忠
咐 呼 鸣 咏 呢 岸 岩 帖 罗 帜 岭 凯 败 贩 购 图 钓 制 知
垂 牧 物 乖 刮 秆 和 季 委 佳 侍 供 使 例 版 侄 侦 侧 凭
侨 佩 货 依 的 迫 质 欣 征 往 爬 彼 径 所 舍 金 命 斧 爸
采 受 乳 贪 念 贫 肤 肺 肢 肿 胀 朋 股 肥 服 胁 周 昏 鱼
兔 狐 忽 狗 备 饰 饱 饲 变 京 享 店 夜 庙 府 底 剂 郊 废
净 盲 放 刻 育 闸 闹 郑 劵 卷 单 炒 炊 炕 炎 炉 沫 浅 法
泄 河 沾 泪 油 泊 沿 泡 注 泻 泳 泥 沸 波 泼 泽 治 怖 性
怕 怜 怪 学 宝 宗 定 宜 审 宙 官 空 帘 实 试 郎 诗 肩 房
诚 衬 衫 视 话 诞 询 该 详 建 肃 录 隶 居 届 刷 屈 弦 承
孟 孤 陕 降 限 妹 姑 姐 姓 始 驾 参 艰 线 练 组 细 驶 织
终 驻 驼 绍 经 贯
九画
奏 春 帮 珍 玻 毒 型 挂 封 持 项 垮 挎 城 挠 政 赴 赵 挡
挺 括 拴 拾 挑 指 垫 挣 挤 拼 挖 按 挥 挪 某 甚 革 荐 巷
带 草 茧 茶 荒 茫 荡 荣 故 胡 南 药 标 枯 柄 栋 相 查 柏
柳 柱 柿 栏 树 要 咸 威 歪 研 砖 厘 厚 砌 吹 面 耐 耍 牵
Appendix 345

残 殃 轻 鸦 皆 背 战 点 临 览 坚 省 削 尝 是 盼 眨 哄 显
哑 冒 映 星 昨 畏 趴 胃 贵 界 虹 虾 蚁 思 蚂 虽 品 咽 骂
哗 咱 响 哈 咬 咳 哪 炭 峡 罚 贱 贴 骨 钞 钟 钢 钥 钩 卸
缸 拜 看 矩 怎 牲 选 适 秒 香 种 秋 科 重 复 竿 段 便 俩
贷 顺 修 保 促 侮 俭 俗 俘 信 皇 泉 鬼 侵 追 俊 盾 待 律
很 须 叙 剑 逃 食 盆 胆 胜 胞 胖 脉 勉 狭 狮 独 狡 狱 狠
贸 怨 急 饶 蚀 饺 饼 弯 将 奖 哀 亭 亮 度 迹 庭 疮 疯 疫
疤 姿 亲 音 帝 施 闻 阀 阁 差 养 美 姜 叛 送 类 迷 前 首
逆 总 炼 炸 炮 烂 剃 洁 洪 洒 浇 浊 洞 测 洗 活 派 洽 染
济 洋 州 浑 浓 津 恒 恢 恰 恼 恨 举 觉 宣 室 宫 宪 突 穿
窃 客 冠 语 扁 袄 祖 神 祝 误 诱 说 诵 垦 退 既 屋 昼 费
陡 眉 孩 除 险 院 娃 姥 姨 姻 娇 怒 架 贺 盈 勇 怠 柔 垒
绑 绒 结 绕 骄 绘 给 络 骆 绝 绞 统
十画
耕 耗 艳 泰 珠 班 素 蚕 顽 盏 匪 捞 栽 捕 振 载 赶 起 盐
捎 捏 埋 捉 捆 捐 损 都 哲 逝 捡 换 挽 热 恐 壶 挨 耻 耽
恭 莲 莫 荷 获 晋 恶 真 框 桂 档 桐 株 桥 桃 格 校 核 样
根 索 哥 速 逗 粟 配 翅 辱 唇 夏 础 破 原 套 逐 烈 殊 顾
轿 较 顿 毙 致 柴 桌 虑 监 紧 党 晒 眠 晓 鸭 晃 晌 晕 蚊
哨 哭 恩 唤 啊 唉 罢 峰 圆 贼 贿 钱 钳 钻 铁 铃 铅 缺 氧
特 牺 造 乘 敌 秤 租 积 秧 秩 称 秘 透 笔 笑 笋 债 借 值
倚 倾 倒 倘 俱 倡 候 俯 倍 倦 健 臭 射 躬 息 徒 俆 舰 舱
般 航 途 拿 爹 爱 颂 翁 脆 脂 胸 胳 脏 胶 脑 狸 狼 逢 留
皱 饿 恋 桨 浆 衰 高 席 准 座 脊 症 病 疾 疼 疲 效 离 唐
资 凉 站 剖 竞 部 旁 旅 蓄 阅 羞 瓶 拳 粉 料 益 兼 烤 烘
烦 烧 烛 烟 递 涛 浙 涝 酒 涉 消 浩 海 涂 浴 浮 流 润 浪
浸 涨 烫 涌 悟 悄 悔 悦 害 宽 家 宵 宴 宾 窄 容 宰 案 请
朗 诸 读 扇 袜 袖 袍 被 祥 课 谁 调 冤 谅 谈 谊 剥 恳 展
剧 屑 弱 陵 陶 陷 陪 娱 娘 通 能 难 预 桑 绢 绣 验 继
十一画
球 理 捧 堵 描 域 掩 捷 排 掉 堆 推 掀 授 教 掏 掠 培 接
控 探 据 掘 职 基 著 勒 黄 萌 萝 菌 菜 萄 菊 萍 菠 营 械
梦 梢 梅 检 梳 梯 桶 救 副 票 戚 爽 聋 袭 盛 雪 辅 辆 虚
雀 堂 常 匙 晨 睁 眯 眼 悬 野 啦 晚 啄 距 跃 略 蛇 累 唱
患 唯 崖 崭 崇 圈 铜 铲 银 甜 梨 犁 移 笨 笼 笛 符 第 敏
做 袋 悠 偿 偶 偷 您 售 停 偏 假 得 衔 盘 船 斜 盒 鸽 悉
欲 彩 领 脚 脖 脸 脱 象 够 猜 猪 猎 猫 猛 馅 馆 凑 减 毫
麻 痒 痕 廊 康 庸 鹿 盗 章 竟 商 族 旋 望 率 着 盖 粘 粗
粒 断 剪 兽 清 添 淋 淹 渠 渐 混 渔 淘 液 淡 深 婆 梁 渗
情 惜 惭 悼 惧 惕 惊 惨 惯 寇 寄 宿 窑 密 谋 慌 祸 迷 逮
敢 屠 弹 随 蛋 隆 隐 婚 婶 颈 绩 绪 续 骑 绳 维 绵 绸 绿
346 Appendix

十二画
琴 斑 替 款 堪 搭 塔 越 趁 趋 超 提 堤 博 揭 喜 插 揪 搜
煮 援 裁 搁 搂 搅 握 揉 斯 期 欺 联 散 惹 葬 葛 董 葡 敬
葱 落 朝 辜 葵 棒 棋 植 森 椅 椒 棵 棍 棉 棚 棕 惠 惑 逼
厨 厦 硬 确 雁 殖 裂 雄 暂 雅 辈 悲 紫 辉 敞 赏 拿 晴 暑
最 量 喷 晶 喇 遇 喊 景 践 跌 跑 遗 蛙 蛛 蜓 喝 喂 喘 喉
幅 帽 赌 赔 黑 铸 铺 链 销 锁 锄 锅 锈 锋 锐 短 智 毯 鹅
剩 稍 程 稀 税 筐 等 筑 策 筛 筒 答 筋 筝 傲 傅 牌 堡 集
焦 傍 储 奥 街 惩 御 循 艇 舒 畨 释 禽 腊 脾 腔 鲁 猾 猴
然 馋 装 蛮 就 痛 童 阔 善 羡 普 粪 尊 道 曾 焰 港 湖 渣
湿 温 渴 滑 湾 渡 游 滋 溉 愤 慌 惰 愧 愉 慨 割 寒 富 窜
窝 窗 遍 裕 裤 裙 谢 谣 谦 属 屡 强 粥 疏 隔 隙 絮 嫂 登
缎 编 骗 缘
十三画
瑞 魂 肆 摄 摸 填 搏 塌 鼓 摆 携 搬 摇 搞 塘 摊 蒜 勤 鹊
蓝 墓 幕 蓬 蓄 蒙 蒸 献 禁 楚 想 槐 榆 楼 概 赖 酬 感 碍
碑 碎 碰 碗 碌 雷 零 雾 雹 输 督 龄 鉴 睛 睡 睬 鄙 愚 暖
盟 歇 暗 照 跨 跳 跪 路 跟 遣 娥 蜂 嗓 置 罪 罩 错 锡 锣
锤 锦 键 锯 矮 辞 稠 愁 筹 签 简 毁 舅 鼠 催 傻 像 躲 微
愈 遥 腰 腥 腹 腾 腿 触 解 酱 痰 廉 新 韵 意 粮 数 煎 塑
慈 煤 煌 满 漠 源 滤 滥 滔 溪 溜 滚 滨 粱 滩 慎 誉 塞 谨
福 群 殿 辟 障 嫌 嫁 叠 缝 缠
十四画
静 碧 璃 墙 撇 嘉 摧 截 誓 境 摘 摔 聚 蔽 慕 暮 蔑 模 榴
榜 榨 歌 遭 酷 酿 酸 磁 愿 需 弊 裳 颗 嗽 蜻 蜡 蝇 蜘 赚
锹 锻 舞 稳 算 箩 管 僚 鼻 魄 貌 膜 膊 膀 鲜 疑 馒 裹 敲
豪 膏 遮 腐 瘦 辣 竭 端 旗 精 歉 熄 熔 潦 漂 漫 滴 演 漏
慢 寨 赛 察 蜜 谱 嫩 翠 熊 凳 骤 缩
十四画
慧 撕 撒 趣 趟 撑 播 撞 撤 增 聪 鞋 蕉 蔬 横 槽 樱 橡 飘
醋 醉 震 霉 瞒 题 暴 瞎 影 踢 踏 踩 踪 蝶 蝴 嘱 墨 镇 靠
稻 黎 稿 稼 箱 箭 篇 僵 躺 僻 德 艘 膝 膛 熟 摩 颜 毅 糊
遵 潜 潮 懂 额 慰 劈
十六画
操 燕 薯 薪 薄 颠 橘 整 融 醒 餐 嘴 蹄 器 赠 默 镜 赞 篮
邀 衡 膨 雕 磨 凝 辨 辩 糖 糕 燃 澡 激 懒 壁 避 缴
十七画
戴 擦 鞠 藏 霜 霞 瞧 蹈 螺 穗 繁 辫 赢 糟 糠 燥 臂 翼
骤
十八画
鞭 覆 蹦 镰 翻 鹰
Appendix 347

十九画
警 攀 蹲 颤 瓣 爆 疆
二十画
壤 耀 躁 嚼 嚷 籍 魔 灌
二十一画
蠢 霸 露
二十二画
囊
二十三画
罐

第二部分 次常用字 （1000 字）

按笔画顺序排列
Part 2 Less Used Characters (1000)
By Stroke Order

二画
匕 刁
四画
丐 歹 戈 夭 仑 讥 冗 邓
五画
艾 夯 凸 卢 叭 叽 皿 凹 囚 矢 乍 尔 冯 玄
六画
邦 迂 邢 芋 芍 吏 夷 吁 吕 吆 屹 廷 迄 臼 仲 伦 伊 胁 旭
匈 凫 妆 亥 汛 讳 讶 讹 讼 诀 弛 阱 驮 驯 纫
七画
玖 玛 韧 抠 扼 汞 扳 抡 坎 坞 抑 拟 抒 芙 芜 苇 芥 芯 芭
杖 杉 巫 杈 甫 匣 轩 卤 肖 吱 吠 呕 呐 吟 呛 吻 吭 邑 囤
吮 岖 牡 佑 佃 伺 囱 肛 肘 甸 狈 鸠 彤 灸 刨 庇 吝 庐 闰
兑 灼 沐 沛 汰 沥 沦 汹 沧 沪 忱 诅 诈 罕 屁 坠 妓 姊 妒
纬
八画
玫 卦 坷 坯 拓 坪 坤 拄 拧 拂 拙 拇 拗 莱 昔 苛 苦 苟 苞
茁 苔 枉 枢 枚 枫 杭 郁 矾 奈 奄 殴 歧 卓 昙 哎 咕 呵 咙
呻 咒 咆 咖 帕 账 贬 贮 氛 秉 岳 侠 侥 侣 侈 卑 刽 刹 肴
觅 忿 瓮 肮 肪 狞 庞 疟 疙 疚 卒 氓 炬 沽 沮 泣 泞 泌 沼
怔 怯 宠 宛 衩 祈 诡 帚 屉 弧 弥 陋 陌 函 姆 虱 叁 绅 驹
绊 绎
348 Appendix

