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| Simplified Chinese | |
|---|---|
.svg) | |
| Script type | |
| Published | |
Time period | 1956–present |
| Direction |
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| Official script | China, Singapore |
| Languages | Chinese |
| Related scripts | |
Parent systems | Oracle bone script
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Sister systems | |
| ISO 15924 | |
| ISO 15924 | Hans (501), Han (Simplified variant) |
| Simplified Chinese characters | |||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | 简化字 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 簡化字 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Alternative Chinese name | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 简体字 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 簡體字 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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Simplified Chinese characters are one of two standardized character sets widely used to write the Chinese language, with the other being traditional characters. Their mass standardization during the 20th century was part of an initiative by the People's Republic of China (PRC) to promote literacy, and their use in ordinary circumstances on the mainland has been encouraged by the Chinese government since the 1950s.[1] They are the official forms used in mainland China and Singapore, while traditional characters are officially used in Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan.
Simplification of a component—either a character or a sub-component called a radical—usually involves either a reduction in its total number of strokes, or an apparent streamlining of which strokes are chosen in what places—for example, the ⼓ 'WRAP' radical used in the traditional character 沒 is simplified to ⼏ 'TABLE' to form the simplified character 没.[2] By systematically simplifying radicals, large swaths of the character set are altered. Some simplifications were based on popular cursive forms that embody graphic or phonetic simplifications of the traditional forms. In addition, variant characters with identical pronunciation and meaning were reduced to a single standardized character, usually the simplest among all variants in form. Finally, many characters were left untouched by simplification and are thus identical between the traditional and simplified Chinese orthographies.
The Chinese government has never officially announced the completion of the simplification process after the bulk of characters were introduced by the 1960s. In the wake of the Cultural Revolution, a second round of simplified characters was promulgated in 1977—largely composed of entirely new variants intended to artificially lower the stroke count, in contrast to the first round—but was massively unpopular and never saw consistent use. The second round of simplifications was ultimately retracted officially in 1986, well after they had largely ceased to be used due to their unpopularity and the confusion they caused. In August 2009, China began collecting public comments for a revised list of simplified characters;[3][4][5][6] the resulting List of Commonly Used Standard Chinese Characters lists 8,105 characters, including a few revised forms, and was implemented for official use by China's State Council on 5 June 2013.[7]
- ^ 教育部就《汉字简化方案》等发布50周年答记者问. GOV.cn (in Chinese). 2006-03-22.
- ^ 沒"Unihan data for U+6C92". www.unicode.org. Retrieved 2023-09-30."Unihan data for U+6CA1". www.unicode.org. Retrieved 2023-09-30.
- ^ 关于《通用规范汉字表》公开征求意见的公告. china-language.gov.cn (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2009-08-15. Retrieved 2009-08-18.
- ^ 汉字，该繁还是简？. Xinhua 新华网 (in Chinese). 2009-04-09. Archived from the original on 2009-04-28. Retrieved 2009-04-10.
- ^ 专家称恢复繁体字代价太大 新规范汉字表将公布. Xinhua 新华网 (in Chinese). 2009-04-09. Archived from the original on 2009-04-12. Retrieved 2009-04-10. Syndicated from 新京报, 2009-04-09. Accessed 2009.04.10.
- ^ Wu, Jing; Guo, Likun (12 August 2009). "China to Regulate Use of Simplified Characters". China View. Archived from the original on 2009-08-16. Retrieved 2009-08-17.
- ^ 国务院关于公布《通用规范汉字表》的通知 [Notice of the State Council on Promulgating the "Common Standard Chinese Characters Table"] (in Chinese). Government of the People's Republic of China. 2013-08-19.