A Short History
Writing, spoken varieties, and standardization did not develop along a single line. This chapter places their timelines beside one another rather than treating them as one process.
Can the histories of writing and language standards be told without flattening distinct trajectories?
How Old Are Chinese Characters? It Depends on What We Count
Chinese writing has no single, self-evident birthday. To discuss its age responsibly, we must separate attested writing from disputed early signs and cultural origin legends.
9 min read→
Spoken and Written Chinese Were Not Standardized on the Same Day
Modern Chinese has no single year of standardization. Its spoken norm, modern written language, character simplification, romanization, and technical encoding belong to distinct historical sequences supported by different kinds of evidence.
9 min read→
Three Scripts, Many Roles: Rethinking Vietnam’s Writing History
Classical Chinese, Chữ Nôm, and quốc ngữ did not simply replace one another. Reading them by social function reveals a layered history of institutions, vernacular writing, and changing literacy.
10 min read→