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53-480: Zhongguo tong ( simplified Chinese : 中国通 ; traditional Chinese : 中國通 ; pinyin : Zhōngguó tōng ; lit. 'China expert'), sometimes translated as "old China Hand", refers to a foreigner who shows a familiarity with, or affinity for, Chinese language and culture. Before the Opium Wars of 1839–1843, The Old China Trade created a group of British and American merchants who did not know

106-677: A Protestant . Gauss was a career Foreign Service Officer for the United States Foreign Service . He was posted as U.S. Vice Consul in Shanghai , 1912–15; U.S. Consul in Shanghai, 1916; Amoy, 1916–20; Jinan , 1920–23; U.S. Consul General in Mukden, 1923–24; Jinan, 1924–26; Shanghai, 1926–27 (acting), 1935–38; Tianjin, 1927–31; Paris, 1935; Shanghai, 1935-1940. From 1940-41 he served as U.S. Minister to Australia, and

159-535: A Civil War. The China Hand view was propounded by Harvard professor John Fairbank in his The United States and China (1948) and in the bestselling book Thunder Out of China , published in 1946 by Theodore White and Annalee Jacoby . They hoped that American policy could encourage Chinese nationalism and prevent alignment with Soviet communism. Patrick Hurley testified to Congress that the China Hands had subverted his mission and General Albert Wedemeyer blamed

212-606: A coalition government led by Chiang Kai-shek . He accused Foreign Service Officers such as Service, Davies, and John Emmerson of disloyalty and had them removed from China. Hurley claimed that the Chinese Communists were not real communists. Nationalist soldiers killed in World War II numbered approximately ten times more than communists killed, according to CPC records. China Burma India Theater Commander Joseph Stilwell claimed that communists were doing more than

265-434: A conversion table. While exercising such derivation, the following rules should be observed: Sample Derivations : The Series One List of Variant Characters reduces the number of total standard characters. First, amongst each set of variant characters sharing identical pronunciation and meaning, one character (usually the simplest in form) is elevated to the standard character set, and the rest are made obsolete. Then amongst

318-580: A few eventually attained ambassadorships: James K. Penfield (Iceland), Philip D. Sprouse (Cambodia), and Fulton Freeman (Colombia and Mexico). Public opinion towards China Hands changed with the establishment of America's full diplomatic ties with China which began with President Nixon's visit to the country and culminated with the signing of the Joint Communiqué on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations under President Carter. Notable

371-610: A newly coined phono-semantic compound : Removing radicals Only retaining single radicals Replacing with ancient forms or variants : Adopting ancient vulgar variants : Readopting abandoned phonetic-loan characters : Copying and modifying another traditional character : Based on 132 characters and 14 components listed in Chart 2 of the Complete List , the 1,753 derived characters found in Chart 3 can be created by systematically simplifying components using Chart 2 as

424-469: A practice which has always been present as a part of the Chinese writing system. The official name tends to refer to the specific, systematic set published by the Chinese government, which includes not only simplifications of individual characters, but also a substantial reduction in the total number of characters through the merger of formerly distinct forms. According to Chinese palaeographer Qiu Xigui ,

477-567: A series of congressional hearings , including those into the Institute of Pacific Relations . Foreign Service Officers O. Edmund Clubb , John Paton Davies, Jr. , John S. Service, and John Carter Vincent were forced out of the Foreign Service, while journalists such as Edgar Snow and Theodore White could not continue their careers in magazine journalism. Career trajectories slowed down for the remaining State Department China Hands, but

530-404: 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

583-641: A training station in Tianjin , and its officers, including future General George Marshall , were called "Old China Hands." Other Army officers trained there include David D. Barrett , who headed the Army's wartime Dixie Mission . During World War II some Foreign Service Officers of the United States Department of State had experience in China, a few with expertise going back to the 1920s. Since

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636-440: Is actually more complex than eliminated ones. An example is the character 搾 which is eliminated in favor of the variant form 榨 . The 扌   'HAND' with three strokes on the left of the eliminated 搾 is now seen as more complex, appearing as the ⽊   'TREE' radical 木 , with four strokes, in the chosen variant 榨 . Not all characters standardised in the simplified set consist of fewer strokes. For instance,

689-454: Is derived. Merging homophonous characters: Adapting cursive shapes ( 草書楷化 ): Replacing a component with a simple arbitrary symbol (such as 又 and 乂 ): Omitting entire components : Omitting components, then applying further alterations : Structural changes that preserve the basic shape Replacing the phonetic component of phono-semantic compounds : Replacing an uncommon phonetic component : Replacing entirely with

