At present, there are two systems of Chinese characters in use, namely, the Traditional Chinese Character System and the Simplified Chinese Character System. Traditional Chinese characters are predominantly used in regions such as Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau, as well as by overseas Chinese communities outside Southeast Asia. Simplified Chinese characters, on the other hand, are the standard in mainland China, Singapore, and Malaysia.
The primary distinction between the two systems is their complexity. Traditional Chinese characters are intricate, containing more strokes than their simplified counterparts. The Simplified Chinese Character system was first introduced to boost literacy in China, simplifying strokes and reducing the number of strokes for Chinese Characters to be written more easily and quickly.
Take how the Hong Kong Polytechnic University is written in traditional Chinese and simplified Chinese as an example. Among the twelve characters on the right, you will find out immediately that only “學”and “学” differ. It is because in the process of simplifying Chinese characters, not every character has been simplified. There are still a large number of simplified Chinese characters that have retained their traditional forms.
In the field of teaching Chinese as a foreign language, simplified characters are usually taught. Here, we will briefly introduce the main contrasts between traditional and simplified characters.
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