九画
契 贰 玷 玲 珊 拭 拷 拱 挟 垢 垛 拯 荆 茸 茬 荚 茵 茴 荞
荠 荤 荧 荔 栈 柑 栅 柠 枷 勃 柬 砂 泵 砚 鸥 轴 韭 虐 昧
盹 咧 昵 昭 盅 勋 哆 咪 哟 幽 钙 钝 钠 钦 钧 钮 毡 氢 秕
俏 俄 俐 侯 徊 衍 胚 胧 胎 狰 饵 峦 奕 咨 飒 闺 闽 籽 娄
烁 炫 洼 柒 涎 洛 恃 恍 恬 恤 宦 诫 诬 祠 诲 屏 屎 逊 陨
姚 娜 蚤 骇
十画
耘 耙 秦 匿 埂 捂 捍 袁 捌 挫 挚 捣 捅 埃 耿 聂 荸 莽 莱
莉 莹 莺 梆 栖 桦 栓 桅 桩 贾 酌 砸 砰 砾 殉 逞 哮 唠 哺
剔 蚌 蚜 畔 蚣 蚪 蚓 哩 圃 鸯 唁 哼 唆 峭 唧 峻 赂 赃 钾
铆 氨 秫 笆 俺 赁 倔 殷 耸 舀 豺 豹 颁 胯 胰 脐 脓 逛 卿
鸵 鸳 馁 凌 凄 衷 郭 斋 疹 紊 瓷 羔 烙 浦 涡 涣 涤 涧 涕
涩 悍 悯 窍 诺 诽 袒 谆 崇 恕 娩 骏
十一画
琐 麸 琉 琅 措 捺 捶 赦 埠 捻 掐 掂 掖 掷 掸 掺 勘 聊 娶
菱 菲 萎 菩 萤 乾 萧 萨 菇 彬 梗 梧 梭 曹 酝 酗 厢 硅 硕
奢 盔 匾 颅 彪 眶 晤 曼 晦 冕 啡 畦 趾 啃 蛆 蚯 蛉 蛀 唬
啰 唾 啤 啥 啸 崎 逻 崔 崩 婴 赊 铐 铛 铝 铡 铣 铭 矫 秸
秽 笙 笤 偎 傀 躯 兜 衅 徘 徙 舶 舷 舵 敛 翎 脯 逸 凰 猖
祭 烹 庶 庵 痊 阎 阐 眷 焊 焕 鸿 涯 淑 淌 淮 淆 渊 淫 淳
淤 淀 涮 涵 惦 悴 惋 寂 窒 谍 谐 裆 袱 祷 谒 谓 谚 尉 堕
隅 婉 颇 绰 绷 综 绽 缀 巢
十二画
琳 琢 琼 揍 堰 揩 揽 揖 彭 揣 搀 搓 壹 搔 葫 募 蒋 蒂 韩
棱 椰 焚 椎 棺 榔 椭 粟 棘 酣 酥 硝 硫 颊 雳 翘 凿 棠 晰
鼎 喳 遏 晾 畴 跋 跛 蛔 蜒 蛤 鹊 喻 啼 喧 嵌 赋 赎 赐 锉
锌 甥 掰 氮 氯 黍 筏 牍 粤 逾 腌 腋 腕 猩 猬 惫 敦 痘 痢
痪 竣 翔 奠 遂 焙 滞 湘 渤 渺 溃 溅 湃 愕 惶 寓 窑 窘 雇
谤 犀 隘 媒 媚 婿 缅 缆 缔 缕 骚
十三画
瑟 鹉 瑰 搪 聘 斟 靴 靶 蓖 蒿 蒲 蓉 楔 椿 楷 榄 楞 楣 酪
碘 硼 碉 辐 辑 频 睹 睦 瞄 嗜 嗦 暇 畸 跷 跺 蜈 蜗 蜕 蛹
嗅 嗡 嗤 署 蜀 幌 锚 锥 锨 锭 锰 稚 颓 筷 魁 衙 腻 腮 腺
鹏 肆 猿 颖 煞 雏 馍 馏 禀 痹 廓 痴 靖 誉 漓 溢 溯 溶 滓
溺 寞 窥 窟 寝 褂 裸 谬 媳 嫉 缚 缤 剿
十四画
赘 熬 赫 焉 摹 蔓 庶 蔼 熙 蔚 兢 榛 榕 酵 碟 碴 碱 碳 辕
辖 雌 墅 喊 踊 蝉 嘀 幔 镀 舔 熏 箍 箕 箫 舆 僧 孵 瘩 瘟
彰 粹 漱 漩 漾 慷 寡 寥 谭 褐 褪 隧 嫡 缨
Appendix 349

十五画
撵 撩 撮 撬 擒 墩 撰 鞍 蕊 蕴 樊 樟 橄 敷 豌 醇 磕 磅 碾
憋 嘶 嘲 嘹 蝠 蝎 蝌 蝗 蝙 嘿 幢 镊 镐 稽 篓 膘 鲤 鲫 褒
瘪 瘤 瘫 凛 澎 潭 潦 澳 潘 澈 澜 澄 憔 懊 憎 翩 褥 谴 鹤
憨 履 嬉 豫 缭
十六画
撼 擂 擅 蕾 薛 薇 擎 翰 噩 橱 橙 瓢 磺 霍 霎 辙 冀 踱 蹂
蟆 螃 螟 噪 鹦 黔 穆 篡 篷 篙 篱 儒 膳 鲸 瘾 瘸 糙 燎 濒
憾 懈 窿 缰
十七画
壤 藐 檬 檐 檩 檀 礁 磷 瞭 瞬 瞳 瞪 曙 蹋 蟋 蟀 嚎 赡 镣
魏 簇 儡 徽 爵 朦 臊 鳄 糜 癌 懦 豁 臀
十八画
藕 藤 瞻 嚣 鳍 癞 瀑 襟 璧 戳
十九画
攒 孽 蘑 藻 鳖 蹭 蹬 簸 簿 蟹 靡 癖 羹
二十画
鬓 攘 蠕 巍 鳞 糯 譬
二十一画
霹 躏 髓
二十二画
蘸 镶 瓤
二十四画
矗
 APPENDIX D: THE LANGUAGE LAW OF 2001
(Rohsenow 2004: 41-43)

The Law of the National Commonly Used Language and Script

of the PRC

(Passed by the eighteenth meeting of the Standing Committee of the

Ninth Session of the National Peoples Congress on October 31, 2000)

CONTENTS:

Section 1: General Principles

Section 2: Applications of the Law of the National Commonly Used
Language and Script
Section 3: Administration and Supervision
Section 4: Note

Section 1: General Principles

Article 1: In accordance with the Constitution, this law is formulated in

order to promote the regularization and standardization of the national
commonly used language and script, as well as its healthy development, to
cause the nation’s commonly used language and script to become even
more widely used in society, and to accelerate economic and cultural
exchange between various nationalities and regions,

Article 2: The national commonly used language and script referred to in

this law are Putonghua and standard Chinese characters.

Article 3: The state will promote Putonghua and employ standard Chinese
characters.

Article 4: Citizens have the right to study and to use the national
commonly used language and script. The state will supply the necessary
conditions for citizens to study and use the national commonly used
language and script. The People’s government offices and other depart-
ments at the various local levels shall adopt measures to popularize
Putonghua and to put standard Chinese characters into practice.

Article 5: The use of the national commonly used language and script
shall be beneficial to maintaining the national sovereignty and the dignity,

350
Appendix 351

be beneficial to national integrity and unity and be beneficial to the growth

of socialist material and spiritual civilization.

Article 6: The state will issue regulations and standards for the national
commonly used language and script, administer the use of the national
commonly used language and script in society, support teaching and
scientific research of the national commonly used language and script, and
promote the regularization, enrichment and development of the national
commonly used language and script.

Article 7: The state will encourage and reward organizations and indivi-
duals who make outstanding contributions to the cause of the national
commonly used language and script.

Article 8: The various nationalities all have the freedom to use and
develop their own languages and scripts. The use of the ethnic minorities’
languages and scripts will follow the regulations [set] in the Constitution,
the Law of Regional Autonomy for Minority Nationalities and other
national laws.

Section 2: Applications of the Law of the National Commonly Used

Language and Script

Article 9: The state takes Putonghua and standard [simplified] Chinese

characters as the language and script for public use. The law also provides
for regulated exceptions.

Article 10: Schools and other educational organizations will take Puton-
ghua and standard Chinese characters as the basic language and characters
to be used in teaching and study. The law also provides for regulated
exceptions. Schools and other educational organizations will teach
Putonghua and standard Chinese characters using a Chinese language
curriculum. The Chinese language materials used shall meet the regula-
tions and standards for the national commonly used language and script.

Article 11: Publications in Chinese shall meet the regulations and standards
for the national commonly used language and script. Foreign languages and
scripts used in Chinese publications shall employ the national commonly
used language and script to make the necessary notations.
352 Appendix

Article 12: Radio and television stations will take Putonghua as the basic
language of broadcasting. Those who wish to use foreign languages to
broadcast must have the approval of the Office of Radio and Television
Broadcasting of the State Council.

Article 13: The public service industry will employ standard Chinese
characters as the basic script to be used in public service. When needed for
public service, signs, advertisements, announcements, and trade brand
logos, etc. which use foreign language scripts as well as Chinese, shall use
standard Chinese characters. The use of Putonghua as the language of
service in the public service industry is encouraged.

Article 14: The national commonly used language and script shall be used
as the basic language and script in the following situations:
(1) The language and script used in radio, film and television;
(2) The script to be used in all publicly used facilities;
(3) The script on signs and advertisements;
(4) The names of for profit and non-profit organizations;
(5) The wrappings and instructions of all products sold domestically.

Article 15: The national commonly used language and script used in all
information processing and information technology products shall meet the
regulations and standards for the national commonly used language and
script.

Article 16: Under the relevant regulations of this section, dialects may be
used in the following situations:

(1) When really necessary to carry out public business by national

level government personnel;
(2) Language used in broadcasting approved by the Office of Radio
and Television Broadcasting of the State Council;
(3) When needed for use in artistic forms such as stage, film and
television;
(4) When necessary in publications, teaching, and research.

Article 17: Under the relevant regulations of this section, [old style]
complex characters and variant characters are permitted to be used in the
following situations:
Appendix 353

(1) On historical relics and sites;

(2) Variant characters in personal names;
(3) Artistic works such as calligraphy, seal carving, etc.
(4) Handwritten characters on inscriptions and signs;
(5) When needed for use in publications, teaching and research;
(6) Under special conditions approved by offices of the State Council.

Article 18: The national commonly used language and script will employ
the Scheme for Chinese Phonetic Writing (Hanyu Pinyin Fang’an) as the
instrument for spelling and sound annotation. The Scheme for Chinese
Phonetic Writing is the uniform standard for the spelling in the Latin
alphabet of Chinese personal names, place names, and literature and docu-
ments in Chinese, and is to be used in places where Chinese characters are
inconvenient or impossible to use. Elementary education shall use the
Scheme for Chinese Phonetic Writing [Hanyu pinyin] in teaching.

Article 19: In all positions in which Putonghua is the working language,

those personnel should possess the ability to speak Putonghua. The level
of Putonghua of broadcasters, program hosts, and film, television and
stage actors as their working language should conform to different stan-
dard levels as fixed by the state; those who have not yet met the standard
levels set by the state should undertake training at the appropriate level.

Article 20: Chinese language teaching for foreigners shall teach Putong-
hua and standard Chinese characters.

Section 3: Administration and Supervision

Article 21: Planning, assistance, administration and supervision of work
on the national commonly used language and script is the responsibility of
the Offices of Language and Script Work of the State Council. The
ministries and offices of the State Council will administer the use of the
national commonly used language and script through their own [admini-
strative] system.

Article 22: Local language and script work offices and other related
offices will administer and supervise the use of the national commonly
used language and script within their own administrative areas.

Article 23: The commerce departments of People’s governments above

the level of county will carry out the administration and supervision of the
354 Appendix

use and use of language and script in commercial names, product names,
and advertisements according to the law.

Article 24: The language and script work office of the State Council
will issue standards for the [Proficiency] Grading System for [Spoken]
Putonghua [Putonghua Shuiping Ceshi Dengji Biaozhun].

Article 25: The translations of such proper nouns as foreign personal

names, place names, etc. into the national commonly used language and
script will be systematically examined and approved by the language and
script office of the State Council or other relevant offices.

Article 26: Citizens may make criticisms of and suggestions to those who
violate the regulations of Section 2 of this law and who do not use
language and script according to the regulations and standards of the
national commonly used language and script. For those who violate the
relevant sections of Section 2 of this law in terms of the use of language by
[broadcast, teaching and government] personnel [as specified] in Section 2
of Article 19, the work units concerned shall carry out criticism and
education of those personnel directly responsible; those who refuse to
make corrections will be dealt with by the units concerned. Those who
violate the relevant regulations of Section 2 of this law concerning the use
of [proper] script in urban public facilities, signs and advertisements will
be ordered to make corrections by the relevant administrative offices;
those who refuse to make corrections will be warned and officially urged
to make timely corrections.

Article 27: Those who violate the regulations of this law, interfering with
others’ study and use of the national commonly used language and script,
will be ordered to make timely corrections and given warnings by the
relevant administrative offices.
Section 4: Note

Article 28: This law will take effect on January 1, 2001.

(This unofficial translation is by J. S. Rohsenow, with supplementary

information added [thus])
 APPENDIX E: IDENTIFICATION OF PERSONAL NAMES

1. Ann, T. K. ( 安子介, 1917-2000): Shanghai native Hong Kong

businessperson, chair of Hong Kong Industry Association. Ann was
the vice-chairman of Chinese People’s Consultancy. The inventor of
Ann, T. K. Chinese character writing machine and the author of
Cracking the Chinese Puzzles (five volumes), Chinese Character is the
Fifth Invention of China, the 21st Century, Is the Chinese Character
Century, Chinese Character is the Root of Chinese Cultural Heritage.
2. Chen Zhangtai (陈章太, 1932-): Linguistic Professor, graduated from
Xiamen University. The posts he has held include: vice-president of
All-China Association of Linguistic, the president of China Applied
Linguistics Association, vice-director of the Linguistic Institute, China
Academy of Social Science, vice-chief editor of Chinese Linguistics,
director of RIAL, and vice-director of SCLW.
3. Guo Moruo (郭沫若, 1892-1978): Writer, politician (country’s Vice-
Premier), chairman of the All-China Federation of Literacy and Art
Circle, President of Academy of Science. Studied in Japan.
4. Hu Qiaomu (胡乔木, 1912-1992): Born in Jiansu Province. He joined
CCP in 1935. Graduate of Qinghua University. He was one of the
political secretaries of Mao Zedong from 1945. Vice minister of
Propaganda Department of the Centre of CCP and the editor of
Collected Works of Mao Zedong from 1950 to 1966. His political life
was limited by his poor heath after 1961, but he became the chief
theorist of CCP after Mao’s death and chairman of Secretariat of CCP
Centre and the president of China Academy of Social Science, the
director of Xinhua News Agency.
5. Hu Shi ( 胡适, 1891-1962): Leading intellectual in the decades
following the May Fourth movement. Influential in promoting the use
of vernacular script to replace classical Chinese. Disciple of John
Dewey under whom he studied at Columbia University. President of
Beijing University, Kuomintung government’s ambassador to America.
Attacked by the Communists for his liberal views.
6. Hu Yuzhi (胡愈之, 1897-): Writer and Journalist. Editor in chief of
Guangming Ribao (Guangming Daily) 1919–1957. Director of the
CLR. Active in foreign affairs. Pioneer of Romanization Movement in
the 1930s and the 1940s.