742-813: Is now discouraged. A State Language Commission official cited "oversimplification" as the reason for restoring some characters. The language authority declared an open comment period until 31 August 2009, for feedback from the public. In 2013, the List of Commonly Used Standard Chinese Characters was published as a revision of the 1988 lists; it included a total of 8105 characters. It included 45 newly recognized standard characters that were previously considered variant forms, as well as official approval of 226 characters that had been simplified by analogy and had seen wide use but were not explicitly given in previous lists or documents. Singapore underwent three successive rounds of character simplification , eventually arriving at

795-547: Is used instead of 叠 in regions using traditional characters. The Chinese government stated that it wished to keep Chinese orthography stable. The Chart of Generally Utilized Characters of Modern Chinese was published in 1988 and included 7000 simplified and unsimplified characters. Of these, half were also included in the revised List of Commonly Used Characters in Modern Chinese , which specified 2500 common characters and 1000 less common characters. In 2009,

848-473: The ⼓   ' WRAP ' radical used in the traditional character 沒 is simplified to ⼏   ' TABLE ' to form the simplified character 没 . 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

901-658: The China Marines ) who lived and worked in China during the first half of the 20th century. Simplified Chinese characters 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

954-499: 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

1007-554: The Qin dynasty (221–206 BC) the character meaning 'bright' was written as either 明 or 朙 —with either 日 'Sun' or 囧 'window' on the left, with the 月 'Moon' component on the right. Li Si ( d.  208 BC ), the Chancellor of Qin, attempted to universalize the Qin small seal script across China following the wars that had politically unified the country for

1060-531: The states of ancient China , with his chief chronicler having "[written] fifteen chapters describing" what is referred to as the " big seal script ". The traditional narrative, as also attested in the Shuowen Jiezi dictionary ( c.  100 AD ), is that the Qin small seal script that would later be imposed across China was originally derived from the Zhou big seal script with few modifications. However,

1113-466: The "Dot" stroke : The traditional components ⺥ and 爫 become ⺈ : The traditional component 奐 becomes 奂 : Clarence Gauss Clarence Edward Gauss (January 12, 1887 – April 8, 1960) was an American diplomat . Gauss was born in Washington, D.C. , as the son of Herman Gauss and Emile J. (Eisenman) Gauss. He married Rebecca Louise Barker in 1917. He was a Republican and

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1166-544: The "Old China Hands", are preserved in Special Collections and Archives in the University Library at California State University, Northridge . These collections include correspondence, diaries, photographs, unpublished memoirs, official documents, artifacts, and oral histories, and reflect the lives of refugees, foreign entrepreneurs, missionaries, diplomats, and members of the military (including

1219-469: The 1919 May Fourth Movement —many anti-imperialist intellectuals throughout China began to see the country's writing system as a serious impediment to its modernization. In 1916, a multi-part English-language article entitled "The Problem of the Chinese Language" co-authored by the Chinese linguist Yuen Ren Chao (1892–1982) and poet Hu Shih (1891–1962) has been identified as a turning point in

1272-482: The 1986 General List of Simplified Chinese Characters , hereafter the General List . All characters simplified this way are enumerated in Chart 1 and Chart 2 in the 1986 Complete List . Characters in both charts are structurally simplified based on similar set of principles. They are separated into two charts to clearly mark those in Chart 2 as 'usable as simplified character components', based on which Chart 3

1325-520: The 1986 mainland China revisions. Unlike in mainland China, Singapore parents have the option of registering their children's names in traditional characters. Malaysia also promulgated a set of simplified characters in 1981, though completely identical to the mainland Chinese set. They are used in Chinese-language schools. All characters simplified this way are enumerated in Charts 1 and 2 of

1378-470: The Chinese government published a major revision to the list which included a total of 8300 characters. No new simplifications were introduced. In addition, slight modifications to the orthography of 44 characters to fit traditional calligraphic rules were initially proposed, but were not implemented due to negative public response. Also, the practice of unrestricted simplification of rare and archaic characters by analogy using simplified radicals or components

1431-735: The Chinese language but depended on their Chinese trading partners. They nonetheless had a reputation for being experts, and exerted some influence on policy in London. Merchants, journalists, and even missionaries established themselves in China, especially in the Treaty Ports created by a series of treaties after the Opium Wars. The foreign community in Shanghai was especially lively and organized. Those who carried out their careers in these territories were likely to be called "China Hands", or "Old China Hands". The United States Army maintained

