This will seem like an odd analogy, but for those unfamiliar with kanji to see what's happening here, I might suggest grabbing a pen and trying to draw Mickey Mouse or Bart Simpson, or some other simple iconic figure that's always drawn a certain way. Even though you could recognize it easily, and can recall the general shape and some of the individual features, unless you've practiced it you're not sure how many lines you need or where they connect. And if you just wing it, you'll probably get enough parts right that others can guess what you were drawing, but the result will look way off, even to you.
For me at least, that's approximately what it feels like to be unable to remember how to write a kanji.
It is actually a bad analogy, because when you draw Mickey Mouse you're using your right brain. This is also the case for a beginner in kanji, because he'll be considering it as a drawing.
When you really learn the kanji (or Han characters to be more generic, kanji being the Japanese name), you end seeing them with their components, and you'll be using your left brain to write them - just like when writing English.
Don't students have to know how to write anyway when they need to take notes in class?
I get the complexity is quite high since every symbol will look different depending on what's after and before it however you would think you get enough practice taking note or is this a formal language used only in certain contexts?
Is there any real advantage to having such a complex system rather than (some level of) a phonetic one like most other languages? Obviously there are cultural reasons we would still like to be able to read old text and not lose that, but in general the Chinese system just seems like pain for very little gain...
Yes there actually is! English is a language that really favours the writer while Chinese favours the readers. Most of the time, you can read Chinese a lot quicker because the characters are all the same size (although they might have different complexity), and there is generally a lesser need for linking words to ease the awkwardness of sentences, unlike English, because each Chinese character carries more of a "concept"/"theme", where as english words usually have quite precise definitions, and have more specific places where the words would actually make sense.
This is just my opinion as a native Chinese and English speaker, but I'm sure other bilingual English/Chinese speakers would tend to agree.
- The Chinese language does not have a single universal pronunciation standard. You may have heard of different Chinese 'dialects' such as Mandarin and Cantonese. The same characters are pronounced differently in different dialects, and it's more than just an accent: someone who speaks only Mandarin may follow something like 20% (ish) of an overheard conversation in Cantonese, if they concentrate hard.
- Even in a single dialect, many words sound exactly the same, but mean different things. Using a phonetic system would harm comprehension. See http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion-Eating_Poet_in_the_Stone... for an excellent illustration of this point.
The other commenters have listed some advantages, but you really meant to ask whether any of those advantages make this complex writing system "worth it." They don't.
Increasing literacy by slightly modifying the writing system is why the PRC created Simplified Chinese in the first place. Now a more radical simplification of just using Hanyu Pinyin directly and not having a computer transliterate is an obvious next step. Hanyu Pinyin is not intelligible to speakers of non-Mandarin dialects, but this shouldn't be a showstopper for a government that is capable of this: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangdong_National_Language_R....
Chinese is in fact a group of spoken languages, including Mandarin, Cantonese, and Southern Min. These are completely different languages at least in tones and pronunciations. Mandarin speakers could hardly talk to Cantonese speakers.
But all these languages share a common character set, so that different dialect speakers can communicate in the written form even they couldn't understand each other orally.
Traditional Japanese (and similarly Traditional Korean and Traditional Vietnamese) uses a subset of Chinese characters which they call "Kanji". And "writing down the characters" (Bitan, 筆談) had been a very effective way of communication between Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese until the last century.
The information density of Chinese characters is enormous compared to English. This becomes very obvious when you find yourself trying to say something in just 140 characters. ;)
Nature and evolution seem to be concerned with passing down information. For that, Nature came up with 4 letters: A, T, C, G. You see where I'm going with this.
"...many Chinese people consider the creation of Chinese calligraphy to be one of their primary contributions to civilisation..." - is this really true?
Anyway there are no reasons to oppose the natural process of more advanced languages displacing the less advanced ones, apart from political (avoiding cultural assimilation).
Chinese calligraphy carries far more artistic dimensions compared to non-symbolic languages. My grandmother has accrued such a beautiful Chinese font style over years of practicing calligraphy and being reporter on battlefields. Her ink writings/letters have been passed down to my parents and taken good care of as family treasure brought overseas. Being Chinese British I still occasionally use them as copybook to practice. Even though all everything about her was told as stories, her handwritings, those strokes & circles, speaks a decisive, brave and clever woman.
Each character needs to be written in balance itself. Like architecture all characters itself has a firm pillar stroke and together they also need to fit into structural of the whole paragraph. Positive or negative, aggressive or passive meaning can also be expressed by same strokes but sharp or round in the right place.
Chinese script is arguably superior in many respects, and it provides a whole platform for "creating language" rather than just script.
