replacing Chinese characters?

Question

Replacing Chinese characters... the Koreans have done it with Hanguel, the Vietnamese have done it with Chu Nom.
What about the Chinese, did they ever try to replace characters with phonetics (i.e. pinyin)... and will they ever try to do so?

Answer 1

I can't say/add anymore than Frankenstein excellent answer. Except are we human suppose to preserve our culture and heritage? If we replace Arabic, Slavic, Thai, Hindi, Sanskrit, Manchu, Hanyu, Dzongkha, Nepali, Vietnamese, And many more ancient character to IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) than in long run slowly but most likely it become obsolete and eventually vanish.
Sometimes I'm glad that Taiwan and Hong Kong still use traditional Chinese character as mainland China using simplified Chinese character.

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

The Chinese language has been around for thousands of years and no one can change it overnight and say "let's do away with Chinese characters". Having hanyu pinyin is already a major step forward, especially for the non-Chinese to learn Chinese.

The evolution process will probably take a few more generations before the Chinese catch up with the rest of the world and use the 26 character alphabet as the sole source of writing for the Chinese language.

Meanwhile, wo men hai shi yao yong zhong wen zi. (we still have to use chinese characters.)

Answer 4

The characters were changed drastically after the revolution from traditional to simplified. You can still find traditional chinese writing in taiwan and hongkong. Also as you mentioned pinyin is used to teach pronouciation. I can write simplified chinese and one of my friends at school is from taiwan and he writes chinese slower than me because for each character he has to write a few more strokes, but I guess it could be just him.

Answer 5

I know Chinese at an low-intermediate level, and I've been a high school English teacher in America. In my opinion, Chinese won't replace English as an international language. The tones are too difficult for the majority of non-native speakers to master to high proficiency, and the characters and writing system are, as you say, much more difficult than an alphabetic system.

Answer 6

The problem is that in China people do not speak one unified language; there are five major Chinese languages and many dialects. Historically they have all been called "Chinese" because they have been unified by the writing system. The Chinese characters can't be replaced until everyone in China speaks the same language, and that prospect is a long, long way off.

Answer 7

Chinese character also can be regarded as one of the most important parts of Chinese culture. So...
If you have any question related China. You can also access to the website: http://ask.jongo.com
It will give you a satisfying answer as well.

Answer 8

if the koreans didn't replace it with Hanguel or something , we have to ask them to pay the royalty to us by using chinese characters

Answer 9

yes

Answer 10

no