355
356 Appendix

7. Li Yuming (李宇明, 1955-): Chinese Linguistics professor, graduated

from Zhengzhou University and the Normal University of Central
China (NUCC), vice-president of NUCC (1998-2000). He has been the
director of the Department of Language and Information, Education
Ministry since 2000 and the Director of RIAL since 2001.
8. Lü Shuxiang (吕叔湘, 1904-1998): Linguist. He graduated from
Foreign Language Department of the National South-eastern Univer-
sity in 1926 and studied at Oxford University in 1936-1937. The vice-
director of CLR, the president of All-China Association of Linguistic
and the director of Institute of Linguistics, China Academy of
Social Science. Lü was the author of numerous influential works on
linguistics.
9. Marr, Nikolai Y. (马尔, 1864-1934): Russian linguist, philologist and
revolutionary. Educator of several generations of sinologist and
linguists in USSR He misinterpreted Marxism and advocated the
creation of a ‘new Russian language’. His theories on linguistic
kinship dominated Soviet Union linguistics for nearly 30 year until
they were criticized by Stalin in Marxism and Linguistics in the 1950s.
10. Wang Jun (王均, 1922-): Linguistics professor, graduated from South-
west Provisional University. Academic positions he has held include:
vice chief-editor of Chinese Ethnic Languages, the chief-editor of
Script Reform, Language Construction, vice-president of Beijing
Linguistics Association, the president of Association of Chinese
Language Modernization. He was the vice-director of CLR and SCLW
from 1984-1990.
11. Wang Li (王力, 1901-1986): Pseudonym of Wang Liaoyi. Writer and
linguist. Professor of the Department of Literature and Language,
Beijing University. Wang was the vice-director of CLR and the
honorary president of All China Association of Linguistics, author
of numerous works on linguistics. PhD in experimental phonology,
studied in France in 1927-1932.
12. Xu Jialu (许嘉璐, 1937-): Chinese Linguistics Professor. Graduated
from Beijing Normal University (BNU). He was vice-president of
BNU (1987-1994), Chairman of the National Central Committee of
Democracy Progress Party, he has been Vice-chairman of the Stan-
ding Committee of the People’s Congress Conference since 1998.
Xu was the Director of SCLW between 1994 and 1997.
Appendix 357

13. Xu Shen (许慎, 58？-147): Famous for his study of the Confucian
classics and especially for his Shuowen jiezi (《说文解字》), a
collection with explanations of all the characters then found in Chinese
literature. It is the oldest known Chinese dictionary and is the basis for
all etymological research.
14. Yuan Xiaoyuan (袁晓圆): Professional diplomat, the founder and the
president of the Research Association of Chinese Character Moder-
nization (1980) (later changed to Beijing International Association of
Chinese Character Studies and Yuan Xiaoyuan Research Institute
of Language, Culture and Science). Yuan gave up her American
citizenship and settled in Beijing in 1985.
15. Zhou Youguang ( 周有光, 1905-): Most prolific Chinese reform
researcher. Member of the CLR. Author of Wenzi Gaige Gailun (An
Introduction to Chinese Character Reform, 1961) and a large number
of works on Chinese LP. Zhou is also a well-known essayist. Zhou is
the graduate from the University of St. John (Shanghai), and he
worked in the banking sector in New York and London and was an
economics professor before he formally became a LP professional at
the request of the Government.
APPENDIX F: CHARACTER CODING SET – MOVING TOWARDS
INTERNATIONALIZATION

Chinese computer experts and LPers are strong believers in Unicode.

They argue if this standardization does not succeed, namely, the standards
cannot be integrated into Unicode, then the productive future for hanzi is
problematic. In the following discussion, a brief introduction is given to
China’s official commitment to the integration of the existing encoding
standards into the future international standard, i.e., Unicode. While this
issue may appear too technical, a description of it may help readers who
want to gain some background knowledge of Chinese standardization
issues as it clears up the confusion over why so many national standards
have been promulgated in China over the last two decades.
According to Gu Xiaofeng (2000: 23-25), since the release of ISO
10646-1/Unicode 2.1 in 1993, the Chinese government has given strong
support to the combined efforts of the ISO/IEC and the Unicode Consor-
tium. The new Chinese National Standard – GB 13000.1 is compatible
with ISO 10646-1/Unicode 2.1. Whenever the ISO and the Unicode
Consortium have changed or revised their common standard, GB 13000.1
subsequently adopted these changes. However, the coding mechanism
used for ISO 10646.1 was totally different from the one used in the older
GB 2312-80, which meant that if the ISO was made the standard in the
Chinese market, all computers that used the GB 2312-80 standard would
be paralyzed. To accommodate all additional hanzi characters specified in
GB 13000.1 that are not included in GB 2312-80, a new specification,
known as GBK, was introduced to bridge the standards. GBK defines
23,940 code points, containing 21,886 characters, and provides mapping to
the code points of Unicode 2.1. It is an extension of GB 2312-80, and its
fundamental function is to leave all characters and codes as defined in GB
2312-80 intact, but to position all additional characters in ISO10646/GB
13000.1 around that standard – these characters are what are so-called the
20,902 East Asian Ideograms. Although it adopted the 20,902 characters
wholesale as well as the codification principles of a two-byte mechanism,
as an extension of GB 2312-80, the code points for each individual char-
acter are compatible with this existing national standard, but not identical
to those in ISO10646.1. Thus, code and character compatibility was
guaranteed between GBK and GB 2312-80, and at the same time, the
complete Unicode unified character set in Unicode 2.1 was made available
in China. GBK covers whole characters encoded in these two character
sets, and is not only much bigger than GB 2312-80, but also goes beyond

358
Appendix 359

the character repertoire of ISO 10646. Therefore, at the time when GBK
was defined, other characters not available in Unicode 2.1 were added.
The introduction of GBK increased the number of characters available
on computer from 6,763 specified in CB 2312-80 to the 20,902 in ISO
10646.1. These characters were conveniently positioned on the favorite
and much eyed Basic Multilingual Plane (BMP) in the Unicode. It also
ensured that the software, encoded by the BG 2312-80 standard before
GBK, operated as it had done previously without any disruption. However,
as it is fully backward compatible with GB 2312-80, it missed the
opportunity to be compatible with the Big5 coding system. Gu (2000: 26)
has pointed out that these 20,902 hanzi characters, also known as CJK
sinographs, include various forms of Chinese characters. Therefore, with
the gradual introduction of GBK in more software, the abolished complex
and variant forms of characters will effectively be legalized, which could
inevitably pose a grave threat to current official language policy. Indeed,
the first author’s personal observation is that over years of use, although
there has not been an overwhelming emergence of illicit characters on the
mainland, compared with the more universal situation prior to the release
of GBK, the number of long prohibited unofficial characters has been
increasing.
In another development, the government decided to create a new
national standard for large character sets – an extension of GB 2312-80 –
known as GB 18030-2000 – to prepare for international information
communication in the future. Although linked to the indigenous national
standard by GBK, ISO10646.1/GB 13000.1 itself was not compatible with
the Chinese software that internalized GB 2312-80 as their regular encod-
ing standard, and it will be a long time before ISO10646.1/GB 13000.1 is
fully adopted by the Chinese IT industry. However, with the rapid spread
of computer use in all spheres of modern Chinese society, and especially
considering the urgent demand from communication, population adminis-
tration, banking systems and geographical data processing, there is a
growing need to have a larger set of encoded Chinese hanzi. The new GB
18030-2000 standard had to be backward compatible with ISO10646.1/GB
13000 and with GB 2312-80 so as to update existing systems and ensure
the effective use of programmed information resources.
In October 1998, the relevant authorities organized a preparation
committee consisting of research institutes, major Chinese computer manu-
facturers and China-based international software companies, to look into
the feasibility of making such a standard. On March 17, 2000, the Ministry
of Information Industry and the former State Bureau of Technological
Quality Supervision jointly issued a new national encoding standard for
360 Appendix

27,484 hanzi, GB 18030-2000. Because it is the most fundamental

encoding standard after CB 2312-80, it will define the country’s computer
system for an infinite period in the future. The government automatically
suspended the application of GBK with the formal release of GB-18030-
2000. The new standard has some tough conformity requirements. It is
illegal to sell products in China that do not conform to this standard, and
failing to embrace official standards will incur a penalty. Specifically, all
computer products manufactured during the interim period between March
17, 2000 and August 31, 2001, had to observe the new standard. Any
products not in conformity with the standard must take remedial measures
approved by the National Commission of Information Technology Stan-
dardization otherwise they will be treated as illegal, non-standard products.
All information products made after the deadline are required to go
through detailed standard testing criteria, formulated and implemented by
the Testing Centre of Standard Conformity for Information Processing
Products, which is affiliated with the Research Institute of Electronic Indus-
trial Standards under the Ministry of Information Technology Industry
(Lin 2004).
Therefore, GB 18030-2000 was created as an update of GBK for
Unicode 3.0 with an extension that covers all of Unicode. It was described
as compatible, open for extension and future orientated, maintaining full
compatibility of GB-encoded text with GBK and GB 2312-80. The look-
up table it uses to go from GB 18030-2000 to Unicode is backward
compatible with the look-up table from GB 2312-80 to Unicode. Another
important feature of GB 18030-2000 is that, as is the case for Unicode, it
does not concern itself with graphic forms of the code and only assigns
encoding numbers to the glyphs. This flexible measure leaves room for
font typographers to add graphic details to the code position, when in the
future, the standardization is completed, and the consensus on the charac-
ters’ graphic form is reached among hanzi-using societies.
GB 18030-2000 has 1.6 million valid byte sequences, but there are only
1.1 million code points in Unicode, so there are about 500,000 byte
sequences in GB 18030-2000 that are currently unassigned. It provides the
ultimate resolution for problems caused by the lack of character forms and
code points, thus providing a unified encoding platform for a possibly
larger Chinese character set, including the future archaic characters as
discussed in Section 3.2, Chapter 4.
Notes

PROLOGUE
1. This Prologue provides a brief introduction to the historical origins and development of
hanzi and a description of their basic characteristics. While this section provides some
essential background for those not familiar with hanzi, it is an area of study in its own
right (see e.g., Boltz 1994, Qiu 2000, DeFrancis 1984b and Wieger 1965) and we only
briefly summarize some key aspects here.
2. The discovery of jiaguwen was a matter of serendipity rather than an archaeological
find, so versions differ about the circumstances surrounding the first discovery. One
recounting (Wong 1990: 59) indicates that a scholar, Liu Yau, visiting his sick friend
Wang in Anyang, Henan, and saw on the prescription for the medical brew to cure his
friend, an item called ‘Dragon Bones’. Liu was curious and bought some pieces for
closer examination. To his great surprise, he found that some of these bones bore what
looked to him like an incised primitive inscription. In his excitement, he went on a wild
spending spree, buying up all the ‘Dragon Bones’ he could lay his hands on. Back in his
study, he looked closely at every piece for the faintest incision, and what he saw was
indeed the work of humans. He had stumbled upon a discovery that shook the scholastic
world of his time, and opened a new vista for research into the study of an ancient
script.
3. A baffling classic, titled ‘Book of Changes’ (《易经》), was devoted to this Yinyang
Bagua system and thus laid the philosophical foundation for the Chinese classical
mindset.
4. The name is a bit misleading as it was not originally associated with seals. People did
have this style of character engraved on their seals for its artistic beauty, but this
occurred much later historically, after the seal script had come into being. The use of
seal style on seals/stamps (exactly as it occurs in Western counterpart forms) is still a
very common practice today. Another explanation is that zhuan (seal) means ‘to pull or

361
362 Notes

stretch long’, and seal characters are characterized by elongated strokes (Yin and
Rohsenow 1997: 33).
5. Some scholars (e.g., Wang and Zou 1999: 68) argue that the 1950s’ simplification did
not cause any change to the style and shape of hanzi. This is true to a great extent, as the
simplification change is in quantity rather than quality.
6. Although the shapes are placed in chronicle order, in actual use the scripts overlap.
Thus, the purpose of this diagram is not to show an evolution consequence, but to
illustrate some representative and distinct shapes that have historically exited.
7. DeFrancis (1984b: 92) holds that ‘radical’ is a ‘quite misleading’ term, and he suggests
it be called ‘significs’. Later on (1989: 279) he further introduces ‘key’ and ‘determina-
tive’ to refer to this semantic element in hanzi. Other terms, such as side components,
primary elements, can also be found in some books.
8. The number of characters listed in the dictionary is an important parameter to measure
the size of a dictionary. This is because, in ancient times, dictionaries used the character
as the entry, instead of the word as is done today. A dictionary was called Zidian,
literally meaning ‘book of characters’.
9. Kangxi Dictionary: One of the most popular Chinese dictionaries, compiled by Zhang
Yushu and his associates, under the patronage of Great Emperor Kang Xi in 1716. With
49,174 entries (characters), it was designated to be the most authoritative and exhaustive
dictionary available at that time.
10. For example, Mao ordered the simplifiers in the 1950s to make bold use of
handwriting/calligraphic style to formulate their simplification scheme. Many of the
characters included in Taiwan’s Official List of Standard Handwritten Characters
(1982) are the same as, or similar, to the mainland’s simplified characters (Zhang et al.
1997). Examining the origin of simplified characters is the first step in understanding
how today’s simplified characters are historically derived from various forms of
handwriting.

