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Category Archives: Policy & Governance
What About Viability?
Ever since the Municipal Inspection Report (aka Farmer Report) was released, there has been a lot of stir about the final comments and recommendations: "While the municipality has legally been amalgamated into a single entity, the Municipality has never been … Continue reading
Posted in Economy, Policy & Governance Comments Off
A Few Facts
We had two rather interesting forums this week and I wanted to make a few comments before I go and reinstall some of my downed election signs. I quite enjoyed answering questions and these forums give candidates a chance to … Continue reading
Posted in Elections, Policy & Governance, Public Information 6 Comments
Fire Dept. & Insurance Rates
Hello! It has been a while. As usual, my summer has been packed with council, business, and family activities. At the council meeting on August 6 we were presented with a report from Opta Information Intelligence regarding a Fire Underwriters … Continue reading
Posted in Policy & Governance, Public Information Tagged Fire Department, Insurance Rates, Master Fire Plan 10 Comments
Municipal Inspection
Municipal Press Release: http://town.crowsnestpass.ab.ca/component/docman/doc_download/1777-press-releasedec-412 The Honourable Doug Griffiths, Minister of Municipal Affairs, has indicated to Crowsnest Pass's council and administration that his office will conduct an inspection in response to the recent petition. Minister Griffiths has made it clear that … Continue reading
Posted in Policy & Governance, Public Information 2 Comments
Peace Officer Program
I hope you are enjoying the sun after that big snowfall last night. Spring is just around the corner. We are busy at council with our three-year budget discussions and there is a lot of hard work happening at the … Continue reading
Tax Penalties Bylaw
There was a lot on the agenda last week during our council meeting. One item was the way we prepare our minutes. Council voted to direct administration to have the "unapproved" minutes available the day after a council meeting, so … Continue reading
Posted in Finance, Policy & Governance Tagged Municipal Government Act, Tax Penalties Bylaw 2 Comments
Year One Recap and Update
Summer is winding down and I hope that you wrung every possible drop of fun and sunshine out of it. I recently managed a short break as my wife spirited us away for our anniversary but the last few months … Continue reading
Posted in Economy, Policy & Governance, Public Information, Uncategorized 2 Comments
Economic Task Force Report
I would like to share a few thoughts on the Economic Task Force report that was presented to the public tonight. You can view it here: http://town.crowsnestpass.ab.ca/component/docman/doc_download/1090-final-report-of-the-mayors-task-force-june-20-2011. My first thought is that it is refreshing to have a group of … Continue reading
Posted in Economy, Policy & Governance, Public Information Tagged Task Force on the Economy 8 Comments
Public Presentation – Economic Task Force
At the Chamber of Commerce luncheon on Wednesday, Mayor Decoux announced that the final report by the Mayor's Task Force on the Economy is complete. In order to properly share it with the community, council has scheduled a public forum … Continue reading
Posted in Economy, Policy & Governance, Public Information Tagged Strategic Plan, Task Force on the Economy Comments Off
Reserves Part 2
I was discussing our municipal reserves with a few folks the other day and why we did not put anything away in the budget. You can see my previous thoughts on the subject here. In my opinion, our reserves have … Continue reading
Posted in Finance, Policy & Governance Comments Off


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subset: commoncrawl


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Supporters of CCTA union drivers rally on Church Street in Burlington Wednesday night.
- Filed Under
A seven-hour negotiation session Saturday between Chittenden County Transportation Authority management and the Teamsters Local 597 bus drivers' union ended with no agreement, according to Teamsters business agent Tony St. Hilaire on Saturday night.
St. Hilaire said two issues had been identified by the union, but the management would not budge on these issues.
"The message was made clear to the company that the acceptance of any contract offer by their employees would be dependent on their acceptance of the Union's proposal," St. Hilaire said. "The company did not produce a change in ...


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Storm Victims Urged to Register for Disaster Assistance
PEARL, Miss. – Homeowners, renters and business owners affected by the recent severe storms, tornadoes and flooding in Mississippi are urged to register with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), as they may be eligible for disaster assistance.
The presidential disaster declaration of April 30 makes federal assistance available to eligible individuals and business owners in Itawamba, Lee, Lowndes, Madison, Rankin, Wayne and Winston counties.
Individuals and business owners in the designated counties can register online at DisasterAssistance.gov or via smartphone at m.fema.gov. Applicants may also call 800-621-3362 or (TTY) 800-462-7585. If you use Video Relay Services, call 800-621-3362. The toll-free telephone numbers will operate from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. local time, seven days a week. Multilingual operators are available. C-Spire wireless customers can register by calling #362.