1484-705: The Nationalists, and sought to cut off all US aid to China. John Service praised the Communists and claimed that the CPC were democratic reformers, likening them to European socialists rather than Soviet communists and claimed that they would preserve levels of capitalism for an extended time until a peaceful transition to a fully realized communist society . Service criticized the Nationalist government as "fascist," "undemocratic," and "feudal", while he described

1537-546: The People's Republic, the idea of a mass simplification of character forms first gained traction in China during the early 20th century. In 1909, the educator and linguist Lufei Kui formally proposed the use of simplified characters in education for the first time. Over the following years—marked by the 1911 Xinhai Revolution that toppled the Qing dynasty , followed by growing social and political discontent that further erupted into

1590-564: The State Department for failing to act. When the Chinese Communists declared victory in 1949, an immediate outcry by anti-communists asked "Who lost China?" John T. Flynn , Louis F. Budenz , Freda Utley , none of whom had any professional expertise in Chinese history or politics, were among the many who charged that China Hands had undermined Chiang Kai-shek, misled the American public and lost China either through naive ignorance of

1643-444: The body of epigraphic evidence comparing the character forms used by scribes gives no indication of any real consolidation in character forms prior to the founding of the Qin. The Han dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD) that inherited the Qin administration coincided with the perfection of clerical script through the process of libian . Eastward spread of Western learning Though most closely associated with

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1696-447: The broadest trend in the evolution of Chinese characters over their history has been simplification, both in graphical shape ( 字形 ; zìxíng ), the "external appearances of individual graphs", and in graphical form ( 字体 ; 字體 ; zìtǐ ), "overall changes in the distinguishing features of graphic[al] shape and calligraphic style, [...] in most cases refer[ring] to rather obvious and rather substantial changes". The initiatives following

1749-407: The chosen variants, those that appear in the "Complete List of Simplified Characters" are also simplified in character structure accordingly. Some examples follow: Sample reduction of equivalent variants : Ancient variants with simple structure are preferred : Simpler vulgar forms are also chosen : The chosen variant was already simplified in Chart 1 : In some instances, the chosen variant

1802-411: The communists as "progressive" and "democratic". The journalist Edgar Snow and his wife used extraterritorial status of foreigners to protect themselves when they assisted student protest movements in 1936, disseminating anti-government materials to the Chinese. They acknowledged that they would have been executed were they not exempted. He also admitted that he modified his reports in accordance with

1855-595: The confusion they caused. In August 2009, China began collecting public comments for a revised list of simplified characters; 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. In Chinese, simplified characters are referred to by their official name 简化字 ; jiǎnhuàzì , or colloquially as 简体字 ; jiǎntǐzì . The latter term refers broadly to all character variants featuring simplifications of character form or structure,

1908-656: The country. In 1935, the first official list of simplified forms was published, consisting of 324 characters collated by Peking University professor Qian Xuantong . However, fierce opposition within the KMT resulted in the list being rescinded in 1936. Work throughout the 1950s resulted in the 1956 promulgation of the Chinese Character Simplification Scheme , a draft of 515 simplified characters and 54 simplified components, whose simplifications would be present in most compound characters. Over

1961-447: The economic problems in China during that time. Lu Xun , one of the most prominent Chinese authors of the 20th century, stated that "if Chinese characters are not destroyed, then China will die" ( 漢字不滅，中國必亡 ). During the 1930s and 1940s, discussions regarding simplification took place within the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) party. Many members of the Chinese intelligentsia maintained that simplification would increase literacy rates throughout

2014-487: The effectiveness of communist political mobilization. This view was opposed by the new U.S. Ambassador to China Patrick Hurley . Hurley, a Republican recruited by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to promote a bipartisan China policy, initially felt there was no more difference between the Chinese Communists and Nationalists than between the Democrats and Republicans in his home state of Oklahoma. But Hurley wanted to form

2067-512: The first time. Li prescribed the 朙 form of the word for 'bright', but some scribes ignored this and continued to write the character as 明 . However, the increased usage of 朙 was followed by proliferation of a third variant: 眀 , with 目 'eye' on the left—likely derived as a contraction of 朙 . Ultimately, 明 became the character's standard form. The Book of Han (111 AD) describes an earlier attempt made by King Xuan of Zhou ( d.  782 BC ) to unify character forms across

2120-475: The following decade, the Script Reform Committee deliberated on characters in the 1956 scheme, collecting public input regarding the recognizability of variants, and often approving forms in small batches. Parallel to simplification, there were also initiatives aimed at eliminating the use of characters entirely and replacing them with pinyin as an official Chinese alphabet, but this possibility