CHAPTER 1
1. Chinese historians begin their study of ‘modern China’ in 1840, with the start of the
opium war. This year is seen as a turning point in Chinese history. After the war, China
was gradually reduced to a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society. At the same time, a
series of self-strengthening movements, combined with the necessary adoption of
Western technology and educational methods, marked the rise of modern China. The
movement, in which language reform was seen as an integral part, subsequently
developed into a cultural revolution, eventually coming to its peak in 1919. For this
very reason, ‘Modern China’, as a cultural term, customarily refers to the time after the
second decade of the 20th century. Therefore, ‘Modern China’, as used in this volume, is
not the same as the chronological term used by Chinese historians.
2. Prior to the last century, two written forms existed in China: Wenyan (文言) Chinese, an
archaic stylized usage, practiced by elite Chinese intellectuals, and Baihua (白话),
literally meaning ‘plain language’, the written medium based on vernacular speech for
common people. In the early 20th century, China went through a period of transition
from dynastic to modern history, marked by constant reforming and revolutionary
movements. Concurrent with simplification and Romanization were efforts to establish
Notes 363

a vernacular written form that achieved dramatic success during the New Culture
Movement culminating in 1919, and won massive support from the majority of the
population. Vernacularization is one of the most significant changes both in Chinese
linguistic as well as cultural life. It marked the end of a 3000 year tradition separating
written and oral language, although Wenyan did not completely die out until the
founding of the PRC in 1949.
3. According to Han Dynasty law, a person above 17 years was sentenced to imprisonment
or death if a wrong character was found in his memorial to the Emperor (Sun 1991).
Similar laws were applied in other dynasties. Liao (916-1125), a regime founded by
Khitan in northern China that used a Chinese hanzi-derived writing system, imposed
capital punishment on people who took books out of the country, making it extremely
difficult for scholars to study Khitan (Xixia in Chinese) characters (Nie 1998).
4. Qian’s eight methods are: 1) Only an outline of the original character remains, with
deletion of the extra components: 壽 寿 (shou, longevity); 2) Adoption of the
existing cursive handwritten characters to replace those that are not only the most used,
but also the most complex ones: 書 书 (shu, book); 3) To represent the whole
character by one part of its components. This is to use a portion of the original character
to represent the original form: 號 号 (hao, number); 4) To replace complex parts
with simple parts: 觀 观 (guan, to look for); 5) To adopt its ancient form, which is
simpler: 禮 礼 (li, ritual); 6) To use the phonetic principle by regulating the phonetic
compound: 鄕 乡 (xiang, hometown); 7) To create a new one as a substitution,
based on the established principles. Established principles refer to the well-accepted
methodologies in public to simplify characters throughout history, such as to substitute
the complex part of characters by a simpler phonetic compound: 竈/竃 灶 (zao,
cooking stove); 8) Replacement of the character with a homophonous one: 幾 几 (ji,
tea table).
5. A Romanization advocacy organization composed of some distinguished linguists,
sponsored by the former government.
6. Except for the CCSR, which was reorganized as the State Commission of Language
Work at the NCLW, held from January 6-13, 1986, all other organizations were
abolished when their replacement groups came into being.
7. From May 1956 Mao called, with increasing vigor, for intellectuals to express their
opinions more freely and asked them to criticize the cadres and the Party constructively
under the slogan ‘Let a hundred flowers bloom together; let a hundred schools of
thought contend’ ( 百 花 齐 放 , 百 家 争 鸣 ). However, when in May 1957 some
intellectuals began to take him at his word, and there followed a torrent of criticism of
the Party’s policies, calling for greater intellectual freedom, even democracy, Mao and
other leaders were shocked at the response and crushed the critics with the Anti-Rightist
campaign, which was the biggest disaster to befall China’s intellectuals before the
Cultural Revolution (Ji 2004: 75-76).
8. Much of the research shows little academic independence and is heavily politically
charged. Wang Xuewen, a prolific LP writer and researcher, is typical of those doing this
kind of research. For instance, his Comprehensive Critique of the Communist Bandits’
Simplified Characters (1974 ) is imbued with political jargon and accusations.
9. Hung is a Cambridge educated mathematician. He used to teach mathematics at Hong
Kong University and is now a philosophy professor at Waikato University, New
Zealand. Hung has been an enthusiastic overseas observer of Chinese script reform and
his name is well-known among overseas Chinese scholars/expatriates for his series
364 Notes

of articles, titled ‘Cursing My Ancestors’ (Ma Zuzong – 骂祖宗), in which he is

extremely critical of the shortcomings of the Chinese language and its characters, and
vigorously spreads his radical views about reforming the Chinese language and writing
system. He has devised a number of Chinese alphabeticization and input schemes.
10. It was assumed that because of political and personal sensibilities, a great deal of
valuable information would be known by these key figures in Chinese LP history. To
get reliable information from this primary source, two rounds of key informant inter-
views and a personal seminar were conducted in Beijing in July 2001 and July 2002
respectively. Sixteen LP professionals, policy makers and researchers were interviewed
or invited to speak in our personal seminar. Unpublished information, gained in this
unique set of face-to-face conversations, was substantial and valuable. Some of the
insights and data contributed would otherwise not have come to light or have been
available to the authors. This empirical information is cited as ‘personal communi-
cation’ throughout this book, and contributors’ names can be found in the Acknowledge-
ment. Given the situation just discussed, this type of qualitative data collection
technique – personal communication – as a method to access information has been very
commonly practiced by researchers studying Chinese LP (e.g., Rohsenow 1986, 1996,
2001, Lehmann 1975, Barnes 1977).
11. The four members of the ‘Gang of Four’ were Wang Hongwen, Zhang Chunqiao, Jiang
Qing (Mao’s wife) and Yao Wenyuan. They were the perpetrators and beneficiaries of
the Cultural Revolution. By the end of the Cultural Revolution they had ascended to key
positions in the central government, but were suddenly ousted from power in a
bloodless coup, plotted by Deng Xiaoping in October 1976.
12. He was the commander-in-chief of China’s army, the PLA, and the constitutional
successor of Mao Zedong, but he fell out of favor with Mao in the middle of the
Cultural Revolution. He died when his plane crashed in Mongolia, on an aborted flight
to the Soviet Union.
13. In September 1974, the State Planning Commission approved the application made
jointly by the previous 4th Machinery Ministry (a national defense organization), China
Science Academy, State Publication Bureau, and Chinese Xinhua News Agency to
launch a research scheme abbreviated as ‘748 Project’. The project was a statistical
program of research on hanzi’s coverage in modern texts. Xinhua News Agency’s
Printing Plant was commissioned as the organizer (because at that time, the working
class had to be the leader). The organizer recruited over 1000 people from nine
institutions, including students in middle schools and the workers from other printing
plants in the Beijing area, to do the statistics manually. 2.160 million characters (tokens)
from four categories of publications (science and technology, literary works, political
theories and news/journalism) were analyzed. After two years, 6374 character types
were tabulated by frequency. This forms the database for the national standard code set
for information exchange GB 2312-80 (Su 1994: 29-30).
14. Ni Zhifu, born in Shanghai in 1933, was the vice-chairman of the Great People’s
Congress, the president of the All-Nation Workers’ Union, and was later elected to the
Politburo by the 11th CCP Congress in August 1977.
15. Liu’s position was only second to Mao when the GLSC was introduced in 1964. Framed
by the Mao-cult, along with Deng Xiaoping, as the foremost ‘Capitalist Roader’ and
Revisionist within the Party, he was later physically persecuted and put to death during
the Cultural Revolution.
Notes 365

16. When the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, to convert ‘bad elements’ from their
‘wrongs’, all academic members of the CCSR, criticized as being ‘scholar tyrants’, and
‘counter-revolutionary authorities’ in academic fields, were sent to the countryside as
part of a brainwashing campaign, and were not allowed to return until the mid-1970s.
17. For example, 籃 (lán, basket) was simplified as 篮 in the TSC. In the SSS, three
homophonous characters: 篮 (lán, basket), 蓝 (lán, blue) and 兰 (lán, orchid) were
merged as one: 兰. At the same time, this also meant that the former two were
abolished.

CHAPTER 2
1. After half a century of practical use, there are some individual studies that can offer a
number of valuable insights in assessing the outcome of the simplification. Some
overseas researchers have studied the simplified characters one by one, from an all-
round aspect, grouping them into various tables by their acceptance; such as ‘ready for
immediate adoption’, ‘acceptable’, ‘propose to re-simplify’. In a research project, aimed
at assisting traditional hanzi users to effectively use simplified characters and to achieve
a breakthrough in the written communication barrier across the Strait, Tsang (1996: 33;
97-107) listed 459 characters in a table, titled ‘Hard to Recognize and Hard to Learn
Simplified Characters,’ and suggests that people from traditional character regions
postpone their learning of these characters until future modifications are completed.
Interestingly, Tsang (25-31) does a case study of 22 characters selected from the TSC
by examining their historical development and analyzing their convenience in current
use; then 22 new simplified forms were suggested.
2. In parallel with this argument, stylistic and lexical simplification has been advocated by
the ‘plain English’ movement, and various documents in a variety of jurisdictions are
required to be written in simple English. However, good communication is not synony-
mous with simplicity, and critics argue that simplification can lead to texts which are
actually less precise, thereby putting the burden of comprehension back on the user (see
Kaplan and Baldauf 1997: 75).
3. For details of how representation efficiency is calculated, one may refer to Zhou (1986a:
141-151) or Shi (1991).
4. But it has been argued that as Wang (王) is a very common Chinese surname, ‘Wang’
inside Guo (囯) can also be interpreted as representing ‘People’, instead of King (Ye
1995: 10-11). According to Lin Yanzhi (1996: 4), the former Party head of SCLW, it
was Zhou Enlai who personally changed 囯 to 国. More details about the debate on
how to simplify this heavily culturally and politically enmeshed character from the TSC
can be found in Xia (2004: 273-274) and Gao (2002: 258).
5. Recently, for the first time, the appropriateness of homophonic replacement for some
geographical names has been questioned by Li Yuming (2004c: 66).
6. Interestingly, the illegal character for the Chinese Premier’s given name is a legal
character in Taiwan. 鎔 has official status in the Table of Standardized Shapes for
Hanzi, promulgated by the Taiwan authorities in 1982.
7. The changing of names is a very sensitive issue worldwide and is often linked to the
issue of human rights. Neustupný (1983), for example, discusses this in the context of a
Japanese law enacted shortly after WWII, which specified that ‘common and easy’
366 Notes

characters must be used for the names of children. Fu and Kataoka (1997) discuss the
issue of naming in relation to Hong Kong.
8. One of the more significant cases is that of Ye Gongchao, the standing member of the
CCSR and the person (director) who was in charge of the Section for Hanzi Optimi-
zation. Ye was very upset about his family name being merged into the simplified
Ye (叶, leaf). He was so unhappy about it that he refused to be addressed by the new
form of Ye (葉) and said with a touch of bitter irony: “I’m surnamed Ye (葉), not
Ye (叶). If you want to take your step-father’s surname [a very strong insulting
expression in Chinese], it’s your own business and nothing to do with me” (Chia 1992:
351). When 葉 as a surname was simplified as 叶 by applying homophonous
substitution, it was so controversial that it had to be ultimately determined by Premier
Zhou Enlai (Gao 2002: 131).
9. An ethnic group of over four million people, living in the mountainous southwest region
of China.
10. The province just across the Taiwan Strait and one of the most vulnerable areas in
China to typhoons.
11. On April 26, 1993, in order to examine the implementation of the ‘Regulation on
Character Use in Publications’, jointly issued by the Media and Publication Department
and SCLW, the two authorities organized an investigation into the character use in
fourteen central and local newspapers, published on February 4, and 526 characters
were found to be against the regulations. The worst case was one local evening
newspaper, in which 1,173 unofficial characters were found during that month (Fei
1997: 560).
12. The authors carried out a small scale investigation in July 2001, in two Chinese cities,
Beijing and Changchun, the provincial capital of Jilin province in northeastern China, to
assess social attitudes towards simplified characters, especially those that were adopted
in the SSS and subsequently banned by the authorities. Another aim was to get first-
hand data about the public preference for character use, in a situation which is
independent from official influence and external pressure. Handwritten materials were
collected from four categories of character users, representative of various strata in
today’s Chinese society: a) Farmers (3,517 magazine subscription forms from readers);
b) Adult students from China TV and Radio University (60 students’ assignments); c)
Intellectuals educated in traditional characters (50 readers’ letters); and d) Primary
school teachers (115 teachers’ annual working reports).
13. This bi-monthly journal, despite strong resistance from a number of influential scholars,
was appraised as being a ‘First Class Linguistics Journal’ by the official media and
press department, and continues to be published today (in 2006).
14. This claim of linguistic superiority is hardly unique. At one time or another, advocates
of various languages have preached a version of this nationalistic self-centeredness. For
example, according to Rudbeck, a President of the University of Uppsala during the 17th
century, “Swedes were direct descendants from the first humans in the Bible. Swedish
was also said to be closely related to Hebrew or even the first language of the human
race, and the first literal language of the world” (Winsa 2005: 297). Schiffman (1996:
59), whose main thesis in his book is that “if language policy is not deeply rooted in
linguistic culture, it is not going to fit the needs of its speakers very well”, provides a
number of other examples of this phenomenon.
15. The Three Loves Campaign: Love our country, love our people and love our Party.
368 Notes