Assistance can include grants for temporary housing and home repairs, and for other serious disaster-related needs, such as medical and dental expenses or funeral and burial costs. Low-interest disaster loans from the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) may also be available to cover losses not fully compensated by insurance.
Mississippi residents should register with FEMA even if they have insurance. FEMA cannot duplicate insurance payments, but under-insured applicants may receive help after their insurance claims have been settled.
Registering with FEMA is required for federal aid, even if the person has registered with another disaster-relief organization. FEMA registrants must use the name that appears on their Social Security card.
Applicants will be asked for the following information:
• Social Security number
• Address of the damaged home or apartment
• Description of the damage
• Information about insurance coverage
• A current contact telephone number
• An address where they can receive mail
• Bank account and routing numbers for direct deposit of funds.
For more information on Mississippi disaster recovery, click www.fema.gov/disaster/4175 or visit the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency (MEMA) site at www.msema.org/ .


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Touring 47 states in the last two years, Denis Donohue, 32, said he is looking forward to performing at 8 p.m. Wednesday July 1 at the Turning Stone Show Room.
Donohue, originally from the Flushing-Queens area, said he knew he wanted to be a comedian since he was five years old. He has been performing standup comedy for more than 12 years now.
Although he had standup in his heart, he attended SUNY-Plattsburgh and majored in the criminal justice program.
"My family always told me to have something to fall back on," said Donohue of his college degree.
His fallback plan was unnecessary after many years of performing and a recent nationally television breakthrough. Donohue was featured on an ABC special for "Barbara Walters Presents." The show had a theme for presenting ageism or age prejudice.
Donohue said the show was designed to show that within all of the politically incorrect topics people generally poke fun at, age is "technically acceptable" to make jokes about.
Even so, the moral of the presentation was to show viewers that we shouldn't make fun of anything that hurts someone's feelings.
A clip of Donohue on the show talked about the new modern age expectancy of 150 years old. In the show, he said the modern age expectancy was great because he could live another 100 years and still be living in his mom's house.
When it comes to live performances, Donohue said he generally wings his routine.
{Q}"I never know what I'm going to say when I'm on stage," he said. "I gauge the energy of the crowd."{Q}
Because of his ability "to go off script," he said he can better interact with an audience.
"Every crowd is different," Donohue said.
While interacting with his crowd, he said that the more audience members that call out comments or questions, the more everyone can feel involved or "in on the joke."
Some of his best experiences doing standup are when the show is over and the audience can approach him comfortably, he said.
"By the end of the show I want everyone to think of me as an old friend," Donohue said.
Donohue said he encourages people to come and see the show Wednesday in Verona or visit myspacegas.com to see some of his comedy performances.
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Family, friends and Miami-Dade Commissioner Jose "Pepe" Diaz are remembering the life of Aaron Cohen, a father and husband, who was tragically struck and killed while riding his bike on the Rickenbacker Causeway two years ago Saturday.
Members of Miami's cycling community, along with Diaz, were passing out bicycle safety lights to cyclists in order to raise awareness.
"It's very dangerous to ride a bike, it's very dangerous to run and walk, so we're trying to change that," said Diaz.
In February 2012, Michele Traverso's vehicle veered into the bike lane hitting a separate cyclist before fatally killing Cohen. Traverso served just 262 days in jail for his crime. It was a sentence that outraged the Cohen family and fellow cyclists. It sparked the "Aaron Cohen Life Protection Act," a measure designed to make penalties for hit-and-run drivers more severe.
To learn more about the "Aaron Cohen Life Protection Act," click here.
"The ability to be accountable for your actions is part of being human and we have to have that accountability," said Diaz.


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2011 AIA Housing Awards
The AIA Housing and Custom Residential Knowledge Community established this awards program to emphasize the importance of good housing as a necessity of life, a sanctuary for the human spirit and a valuable national resource. The categories are (1) One- and Two-Family Custom Residences, (2) One- and Two-Family Production Homes, (3) Multifamily Housing, and (4) Specialized Housing. Click here to view all 2011 AIA Awards Recipients.
