China and the Character Debate

China is known for its unique character system that led to the emergence of calligraphy as an art form and an identifying cultural characteristic. Recently, however, the relevance characters hold in an ever-modernizing society is being questioned. The ongoing debate questions whether the Chinese language should be simplified further to facilitate international business and politics. To do this, the government would get rid of characters all together and solely use Pinyin, the Romanized alphabetical system created in the 1950s to connect the learning of characters to their phonetic pronunciation. There are two clear sides to the debate, one being that characters should remain in use because of their ties to China’s rich cultural past, and the other being that characters are no longer needed due to Pinyin, and technological advances. Research shows that character recognition has dropped among younger generations of Chinese speakers due to an increased use of cell phones and computers. However, the cultural identity of a nation takes priority over this fact for some, ultimately creating friction in Chinese society. Written characters have origins that go as far back as 1350 BCE. The actual writing of characters involves the proper hand placement, stroke order, and keeping of size conformity throughout an entire written work, which proves to be a difficult feat. Artists able to perfect this craft were commissioned to complete a wide range of projects that enriched and defined Chinese culture. Doing away with the use of Chinese characters would, in turn, do away with a large portion of the Chinese identity causing a great loss to a nation that has had a role in the world since prehistoric times.