4. The number was increased to 1,945 in the Table of Common Characters issued in
1981 (He 2001: 131).
5. Some researchers do provide some statistics (e.g., Ding 1990:14, Wang 2002: 66), but
these are all based on brief surveys.
6. For details of the Analects and Classics Recitation Campaign that has been sweeping
the whole country over the last decade or so, see Zhang Limin (2001).
7. The following incident was cited by Zhu Xuefan, the former minister of the Ministry
of Posts and Telecommunications (Fu 2002: personal communication): A lady, named
Xia Xiaoyu, was loudly called ‘thief Xia’ in her working place, because a telegram
addressed to her, in official characters, was written as ‘Xia Xiaotou’ (夏小偷＝petty
thief) instead of Xia Xiaoyu. 媮 is read as Yu, which means delightfulness when
used in a female name. Most of the time, though, it is pronounced as ‘tou’ and means
‘to steal’. During the 1950s, when the women’s liberation movement was one of the
most important concerns in communist propaganda, a number of characters with
female compounds (女), that were seen as anti-female discrimination, were simplified,
or cancelled. Hence, only the human compound (亻) was kept as a standard one, while
the one with the woman compound was eliminated as yiti zi. But for Xia Xiaoyu, this
decision meant that in its printed form the one distinguishing character in her first
name disappeared.
8. Out of 428 characters in the book, Characters That Are Easily Mispronounced
(Beijing: People’s Press), over half (246) are semantic-phonetic characters. For
instance, among four characters, 歼 (jian), 忏 (chan), 纤 (xian), 迁 (qian), with the
phonetic compound 千 (qian), only one is pronounced as ‘qian’. 破绽 (pozhan-
poding), 屹立 (yili-qili) and 停滞 (tingzhi-tingdai) are some other typical examples
of mispronounced characters that frequently come to people’s attention.
9. As the individual character’s pronunciation can only be determined in a word, the
majority of which are in modern Chinese disyllabic or polysyllabic, yiti zi is known
most of the time as yiti ci (heterophonic words).
10. Qing was a regional government established in 1616. Its rule was confined to the
Northeast area, inhabited by the Manchuri ethnic population beyond the Great Wall.
The Manchuri Qing breached the Great Wall and took Beijing in 1644.
11. Contrary to classical Chinese, modern Chinese language is dominated by polysyllabic
words. If a word is monosyllabic, then the character equals the word. Exceptions are a
few newly created characters, especially coined for scientific metric terms (measuring
units). For instance, (nautical mile) is a ONE character word, but is read
disyllabic ‘hai li’. These words had been cancelled in a 1960s standardization measure,
but are still very popular both inside and outside Mainland China.
12. In an account of his personal experience in China, Mair (1991: 1) observed that it
might take hours to locate a friend’s name in the housing office of apartment complex
in Beijing.
13. Most radicals are independent single component characters or the derived forms of
these characters, e.g.,忄 is from 心 (xin, heart),刂 is from 刀 (dao, knife), 扌 is
from 手 (shou, hand). There are many radicals that are not characters in their own
right, meaning that they are used exclusively as radicals, e.g., 灬 (hot), 冫(cold) and
疒 (ill).
14. The Official Guidelines for Handwritten Characters was published by the Taiwan LPP
authority in 1976; the Japanese educational administration has tried to impose
Notes 369

stringent standards on students’ handwriting behavior, but stopped after confronting

strong resistance (He 2001: 135).
15. The Chinese language does not make a distinction between STANDARDIZED and
STANDARD characters, both are biaozhun in Chinese, but they are not equivalent. It
is anticipated that a number of the characters standardized in the future CTSC will not
be STANDARD CHARACTERS for public use in Mainland China – e.g., traditional
hanzi and variant forms – but in this table they are STANDARDIZED CHAR-
ACTERS.
16. After the Conference on Character Standardization, held in Shanghai from 21 to 22
December 2001, the Conference on Variant Forms of Characters was held in Jinggang
Shan (Jianxi Province) from 16-17 May 2002, followed by the Hefei (Anhui Province)
Conference on Issues of Character Simplification from 22 to 23 June, 2002, and
Yantai (Shandong Province) Conference on the Graphic Shape of Printed Characters
from 22-23 August 2002. The purpose of the last three conferences was to exclusively
deal with the difficulties that were arising in making the CTSC.
17. More examples are: Is whale 鲸 (鱼 = fish) a kind of fish? Should ‘bat’ 蝙蝠 (虫
= worm or insect) be categorized as a kind of insect? For proud 骄 (马 = horse);
what is the relationship between a horse and proud or pride? For bridge 桥 (木 =
wood); bridges are not necessarily made of wood. How can laughing 笑 (竹 =
bamboo) be related to bamboo? Wooden cups 杯 (木 = wood) are rarities today
(Research Team of Chinese Department 1974).
18. Many linguists and scientists have been input scheme designers, e.g., Zhou Youguang
(1999: 232), Liu Yongquan (1997: 394), Qian Weichang (Zhang 1997: 73), Zhang Pu
(1997: 74), but they all eventually discontinued or gave up the promotion of their
schemes.

CHAPTER 5
1. In this volume, sociolinguistic dimensions or factors/conditions are alternatively used
with non-linguistic, extra-linguistic or external factors, when referring to the impact of
social change while discussing hanzi development.
2. To illustrate the fact that characters are indispensable for understanding Chinese text,
Y. R. Chao has playfully written a well-known passage using over forty characters,
each pronounced by using only the one phonetic word ‘shi’. It makes no sense to the
ear, reading ‘shi’ aloud more than 40 times, but makes an interesting story when read
silently in Chinese characters. Another similar play with the syllable ‘xi’, created by
Chao, was cited in DeFrancis (1984b: 192).
3. “Every evening, the whole country would see two wrong spellings for Xinwen Lianbo
(‘News Across the Country’, the most-viewed TV program in China) in one second”,
Zhou (2002: personal communication) complained. It is estimated that the correct rate
of pinyin spelling in publications is around 85 percent (Li and Fang 2004: 139).
4. E.g., ‘wen’ (warm) is rarely used as monosyllable, and is almost always used in
concatenation with another syllable, such as ‘wennuan’ (warm), or ‘tiwen/wendu’
(temperature).
370 Notes

5. In archaic Chinese, monosyllabic words were dominant. The overwhelming majority

(over 90 percent) of modern words are polysyllabic. Classical texts should be dealt
with by using discipline-oriented input software.
6. Research done by a Canadian agency (International Development Research Centre
1997: 20-21, 45, 109) indicates, that with more than four million scientists and
engineers and 20,000 science and technology institutions, China has the capacity not
only to undertake ventures in big science but also to develop a strong tradition of
strategic research that is closely linked to China’s short-term technological develop-
ment. China is the only country with the potential to compete with the USA and the
EU on all fronts of science and technology before the middle of this century.
7. For instance, in the best-selling computer input program New Pinyin Scheme, one
cannot find the word ‘have/has (得)’ or ‘dislike (恶)’ by their correct pronunciation
‘dei’ and ‘wu’. Lin (2003: 306) gives more examples of the same problem with some
other input schemes. They are represented by pronunciations corresponding to other
meanings (which are used by some people with little education or in certain social
strata). When one fails to get the correct character, a very time-consuming process
often ensues to guess or to try out all other possible pronunciations.
8. According to the World Almanac and Book of Fact-2004 (1996), China has a literacy
rate of 86 percent; according to the China Statistical Yearbook-2004 (2004: 109), the
illiteracy and semi-illiteracy rate of those aged 15 or above is 10.95 percent of the total
population.
9. This can be substantiated by the following data (if the yiti zi factors can be
disregarded): 3,500 characters are included in the Table of Most Used Characters
(Mainland, 1, 1988), The Standard Forms Table of Most Used Characters has 4,808
characters (Taiwan, 9, 1982); the standard encoding sets for computers, GB 2312-80,
has 7,445 mapped code points, while Big 5, its equivalent in Taiwan, has 13,053
mapped code points. The official General Character Encoding Set for Information
Interchange (3, 1986) also includes 13,053 characters, almost double the size of the
character set used on the Mainland.
10. This artificial ‘elected’ standard, which is without basis in living speech, is a motley
assemblage of sounds from different dialects, “nearer to Nanjing but far from Beijing,
different from all dialects, not living on lips of any person in China” according to
Zhou Youguang (2001b: 10). The result is, as was jokingly put by Chao, the linguist
who made the recording of the standard pronunciation, “in 13 years, I am the only
person who has ever spoken this kind of national language, which was intended for the
whole population of 400 or 500 or even 600 million people” (Fei 1997: 39). In 1924,
controversy over the issue was eventually subdued by the emergence of the New
National Pronunciation, advocated by some predominant linguists such as Li Jinxi,
adopting the Beijing dialect as the exclusive standard speech for the whole country.
11. The first comprehensive study on the Mainland of this issue was carried out by Fei
Jichang (1993: 42). According to this research, in 4,786 comparable characters, 1,941
characters (41 percent) are totally the same in shape, and 1,864 characters (39 percent)
are slightly different. The 975 different ones that have the potential to cause a barrier
in written communication cover 20 percent of the total if the contextual factors are
disregarded.
12. Since the pro-independence DPP (Democracy Progress Party) took power from the
Kuomintung in 1996, there has been a growing interest to stress or even exaggerate the
linguistic differences between the two polities across the Strait, with the unconcealed
Notes 371

aim of developing the local dialect as a replacement for Guoyu (Mandarin). The first
step was to officially reject the widely expected use of pinyin as the official
transliteration system in 2002, and adopt Tongyong Pinyin, a much disputed dialect-
oriented scheme designed by some Taiwanese linguists. Pinyin was only allowed to be
used in public places in Taipei for international convenience.
13. Huang Peirong (1992: 93-96) deals at great length with this in his four-step proposal
to unify the writing system.
14. The reports about discussions at ministerial level to reduce pinyin teaching in primary
schools nationwide caused a great panic among the LP professionals. “We are worried
about the possibility of pinyin’s gradual phasing out from the compulsory education.
We wrote to the Ministry, we also wrote to the Guangming Daily and Education
Daily, to point out the potential harmful result of reducing teaching hours in schools
and to appeal for support from the public. These two papers dared not publish it, but
finally we managed to have it published in China’s Youth Daily and the proposal was
withdrawn” (Wang 2002: personal communication; Chinese Youth Daily, May 2,
2000).
15. For example, according to one random sample survey conducted in Beijing, out of 58
higher institutions, 25 (52%) universities and institutions use traditional hanzi to write
their name; 43 out of 51 (84%) restaurants/hotels use traditional hanzi for their brand
names (Zhang and Xia 2001: 263).
16. The figures from the following Google.com search of Chinese Party and state leaders’
tici (Sun 2003) show the tremendously negative impact these most visible and ever-
present tici can have on the public conception of standard hanzi: by 2003 Jiang Zemin
has written 33,800 pieces, Mao Zedong 22,800, Deng Xiaoping 19,400 and Li Peng
11,800.
17. After his failure to do it in his capacity as a LP official, Wang had to turn to the
commerce administration authority. “I was told that it would cost the store one million
RMB, but they had to do it, because of its influence. No tourists from the provinces
leave Beijing without a visit to Wangfujing Department Store”. It is calculated that the
cost of a name change is very high. For instance, for some nationally important banks
it would be in the tens of millions of Chinese RMB (Li 1992: 29). It was reported that
to implement the Directive on the Management of Character Use in Publications of
July 1992, which was issued by the SCLW in conjunction with the National
Department of Media and the Press, campaigns were launched in some regions, for a
period, to wipe out the traditional forms of characters from the signboards and Bian’e
(inscribed boards above or on the two sides of a door) (Liu 1992: 19). The reason for
the failure of this campaign was more because of their historical significance than the
financial affordability.
18. This was first implicitly revealed in written form in the Instructions on Using
Language Standards, compiled by the editing team of Standard Modern Chinese
Dictionary, published by Shanghai Cishu Chubanshe in 2002. (see also Fei and Xu
2005: 33-34.)
19. Hu Qiaomu (Editing Team: 294) revealed that due to Mao Zedong’s ‘suggestion’, the
character Yi (夷) for Yi nationality, had to be changed into 彝, because 夷 was
used in classical Chinese to imply a chauvinist sentiment. But 彝 is a rather rare
character, not used in modern life, and few people know how to write it. “Now we
cannot change it back, lest it will attract criticism [because of the possible confusion it
may cause]”, Hu said.
372 Notes

20. For details concerning the discrepancies in Mao’s directives, readers are referred
to DeFrancis (1984b: 295). A succinct review of Soviet/Stalin’s influence on Mao’s
thinking about Chinese Romanization can be found in Rohsenow (2004: 39).
21. The Law of National General Language and Script, People’s Republic of China, was
passed on 31st October 2000 and came into force from the first of January 2001. An
unofficial translation of this law is available in Appendix D.
22. Chen explained to the Soviet experts, “From the international revolutionary point, the
Soviet Union is in charge of East Europe, and China gets more involved in the affairs
in the South East Asian region, where Latin-based scripts are used.” (Feng 2001:
personal communication.) Chen Yi (1900-1972), a Sichuan native, joined the CCP
when he studied in France and became Mayor of Shanghai, vice-premier and foreign
minister of the PRC.
23. Some of these influences did become reality. The Chinese government designed six
New Script minority languages using the Cyrillic alphabet. But, except the one for
Mongolian, which was cancelled in 1958, none of the others were promoted (Nie
1998: 227-228).
24. According to Duan (1990: 2), ‘East’ was originally a reference to the other ethnic
groups living within the Soviet Empire at that time. It has nothing to do with China or
any other ‘Eastern’ countries.
25. According to the account by Zhu Bangfu (2000), one of the pioneers of hanzi
computerization, at the end of the 1970s, in order to get support from the industry, he
visited almost all computer companies in Taiwan and was given the same negative
response everywhere: they cannot afford the risk of investing money in something that
is impossible. In addition, he was told hanzi is a kind of antique relic that will be
abandoned very soon in the computer age. After repeated failures, he turned to the
public sector at a time when the defense force was in desperate need of developing an
automatic communication system. His research team was employed with the full
support of the National Defense Academy.
26. Chinese Central TV (CCTV.com 2004) reported statistical data on 5 December 2003
that the long dependency on foreign technology for inputting hanzi on mobile phones
meant that Chinese companies had to pay seven US cents more per mobile phone set
for the use of hanzi technology. Given the huge consuming capacity (the current
number is at 200 million sets) and 30 percent growth rate, the payment for hanzi input
technology, owned by foreign companies, reaches as much as 700 million RMB every
year.

