what do you think about chinese characters?

Question

I am a student in Taiwan and I would like to know what you think about Traditional Chinese characters and simplied ones. I think traditional chinese characters are much more beautiful than simplied ones.
Traditional Chinese characters are made by the six categories -- self-explanatory, characters pictographs, pictophonetic characters, associative compounds, mutually explanatory characters, phonetic loan characters. So, each character is meaningful. However, Simplified Chinese characters are now widely used all around the globe. It's a shame that the traditional now is used only in Taiwan and Hong Kong. I still love the traditional ones for its symbol of Chinese culture although it is much easier to write the simplified ones. What do you think about it?
example: traditional:龍的傳人、中華文化、歷史悠久、廣博無窮 simplified:龙的传人、中华文化、历史悠久、广博无穷

Answer 1

Language is simply a tool for communication. It is undesirable (and unnecessary) for the written form to be overly complex.

Ease of writing is the first and foremost consideration. If some people want to continue to use the traditional characters, they should be free to do so. However, for the majority of the populace, and for teaching in the schools, the simplified forms should be taught.

Many foreigners who study Chinese and learn to write hundreds (or even thousands) of characters still frequently get the various radicals or components mixed up. Foreigners are often heard to say: "This item is related to metal, why doesn't it have the metal radical?" -or- "This item is only used by women, why doesn't it have the woman radical?" etc., etc.

In a similar manner, some foreigners may examine various characters and ask people in Taiwan: "What does this stroke mean?" -or- "Does this loop go up or down?" etc. etc. ...... and in fact the vast majority of Taiwanese people cannot answer such questions.

Additionally, if you pick several fairly complicated Chinese characters out of the dictionary and ask Taiwanese people to assess the "stroke count" of each, you will often get different answers!!!

These points of analysis are important. If all those lines, dots, strokes, etc. have no particular meaning, and if the use of the radicals is not consistent across a wide range of characters, and if it is even difficult for Chinese speaking persons to agree on the stroke counts, etc., etc. ...... then it is obvious that "Chinese characters" (in their traditional form) can hardly be considered scientific, or even logical.

Thus, since "Chinese characters" (in their traditional form) are neither scientific or logical, then they should be simplified. That way, they are much easier to remember.

As for the complaint that "Chinese characters" (in their traditional form) are more beautiful, that is a totally subjective statement. It is not objective in any way, shape, or form. What do you think about the non-alphabetic scripts of the Indian subcontinent, or of Thailand, or Cambodia? Are they beautiful or ugly?? Well, I can tell you that the native people think they are beautiful. Have those scripts been simplified over the ages?? Well, they certainly have. Yet, today they are still considered beautiful. It is just a matter of mental adjustment ...... If you spend some time getting used to the simplified characters, you will become comfortable with them!!!

Answer 2

why should it? if you look at the background of the koreans and the vietnamese getting rid of the chinese characters, you will know it's national pride, and not evolution that prompted that. these two countries had been ruled or administrated over by china for vast periods of time in their history. And they wanted to erase those pasts as much as they can. The japanese have made attempts to do so as well, but without great efforts, largely because they're not as insecure as the koreans and the vietnamese, since they're have always been the conquerer and aggressor. furthermore, the chinese language, with it's current phonetic system, is quite efficient in modern applications. It's a lot more applicable than most NON-indoeuropean languages.

Answer 3

Although I think Traditional Chinese characters are much more elegant and poetic, speaking as someone who has attempted to learn both sets of characters, I think Simplified Chinese is the easiest and most straightforward to learn, the Traditional set being so much more tricky. Still, it does seem a shame that the old characters should almost disappear from usage. Perhaps there could be some kind of compromise?

Answer 4

i'm from taiwan, have lived in the us for
many years. the traditional characters are definitely
better at least in the poetic sense.
too bad the whole world is more interested in science,which
favors the simplified ones.

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and leave a message

Answer 5

Chinese characters are very interesting and beautiful.I'd like to learn to write them but I think that's very hard,they have to many lines!