Category One: One- and Two-Family Custom Residences
Addition to an Historic Cape on a Coastal Farm
- Bohlin Cywinski Jackson
The team, tasked with designing an addition to a historic cape, successfully balanced past and present, and achieved the restoration of the structure's original function.Read more
Blair Barn House
- Alchemy LLC
The project takes cues from classic nineteenth-century barns and updates them to create a twenty-first century, fulltime house.Read more
Combs Point Residence
- Bohlin Cywinski Jackson
This necklace of buildings serves as both a center of activity and a quiet retreat for a family that treasures life on the lake.Read more
North Beach Residence
- Heliotrope Architects
The design brief called for a very low-impact, easy-to-maintain, summer home that provides necessary programmatic functions with minimum distractions from the land and the view.Read more
Town House
- Robert M. Gurney, FAIA, Architect
This renovation provided natural light, great variety, and a tastefully modern feel within a traditional townhouse.Read more
Category Two: One- and Two-Family Production Homes
100K Houses
- Interface Studio Architects LLC
These production homes were conceived as new housing for a new generation of young, green-minded, reurbanizing homebuyers.Read more
Category Three: Multi-family Living
50 Saint Peter Street/Historic Salem Jail
- Finegold Alexander + Associates
The project restored a three-building historic jail complex and adapted it for residential and mixed use, including a full-service restaurant and an exhibit space devoted to the history of the jail property.Read more
930 Poydras Residential Tower
- Eskew+Dumez+Ripple
Designed to re-imagine the typically horizontal condition of New Orleans' dense French Quarter, the project boasts a ninth-floor "courtyard level" to promote opportunities for residents to cross paths with one another.Read more
1111 E. Pike
- Olson Kundig Architects
Responding to the client's wishes to fill the disappearing stock of affordable housing in a unique area, the design looked to the history of the site and the neighborhood, Seattle's "Auto Row."Read more
Armstrong Place Senior and Family Housing
- David Baker + Partners, Architects
This complex development fills a formerly industrial city block with an innovative housing mix.Read more
Art Stable
- Olson Kundig Architects
The use of concrete, steel and glass draws upon the warehouse typology of the formerly industrial neighborhood, and the structure itself is even designed with a crane to lift heavy loads.Read more
Hancock Mixed Use Housing
- Koning Eizenberg Architecture, Inc.
The design focused on achieving a balance between public parking, scale, active street presence, and the transition to the hillside neighborhood.Read more
Tassafaronga Village
- David Baker + Partners, Architects
This complex development is a new, green neighborhood that brings a diversity of affordable housing to an underserved area and repairs the deteriorated neighborhood fabric.Read more
Category Four: Specialized Housing
Haven for Hope
- Overland Partners Architects
Determined to change the plight of its homeless population, the City of San Antonio called for a comprehensive "campus of transformation," which addresses and treats all root causes of homelessness.Read more
Northeastern University Building F
- William Rawn Associates, Architects, Inc.
Creating a vibrant, high-density environment that is active at all hours of the day, the building embodies the spirit of "living & learning."Read more
The Schermerhorn
- Ennead Architects LLP
This large, urban, supportive housing facility serves as an example of an affective design response to unique site conditions.Read more


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en Con is fast approaching and Magic: The Gathering will have a giant presence this year, and we aren't just talking about the oversized Magic game that will be featured each day!
With a plethora of cool foil promo cards, a photo scavenger hunt, limited advanced sales of From the Vault: Relics (details below), a Duels of the Planeswalkers lounge, Magic tournaments, and other activities, this Gen Con will be one to remember! The action starts Thursday, August 5 in Indianapolis.
Wizards of the Coast will once again be selling the popular From the Vault series at Gen Con 2010. A limited quantity of the new set Magic: The Gathering From the Vault: Relics card boxes will be sold at Gen Con Indy 2010.
Noted Magic card artists Steve Prescott and Kekai Kotaki will be in the TCG Hall Artists Booth signing cards. Steve's work has been featured on Magic cards since Time Spiral block and some of his most recognizable pieces include Rhys the Exiled, Rhys the Redeemed, Knollspine Dragon, Berserk from From the Vault: Exiled, and the new M11 card Fauna Shaman. Kekai's art was featured prominently in the Zendikar block, including Lorthos, the Tidemaker, Shepherd of the Lost, Lord of Shatterskull Pass.
In addition to those artists featured in the TCG Hall, the following artists who have done Magic card art will be at Gen Con Art Show:
If you've ever thought of going to Gen Con, this is the year to do it. No matter how you like to experience Magic, there will be something for you.
For complete information about Gen Con, visit www.gencon.com.
© 1995-2015 Wizards of the Coast LLC, a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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|Evaluation of polymerase chain reaction using protein b primers for rapid diagnosis of tuberculous meningitis.
