The Chinese nation is a great nation. Of all the countries in the world, only our China culture has been passed down without interruption, and only our "Chinese character" is the only writing form in the world that has evolved without interruption in ancient times. Chinese civilization is also the most unique civilization.
Since ancient times, China has said that "calligraphy and painting are of the same origin", because the earliest source of words is pictures, and calligraphy and painting are brothers, born from the same root, and have many internal relations. The origin of Chinese characters is the original painting, and primitive people express themselves in the form of "painting" in their lives. Slowly changed from the original picture to "ideographic symbol"
About BC14th century, late Yin and Shang dynasties. "Ideographic symbol" evolved into a relatively stereotyped "Oracle Bone Inscriptions". This is considered to be the first form of Chinese characters. The characters carved on the tortoise shell of animal bones and found in Yin ruins are considered as the direct ancestors of "modern Chinese characters", which can prove the continuation of Chinese civilization. For thousands of years, Middle Easterners have been unable to read the hieroglyphics of their ancestors. Only modern people in China can understand some "Oracle Bone Inscriptions" in Shang Dynasty. The words on these tortoise shells were originally used to predict good luck or bad luck. Ancient people thought that the cracks caused by carving some problems about diseases, dreams, hunting and weather on tortoise shells and then baking tortoise shells and animal bones with fire could be judged by fortune tellers according to the shapes and directions of these cracks. This is the ancestor of the modern Chinese character "Oracle Bone Inscriptions". Up to now, there are more than 5,000 species of "Oracle Bone Inscriptions". And there are more than 1000 kinds that can be interpreted.
During the Western Zhou Dynasty, bronzes were widely used, and the inscription on bronze Zhong Ding and stone drum was "Da Zhuan". Also known as Zhong Dingwen and Shi Guwen. Legend has it that it was written by Taishi Gong of Zhou Xuanwang. At present, the Palace Museum has ten Zhou Dynasty stone drums with ten four-character poems engraved on them. Because the feudal regime was fragmented, the words were different. Until the Qin dynasty. Qin Shihuang unified China. To unify the text.
During the Qin Dynasty, Qin Shihuang unified writing and measurement. His outstanding achievement was Li Si, the prime minister at that time. Li Si collected and sorted out the characters at that time, and then simplified and beautified them. The unified characters were called Xiao Zhuan, also known as Qin Zhuan. At this time, there are almost no hieroglyphs in the text.
The writing of Xiao Zhuan in Qin Dynasty was too standard and slow, so many simple fonts appeared among the people. This font is characterized by changing the original square of "Xiao Zhuan". The tune of Xiao Zhuan was straightened and some radicals were separated, which was called Qin Li.
Official script was very popular in Han Dynasty. Qin Li didn't completely get rid of the structural characteristics of Xiao Zhuan, but it was basically square, while Han Li gave full play to the role of a writing brush, with a zigzag swallow-tailed silkworm head, which was convenient for writing. This kind of official script was popular in the Western Han Dynasty. Call it "Han Li".
When Han Li was popular in the Han Dynasty, regular script was still in its infancy. It was very popular in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. Wang Xizhi and Wang Xian in Jin Dynasty were the real founders of regular script. At the same time, they absorbed the round strokes of seal script, retained the square straightness of official script, and removed the "dovetail". The structure of Chinese characters is generally fixed. At that time, it was called "true calligraphy", and later generations renamed it "orthodox calligraphy" because it was used as a model for learning calligraphy.
Regular script was particularly popular in the Tang Dynasty. At that time, calligraphers such as Sheng Zhenqing, Liu Gongquan and Ou Yangxun were outstanding, and their calligraphy works are still studied as models.
Due to the neatness of regular script, the need of writing quickly, and the writer's creation of expressing his thoughts and feelings at the end of the pen, a smooth, rhythmic and artistic font-"cursive script" has been produced.
Between regular script and cursive script is "running script". Running script is not as standard and serious as regular script, nor as bold and unrestrained as cursive script, but it is elegant and cheerful, and the font is flexible. It is also the most popular and commonly used font. Before I knew the font, I was asked to practice running script when I was a child.
In Song Dynasty, engraving printing and movable type printing, one of the four great inventions in China, were invented, and "Song typeface" should also be produced. First produced in the Northern Song Dynasty, it was changed from regular script. There are fat and thin, but regardless of fat and thin, they are horizontal, thin, vertical and square. Looks quaint and dignified.
"Imitation of Song Dynasty" is also a font that imitates Song Dynasty. This font has only appeared for 70 or 80 years, but it has developed very rapidly. It is the standard font that people like to use most, and it has been widely used in printed matter and various occasions.