2173-430: The founding of the Qin dynasty (221–206 BC) to universalize the use of their small seal script across the recently conquered parts of the empire is generally seen as being the first real attempt at script reform in Chinese history. Before the 20th century, variation in character shape on the part of scribes, which would continue with the later invention of woodblock printing , was ubiquitous. For example, prior to

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2226-649: The general expectation was that the war would continue for perhaps another two years and that the invasion of Japan would be based in China, General Joseph Stilwell determined that American interest required liaison with the military force of the communists . At his behest, the Dixie Mission was sent to the Communist headquarters in Yan'an in July 1944. Colonel David Barrett and John S. Service reported favorably on

2279-556: The history of the Chinese script—as it was one of the first clear calls for China to move away from the use of characters entirely. Instead, Chao proposed that the language be written with an alphabet, which he saw as more logical and efficient. The alphabetization and simplification campaigns would exist alongside one another among the Republican intelligentsia for the next several decades. Recent commentators have echoed some contemporary claims that Chinese characters were blamed for

2332-533: The mainland has been encouraged by the Chinese government since the 1950s. 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,

2385-430: The public and quickly fell out of official use. It was ultimately formally rescinded in 1986. The second-round simplifications were unpopular in large part because most of the forms were completely new, in contrast to the familiar variants comprising the majority of the first round. With the rescission of the second round, work toward further character simplification largely came to an end. In 1986, authorities retracted

2438-481: The same set of simplified characters as mainland China. The first round was promulgated by the Ministry of Education in 1969, consisting of 498 simplified characters derived from 502 traditional characters. A second round of 2287 simplified characters was promulgated in 1974. The second set contained 49 differences from the mainland China system; these were removed in the final round in 1976. In 1993, Singapore adopted

2491-467: The second round completely, though they had been largely fallen out of use within a year of their initial introduction. That year, the authorities also promulgated a final version of the General List of Simplified Chinese Characters . It was identical to the 1964 list save for 6 changes—including the restoration of 3 characters that had been simplified in the first round: 叠 , 覆 , 像 ; the form 疊

2544-504: The strength and capabilities of the Communist led forces compared with the Chinese Nationalists . Many China Hands argued that it would be in American national interest to work with the communists during the war, and to maintain relations if, as many government and civilian experts expected, they gained power. Theodore White , correspondent for Time magazine was among the many journalists who visited Yan'an and described

2597-833: The traditional character 強 , with 11 strokes is standardised as 强 , with 12 strokes, which is a variant character. Such characters do not constitute simplified characters. The new standardized character forms shown in the Characters for Publishing and revised through the Common Modern Characters list tend to adopt vulgar variant character forms. Since the new forms take vulgar variants, many characters now appear slightly simpler compared to old forms, and as such are often mistaken as structurally simplified characters. Some examples follow: The traditional component 釆 becomes 米 : The traditional component 囚 becomes 日 : The traditional "Break" stroke becomes

2650-488: The true nature of Marxism or even allegiance to the Soviet Union . John Service, they pointed out, had admitted that before he went to Yan'an he had not read the basic texts of Marxism, and the other China Hands were no better informed. Senator Joseph McCarthy expanded these accusations to include Owen Lattimore , who had served as personal adviser to Chiang at the beginning of the war. These charges were developed in

2703-545: The wishes of the communists, to portray them as democratic socialist reformers. U.S. Ambassador to China Clarence Gauss recommended the United States "pull up the plug and let the whole Chinese Government go down the drain". The US strove to send aid to the Chinese Communists during the war. After the sudden surrender of Japan in 1945 and the onset of the Cold War , the Communists and the Nationalists were locked in

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2756-464: Was abandoned, confirmed by a speech given by Zhou Enlai in 1958. In 1965, the PRC published the List of Commonly Used Characters for Printing  [ zh ] (hereafter Characters for Printing ), which included standard printed forms for 6196 characters, including all of the forms from the 1956 scheme. A second round of simplified characters was promulgated in 1977, but was poorly received by

2809-555: Was the invitation to the surviving China Hands to testify to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in 1971. The chairman, Senator J. William Fulbright , remarked to John Paton Davies on how the China Hands who had "reported honestly about conditions were so persecuted because [they] were honest. This is a strange thing to occur in what is called a civilized country." Dozens of archival collections related to foreigners who lived and worked in China before 1950, known as

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