Learning the Chinese language is easy as long as you understand its rules and how it was evolved over years. Chinese characters came from pictures of objects in daily life that gradually evolved into text. A simple explanation of this process is as follows: Pictographs Before the invention of text, humans drew pictures to represent objects or record things that happened. The discovery of pictographs showed the beginning of the evolution of human language from oral to written. Chinese is the only written language to still use pictographs today. Oracle Bone Script In Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 B.C.), characters were carved onto tortoise shells for divination. These character were later seen to be the beginning of written Chinese. Bronze Vessel Script In Zhou Dynasty (146-256 B.C.), the development of bronze ware, rituals, and social hierarchy led to characters being inscribed on bronze containers and musical instruments. Bronze Vessel Script (metal text) is similar to Oracle Bone Script, but places more emphasis on stroke order. Bronze Vessel Script also set the foundation for the later Small Seal Script. Small Seal Script The Small Seal Script was developed after Qin Shi Huang united China in 207 B.C. It became the standard text for official documents. Because of its elegant font, the Small Seal Script is still often used in calligraphy and on carvings. Clerical Script Clerical Script evolve from the Small Seal Script, changing the rounder strokes to form rectilinear characters that allowed for faster character formation, making it suitable to be written on various objects. Clerical Script became the standard text of the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.) and continues to be used as the ‘normal’ written text of today.

From pictures and symbols to the creation and formation of text, from oracle bones through each successive dynasty to the present day, multiple writing styles have been established that show the history and culture of each Chinese character. Calligraphy, an art form for writing Chinese characters, has five basic styles that we will examine: Seal Style (zhuanshu), Official Style (lishu), Standard Style (kaishu), Running Style (xingshu), Cursive Style (caoshu). Seal Style (zhuanshu) Big Seal Characters大篆: The neat structure of oracle bone inscriptions laid the foundation for the form of modern Chinese characters.Small Seal Characters小篆: more simple in form and more standardized in structure. Characters are very elegant in style and are widely favored by people today in the creation of calligraphy works. Official Style (lishu) Small Seal Characters小篆: more simple in form and more standardized in structure. Characters are very elegant in style and are widely favored by people today in the creation of calligraphy works. Standard Style (kaishu) Standard Style 楷书 is simpler in structure and square in shape. To be specific, it is more standardized horizontally and vertically. The integral feature of formal script is neatness and orderliness, for which reason it is widely used and favored today. Running Style (xingshu) Running Style 行书 is the cursive form of formal script. When carefully written with distinguishable strokes, running script characters look more like formal script, while when swiftly written, they look more like cursive hand. It was created during the Han Dynasty (202 BC-220 AD). In general, it is convenient and highly practical for writing. Cursive Style (caoshu) Cursive Style 草书 is faster to write than other styles, but difficult to read for those unfamiliar with it. It functions primarily as a kind of shorthand script or calligraphic style. It has concise structures with borrowed components. Although it looks irregular, cursive hand has high artistic value beyond its practical worthiness. 6 categories of Chinese Calligraphy- Examples of character “le” (means “happy”)

There are two types of written Chinese characters in use today: Traditional characters and Simplified characters. Traditional characters, stemming from the Qin Dynasty (221-207 B.C.), have a history of roughly 2,000 years. Simplified characters evolved later from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) government’s wish to reduce illiteracy; they simplified the strokes used in Traditional Chinese to achieve this goal. Thus, Simplified characters are derived from the Traditional characters. Modern Chinese characters, which is another term referring to the normalized forms of Chinese characters, are officially recognized and used in Mainland China, Singapore and Malaysia as well as at the United Nations, while the traditional forms of Chinese characters are still in use in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao as well as some Chinese communities outside China. Among modern Chinese characters, about 75% are inherited characters (Chinese characters that were created and officially accepted before 20th century and had the same structure since “clerical change” without being simplified until today), about 5% are newly created characters or characters that have been borrowed to represent new modern meanings, and about 20% are simplified characters. Examples: Can you identify the traditional and simplified characters in the image?

1. How did Chinese characters evolve? List the process. 2. What are the writing styles/forms of Chinese calligraphy? 3. What are the writing styles of following characters? _____________________________________________________________________________ 4. Why Chinese characters were simplified in China mailand? 5. Which region do people use Traditional characters?

1. 2. Seal Style (zhuanshu), Official Style (lishu), Standard Style (kaishu), Running Style (xingshu), Cursive Style (caoshu). 3. 4. Simplified characters evolved later from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) government’s wish to reduce illiteracy. 5. The traditional forms of Chinese characters are still in use in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao as well as some Chinese communities outside China.