MedLine Citation:
|PMID: 21045496 Owner: NLM Status: In-Data-Review
|Background: Rapid and specific diagnosis of tubercular meningitis (TBM) is of utmost importance. Aim: To evaluate polymerase chain reaction (PCR) using protein b primers directed against M. tuberculosis for the diagnosis of tuberculous meningitis. Materials and Methods: PCR using protein b primers was performed in ten patients with confirmed TBM (culture positive), 60 patients with clinically suspected TBM and 40 patients with no TBM (control group). Results: Protein b PCR had a sensitivity of 90% and a specificity of 100% in patients with confirmed TBM. In 60 clinically diagnosed TBM patients, protein b PCR was positive in 49 (81.7%) patients. The overall sensitivity of microscopy, culture and PCR using protein b primers was 1.4%, 14.3%, and 82.8% and specificity was 100%, 100%, and 100% respectively. Conclusion: Protein b PCR is valuable in rapid diagnosis of TBM.
|Kusum Sharma; Aman Sharma; Malkit Singh; Pallab Ray; Ritika Dandora; Shiv K Sharma; Manish Modi; Sudesh Prabhakar; Meera Sharma
Related Documents :
|9215466 - Activated protein c resistance as a "new" cause of deep venous thrombosis in aviators.
12482406 - Protein c pathway impairment in nonsymptomatic cigarette smokers.
1420826 - Intra-cardial thrombosis with systemic and pulmonary embolism as main symptoms in a pat...
3161206 - Determination of plasma protein s--the protein cofactor of activated protein c.
20073486 - Size-sorting combined with improved nanocapillary liquid chromatography-mass spectromet...
15254796 - Gsk-3beta in cerebrospinal fluid of schizophrenia patients.
Publication Detail:
|Type: Journal Article
Journal Detail:
|Title: Neurology India Volume: 58 ISSN: 0028-3886 ISO Abbreviation: Neurol India Publication Date: 2010 Sep-Oct
Date Detail:
|Created Date: 2010-11-03 Completed Date: - Revised Date: -
Medline Journal Info:
|Nlm Unique ID: 0042005 Medline TA: Neurol India Country: India
Other Details:
|Languages: eng Pagination: 727-31 Citation Subset: IM
|Department of Medical Microbiology, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India.
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From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine
Previous Document: Duration of anti-tubercular treatment in tuberculous meningitis: Challenges and opportunity.
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Conference Overview
This conference is for parents, and those who are passionate about their work with parents, children, and around pregnancy and birth.
The conference will focus on the whole spectrum of early parenting – from the neonatal period through birth to early childhood years.
We have brought together world renowned speakers and workshop leaders so that together, we can reach a better, more intuitive and compassionate understanding of early childhood and parenting.
There will be refreshments available during the breaks. For those who are not selecting the ICH hot buffet lunch option, there are many cafes, restaurants and pubs nearby. Breastfeeding mothers are welcome to attend with their young babies. We only ask that you are sensitive to the needs of other delegates.


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Now that we are post-Thanksgiving and worn out from shopping, or I should say watching the children while the wife went shopping, we can revisit a 48 point victory over the Highlanders of Radford. The Wildcats came out roaring against this opponent. The Highlanders saw easier opponents before walking into Rupp, boasting an average 61 points per game. The Cats kept the score on the opponents end to 40 overall while the Wildcats sailed with 88 for the contest.
All the fans seemed very happy to see Marquis Teague not only decreased the number of times he turned over the ball, but instigated steals of his own. Jones came alive with 17 points for the night while Kidd-Gilchrist added 15 points with 9 rebounds. Radford kept fighting as Kentucky wouldn't let up on the defensive end. Cal kept the energy alive on the court with selective substitutions utilizing his six starters. Kyle Wiltjer saw significant playing time and contributed with the offensive boards. Davis seemed to calm down and begin to communicate with his team mates posting 12 points for the night. Miller came off the bench and went straight to work, making it happen on both ends of the court, while Lamb broke the 3 point cold streak. Lamb finished the night with 10 points.
Radford struggled for the majority of the game; Johnathan Edward scored 10 points and 8 rebounds for the Highlanders. UK's defensive game was in tune and that hurt Radford, who frequently tried to drive inside. A last minute shot by Jareal Smith saved the Highlanders from setting a new school record for the fewest points scored in a game, according to Radford University.
The Cats will host Portland Saturday at 7pm and then look forward to a rough two game stretch with St. John's and then No. 1 UNC. The game against Portland will be the final chance for the Cats to grow up before more seasoned opponents come to Rupp.


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Scouting Oklahoma's Cotton Bowl opponent: Texas A&M
Led by Heisman Trophy-winner Johnny Manziel, Texas A&M has the nation's third-most-potent offense, averaging 552 yards per game. The Aggies rank 13th in rushing offense (235 yards per game) and 14th in passing offense (317 yards per game). No team ranks higher in both categories, and only a couple are even close.
