Zhao Haoyang, the author of the article refuting the renaming of simplified Chinese characters, published a research post entitled "Why Oppose the Revival of Traditional Chinese Characters" in Zhihu and Douban. He represents one of the voices-"Have we misread simplified characters? Are you over-interpreting traditional Chinese characters? " Guo Yongbing, an associate professor at the Research Center for Unearthed Documents and Ancient Chinese Characters of Fudan University, said in an interview that the so-called simplified word "love" was written in a way similar to "unintentional" as early as the Northern Wei and Sui Dynasties and was widely used in education as early as the Republic of China. From ancient times to the present, the basic change direction of Chinese characters from complex to simple is itself determined by the instrumental characteristics of Chinese characters, and it is also an adjustment to adapt to the development of social productive forces.
Simplified characters represent cultural retrogression? Simply writing "love" has no "heart". The first crime of simplified Chinese characters is being pointed out as "the lack of cultural connotation". However, subjective judgment can't hide ignorance. Guo Yongbing believes that this method of interpreting Chinese characters by simply linking glyphs and radicals with meaning and extension "has not been objectively analyzed and verified."
Taking the word "abandon" as an example, Guo Yongbing said that the word "abandon" had two different ways of writing in early ancient Chinese characters: "abandon" and "abandon". The former traditional writing method is to discard the child in a dustpan and other utensils with both hands, while the latter simplified writing method is to discard the child directly with both hands. "The simplified process is to throw a dustpan. How many cultural groups can a dustpan carry? " Guo Yongbing said, "If it carries cultural information, why did some countries in the Eastern Warring States period not use that traditional writing method, but directly use simplified forms that are in the same strain as today's simplified characters?" Linguistic researchers believe that the evolution of a word is more precious than the cultural significance it carries.
Is the simplified word "love" commonly used since ancient times the first reform initiated by China Chinese Character Simplification Law 1956? In Zhao Haoyang's Textual Research Post, similar words left by Su Dongpo, a writer in the Northern Song Dynasty, were dug up. Guo Yongbing also believes that the origin of the simplified word "love" far exceeds people's general cognition. Even in the inscriptions of the Sui Dynasty and the Northern Wei Dynasty, there appeared a writing style similar to today's "unintentional".
Many of these simplified Chinese characters are today's habits and fossils in the literary world. For example, "Deng" and "Deng" first appeared in ancient calligraphy and rhyme books. "Deng" was originally another word different from "Deng", meaning fire or violent fire. In the Yuan Dynasty, the word "light" was used instead of "light" in popular literature, Beijing popular novels, 30 kinds of ancient and modern zaju, and all-round commentary on the Three Kingdoms.
Many simplified characters used in modern times have been used in various periods and occasions in history. According to Tracing the Source of Simplified Chinese Characters (Language Publishing House, 1997), the vast majority of modern simplified Chinese characters come from the "vulgar characters" and "handwritten characters" of past dynasties, that is, simplified Chinese characters of past dynasties; Some come from cursive script and running script; Some of them are still "ancient words", which are older than their traditional "qualifications".
In fact, simplified characters can be seen in many existing ancient cultural relics. Some words even appeared in Oracle Bone Inscriptions and Jinwen thousands of years ago, such as "the worm comes from the cloud"; The ancient prose of the Warring States period preserved in Shuo Wen Jie Zi is also "rough".
Some experts believe that the evolution of Chinese characters from ancient times to the present is a process of simplifying. The basic direction from complexity to simplicity is itself determined by the instrumental characteristics of words. Lv Liuliang, a scholar in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, said in a poem note to Huang Zongxi: "I am complacent about copying vulgar books, and the cloud can save me half the time." This "vulgar word" was a simplified word at that time.
Researchers pay more attention to the evolution of simplified characters. "I remember Mr. Li Xueqin said that when they learned to write when they were young, the simplified word' love' was taught by the teacher, which shows that simplified words have been widely used in education in the Republic of China." Guo Yongbing said that many learned people spare no effort to promote the reform and simplification of Chinese characters. Even traditional Chinese characters are not necessarily necessary in general academic research. The Outline of Philology written by Mr. Qiu Xigui only keeps traditional characters when it is necessary to explain the evolution of characters, and the others are simplified characters. If it is irreplaceable, it is only necessary in the collation and publication of ancient books, stone carving and seal cutting, calligraphy art and academic research of literature and history.
Chinese researchers pay more attention to the evolution of simplified characters than the dispute between complexity and simplification. "There are many problems in the simplification of Chinese characters, especially replacing' one-to-many' with words with similar homophones. Simplified characters destroy the phonetic and ideographic functions of Chinese characters, and in order to simplify fonts, they destroy the systematicness of characters, causing many problems and troubles. These are the disadvantages of simplified characters. " Guo Yongbing believes that people who attack simplified characters rarely systematically summarize these problems, but stay in the aspects of traditional culture preservation and moral debate, which is the result of not deeply and thoroughly understanding the function of written recording language.