CHAPTER 6
1. That is, for air traffic control, for use with international shipping (Seaspeak – Strevens
and Weeks, 1985), for police forces (Policespeak – Johnson, 1994) or for the English
Channel tunnel.
2. The original sentence first appeared in Sun Mian’s Preface for Qieyun (Sound
Spelling) in the Qing dynasty. Qieyun, written by Lu Fayan during the Sui Dynasty
(581-618), was used as the governmental standard of pronunciation in the Tang
Dynasty (618-907). Since then the saying has become a proverbial reference in
resolving contentious issues when a language standard has to be made. ‘A Few Peers’
Notes 373

Association was the name of a linguists’ salon composed of some renowned linguists
in the 1920s, including Chao, Liu Bannong and Qian Xuantong. They were the key
members of the Preparatory Commission of Unified National Language Promotion,
who were appointed by the then government to standardize the National Language.
“We, a few peers, do it and it is fixed” was their principle when they were caught up
amidst endless debates and felt helpless to agree upon some issues.
3. The rising superstars that have occupied Chinese screens for the past decade are Nā
Yīng (那英), Nīng Jìng（宁静） , Zāng Tiānshuò（藏天朔）and Wéi Wéi（韦唯） . They
all are the most talked about names in China in the 2000s, but in public life
hardly any of their fans nor the TV and radio announcers across the country pronounce
these four top entertainers’ surnames correctly, according to standard pronunciation –
that is the one found in the Modern Chinese Dictionary, the de facto official standard.
If one asks any ordinary Chinese to pronounce their names, they would call them Nà
Yīng, Níng Jìng, Zàng Tiānshuò and Wéi Wéi. Except for a few linguists and language
teachers, perhaps even the pop stars themselves are not aware that the pronunciation of
their surnames is non-standard (Liu 2003)!
4. Modest changes have been introduced in schools and administrations since 1996
(Coulmas, 1998; Stillemunkes, 2000).
5. In Japan, the government decreed a Supplementary Table of Characters for Name
Giving in 1951 with 92 characters, increased to 166 in October 1981. But the law was
challenged and questions concerning individual rights were raised in a court case
(Neustupný, 1983). A similar proposal from the Taiwan IT industry failed to be passed
in the legislature in the 1980s (Tse 1983: 16).
6. This is not the first attempt to standardize the names that components are called. The
issue was put to the public through the launch of a nationwide discussion from
September 1965 to April 1966 by Script Reform, the affiliated monthly journal under
the CCSR and Script Reform, the bi-weekly specialist section of Guangming Daily.
The discussion was basically confined to a circle of specialists, notwithstanding that
the initial purpose of the discussion was to seek popular component names to facilitate
teaching and learning hanzi for regular education, and to eliminate illiteracy. The
whole event was conducted in quite an appropriate manner: special sections were
vacated and an editorial with seven suggestions and two guiding principles was written
to formally kick off the discussion. In order to avoid influencing the discussion, Script
Reform discontinued the publication of the Table of Calling Names of Chinese Char-
acter Components (draft) for a period of over 6 months. Eventually, 19 papers were
published on the topic, but the uncompleted discussion came to a sudden halt when the
Cultural Revolution broke out on May 16, 1966 (Fei 1980).
7. The fieldwork involved in doing the research for this book gave the first author the
rare opportunity of getting extensively acquainted with the consultative members in
SCLW. The author had a strong feeling that the SCLW does not have a system in
place to guarantee that all legislative regulations are arrived at consensually by its
members. What members complained about most was that they were only approached
or consulted shortly before a LP program was carried out. Take the National Standard
for Numeral Use in Publications as an example. It had evoked an outcry on its
publication as the Standard was the work of only two scholars. More ironically, some
members of a previous SCLW did not know that their membership in this organization
already had been terminated! This failure to confront change directly is evidenced in
some other features of the organization.
374 Notes

8. In Chinese society, the handling of interpersonal relationships is given more attention

than in some other countries. The sensitivity and complexity of this can be seen from
the frequent use of pseudonyms when discussing disputable topics. Examples of this
can be found in articles published on Chinese Character Culture during the 1980-
1990s’ debate, as well as for papers discussing the SSS in Chinese Linguistics in 1978.
9. The Academie Française was established by the French First Minister, Cardinal de
Richelieu, in 1634 and incorporated in 1635, and has existed, except for an
interruption during the era of the French revolution, to the present day. Its original
purpose was to maintain standards of literary taste and to establish a literary language
(see Cooper 1989).
10. Yuan Xiaoyuan International Language Modernization Research Forum has been in
operation for two decades. Chinese Character Culture, its institutional journal, was in
the forefront of the battle that sparked the polemic of Hanzi Culture in the 1990s, and
has frequently published unorthodox views and disputed papers that openly challenge
the official policy. The Common Script Association was established in Shanghai in
December 1997 by Zhou Shenghong, a retired Chinese language teacher, and Huang
Zuohong, an entrepreneur from Taiwan. It has organized seven international symposia,
aimed at unifying hanzi across the Taiwan Strait, with refereed conference
proceedings published from each symposium. It is one of the most active non-
governmental associations in this area and it also runs a Chinese Script Research
Information Library located at the same venue in Shanghai, besides its own website
(http://hzdt.xiloo.com/stw.htm). The American Association for the Promotion of
Chinese Script Reform (http://www.wengai.com), with the aim of promoting ‘One
Language, Two Scripts’, was founded in 1979 by a group of enthusiastic Chinese
language reform scholars and interested students based in New York. Its current
sponsor is Apollo Wu, a retired translator at the UN. Through 2006, eighteen issues of
its journal Language and Information have been published. It also maintains an online
language reform forum (http://www.hpwwzm.com/YuiceYuXsoxva/YuiceYu Xsoxva
02.asp).
11. Many websites that we have come across in searching for material on language reform
provide a glimpse on how vibrant non-governmental LP activities are. Pan Defu works
through his own website (http://www.yywzw.com/pan/pan-03d-002.htm) to publicize
his books and papers, critiquing orthodox theories about hanzi reform and challenging
the government’s LPP; Shen Kecheng (http://hzdt.xiloo.com) produces a well-
maintained website specializing in input systems; Su Chengzhong (http://hzdt.xiloo.
com/wgyy01.htm) focuses on exploring a common script for all languages; Zhang
Shizhao founded an online Hanzi Research Institute (http://www.chancezoo.com/) to
promote the idea of a ‘Chineseized Computer’. A number of non-governmental organ-
izations, forums and online journals/magazines on Chinese LP can be found at
http://www.yywzw.com/ and http://www.china-language.gov.cn/webbbs/index.asp.

CHAPTER 7
1. Chen Yuan, a famous Chinese encyclopedist and former director of SCLW from 1987
to 1989, said that he created these two phrases and spread them in Lu Xun’s name
(Li 1992: 14). Nevertheless, “to sacrifice ourselves for hanzi, or to sacrifice hanzi for
Notes 375

ourselves”, and similar phrases, can be found throughout Lu Xun’s eight articles,
collected by Language Reform Press (1974: 36-38; 39-41).
2. In China, the policy of ‘walking on two legs’ was first put forward by Mao Dun,
Chinese novelist and then Minister of Cultural Affairs in the early 1960s (DeFrancis
1984b: 8). The notion of digraphia was raised in a sinographic IT context at the
International Symposium on East Asian Information Processing, held at the University
of Pennsylvania in October, 1990 (Mair 1991: 7).
3. Initiated by Professor Peng Zerun, some books and web pages have been published in
an interword text (spaced by words rather than hanzi) on an experimental basis over
the past few years. For more details, see http://www.yywzw.com/jt/zerun/.
4. A large-scale experiment, “Phonetically Annotate Character Recognition to Promote
Earlier Reading and Writing”, has been ongoing in Mainland China since 1982. In this
innovative pedagogical program, primary school children (and adult illiterates) are
taught to read and write standard Mandarin Chinese, using the pinyin alphabet in
addition to Chinese characters for the first two years of their education. Under this
experiment, beginners are encouraged to use pinyin where they have found their
reading and writing development being hampered by their hanzi limitations. More than
two million children across the country are involved, and the result shows that the
language skills of the majority of participants are greatly improved; for most of the
students who were taught with the more traditional method in the standard curriculum,
pinyin is just taught and used for the first two months as a phonetic notational device,
purely for a pronunciation purposes. For details, see Rohsenow (1996, 2001) and Su
(2001a).
5. The ‘thousand’, in the cited statistics, was misprinted as ‘hundred’ in the documents.
6. For example, some characters, printed in their traditional forms in two currently
popular computer-typed textbooks and published by prestigious and influential
publishers, namely Integrated Chinese (simplified version, Boston: Cheng and Tsui
Company, 1997), and Chinese for Today (Hong Kong: Commercial Press Hong Kong,
1998, also simplified), bewilder overseas Chinese learners.
7. They are the Chinese/Japanese/Korean Joint Research Group (CJK-JRG, 1990-1993)
and the Ideographic Rapporteur Group (IRG, after 1993). Member nations also include
Vietnam, although it was not invited as an initial party. IRG advises the Unicode
Consortium on Han character additions to the repertoire of the Unicode and ISO/IEC
10646-1 character set standards, and on Han unification.
8. For example, as Cheong (1999) has noted, a person from Hong Kong would be quite
displeased to see characters appear in a Japanese font style, although there are many
Japanese books sold in original packaging in Hong Kong.
9. In Japan by shape, or ideographic components; in Korea by sounds, or phonetic
representation and in China, the prototypical GB 2312-80 was indexed half by sound
for a more frequently used character and half by shape for rarely used characters,
which made recognition by pronunciation difficult for most people.
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Content Index

748 Project, 59, 60, 364 character input, 73, 106, 114, 122, 137,
All China Character Preservation 168
Congress, 33 Chen Yi/Chen, 241, 372
alphabetic language (s), 130, 132, 163, Chiang Kaishek/Chiang, 38, 215, 226
294, 316 Chinese calligraphy, 2, 8, 19, 229, 381
alphabetic script (s), 12, 115, 289, 294, Chinese Character Cultural Faction
392 (CCCF), xi, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101,
alphabetic writing system, 42, 289 102, 103, 104, 106, 223, 227
Ann T.K./T. K. Ann, 99, 102, 355 Chinese character processing software,
archaic-style language, 221 115
Artifical Intelligence (AI), xi, 84, 114, Chinese Communist Party (CCP), xi, 37,
115, 118, 196, 198, 199, 202, 207, 41, 42, 44, 52, 53, 54, 69, 72, 88,
235, 293, 294, 303, 310 101, 102, 228, 230, 232, 233, 237,
automatic conversion, xviii, 265, 307 238, 246, 263, 279, 355, 364, 372
automatic information processing, 145, Chinese computer (s), xvii, 106, 116,
180 128, 132, 249, 293, 294, 298, 313,
automatic recognition, 145 358, 359, 392, 406
automatic standardization, 283 Chinese computerization, xvii, 106, 128,
bamboo slip(s), 26, 187 249, 294, 298
Big5, 129, 131, 132, 359 Chinese culture, 25, 33, 34, 49, 82, 188,
black market, 95 229, 237, 246, 327, 378, 403
bottom-up, 80, 269 Chinese economy, xiii, 205
bronze inscription (jinwen), 2, 3, 297 Chinese entropy, 97, 105, 403
bushou, 13 Chinese information processing, xi, 73,
Cangjie, 2, 16, 25, 55 106, 111, 114, 207, 293, 329, 382,
centripetal forces, 189 391, 312, 404
centrism, 283 Chinese intellectuals, 113, 224, 236, 362
Chang-effect, 71, 75, 80, 81 Chinese language authorities, 139, 250

407
408 Content Index

chongma, xvii, 111, 112, 115, 119, 120, cyberspace, xix, 186, 262, 264, 287,
126, 194, 196 295, 313, 321, 323
Civil Service Examinations, 34 Cyrillic letters/script/alphabet, 241, 275,
CJK sinography/character/script, 142, 372
309, 316 Dai Jitao/Dai, 31, 33, 226
classical Chinese, 34, 83, 96, 150, Daoism, 187
151,178, 294, 323, 355, 368, 371, 389 data bank, 122, 196
clerical script (lishu), 3, 7, 8, 12, 276, Deng Xiaoping/Deng, 66, 235, 238, 267,
297, 300 364, 371
clinical treatment, xvii, 71, 174 deregulation, 282, 285
code set (s), 126, 144, 186, 257, 262, dialectal characters, 140, 185, 204, 213,
264, 279, 364, 390 320
Cold War, 239, 240, 246 digitalization, 112, 240, 252, 316, 404
collectivism, 253 digraphic writing system, 293
Commission of Chinese Script Reform dirigisme, 284, 395
(CCSR), xi, 35, 46, 56, 57, 58, 59, East Asia/Asians, 49, 98, 100, 112, 135,
60, 61, 63, 64, 65, 102, 146, 154, 186, 246, 304, 313, 314, 315, 316,
161, 166, 170, 258, 259, 278, 302, 318, 319, 358, 367, 372, 375, 385,
306, 307, 363, 365, 366, 373 392, 394, 395, 400
common script, xviii, 134, 216, 285, East Asian ideographs, 186
308, 313, 374, 393, 398, 402 Education Ministry/Ministry of
Communist propaganda, 51, 368 Education, 40, 43, 74, 152, 158, 234,
Comprehensive Table of Standardized 238, 279, 281, 290, 306, 356, 383
Characters (CTSC), xi, xvi, 175, 176, ethnic minorities/groups/population, 89,
177, 179, 180, 182,183, 184, 185, 140, 149, 185, 187, 274, 280, 292,
219, 264, 265, 279, 369 351, 368, 372
computer technology, 20, 111, 113, 127, evolution, 3, 6, 9, 11, 67, 84, 204, 210,
168, 194, 294, 327, 389 296, 297, 303, 312, 315, 322, 323,
computerized hanzi, 111, 294 324, 326, 327, 328, 362, 377, 387,
Confucian classics, 357 399, 400
Confucianism, 26, 220, 246 First Simplification Scheme (FSS), xi,
consensual model/decision, 250, 283 24, 29, 30, 31, 32, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40,
conservatism, 40, 210, 301, 326 41, 49, 67, 227, 324
Corpus of Whole Chinese Character First Simplification, xi, 24, 28
(CWCC), xi, xvi, 185, 186, 187, 188, First Table of Verified Variant Forms
189 (FTVVF), xi, 46, 87, 89, 161, 162,
corpus planning, 35, 138, 267, 268, 322, 229, 258, 385
379, 384, 387 folk hanzi, 186, 187, 388
corpus-based/corpus method (s), 118, font style (s), 19, 158, 317, 321, 375
196, 198, 199, 201 Four Fixations, xvi, 73, 138, 139, 175,
cultural heritage, 32, 36, 84, 87, 100, 246, 249
106, 143, 155, 185, 189, 223, 312, function-specific multilayered standards
325, 355, 387 model, 265
Cultural Revolution, 29, 47, 51, 54, 55, Gang of Four, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 66,
56, 59, 60, 65, 66, 68, 69, 89, 92, 93, 69, 364
103, 104, 105, 116, 151, 154, 220, GB 13000.1, 14, 129, 141, 171, 219,
237, 253, 325, 362, 363, 364, 365, 373 262, 263, 358, 359
Content Index 409

