Back to Ming Dynasty with Industrial Revolution System

Chapter 93 Simplified Chinese Characters and Pinyin

"My lord... this... what is this..."

The senior civil officials of the Liao Army were all summoned to the mansion by Chu Yun, and a document of dozens of pages was circulated by these civil officials.

"Look carefully, is there any difference between the words on this paper and the Chinese characters we are used to?" Chu Yun reminded.

After hearing what Chu Yun said, these high-ranking civil officials gradually realized: "Ah, these are very similar to our Chinese characters, but they seem to be simplified Chinese characters. You can see that this character is the same as the one we commonly use, and this character seems to be a Chinese character. The calligraphy is very different from the way we usually use it, if you don't read it carefully, you really can't tell it."

"That's right, this is my memory after more than a month... No, it's creation. I created about [-] commonly used simplified characters and will promote them to all the people. I'm here to ask for your opinions." Chu Yun said frankly.

It was with great difficulty that he wrote the three thousand characters one by one, and it was not easy to come up with three thousand characters after racking his brains.However, Chu Yun believes that ordinary people can master [-] characters, which is enough to deal with most situations in life.As for the establishment of a complete system of simplified characters, the efforts of others are still needed. After all, Chu Yun can't spend all his time on character creation, and those rare characters will be more difficult to convert in the future.

"Simplified characters...will it go against our traditional culture? We have always used the official script and regular script that have been handed down. If we suddenly change to the so-called simplified characters, will it be disrespectful to our ancestors..."

"Although the simplified characters are simple, they seem to have lost some of their charm, which is quite inappropriate."

A group of senior civil servants looked at me and I looked at you, and they all felt incredible.

"This statement is wrong. Chinese characters have changed from oracle bone inscriptions and bronze inscriptions to seal script, and then to official script and regular script. The general trend is from complex to simple. Simplified characters are also a way of simplification. With simplified characters, people can quickly Learning to read and write can quickly reduce the illiteracy rate, and the writing speed is even faster." Chu Yun explained.

When Chu Yun came to this world, he found that the illiteracy rate was astonishingly high, and the power to speak was almost all in the hands of the bureaucracy represented by intellectuals, and even if a private school was established, it would be difficult to improve everyone's knowledge level in a short period of time.

"What do you all think?" Chu Yun looked around at the crowd.

These high-ranking civil servants suddenly felt that what Chu Yun said seemed to be very reasonable, and they were unable to refute it.Moreover, the simplified characters promoted by Chu Yun don't seem to be very difficult for those of them who can even write traditional characters, and it takes about a short time.

"It's like using machines to replace hand-spun yarn. Only by innovating through the old can we better liberate productivity. Think about it, everyone has the current salary and status, isn't it because of the use of a new production method? What's more, our use of simplified characters is not In order to eliminate the current characters, these characters and ancient books are still preserved as the necessary knowledge of Chinese studies and linguistics."

"Your Excellency's words are reasonable..." Chen Ting said, "But it may be opposed by many scholars when it is actually promoted."

"They will understand when they actually use it." Chu Yun said, "We can use two writing methods in parallel at the same time, and see which one the people will choose in the end."

The writing speed of simplified characters is not comparable to that of traditional characters in the past. As long as the volume of writing is slightly increased during the examinations of the Academy of Sciences and private schools, those scholars who can't finish writing the questions will naturally choose the more convenient simplified characters.

"Subordinates feel that simplified characters are the same as Arabic numerals. It is indeed a lot of convenience for us, so I have no objection." Chen Ting said.Anyway, the promotion of simplified characters does not have much conflict with his personal interests.

"We have no objection either." Seeing that Chen Ting was firmly on Chu Yun's side, the other civil officials expressed their support in unison.

"It's just my lord, I don't understand, what are those ghostly symbols on the simplified characters?" A civil servant pointed to the Latin letters on the simplified characters.

"This thing is called Pinyin, which is used for pronunciation. Look at how I spell it..." Chu Yun personally demonstrated to them the content taught in the later kindergarten.

These civil servants couldn't help being dumbfounded when they heard Chu Yun's pinyin pronunciation: "It's still possible to do this."

"It sounds very different from the Mandarin and local dialects we use now, although there are some very similar places."

The civil servants said that learning pinyin is too difficult, especially for those who may be elderly.

"The promotion of simplified characters may still need to seek your opinions, but this spelling must be promoted. Do you know how many dialects there are in the country? People can't communicate effectively with each other. Teaching the pronunciation of Chinese characters takes a lot of time and productivity is extremely high. It is low, and it is not conducive to the spread of our culture overseas.”

Chu Yun had been exposed to the generation of pinyin before, and Mr. Zhou, a later generation, believed that national forms should go through a process of habit cultivation. For example, Huqin can be transformed into Chinese music, cheongsam can be transformed into Hanfu, and foreign letters can be transformed into national letters.Chu Yun deeply agrees with this point. As long as the national power is strong enough, the Pinyin derived from the Latin alphabet can completely replace the Latin alphabet in the future, and Chinese pronounced in Pinyin will become an international lingua franca!
Seeing that Chu Yun was so determined, the civil servants looked at each other in blank dismay.It's not that they are dissatisfied, but it means that they have to re-learn the new pronunciation system, which is a bit strenuous.

"Then we will set up a language promotion office to promote simplified characters and pinyin. The goal is to make pinyin available in private schools and academies of science within two months, and to set up several overseas promotion teams within three months to go to Satsuma and Hizen in Japan. Fan and Goryeo set up a Chinese Academy, so that our influence can radiate to these two kingdoms. By the way, we need to set up an overseas promotion team to go to the Ryukyu country we are going to accept to promote Chinese. Zhou Xiaode, I heard that you once talked with The missionaries have learned Latin and have a little talent for languages, so you should be the person in charge of the language promotion department." Chu Yun pointed to a civil servant from Fuzhou.

Other civil servants cast envious glances at Zhou Xiaode.You must know that the highest institutions in the Fuliao Army are the Ordnance Bureau, the Agricultural Army, and the Maritime Safety Administration. The person in charge, it's really a step up to the sky!
Although the civil service system in the Fuliao Army still uses the system of the Ming Dynasty, and the ranks must be sealed by the court, everyone with a discerning eye knows that only those who hold high positions in the Fuliao Army can enjoy the far-reaching benefits provided by the Fuliao Army. The treatment and status of the imperial court.For example, the salary provided by the Liao Army was not comparable to the salary of the imperial court, which greatly encouraged a large number of honest officials.The salaries of the Liao army allowed them to have a lot of surplus in addition to supporting their families, so they didn't need to be greedy against their conscience.

(End of this chapter)