Forgetting how to properly write by hand is not just a problem for those writing in complex script, although it's exacerbated by complexity. People relying too much on spelling correctors feel lost without them and make mistakes, people also go months or years without writing by hand and struggle when they have to.
There's a natural process of writing more with technological aids, which by the way favours Chinese script as it retains its strengths and loses its drawbacks (there are extremely fast Chinese input systems). It may well happen - seems to be happening - that moderately skilled handwriting becomes as rare as professional calligraphy is now.
There are plenty reasons to oppose the natural process of advanced things displacing less advanced ones. Cultural assimilation is not a political reason, it is an emotional reason. Many Chinese people regard calligraphy as art, so naturally they'd be uncomfortable with a newer generation not being able to perform it.
I think western society has the same feeling towards cursive writing, although it is much easier to obtain the basic skill of writing cursive western characters not many people are still able to write it in a beautiful fashion.
Without telepathy, the diversity of languages is still important and there is unlikely an ultimate language more advanced than the rest, just like there are so many programming languages of all kinds. If Chinese is displaced then the new one is highly possible of the same kind.
[+] [-] fenomas|11 years ago|reply
For me at least, that's approximately what it feels like to be unable to remember how to write a kanji.
[+] [-] eloisant|11 years ago|reply
When you really learn the kanji (or Han characters to be more generic, kanji being the Japanese name), you end seeing them with their components, and you'll be using your left brain to write them - just like when writing English.
[+] [-] Fuxy|11 years ago|reply
I get the complexity is quite high since every symbol will look different depending on what's after and before it however you would think you get enough practice taking note or is this a formal language used only in certain contexts?
[+] [-] conistonwater|11 years ago|reply
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=5669
[+] [-] mehwoot|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wesleyy|11 years ago|reply
This is just my opinion as a native Chinese and English speaker, but I'm sure other bilingual English/Chinese speakers would tend to agree.
[+] [-] rahimnathwani|11 years ago|reply
- Even in a single dialect, many words sound exactly the same, but mean different things. Using a phonetic system would harm comprehension. See http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion-Eating_Poet_in_the_Stone... for an excellent illustration of this point.
[+] [-] lern_too_spel|11 years ago|reply
Increasing literacy by slightly modifying the writing system is why the PRC created Simplified Chinese in the first place. Now a more radical simplification of just using Hanyu Pinyin directly and not having a computer transliterate is an obvious next step. Hanyu Pinyin is not intelligible to speakers of non-Mandarin dialects, but this shouldn't be a showstopper for a government that is capable of this: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangdong_National_Language_R....
[+] [-] phil5|11 years ago|reply
Chinese is in fact a group of spoken languages, including Mandarin, Cantonese, and Southern Min. These are completely different languages at least in tones and pronunciations. Mandarin speakers could hardly talk to Cantonese speakers.
But all these languages share a common character set, so that different dialect speakers can communicate in the written form even they couldn't understand each other orally.
Traditional Japanese (and similarly Traditional Korean and Traditional Vietnamese) uses a subset of Chinese characters which they call "Kanji". And "writing down the characters" (Bitan, 筆談) had been a very effective way of communication between Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese until the last century.
[+] [-] unknown|11 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] fenomas|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] innguest|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] CmonDev|11 years ago|reply
Anyway there are no reasons to oppose the natural process of more advanced languages displacing the less advanced ones, apart from political (avoiding cultural assimilation).
[+] [-] baconstrp|11 years ago|reply
Each character needs to be written in balance itself. Like architecture all characters itself has a firm pillar stroke and together they also need to fit into structural of the whole paragraph. Positive or negative, aggressive or passive meaning can also be expressed by same strokes but sharp or round in the right place.
[+] [-] muyuu|11 years ago|reply
Forgetting how to properly write by hand is not just a problem for those writing in complex script, although it's exacerbated by complexity. People relying too much on spelling correctors feel lost without them and make mistakes, people also go months or years without writing by hand and struggle when they have to.
There's a natural process of writing more with technological aids, which by the way favours Chinese script as it retains its strengths and loses its drawbacks (there are extremely fast Chinese input systems). It may well happen - seems to be happening - that moderately skilled handwriting becomes as rare as professional calligraphy is now.
[+] [-] tinco|11 years ago|reply
I think western society has the same feeling towards cursive writing, although it is much easier to obtain the basic skill of writing cursive western characters not many people are still able to write it in a beautiful fashion.
[+] [-] NaNaN|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] malkia|11 years ago|reply
Give me sane language with small alphabet, and whatever you speak is whatever you write (and vice versa).
Just kidding!