At the same time, the "black body" was born. This font is striking and generous, the handwriting is the same thickness, the structure is striking and compact, the strokes are strong and powerful, and the strokes are not sharp, which makes people read easily. Because of its striking characteristics, it is often used in titles, introductions, signs and so on. It enriches the expression forms of Chinese characters.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, various fonts were born, such as comprehensive art, whole block, floating clouds, variants and so on. This is the concrete manifestation of the cultural prosperity of the motherland and the inevitable result of the development of Chinese characters.
Second, the development stage and direction of Chinese characters.
Liu Jiaoshou, Chinese Department of Southwest Normal University, is in charge of the national social science fund project "Outline of the Development History of Chinese Characters". The final result is the monograph Outline of the Development of Chinese Characters published by China Encyclopedia Publishing House. This achievement puts forward some new viewpoints worthy of attention from the following aspects.
1. Three stages in the development history of Chinese characters.
In the development history of Chinese characters, there are different stages of development. Traditional stages are divided into four stages according to the changes of Chinese font, that is, according to the standards of big seal script, small seal script, official script and regular script. This achievement puts forward that font change is not an essential change in the development of Chinese characters, and it cannot explain the historical development law of Chinese characters, but should be explained by the change of Chinese character construction methods. On the basis of this understanding, this achievement further puts forward the three-stage theory of Chinese character development. That is, the first stage is the drawing stage. People before Shang Dynasty should belong to this stage. The second stage is the phonetic stage with phonetic notation as the main body and hieroglyphics as the basis. The characters from Oracle Bone Inscriptions to Qin Dynasty all belong to this stage. The third stage is the writing stage of pictophonetic characters with pictophonetic characters as the main body, and there are still some pictophonetic characters and pictophonetic characters, which belong to this stage from Qin and Han dynasties to modern Chinese characters.
2. Advantages and disadvantages of Chinese characters.
At present, there are two popular characters in the world: one is phonography who records the pronunciation of words with dozens of letters; Second, Chinese characters with both phonograms and phonograms. These two types of writing systems have their own advantages and disadvantages, and we can't say which one is absolutely good and which one is absolutely bad. Some scholars in Europe believe that phonography is the most advanced writing, while Chinese characters are a kind of backward writing. This prejudice is accepted by some domestic scholars. When they talk about Chinese characters in books and periodicals, they seldom talk about the advantages of Chinese characters, which is one-sided.
Advantages of Chinese characters. The biggest advantage of Chinese characters is super dialect. China is a country with a vast territory and complicated dialects. In ancient times, it was impossible to standardize language. Even now, the promotion of Putonghua cannot be completed in a short time. However, Chinese characters are a popular written language communication tool in China. Different languages, writing with pen instead of mouth, are exactly the same. If the words are pinyin, Cantonese, Minnan, Shanghai dialect and Beijing dialect will appear, which will hinder people's exchange of ideas. Another advantage of Chinese characters is rationality. Character is a symbol system, which can be divided into rational characters and irrational characters. Unreasonable refers to pure phonetic symbols, such as loanwords, syllables and letters. This kind of writing is purely a symbol and has no direct connection with what is to be expressed. The so-called rational words, such as Chinese characters, not only represent the pronunciation of words, but also represent the symbol of things. For example, the word "water" evolved from the shape of hieroglyphic water. It has two functions: pictographic and phonological. Another example is the words "Wang" and "Yang". The word "water" means general name, and the words "Wang" and "Yang" mean pronunciation. They are called pictophonetic characters and are the main body of Chinese characters. This combination of sound and shape is easy to identify and remember.
Disadvantages of Chinese phonetic notation. A small number of ideograms of Chinese characters have long been used as loanwords, which are phonetic characters in Chinese characters. Because its number is not much, and most of them are commonly used words, so I won't say much. Only the phonetic functions of pictophonetic characters are discussed here. Phonetic symbols of pictophonetic characters are mostly pictophonetic characters that can be used alone, which are not as accurate as alphabetic sounds. The phonetic function of Chinese characters has many shortcomings, mainly the following three points: a, the phonetic symbols of pictophonetic characters cannot distinguish the differences of tones, and the same phonetic symbol often represents different tones. For example, the word "Hu" is accented, but "confused" and "paste" are pronounced as accented, while "confused" and "paste" are pronounced as falling tones. B, phonetic symbols of pictophonetic characters often lose or weaken their phonetic functions because of language changes. For example, "Shang" reads the fourth sound of "Shang", but "If" and "Lie" with "Shang" as phonetic symbols read the third sound of "Tang", "Dang" reads the third sound of "Dang" and "Chang" reads the second sound. C, the stress phenomenon of Chinese characters reading more than one word. For example, in the word "Shen", the word "Shen" is pronounced in the word "Shen", and the word "Cen" is pronounced in the word "Uneven". * * There are three accents.
