Talk:Second round of simplified Chinese characters

Image issue
This image was in the history section. I removed it because, while I don't doubt the intent of whoever inserted it, it contributes little to the article without an explanation of what's in the image.

The reader can deduce that these are (probably) proposed simplifications from the second round, but there's no explanation of what the characters represent, which method of simplification applies, whether any of them survived in informal use, etc. A table header in English would be a nice start. :) Recognizance (talk) 18:01, 1 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Hm, I'd put them back in with a header or footer explaining that the left column represents the traditional characters, the right hand column the proposed 2nd round simplification. They are intuitively simpler than the traditional ones, even without knowing what the method of simplification was. Akerbeltz (talk) 10:52, 17 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Btw, if you go to the Unihan Database, you can look up the Unicode code points for those characters. Akerbeltz (talk) 11:15, 17 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Asked a friend, he remembered this place - someone scanned the chapter in a book by the 中国文字改革委员会 (Committee for Reforming the Chinese Written Language). Can't see the title but it lists them all nicely. Thought it might be useful. Akerbeltz (talk) 16:02, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

That is very useful, particularly the Unicode link. In a couple of cases the sources show XYZ character and I didn't have a way of inputting them myself. The other list is potentially useful but probably doesn't meet RS standards. The appendices in Planning Chinese Characters do include the simplification lists if we need to cite them as a source. Recognizance (talk) 18:58, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was moved to Second round of simplified Chinese characters -- Aervanath (talk) 04:49, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm requesting this page be moved because the focus is on the second round of simplifications and the environment they came about in (or will be once I finish sourcing the existing information). The term in bold when I found the article is the name I chose. If there is opposition to this suggestion then at least Second-round simplified Chinese characters should be used.

By the way, if anyone can read Chinese and is willing to help with this article I would greatly appreciate it. As much as I don't want the article slanted to a western point of view, I can't access a significant amount of information. Recognizance (talk) 02:37, 17 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Given that the first round page is called Simplified Chinese characters, I think we should follow that general principle and call it Second round of simplified Chinese characters - which technically just takes out the grammar errors but is more in line with the other page and should prove much less controversial. Akerbeltz (talk) 10:52, 17 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I think either Second-round simplified Chinese characters or Second round of simplified Chinese characters are OK. The bolded term in the intro para should be changed accordingly. I am interested in Chinese simplification and can read Chinese, so will try to help improve the article when I get some time. BabelStone (talk) 11:19, 17 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I had made up my mind on the title until you suggested using "of". Now I'm not sure where to put it! :) I am glad I decided to get outside opinions though.


 * And any help translation-wise would be great. I had left User:Vina a message on her zh talk page because I found her on the list of people willing to do translations somewhere, and she was kind enough to translate one of the zh images. I'm still waiting for the DeFrancis book and some other stuff to come via inter-library loan but will eventually reach the limit of what a non-speaker (or non-reader I should say) can do. Recognizance (talk) 20:52, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Found this through google, I've usually heard it referred to in English as the Second Scheme. Would Second Scheme of simplified Chinese characters work? Postulor (talk) 20:45, 20 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Both Second Scheme and Second Round are used as ways of referring to it, but as mentioned above, the naming should match with other articles. Plus, technically using Second Scheme in the title is cutting part of the (translated) "full" title and pasting it into a newly created name. Recognizance (talk) 01:06, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

I feel like this article should focus on the "second round" of character simplification, rather than the "second-round simplified Chinese character" as such, because the second round simplified characters were never really put into wide usage. Therefore, the article should focus on the attempt to simplify a second time, and why it failed. So, basically, I support the requester's chosen name.--Danaman5 (talk) 15:03, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Technical Info
That section needs looking at. It's true that some characters appear to be missing from Unicode as yet but by no means all, I found 𦬁 26B01, 浂 6D42, 氿 6C3F and 𠮵 D842DFB5. I haven't got the time to put the one's off the Society's list through Unihan but it might be worthwhile doing. In addition, it might be worthwhile checking if they have been submitted to Unicode and if not, to draw their attention to it or write a proposal. Akerbeltz (talk) 19:22, 18 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure on this one. I've found plenty of discussion of the formidable task of including 'all' Chinese characters in Unicode, but it doesn't specifically address the inclusion or lack thereof of second round characters.
 * On a related note, the current location of this article at 'Second-round simplified Chinese character' makes it even easier to spot potential references that are just scraping Wikipedia. Recognizance (talk) 20:00, 18 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Well... either way, it needs a plural s :b And the goal of Unicode is to *ultimately* include all the characters, they're well aware of the fact that haven't got all yet, especially some of the really old ones. I don't see why the list shouldn't be acceptable as a source by the way, it's printed by a gov organisation - the fact that we got the scanned pages of the web shouldn't be a hindrance. Akerbeltz (talk) 20:09, 18 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I give some mappings of 2nd round simplified characters to Unicode in my page, and there are a few more 2nd round simplified characxters in CJK-C which will be part of Unicode 5.2 (Autumn 2009). There has not yet been a proposal to encode all the remaining 2nd round simplified characters, but as someone actively involved in Unicode I can assure you that they will eventually be encoded. BabelStone (talk) 10:27, 20 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Incidentally, we should either expand the Tech Info section, perhaps with a table of common fonts showing their coverage of both rounds of simplification or at least take off the comment about the font supporting the *first* round - which doesn't really belong here I think. Akerbeltz (talk) 11:50, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