GB 2312-80, xi, 12, 186, 262, 358, 359, 377, 385, 387, 390, 391, 392, 396,
360, 364, 375 397, 399
General List of Print Font of Chinese Hu Qiaomu/Hu, 44, 75, 86, 88, 102,
Characters (GLPFCC), xi, 46, 54, 158, 184, 226, 231, 232, 235, 236,
146 278, 299, 355, 371, 383, 386
General List of Simplified Characters Hu Yuzhi/Hu, 60
(GLSC), xi, 46, 51, 80, 230, 231, ideographic input, 79, 120, 122, 206
277, 304, 308, 364 ideographic system (s), 97, 100, 188
geographical names, 88, 145, 149, 152, ideographic-based script (s), 82, 372
259, 365 image planning, 269, 270, 322, 377
Germany, 211, 240, 271, 276, 367, 378, imperialism, 243, 318
394 India, 26, 239
globalization, 222, 240, 243, 252, 400, individualism, 146, 251
402 Information Retevial (IR), xi, 114, 168
Gou-phenomenon, 71, 75, 82, 84, 85, information technology, xi, xxi, 73, 352,
87, 89 403
grass style characters (caoshu), 18, 45, intellectualization, 66, 385
297 interdisciplinary cooperation, 234
great seal script (dazhuan), 6 international (standard) keyboard, 117,
Guangming Daily, 55, 56, 62, 75, 154, 123, 126, 194
299, 355, 371 international environment, 239, 245
Han Ja, 367 international standard(s), 112, 117, 123,
Han Unification, 314, 315, 316, 317, 126, 129, 142, 181, 185, 194, 207,
321, 375, 381 252, 262, 314, 318, 319, 321
handwriting standard, 305 intervention, 6, 23, 31, 41, 104, 174,
hanzi computerization, 112, 116, 137, 189, 201, 218, 223, 225, 226, 232,
193, 207, 372 235, 236, 253, 280, 281, 283, 308
hanzi culture debate, 104, 217, 223, 237 ISO standards, 263
hanzi processing, 125, 199, 244, 308 IT expert (s), xvii, 79, 218, 235, 263,
hanzi simplification, 18, 24, 30, 47, 71, 314
75, 101, 111, 299, 305, 325, 383, IT industry, 115, 123, 124, 144, 174,
389, 396, 399, 403 181, 182, 196, 199, 201, 203, 206,
Hebrew, 201, 366 207, 208, 234, 238, 243, 245, 262,
heterophonic character (yidu zi), 164 274, 289, 293, 321, 359, 373
Hindi, 195, 289 IT-oriented standard (s), 182, 190, 256,
Hokkien, 320 260, 261, 263, 280
homophones/homophony, 10, 80, 115, Japan, 18, 29, 37, 151, 152, 153, 186,
119, 198, 199 225, 239, 304, 313, 314, 315, 318,
homophonous character (s)/word (s), 10, 319, 320, 355, 373, 375, 381, 387,
120, 123, 177, 194, 197, 198, 229, 398, 399
308, 309, 365 Japanese, 37, 65, 83, 86, 87, 91, 140,
homophonous substitution/ replacement, 141, 151, 178, 206, 275, 276, 290,
79, 154, 161, 308, 366 293, 295, 309, 315, 318, 319, 320,
homophonous syllables, 194, 196, 198, 365, 367, 368, 375, 382, 392, 397,
292 398
Hong Kong, 31, 92, 95, 96, 103, 131, Jiang Qing/Jiang, 58, 364
141, 205, 213, 214, 217, 219, 239, Jiang Zemin/Jiang, 104, 217, 223, 228,
240, 243, 310, 355, 363, 366, 375, 237, 238, 371, 397
410 Content Index

June Fourth Movement, 221, 237 May Fourth Movement, 32, 107, 220,
Kana, 87, 275, 290 355
Kanji, 276, 318, 367 Microsoft, 119, 120, 127, 130, 244, 245,
Keizo Obuchi, 225 303, 309
Korea, 142, 166, 186, 209, 225, 239, Ming Dynasty, 27, 28, 30
314, 375, 393, 399 Ministry of Culture, 161, 170
Korean, 140, 141, 180, 205, 291, 309, Ministry of Information Industry, 142,
315, 367, 375, 389, 397 150, 359, 360
Kuomintung, 36, 37, 216, 355, 370 minority language (s), 372, 392
language (management) administration, model style characters (kaiti/kaishu), 8,
41, 141, 203, 230 19, 20
language authorities/authority, 139, 171, Mongolian, 187, 263, 372
175, 213, 250 monosyllables, 92
language maintenance, 191, 379 morphemic script, 147
language market, 96 Morse, 113
language-in-education, 270, 281, 322, multidimensional model, 226
378 multi-level model, 167
Latin (-based) script, 128, 372 multi-standard model, 250, 254, 256,
Latin alphabet/letter, 35, 42, 179, 233, 289, 299
241, 275, 294, 303, 353 National Conference on Language Work
Latinization, 41, 42, 241, 291, 402 (NCLW), xi, xvi, 64, 71, 235, 238,
Lee Kuan Yew, 225 282
Li Peng, 371 National Digital Archives Program, 188
Li Si, 25 National Standard Pronunciation, 213
Lin Biao, 55, 62 national standard, 68, 123, 126, 144,
lingua franca, xv, 166 203, 216, 219, 230, 264, 318
literary characters, 149, 150, 151, 152 nationalism, 8, 36, 101, 104, 107, 109,
Liu Shaoqi/Liu, 55 155, 191, 245, 246
logographic script (s), 292, 295, 322 natural language processing, 114, 120,
LP authorities, 92, 152, 170, 184, 186, 196, 199
274, 311 Northern Mandarin, 166
LP workers, 43, 50, 72, 253, 263, 274, obsolete characters, 88, 140, 146, 264
276, 279 official characters, 213, 229, 259, 368
luanma, xvii, 111, 112, 129, 130, 131, Opitical Character Recognition (OCR),
132, 133, 134 xi, 21, 118
Mainland China, 37, 46, 50, 91, 93, 94, oracle bone script (jiaoguwen), 2, 3, 4,
102, 125, 131, 142, 169, 216, 217, 5, 185, 188, 297
228, 260, 264, 278, 280, 314, 320, overseas Chinese, 46, 47, 48, 80, 85, 95,
330, 368 96, 101, 102, 126, 128, 134, 165,
Mainlander(s), 131 184, 205, 240, 309, 310, 363, 365,
Mao Zedong/Mao, 20, 35, 42, 55, 148, 375
226, 232, 275, 298, 355, 364, 371 paradigms, 266
Maoist, 101 Party propaganda, 104, 223, 237
Marr, 53, 54, 356 Party propagandists, 101
Marxism, 54, 84, 225, 237 People’s Republic of China (PRC), xi,
Marxist, 52, 221 xiii, xv, 8, 41, 42, 54, 72, 85, 92, 102,
mass line, 55, 83, 92, 164, 306 109, 142, 220, 230, 232, 263, 292,
mass-accessible script, 208 363, 372
Content Index 411

personal names, 84, 149, 152, 175, 276, Republic of China, xi, xv, xvi, 30, 31,
353, 354, 355 32, 41, 86, 367
phonetic compound, 10, 12, 13, 14, 45, Research Institute of Applied
88, 163, 178, 179, 302, 363, 367, 368 Linguistics (RIAL), xi, 74, 167, 170
phonetic script (s), 289, 296 revolution, xv, xix, 47, 51, 52, 54, 55,
phonetic symbol (s), 226, 290 56, 58, 60, 61, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 87,
phonetic/phonetics-based input, xvii 89, 92, 93, 103, 104, 105, 107, 116,
phoneticization, 10, 12, 72, 93, 232, 268, 151, 154, 180, 220, 237, 241, 253,
279, 288, 292, 295, 296, 299 296, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326, 327,
phonetics-based schemes, 194 328
pinyin orthography, 198, 241, 298 revolutionary change, 52, 214, 326
pinyin scheme, 233, 241, 277, 278, 295, rights, 150, 208, 266, 268, 279, 281, 320
370 Romanization history, 233
pinyin-based methods, 125 Romanization movement, 288, 292, 296,
pluricentric language, 188, 239, 240 327
pluricentric model, xviii, 256, 263, 266, Romanization, xvi, xviii, 30, 37, 43, 46,
299 49, 53, 72, 73, 102, 109, 122, 180,
pluricentric script, 313 216, 233, 267, 275, 283, 287, 288,
polyphonic character, 163 289, 292, 293, 294, 295, 296, 299,
prestige planning, 270, 271, 284 324, 325, 326, 327
printing industry, 18, 39, 146, 162 Romanized script, 240
pronunciation standard, 165, 213, 282, running style characters (xingshu), 17,
public media, 103, 183 20
public opinion (s), 183, 212, 271, 274, Russian, 211, 241
275, 276, 277, 278, 279, 280, 306 script modernization, 46, 109, 227
public participation, 183 script standardization, 25, 26, 204, 222,
public space, 228, 229 script worship, 238, 254, 255
public support, 275 seal script (zhuanshu), 3, 6, 7, 8, 17, 25,
purism, xvi, 28, 32, 33, 35, 36, 220, 326 300
putonghua popularization/promotion, Second Simplification Scheme (SSS)/
73, 166, 167, 180, 195, 203, 213 Second Scheme, xviii, 55, 60, 62, 66,
Qian Weichang, 243 67, 94, 273, 299, 300, 325
Qian Xuantong/Qian, 30, 40, 45, 226, self-evident script, 53, 99, 166, 245
302 semantic compound, 13, 14, 85, 159,
Qian Xuesen, 202, 234, 243 160, 161, 177, 367
Qin Dynasty/government, 7, 25, 82, 297, semantic-phonetic characters, 6, 10, 13,
313 80, 162, 163, 169, 178, 179, 180
Qin Empire, 7, 25, 300 semantics, 118, 199
Qin Shihuang, 25 Shanghai Times, 275
Qing Dynasty/period, 27, 140, 297 Singapore, ix, 47, 131, 216, 225, 305
rarely used character (s) (RC), 20, 89, small seal script (xiaozhuan), 6, 7, 8, 25,
120, 122, 143, 145, 148, 153, 175, 300
221, 222 socialist ideology, 324
reformers, 36, 66, 72, 81, 89, 93, 96, 98, socialist, 52, 53, 83, 204, 221, 242, 324,
103, 104, 106, 107, 177, 210, 217, 351
302, 314 socio-cultural factors, 292
regulator, 283 socio-cultural settings/context, 253
412 Content Index

Song Dynasty/period, 27, 88, 158, 296 traditional culture, 83, 93, 101, 155, 188,
Southeast Asia, 246, 304 211, 216, 221, 222, 223, 224, 237,
Soviet, 53, 211, 241, 246, 356 328
specialty characters, 149, 152, 302 traditional heritage, 36, 90, 93, 104, 106,
speech recognition (SR), xi, 124, 194, 151, 155, 188, 211, 222, 224, 227,
203 245, 295, 319
spiritual life, 33, 253 traditional script, 292
square script (kaishu), 3, 8, 9, 18, 19, 41 traditional treasures, 17
Stalin, 241, 356 traditionalism, 36, 101, 107
standard pronunciation, 121, 126, 165, traditionalist (s), 221, 245, 252
167, 195, 202, 213 Turkey, 225, 239, 276
standardization process, 138, 283 two-way model, 270
State Bureau of Technology typesetting, 18, 20, 60, 231, 298
Supervision, 142, 262, 263, 305, 353, Unicode Consortium, 142, 186, 218,
359 314, 315, 318
State Commission of Language Work Unicode, 128, 131, 134, 135, 142, 143,
(SCLW), xi, 14, 74 162, 185, 186, 187, 188, 214, 218,
State Council, 46, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 63, 313, 314, 315, 316, 317, 318, 319,
72, 91, 149, 228, 232, 258, 259, 277, 320, 321, 359, 360
279, 280, 352, 353, 354 United Nations, 97
Sui Dynasty/period, 8, 26, 372 unofficial characters, 91, 176, 359
superstructure, 52, 53, 59, 224, 237, 260 urbanization, 191, 204
Swahili, 225 Uygur, 187, 263
Table of Simplified Characters (TSC), variant form(s) (yiti zi), xi, 17, 28, 30,
xi, xviii, 24, 39, 45, 265, 277 46, 83, 87, 88, 89, 91, 140, 146, 147,
taboo (s), 87, 88, 305 150, 159, 160, 161, 162, 176, 184,
Taiwan, 31, 36, 37, 47, 65, 85, 90, 92, 258, 262, 264, 300, 308, 359, 367
95, 96, 103, 131, 141, 142, 165, 183, vernacular Chinese, 294
184, 188, 189, 195, 205, 211, 212, Vernacularization Movement, 58, 151,
215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 228, 323
239, 240, 242, 243, 260, 305, 310, Vietnam, 239, 375
313, 314, 319, 320 Wang Yunwu, 113
Tang Dynasty/period, 27, 188 Western powers, 30, 220, 327
Tanzania, 225 Westernization, 107
text automation, 294 word processing, 106, 114, 127, 167,
Thailand, 389 196, 214
Three Developing Phases Theory, 296, Wu Yuzhang/Wu, 42, 43
298 Xiandai Hanyu Cidian (Modern Chinese
Three Representation (Theory), 237, 238 Dictionary), 165
tici, 227, 228, 229 Xinhua News Agency, 60, 355
Times New Roman, 18 Xinhua Zidian (Xinhua Chinese
tokenism, 274 Character Dictionary), 171
top-down interfence, 41 Xinjiang, 187
top-down model, 269 Xu Dejiang, 102
top-down nature, 182 Xu Shen/Xu, 7, 169, 357
top-down policy, 41 Yuan Dynasty, 39, 302
top-down structure, 283 Yuan Xiaoyuan, 101, 237, 285, 357
top-down tradition, 212 Zhang Chunqiao/Zhang, 57, 58, 60
Content Index 413