The Aggies aren't quite as impressive defensively. They rank 38th in run defense, 80th in pass defense and 101st in turnovers forced. Turnovers can be a bit fluky, though, and Texas A&M ranks 29th with sacks. Pressuring the quarterback is one of the best ways to force turnovers, so the Aggies might have a better defense than their numbers indicate.
Special teams
Texas A&M rates well in punts, punt returns and kickoffs, but kickoff returns are a bit of a weakness. Taylor Bertolet made 8-of-9 field goals inside 30 yards, but just 2-of-9 between between 30 and and 49 yards. However, he does have a big leg and is 3-of-4 from 50+, including making a 54-yarder.


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Caroline S. Brooks (1840-1900?)
Caroline Shawk Brooks, sculptor, used a process of sculpting that involved molding in butter before progressing to marble. She was ridiculed as the "Butterlady" and endured much mockery of her molding technique. (Butter sculpture had its roots in ancient Tibetan Buddhist art where it symbolized impermanence.) Brooks' two marble statues of Lady Godiva were destroyed by a 1906 earthquake in California. The artist was the widow of San Francisco painter Samuel Brooks.
- Date:
- 1875 circa 5 years
- Original Format:
- Carte de Visite
- Item#:
- Photographer:
- Brooks
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- 1231px
- Width:
- 741px
- download hi-res watermarked image
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All Licensed images are available for download as jpeg files at 300 dpi of original size.
If your project requires an image at higher resolution, please contact us (be sure to include item number). Custom requests may require an additional charge.


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Debate on traditional and simplified Chinese characters
|This article is in a list format that may be better presented using prose. (February 2015)
|Debate about the simplification of Chinese characters
|Traditional Chinese
|Simplified Chinese
|Literal meaning
|Chinese character simplification debate
|Traditional-simplified debate
|Traditional Chinese
|Simplified Chinese
|Literal meaning
|Complicated-simple dispute
|Traditional-simplified debate
|Traditional Chinese
|Simplified Chinese
|Literal meaning
|Proper-simple dispute
The debate on traditional Chinese characters and simplified Chinese characters is an ongoing debate concerning Chinese orthography among users of Chinese characters. It has stirred up heated responses from supporters of both sides in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, and among overseas Chinese communities with its implications of political ideology and cultural identity.[1] Simplified characters here exclusively refer to those characters simplified by the People's Republic of China (PRC), instead of the concept of character simplification as a whole. The effect of simplified characters on the language remains controversial decades after their introduction.
- 1 Problems
- 2 Culture
- 3 Literacy
- 4 Ambiguity
- 5 Speed of writing
- 6 Phonetics
- 7 Radicals
- 8 Aesthetics
- 9 Practicality
- 10 Politics
- 11 Developments in recent years
- 12 See also
- 13 Notes
- 14 References
The sheer difficulties posed by having two concurrent writing systems hinders communications between mainland China and other regions, although with exposure and experience a person educated in one system can quickly become familiar with the other system.[2] For those who know both systems well, converting an entire document written using simplified characters to traditional characters, or vice versa, is a trivial but laborious task. Automated conversion, however, from simplified to traditional is not straightforward because there is not a one-to-one mapping of a simplified character to a traditional character. One simplified character may equate to many traditional characters. As a result, a computer can be used for the bulk of the conversion but will still need final checking by a human.[2]
The writer Ba Jin, in his essay "Thoughts: Reform of Chinese characters" (simplified Chinese: 随想录·汉字改革; traditional Chinese: 隨想錄漢字改革; pinyin: Suí xiǎng lù hànzì gǎigé), urged caution in any reforms to the written Chinese language. He cited the inability of those educated in Hong Kong or Taiwan to read material published on the mainland, and vice versa, as a great disadvantage of simplified Chinese. He also cited the ability to communicate, not just with Chinese peoples of various regions, but also with people from across the Chinese cultural sphere — countries such as Japan and Vietnam — as a great advantage of the written Chinese language that should not be undermined by excessive simplification.[3]
Pro-Simplified characters