For inclusion (or at least food for thought)
So I picked up this book today, and it discusses at length the underlying Gestalt of the Chinese writing system: The politics of Chinese language and culture. (Part about the Second Scheme is on 63-64.)
 * In their in-depth look at the psychology of the Chinese writing system, Hodge and Louie examine the Gestalt which is taught in the process of learning many characters' forms and argue that Chinese characters are "more saturated with ideological functions and ideological content than any other major writing system". They use the Second Scheme as a case study of a failed attempt at altering the direction of a language's growth, pointing to the contrast between the First Scheme, which recorded existing variations, and the Second Scheme, which invented new ones. They use xian, the character for suspicion. Blah blah blah, the character originally used the woman radical. So basically this was a product of the Cultural Revolution, and the attempt at changing the underlying Gestalt of the language was another factor that led to the Second Scheme's failure and by this point the average reader's probably fallen asleep.

Probably have to chop most of that paragraph down in the morning, but I figured it was worth putting here. And the specialists among us might find the book interesting. Recognizance (talk) 05:09, 20 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I don't think that's too much detail at all personally, it's fascinating really. I like Routledge. Unfortunately books they publish are usually so specialised that 'picking up' a copy is rather expensive. Postulor (talk) 20:58, 20 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I agree, go for it. It's pertinent to the topic. Akerbeltz (talk) 21:34, 20 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Alright, I added it but without the detailed explanation of the suspicion character. I also re-added Hannas (Asia's Orthographic Dilemma) to the reference list and added one citation to him, but I haven't been able to check him out at length yet. Still waiting on DeFrancis to arrive. Recognizance (talk) 01:11, 21 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Responding to Recognizance RFC on #wikipedia.freenode.net. Not commenting on the article which I haven't read yet but the underlying issue, i.e. the nature of the Chinese writing system and its position in writing systems of the future, inside or outside China. First, the phenomenon (binding of concepts and recombination of same in characters and multi-character words) has also been referred to in some (eg AI) circles as "chunking" (due SFAIK (in re the reading of Hanzi) to Douglas Hofstadter). Second, the more general notion is not without experimental treatments outside of the context of Chinese, e,g. in implementations of Herman Hesses Glassperlenspiel. Lycurgus (talk) 00:03, 23 April 2009 (UTC)


 * So you're getting me in trouble with the transparency crowd without even weighing in on the requested move I asked about? You're no help. (Kidding of course!) That is fascinating if outside the article's mandate. Recognizance (talk) 03:25, 23 April 2009 (UTC)


 * This thread does not appear to be about a proposed move but rather a topic/&sect;/whatever for inclusion which is what my response refers to. Rest of transmission garbled. Lycurgus (talk) 19:53, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Non-included images
Just placing some here, in case no one knows about them: Kindest regards, --  李博杰   | —Talk contribs email 11:57, 1 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposal to encode second round simplified characters
I have written a Proposal to Encode Obsolete Simplified Chinese Characters which may be relevant to this article, but to avoid WP:COI I am mentioning it here for other editors to evaluate. BabelStone (talk) 00:41, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Removal of contradict tag
An IP editor placed a contradict tag on the "Reasons for failure" section back in November of 2014 with the edit summary. This was apparently in reference to the following section: "Hannas similarly argues against the lack of differentiation and utility: 'it was meaningless to lower the stroke count for its own sake.' Thus, he believes simplification and character limitation (reduction of the number of characters) both amount to a 'zero-sum game' — simplification in one area of use causing complication in another — and concludes that 'the 'complex' characters in Japanese and Chinese, with their greater redundancy and internal consistency, may have been the better bargain.'" I personally believe that this tag was placed in error. Clearly Hannas believed that the simplification caused greater harm than it solved; this is not what he meant by a "zero sum game." The "zero sum game" referred specifically to the reduction of complexity in one area causing greater complexity in another, and did not make any statement as to the overall benefit derived or lost (simply a quantification of complexity itself). Accordingly I have removed the tag. If anyone wishes to contest this, you are welcome to revert.  C Thomas3   (talk) 05:51, 13 July 2019 (UTC)