Vernacular is what people say and has existed since ancient times.
In the initial stage of the development of the Chinese language, language and language were integrated. We now feel that those mysterious ancient Chinese classics were actually vernacular works at that time. For example, in the "Book of Documents" that makes people feel "unsatisfied", most of the "official letters" in it are the spoken language recorded at that time. "Hanshu Yiwenzhi" says: "The "Book" is the ancient order. The order is in "Everyone, if his words are not followed by a concrete document, then he will not know who will obey them." "Commands" are "announcements", and "his words are manifested in concrete documents" means that they are written immediately without any polish or embellishment. Another example is the Book of Songs. We know that most of the "winds" in it are folk songs, and we can be sure that many of them were composed directly orally. The other "Analects of Confucius" is a collection of quotations by Confucius, and its relationship with spoken language goes without saying.
Due to historical changes, the written word remains unchanged, but the spoken language used in people's daily communication is bound to change. Therefore, from about the Six Dynasties, classical Chinese has shown obvious signs of separation from spoken language. However, because Chinese characters are ideographic characters, the difference in pronunciation does not hinder people's understanding of reading, so the inconsistency between words and texts is not an urgent matter and does not attract enough attention from people. At the same time, because the classics of the pre-Qin and Han Dynasties were all written in classical Chinese, and these works are the source of Han culture, the literati of later dynasties consciously insisted on a kind of imitation of classical Chinese creation, which is tantamount to artificially exacerbating the language. This resulted in the long-term inconsistency between Chinese language and Chinese language. It is precisely this kind of creative behavior that seems to deviate from the law of language development, but it has created the miracle of Chinese civilization lasting for thousands of years without extinction. This also expresses the absolute confidence of the Chinese people in the cultural attitude from another aspect.
Of course, in real life, there are also some oral works that conform to people's oral communication habits, starting from "Shishuoxinyu" and "Yan Family Instructions" to Dunhuang Bianwen, Tang and Song Quotations, Song and Yuan Dynasties From storybooks to Ming and Qing novels, it should be said that each dynasty and each generation produced a large number of vernacular works, but in the end they failed to shake the dominance of classical Chinese, and most of them could only be scattered among the people.
All this was reversed until the late Qing Dynasty. At that time, foreign powers were humiliating and the country was in troubled times. The Chinese people first wavered in their cultural self-confidence. This was a prerequisite and the fundamental reason for the future changes in Chinese culture. It is this mentality that makes the Chinese people put tradition on the dock for the first time and count its sins. Classical Chinese, as the main carrier of traditional culture, must bear the brunt of the impact. So Huang Zunxian wanted to "write by hand and speak by mouth", while Qiu Tingliang claimed that he "favored the vernacular and abandoned classical Chinese", which can be said to be the beginning of the vernacular movement. We must have a clear understanding of this situation. Originally, reflection on history in every era is a normal reaction, and it is also a necessary step for the development and progress of traditional culture. However, it is an extremely irresponsible historical attitude to shirk the responsibility for the country's decline on tradition, and it is even more ridiculous to link this crime to classical Chinese. However, in the face of the possible danger of national subjugation, treating traditional culture rationally has become the most unacceptable behavior for the Chinese people. Any calm thinking will be denounced as reactionary ideas and must not be displayed. However, radicalism representing patriotism has gradually become a part of Chinese society. the mainstream trend of thought.
Then came the New Culture Movement in 1917, and the vernacular movement was pushed to the extreme. In January of that year, Hu Shi published "A Preliminary Discussion on Literary Reform" in "New Youth". Although it was written from the perspective of reforming literature, its main purpose was to advocate vernacular literature and believed that "vernacular literature is the authentic form of Chinese literature." He later also I wrote a special "History of Vernacular Literature" to demonstrate this point of view. Chen Duxiu also published "On Literary Revolution" in February, using the "three major principles" to echo Hu Shi's "eight propositions". This one and the other can be said to have really opened the curtain of this vigorous cultural and sports revolution, and there has never been a quiet moment in China since then. In 1918, all articles in "New Youth" switched to vernacular, and various vernacular magazines such as "New Wave" and "Weekly Review" followed suit. In September 1920, the Ministry of Education ordered all national schools to switch to Mandarin for the first and second years of Chinese studies from the fall of this year. At this point, the vernacular has achieved officially recognized legal status.