Proponents say that the Chinese writing system has been changing for millennia: it has already passed through the Oracle Script, Bronzeware Script, Seal Script and Clerical Script stages. Moreover, the majority of simplified characters are drawn from conventional abbreviated forms that have been in use for centuries[4] such as the use of 礼 instead of 禮,[5] and some simplified characters are in fact restorations of ancient forms that had become more complicated over time. For instance, the character for "cloud" was originally 云, but the character was borrowed to write a homophonous word meaning "to say". To disambiguate the two uses of the character, the "rain" radical (雨) was added on top when it meant "cloud", forming the current traditional character 雲. The homophonous word meaning "to say", however, has become archaic in modern Chinese, though 雲 continues to be used for "cloud". The simplified version simply restores 云 to its original use as "cloud".[5]
Pro-Traditional characters
While some simplified characters were adopted from conventional abbreviated forms that have existed for a long time, many of the changes made were found by many to be "unnatural" such as the removal of the symbol for heart (心) from the word love (愛) into the new character (爱) without 'heart'. To many, the new 'heartless' love character conflicts with Confucianism which emphasizes filial piety and humanity.[6] On the other hand, supporters of simplification claim that the use of the character 愛/爱 to represent the meaning of "love" is a rather new invention and was not recorded in Shuowen Jiezi. The character 愛, originally meaning "the manner of walking", is a phono-semantic compound (形聲字/形声字) made of 㤅 (phonetic element) and 夊 (semantic element, meaning "to go slowly"). The heart component (心) is part of the character 㤅, where it is used as a phonetic element of 愛. However, according to Duan Yucai's commentary of Shuowen Jiezi, the original character for love is 㤅 and has been replaced by 愛.[7]
Pro-traditional commentators say that the changes through the history are merely alteration in writing styles, not in the structure of the characters, especially after the Qin standardization. They also claim many other simplified characters were arbitrarily designed by the government of the PRC to pervert traditional Chinese culture for political reasons in order to carry out what the PRC viewed as modernization. These critics say that many characteristics underlying various Chinese characters, including radicals, etymologies and phonetics were ignored and destroyed in their simplified form for this reason. One frequently-cited example of this argument is found in the character for "sage" or "holy", 圣 in simplified and 聖 in traditional. The simplified character removed the king radical (王), replacing it with soil (土). Supporters of simplification note that 圣 (literally meaning holy) is an ancient component used in characters like 怪 (literally meaning crazy or odd), and that 圣 was used as a variant of 聖 before the PRC even existed.[6]
Pro-Simplified characters
- Proponents feel that simplified characters with fewer strokes make learning easier.[8] Literacy rates have risen steadily in rural and urban areas since the simplification of the Chinese characters, while this trend was hardly seen during 30 years of Kuomintang (KMT) rule and 250 years of Manchurian rule before them, when the traditional writing system was dominant, though this rise in literacy may not necessarily be due to simplification alone.
- Although Taiwan, which uses traditional Chinese characters, has a better literacy rate, proponents point out that with a population 50 times larger and landmass 260 times bigger, the illiteracy in mainland China is much more difficult to eradicate. In 2004, the only provinces of China where the illiteracy rates were lower than Taiwan's were Guangdong at 3.84%, and Guangxi at 3.79%.[9]
- Many studies have been conducted to prove, contrary to cultural prejudice, that simplified characters are easier to learn than traditional ones.[10]
Pro-Traditional characters
- The literacy rate of Taiwan and Hong Kong is higher than that of mainland China, compared for the same year.[11]
- Although it is possible to correlate the adoption of simplified Chinese characters with increases in literacy rates, given the higher literacy rates in Taiwan and Hong Kong, correlation does not imply causation, and these are likely to be influenced by cultural change and education reform.[12][13]
- Aside from correlational arguments, the only other form of evidence offered in support of script reform success through character simplification is anecdotal.[12]
- The validity of statistics about literacy rates in mainland China is questionable.[14]
Pro-Simplified characters
- Proponents feel that some traditional characters are too similar in appearance, such as 書 (shū) "book", 晝 (zhòu) "daytime" and 畫 (huà) "drawing": the simplified forms are 书, 昼, and 画, which look much more distinct.