Zhang Zhigong, 234 Zhou Dynasty/period, 6

Zhao Ziyang/Zhao, 88 Zhou Enlai/Zhou/primier Zhou, 43, 58,
Zhonghua Zihai (Ocean of Chinese 226, 233, 236, 274,
character), 140 Zhu Rongji/Zhu, 229, 230, 235
Author Index

Ager, D., 37, 204, 225, 269, 271, 330 Chen, E. S-h., 100
Ager, S., 3, 11 Chen, M.G., 182
Ammon, U., 191 Chen, M.J., 85
Ann, T.K., 102 Chen, M.Y., 289
Anwar, K., 225 Chen, P., 41, 90, 146, 174, 179, 241,
Ao, X.P., 144 292, 299, 302
Baker, C., 276 Chen, S.C., 205
Bakken, B., 100 Chen, W.Z., 103
Baldauf, R. B. Jr., 45, 50, 85, 191, 225, Chen, Y,C., 79, 241
232, 240, 246, 267, 269, 270, 271, Chen, Y.S., 65, 87
272, 273, 274, 276, 281, 322, 323
Chen, Z.T., 278
Ball, R., 66, 271
Bambose, A., 283 Cheng, C.C., 46, 66, 307, 367, 375
Bao, M.W., 116, 145, 302 Cheng, R., 138
Barme, G.R., 101 Cheong, O., 317, 375
Barnes, D., 167, 212, 227, 241, 364 Chia, S.Y., 42, 43, 44, 47, 48, 83, 278,
Bates, M., 199 366
Bem, D.J., 284 Chiang, G.K., 33, 38, 41, 55, 57, 215,
Blachford, D.Y.R., 57, 230 226, 236, 296
Bluesea, 132 Chiang, Y., 5, 17
Boeschoten, H., 276 Chinese Youth Daily, 371
Boltz, W.G., 361 Chu, M., 120
Bourhis, R.Y., 228 Clyne, M.G., 37, 240, 276
Canagarajah, A.S., 271, 323 Cobarrubias, J., 2
CCTV.Com., 372 Collective Editors, 102
Chao, Y.R., 87, 178, 179, 216, 369, 370, Cook, R.S., 314, 315, 317, 320
373 Cooper, R.L., 2, 30, 35, 191, 226, 268,
Chen, A.B., 159, 379 270, 283, 374

415
416 Author Index

Coulmas, F., 84, 98, 100, 253, 254, 272, Gonzalez, A., 66
301, 373 Gottlieb, N., 206
Crystal, D., 4, 189 Goundry, N., 310, 317, 318, 320
Dai, J., 31, 33, 132, 226 Gregersen, E.A., 272
Dai, Y., 31 Grin, F., 191
Das Gupta, J., 191, 198, 218, 251, 268, Gu, X.F., 16, 120, 172, 173, 359
271 Guo, M.R., 54
De Silva, K.M., 195 Guo, X.W., 308
DeFrancis, J., 10, 17, 41, 45, 55, 57, 59, Guo, Y.J., 97, 103, 246
86, 97, 99, 107, 109, 151, 178, 210, Haarmann, H., 269, 270
227, 233, 237, 241, 242, 282, 284, Halpern, J., 309, 310
289, 361, 362, 369, 372, 375 Han, J.T., 367
Deng, C.Q., 156 Hannas, W.C., 76, 115, 121, 310
Ding, C., 89 Haugen, E., 137, 270, 272
Ding, F.H., 368 He, Q.X., 65, 83, 87, 152, 276, 318, 330
Ding, X.Q., 102, 145, 172 He, Y.L., 83
Dogançay-Aktuna, S., 174 Hook, B., 1, 35
Du, Z.J., 31, 37 Hsieh, C-c., 65, 188, 189, 320
Duan, S.N., 43, 212, 372 Hu, S., 177
Ducke, I., 285 Hu, S.B., 34, 102, 184, 210, 226, 230,
Eastman, C.M., 66, 240 231, 232, 235, 236, 278, 299,
Editing Team, 77, 86, 88, 184, 232, 236, Huang, D.C., 218
371 Huang, K.D., 65, 188
Editors, 162 Huang, P.R., 47, 81, 88, 176, 184, 212,
Education Office, 217, 227, 258 228, 371
Fan, K.Y., 180, 231, 237, 293, 302 Huang, Y.Z., 189
Fang, S.Z., 18, 369 Hung, H-c., 65, 188
Fei, J.C., 31, 43, 58, 63, 64, 89, 149, Ingram, D.E., 191
157, 172, 178, 182, 216, 219, 265, International Development Research
278, 299, 302, 329, 366, 370, 371, Centre, 370
373 Jackson, R., 11, 61
Feng, S.Z., 216 Jernudd, B.H., 32, 191, 198, 218, 251,
Feng, W.J., 126, 207 326
Feng, Z.W., 105, 207 Ji, F.Y., 220, 237, 363
Ferguson, C.A., 26, 47, 85, 86, 251, 255, Jin, G.T., 19, 89, 304
256, 268, 271, 275 Johnson, E., 372
Fishman, J.A., 33, 34, 191, 268, 282 Jordan, D.K., 140, 313, 320
Fu, K.H., 366, 368 Journalist, 60, 232, 355
Fu, Y.H., 18, 329 Kan, J.Z., 147
Galambos, I., 5, 330 Kaplan, R.B., 45, 50, 85, 191, 225, 232,
Gao, G.S., 80, 161, 168, 171, 179, 219, 240, 246, 267, 270, 271, 273, 274,
231, 304, 365, 366 276, 322, 365
Gao, J.C., 89 Kataoka, S., 366
Gao, M.C.F., 10 Kerman, j., 309, 310
Geerts, G., 66, 210, 271, 272 Keyes, C.F., 195
Gelb, I.J., 11, 180 Kim, C-W., 52, 225
Geng, Z.S., 26, 28, 39, 87 Krzak, M., 98
Gong, J.Z., 182, 223 Kwong, J., 53
Author Index 417

Landau, J., 225 Ohlendorf, H., 272

Landry, R., 228 Orleans, L.A., 295
Language Reform Press, 56, 375 Ouyang, Z.S., 80
Lehmann, W.P., 57, 284, 364 Pan, D.F., 282, 296, 374
Leng, Y.L., 16, 84 Peng, H., 34, 36, 105, 211, 371, 375
Lewis, E.G., 281 Qi, C.T., 177
Li, C.X., 182 Qiu, X.G., 161, 179, 361
Li, J.G., 15 Rahman, T., 95
Li, J.Q., 204 Reley, J., 83
Li, J.X., 58 Research Team of Chinese Department,
Li, L.Q., 300 369
Li, M.S., 54, 102, 103, 374 Research Team of Computer,
Li, Y.M., 143, 175, 178, 186, 221, 234, Information Processing, 16
243, 273, 365 Rohsenow, J.S., 6, 30, 58, 59, 60, 64,
Li, Y.Y., 86 113, 121, 163, 164, 294, 330
Li, Z.H., 38 Rubin, J., 270, 276
Lim, B.C., 305 Sailard, C., 255
Lin, L.L., 205 Sakamura, K., 319
Lin, N., 142, 360 Schiffman, H.F., 33, 95, 191, 271, 275,
Lin, Y., 189 281, 283, 326, 366
Lin, Y.F., 370 SCLW, 74, 102, 158, 159, 164, 170,
Lin, Y.Z., 201, 231, 365 171, 185, 201, 231, 232, 238, 258,
Liu, A.P.L., 56, 277 261, 262, 263, 278, 279, 280, 281,
Liu, C.Y., 373 284, 308
Liu, M.C., 86 Searle, S.J., 318, 319
Liu, Q.E., 371 Seybolt, P.J., 33, 41, 55, 57, 236, 296
Liu, Q.L., 182 Shapiro, M.J., 32, 326
Liu, S.Z., 302 She, K.C., 83, 367
Liu, Y.Q., 65, 235, 369 Shen, J., 75, 90, 308
Lu, B.F., 43, 83, 85, 89, 144, 153, 194, Shepherd, J., 225
285, 288, 294, 295, 303, 329 Shi, F., 237
Luan, L., 227 Shi, Y.W., 80, 174
Lunde, K., 140, 142, 315 Shi, Z.Y., 92
Lü, G.X., 16, 43, 285 Shidner, T., 207
Lü, S.X., 294 Shohamy, E., 228, 229
Ma, Q.Z., 34, 42, 81, 122, 235, 364 Shuy, R.W., 191
Maata, S.K., 191 Sommer, B.A., 191
Mair, V.H., 116, 117, 121, 206, 367, Stillemunkes, C., 373
368, 375 Strevens, P., 372
Mao, Z.D., 148, 226, 228, 232, 275, 298 Su, P.C., 67, 80, 83, 86, 89, 105, 107,
Meyer, D., 214, 316, 317 146, 150, 154, 155, 178, 221, 222,
Mi, A.L., 244, 245 253, 282, 285, 289, 292, 294, 298,
Milsky, C., 54, 227 302, 329, 364, 375
Moon, H -h., 225, 282 Sun, J.X., 363
Moore, H., 26, 191 Sun, W.J., 228, 371
Neustupný, J.V., 270, 365, 373 T’sou, B.K.Y., 11, 61
Ni, Y.Y., 43, 60, 85, 309, 364 Tang, L., 8, 9, 16, 26, 27, 83, 179, 188,
Nie, H.Y., 209, 363, 372 372
418 Author Index

Tao, L., 306 Xie, T.W., 27, 194

Taylor, I., 33, 222 Xin, Bao., 145, 368
Taylor, M., 33, 222 Xu, C.A., 81, 178, 181
The Office of Standard, 91, 227, 258, Xu, C.M., 178
307 Xu, D.J., 237
Thomas, G., 30, 211, 252 Xu, J.L., 85, 143, 199, 243, 356
Tompson, P.M., 125 Xu, L.L., 265, 371
Topping, S., 315 Xu, S.C., 140
Totten, G.O., 209 Yan, Y.M., 16, 86
Tsang, Y-h., 45, 47, 365 Yang G., 150
Tsao, F-f., 195, 211 Yang, H.Q., 179, 299
Tse, J.K.-p., 373 Yang, R.L., 146
Turley, J., 303 Yao, D.H., 31, 166
Twine, N., 151 Yao, Y.P., 203, 204, 243
Twitchett, D., 1, 35 Ye, L.S., 35, 197, 233, 275, 365
Unger, J.M., 84, 97, 293, 295, 318 Yin, B.Y., 6, 30, 87, 113, 158, 163, 164,
US Embassy, 263 329, 362
Wada, E., 316, 319 Yu, G.Y., 239
Wan, Y.X., 91, 181 Yu, J., 231
Wang, B.X., 367 Yu, J.E., 226, 282
Wang, F.Y., 10, 38, 147, 183, 189, 219, Yu, X.L., 209
301, 304, 368, 371 Yuan, X.Y., 101, 237, 285, 357
Wang, H.Y., 178 Zeng, X.C., 80, 104, 105
Zhang, F.P., 244, 245
Wang, J., 42, 44, 48, 159, 213, 234, 277,
Zhang, J.Q., 84, 244
278
Zhang, L.M., 368
Wang, J.S., 214, 241
Zhang, L.Q., 98
Wang, L., 40, 179
Zhang, P., 117, 122, 156, 180, 199, 369
Wang, N., 5, 7, 230, 265, 300
Zhang, S.Y., 34, 136, 148, 156, 186,
Wang, S.Y., 122
204, 235, 312
Wang, T.K., 27, 152, 175, 180, 204,
Zhang, W.B., 158
205, 210, 240, 258, 264, 265, 282
Zhang, X.T., 60
Wang, X.W., 31, 241
Zhang, Y.J., 102, 362
Wang, Y.W., 88, 144, 265, 278, 368 Zhang,Y.M., 122, 126
Weeks, F., 280, 372 Zhang, Z.C., 320
Weischedel, R.M., 199 Zhang, Z.G., 34
Whiteley, W.H., 276 Zhang, Z.R., 101
Wieger, L., 361 Zhao, S.H., 66, 67, 87, 97, 156, 172,
Winsa, B., 366 180, 185, 189, 289, 324
Wong, Y.K., 25, 33, 89, 361 Zhao, F.F., 180
Wood, J.D., 225 Zhao, W.Z., 85
Woon, W.L., 11 Zheng, L.X., 2, 61, 154, 306
Wright, S., 119, 189, 250 Zheng, Y.L., 306
Wu, C.A., 16, 87, 89, 150 Zhou,Y.G., 30, 31, 39, 50, 65, 66, 67,
Wu, W.C., 222 68, 80, 89, 117, 125, 140, 144, 145,
Wu., Y.S., 120, 145, 172, 173 146, 147, 155, 178, 180, 195, 197,
Wu, Y.Z., 44, 54 205, 209, 220, 222, 240, 241, 256,
Xi, B.X., 267 277, 278, 282, 300, 314, 357
Xia, Z.H., 83, 104, 146, 187, 365, 368, Zhu, B.F., 372
371 Zou, X.L., 5, 7, 362
Language Policy

1. M.H. Amara and A.A. Mar’i: Language Education Policy: The Arab Minority in Israel.
2002 ISBN 1-4020-0585-7
2. R.B. Kaplan and R.B. Baldauf Jr.: Language and Language-in-Education Planning in the
Pacific Basin. 2002 ISBN 1-4020-1062-1
3. L.A. Grenoble: Language Policy in the Soviet Union. 2003 ISBN 1-4020-1298-5
4. M. Zhou (ed.) Language Policy in the People’s Republic of China: Theory and Practice
Since 1949. 2004 ISBN 1-4020-8038-7
5. T. Clayton: Language Choice in a Nation under Transition: English Language Spread in
Cambodia. 2006 ISBN 0-387-31193-9
6. A.L. Rappa and L. Wee: Language Policy and Modernity in Southeast Asia: Malaysia,
the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. 2006 ISBN 1-4020-4510-7
7. M. Berns, K. de Bot, and U. Hasebrink (eds.): In The Presence of English: Media
and European Youth. 2007 ISBN 0-387-36893-0
8. W.P. Rivers (ed.) Language Planning in the Former Soviet Union: Internal and External
Perspectives. (Planned)
9. S. Zhao and R.B. Baldauf Jr.: Planning Chinese Characters: Reaction, Evolution or
Revolution? 2008 ISBN 978-0-387-48574-4