3. About the simplification of Chinese characters.
Chinese characters are evolved from picture characters, and if they are painted in kind, there will be more strokes. Judging from the development history of Chinese characters, the evolution of Chinese characters has always been an obvious trend. 1956 announced the simplification scheme of Chinese characters, and 1964 expanded the scope and quantity of simplified characters, which was the first large-scale Chinese character reform in more than two thousand years. After more than forty years of practice, it has played a great role in popularizing education and writing. On the other hand, simplified characters are not completely without discussion. Such as "Deng", "Huan", "Nan", "Shu", "Xi" and "Dui", its component is "You", which replaces different phonetic symbols such as "Deng". Some cursive scripts are written differently from regular script, and some homophones can replace Chinese characters. However, once the norms of writing are determined, they cannot be achieved overnight, nor can they go their own way and let themselves go. Chinese characters are the carrier of China's excellent culture and an important aspect of China culture. Chinese characters should be treated like traditional culture in China. First of all, we should inherit the tradition, not cut it off. Second, we should transform Chinese characters according to their development laws, so that they can become better communication tools. With the improvement of China's international status and economic development, more and more people are learning Chinese characters. Among the teachers who teach Chinese in various countries, some are from Taiwan Province Province and some are from the mainland. When teaching Chinese characters, there will naturally be two sets of teaching methods: traditional Chinese characters and simplified Chinese characters. Whether or not these two sets of teaching methods are unified, or how to unify them, needs to be discussed and solved by relevant people, experts and scholars on both sides of the Taiwan Strait and overseas.
4. Chinese characters can't follow the path of pinyin.
1958, the state announced the scheme of Chinese Pinyin. Its function is as a tool to popularize Putonghua and annotate Chinese characters. At present, the application scope of pinyin scheme may be expanded. For example, primary school students can write in pinyin when they encounter Chinese characters that they cannot write. Pinyin can be added to difficult words in books and periodicals. When quoting foreign place names, some people advocate spelling and translation with pinyin scheme. It can be predicted that this scheme will last as long as Chinese characters. However, some people once thought that all written symbols of human language should be pinyin-oriented, and all words that do not meet this standard are regarded as backward. This is a prejudice without scientific basis. Chinese characters are one of the excellent cultures created by the Chinese nation. They are not only cultural carriers of China for thousands of years, but also communication tools for the whole nation and overseas Chinese. Now more and more foreign people of insight have realized the superiority of Chinese characters, and it is impossible and unnecessary for this writing system to take the road of pinyin writing.
5. Talking about Chinese character teaching
It is correct to teach Chinese characters according to the Chinese character teaching method. However, the old theory of "six books" (referring to things, pictographs, sounds and shapes, cognition, annotation and excuses) must be reformed. Based on the comparative study of philology, this achievement combined with Mr. Tang Lan's "Three Books" theory, and put forward the "New Three Books" theory of ideographic, loanwords and pictophonetic characters. It contains the reasonable part of "Six Books" and excludes "concentration". Pictographic characters include pictographic characters, ideographic characters and knowing characters in six books. The word "borrowing sound" means borrowing. The reason why it was renamed as a loan word or a phonetic word is because some people think that there is another loan word in the loan word, which is out of nothing and confusing. In Mr. Tang Lan's "Three Books", it is inappropriate to exclude loanwords and divide characters made by pictographic method into pictographs and pictographs. The "new three books" not only absorbed the research results of predecessors, but also corrected their shortcomings. Mastering the classification standard of "New Three Books" can play a great role in Chinese character teaching.
Mr. Liu, 89, wrote in the Diary of Hong Kong's Return to China on July 1 July, 1997: "This book has finally been written, which is a wish that has been fulfilled for 50 or 60 years. This book is a project supported by the National Social Science Foundation. Thanks to a little support, the book was completed. We submitted this paper anxiously, hoping that the precious money of the people was not wasted. " Ma Xueliang, a famous linguist and professor at Minzu University of China, said: "This outline of the development of Chinese characters is the result of many years' research on Chinese characters. It was written by Liu He and his successors. It not only expounds the essence and development law of ancient and modern Chinese characters, but also puts forward a series of important issues such as the direction of Chinese character reform and Chinese character teaching from the inevitable trend of Chinese character development. This is a practical book about the history and reform of Chinese characters.