- Classical Chinese mainly used one character to form one word, which made it very common that one character had multiple meanings and multiple pronunciation: "天" means "sky" (天苍苍), "heaven" (天将降大任), "nature" (浑然天成), "weather" (心忧炭贱愿天寒); "长" means "length" (cháng, 长一身有半), "specialty" (cháng, 一技之长), "grow" (zhǎng, 草木遂长), "senior" (zhǎng, 以君为长者), etc. And context is vital to determine the meaning of a certain character in Classical Chinese. After the early 1900s' Vernacular Chinese movement, words were mainly formed by multiple characters (mostly two), and today one word usually has only one meaning: "天空" means "sky", "上天" means "heaven", "天然" means "nature", "天气" means "weather", "长度" means "length", "生长" means "grow", etc. Context is not necessary to determine the meaning of a certain word. Merging characters with few meanings in identical or similar pronunciation, actually does not make reading more difficult when using Vernacular Chinese: "头发" (頭髮, fà) means "hair", "出发" (出發, fā) means "set off", "谷物" (穀物, gǔ) means "grain", "山谷" (gǔ) means "hollow". Instead, simplification simply reduces the number of characters one would need to learn for modern life.[15]
Pro-Traditional characters
- Opponents claim the reverse: simplifications make distinct characters more similar to each other in appearance, giving the "shape recognition" mechanism of the reading part of the brain ambiguous clues. An example is 無 (wú) "none", simplified into 无, which looks very similar to the existing character 天 (tiān) "sky". Also, 設 (shè) "designate", and 沒 (méi) "without", are quite similar in their simplified forms 设 and 没 and can result in confusion in rapid handwriting (Another example of the same kind is 活 (huó) "to live" and 話 (huà) "talk," which in simplified are 活 and 话 and can be misinterpreted in rapid handwriting). Similarly, some simplified characters create more confusion. In traditional writing, 千 (qiān) "thousand", and 乾 (gān) "dry" are very different characters. In simplified writing, the same characters appear to be almost identical, being 千 and 干, respectively.[16]
- Simplified Chinese characters frequently include merged characters, which opponents view as baseless and arbitrary: 後 (hòu, "behind") and 后 (hòu, "queen") are both simplified into 后. Likewise, 隻 (zhī, a measure word) and 只 (zhǐ, "only") are merged into 只; 發 (fā, "happening") and 髮 (fà, "hair") are merged into 发; 穀 (gǔ, "crop") and 谷 (gǔ, "valley") are merged into 谷, and so on.
- On 3 September 1993, the Board of Language Usage & Applications of China permitted and re-introduced the usage of the character '鎔' and released a new policy of Resolution for the Complication in Using Character '鎔' and Its Usage Re-introduction (《关于"鎔"字使用问题的批复》). The movement was an attempt in trying to resolve the controversy caused by the conflict between the lawful mergers of characters of '鎔'and '熔' and the name usage of former Vice Premier Zhu Rongji. According to earlier Chinese laws regarding Chinese Language Simplification, character '鎔'should have always been written as '熔'; however, Zhu Rongji insisted on writing '鎔' when it came down to writing his name because he was originally named in the character '鎔'but not '熔'. Thus, the Board later re-introduced the character. Supporters of traditional characters often use this example in against the use of simplified Chinese, especially when it comes down to mergers of characters in names of historical heroes, scholars, philosophers, and political figures. They also complain about the trouble in flight reservations when traveling in and out of mainland China due to the mergers of characters.[17]
- Professor Wang, at Beijing University of Education, also the Vice President of Chinese Language Association, and an official of Ministry of Education of China, agreed and criticized that some characters were oversimplified during the simplification campaign, and thus more difficult to learn, apply, and use. Wang particularly pointed at merged characters borne with these problems.[18]
Speed of writing
Pro-Simplified characters
- Simplified characters have fewer strokes. For example, the common character 邊 (biān, meaning "side") has 18 strokes in traditional form, while its simplified form 边 has only 5. Proponents of simplification claim this makes them easier to write.[8] Characters with more than 15 strokes are especially difficult to write.[19]
- Input methods for electronic devices are commonplace today and can be thought of as a form of simplification of Chinese characters .[20]
- Input method for electronic devices, and access to computers generally, are still the privilege of a few in mainland China, where the digital divide is strong.[21]
- People educated in traditional characters will often make extensive ad-hoc character simplifications in their handwriting to save time. This is similar to the practice of using abbreviations in informal written English (i.e. "thru" for "through") and proponents of traditional characters reply that this does not mean that the informal simplifications should be adopted as standard.[22]
Pro-Traditional characters
- Opponents say that the speed advantage of simplified Chinese becomes less relevant in the computer age.[23] With modern computing, entering Chinese characters is now dependent on the convenience of input method editors or IMEs. Most IMEs use phoneme-based input, such as pinyin romanization or bopomofo, while others are grapheme-based, such as cangjie and wubi. These have mainly sidelined the speed issues in handwritten Chinese, as traditional and simplified Chinese input methods have the same input speed, especially with phoneme-based IMEs. Furthermore, even when it comes to handwriting, a majority of people resort to semi-cursive script to reduce strokes and save time.[citation needed]
Pro-Simplified characters
