Hello 你们好！This is ChineseFor.Us Hands-on Writing. I’m Lili.
Welcome back. I’m Chuck! Today we’ll try to answer this question: “What’s the difference
between simplified and traditional characters?” When you decide to learn Chinese, the first
thing you might wonder is whether you should learn Simplified or Traditional Chinese.
A lot of times is that if you learn the language in mainland China, Singapore, you will be
learning Simplified characters. But if you learn the language in Taiwan or
Hong Kong. You will probably be using the traditional characters.
The first character simplification discussion and program started in the 1920s and 1930s
but wasn’t officially carried out. In the 1950s, mainland China started to adopt Simplified
Characters and the system has been used ever since.
There are some strict rules between Simplified and Traditional characters, and if we have
to describe their relationships it would be like this:
So there are parts that belong to each other. There are 6 major ways of simplification.
1. simplifying Radicals and elements: every character that has certain radicals and elements
are replaced by the simplified version and are easy to spot. Here are some examples:
For simplified we have; and for traditional, we have:
Basically, all characters that contain these radicals or elements, are simplified the same way.
For example, here’s the radical 车chē。Let’s
see a group of characters that contain it [2 second pause]. You could see that the simplified
车 are all written the same way. Here’s another radical 食. Let’s see
how it looks in both simplified and traditional. 2. The second method of simplification is:
using the simplest character: When two or more characters share the same pronunciation,
only the simplest one was kept to carry on the meanings of both or all. For example,
the simple character 后 is used to represent both 后 and 後. Also, the simple character
胡 is used to represent two traditional胡s. Another example, The simplest. 台 is used
to represent these four versions of 台. 3. And the third method of simplification
is: Partial Replacement: which means to Replace complex elements with simpler elements
such as 又yòu or 乂yì. Or replace complex phonetic indicators with simpler ones.
Here are some examples where complex elements were replaced with 又. And for 乂, we have
some other examples. And here’s some examples of simpler phonetic
indicators: such as these ones. 4.And the fourth method of simplification
is called Partially Omitted: which means Complicated elements were omitted leaving only the simple
elements remaining. For example, 广guǎng, 厂chǎng, 宁níng.
5. The fifth is called Shape Simplification: The characters are simplified based on its
shape. Like the ones you see right now. 6.The last one is Remake. This is when some
characters were remade to replace the old ones. Such as: 护hù, 惊jīng, 响xiǎng.
We’ve always heard Chinese learners asking, should I learn Simplified Characters or Traditional
Characters? If I only learn one, would it be a problem later if I will have to use the
other system? I would say that no matter which system you
learn, getting familiar with the other one is not that difficult.
I grew up using simplified Chinese characters, but by practicing calligraphy as a child,
and reading books printed in traditional characters, I could read and type traditional characters
no problem. Even though I may not be able to write all of them from memory.
And even for me, I’m not a native Chinese speaker. I learned Chinese in Chengdu, China
and learned pure simplified characters. But I was able to read almost all traditional
characters just by singing karaoke that had lyrics written in Traditional characters.
Learning simplified characters of course would be easier. But don’t be stressed about it
being so hard if later you decide to or have to switch to traditional, you’ll most likely
to able to feel fully literate again in just two or three months.
So, make your initial choice based on where you’re planning to travel, study or work,
and then later on you will still be able to switch to the other system. Hope this video helps.
Thanks for watching! See you next time!
谢谢！下次见！