- Proponents point out that Chinese characters are most often made up of a pronunciation-indicating part (called the phonetic) and a part that indicates the general semantic domain (called the radical). During the process of simplification, there are some attempts to bring greater coherence to the system. For example, the shape of 憂 (yōu), meaning "anxious", is not a good indicator of its pronunciation, because there are no clear radical and phonetic components. The simplified version is 忧, a straightforward combination of 忄, the "heart" radical to the left (indicating emotion) and the phonetic 尤 (yóu) to the right.[citation needed]
- Simplification emphasizes the phonetic, rather than semantic, nature of the characters. Most Chinese speakers are familiar with Standard Chinese, which the pronunciation is based on.[22][24]
Pro-Traditional characters
- Opponents point out that some simplified forms undermine the phonetics of the original characters, e.g. 盤 (pán, plate) has the phonetic component 般 (bān) on top, but the simplified form is 盘, whose upper part is now 舟 (zhōu). 盧 (lú, a family name) and 爐 (lú, "furnace") shares the same component 盧 in their original forms, but they were inconsistently simplified into 卢 and 炉 respectively, so that 炉 now has the less helpful 户 (hù) as its phonetic.[citation needed] Some characters were radically stripped of all phonetic elements. An example of a traditional character simplified such that its phonetic element is totally removed is 廣 (guǎng, meaning "extensive"), of which the internal character 黃 (huáng) is enclosed within a 广. Simplified, the character is written without its internal phonetic element: 广.[25]
- The phonologization of simplified characters reduces the writing system's ability to bring mutual understanding between speakers of different, especially non-Mandarin Chinese dialects.[24]
Pro-Simplified characters
- Proponents say that the radical system is imperfect in the first place. For example, 笑 (smile, laugh) uses the "bamboo" radical.
- The removal of the radical 雨 from the traditional word 電 (electricity) is a sign that Chinese is moving into the modern era because 雨 (rain radical) symbolizes that electricity comes from lightning; nowadays, electricity can come from more sources than just lightning.[24]
- The creators of simplified characters tried to retain semantic clues in characters wherever possible, which is why the simplification is not systematic. For example, càn (燦, "burning, bright") was simplified to 灿, retaining both the masculine "fire" radical (火) as well as a balancing "mountain" element (山).[10]
- Character simplification removed a number of offensive radicals, replacing the old character 僮 Zhuàng for the Zhuang people (meaning "child, boy servant") with another Zhuàng (壮 "strong, robust").[26]
Pro-Traditional characters
- Some argue that simplification results in a broken connection between characters, which makes it more difficult for students to expand their vocabulary in terms of perceiving both the meaning and pronunciation of a new character. For example, 鬧 (din, fuss) is now 闹, with the door radical 门 that is not indicative of its meaning.[23]
- The round of characters simplified by the Communist party was not systematic.[27] Extensive studies have been conducted among different age groups, especially children, to show that reducing the strokes loses the radical and phonetic relationships between the characters. This actually makes it more difficult for simplified character readers to distinguish the characters, since they now rely heavily on memorization.[27]
- Some traditional characters are very distinct. Such as electricity/lightning 電, rope 繩 and turtle 龜. After the simplification process all three characters appear to have the same components even though they have no relationship at all. Respectively electricity 电, rope 绳, turtle 龟 can be easily confused. The simplification of the word electricity/lightning 電 to 电 also took it out of the natural context. It no longer belongs with snow 雪, thunder 雷 and clouds 雲.[24]
Pro-Simplified characters
- Simplified Chinese characters are more legible when small fonts are used. The fine details of traditional Chinese characters are easy to discern in large size calligraphy but a number of very complex characters are much harder to identify when smaller fonts are used and complex character components can merge. This problem is exacerbated by low-quality printing. The recognition issue applies to some OCR software as well.[citation needed] Such software is more accurate with hanzi with fewer details.
- About 30% of simplified Chinese characters match simplified kanji (see shinjitai).[28] This makes it easier for people who know simplified characters to be able to read and understand Japanese kanji. For example, the character 国 (country) is written the same way in Japanese (国) although in traditional Chinese it is 國. However, those who understand traditional Chinese will understand a much greater proportion of Japanese Kanji, as the current standard Japanese character set is much more similar to traditional Chinese.
- Chinese calligraphy has favored the radical simplification of characters, especially in the cursive and semi-cursive styles. In semi-cursive script, the six-stroke character xíng (行, running) is reduced to just two strokes.[2]
Pro-Traditional characters
- Traditional Chinese characters are often used as the standard characters set in Chinese calligraphy in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and are allowed for calligraphy in the PRC, presumably because of its aesthetic value.[29]
- A strong preference for the aesthetics of traditional characters among Mainland Chinese has resulted in their significant usage in artistic work, signage, advertising, and internet screen names.
- Simplified characters, such as 门 for 門 (mén, door) look like the universal informal handwritten form, and look as improper as cursive would look in printed English.[24]
Pro-Simplified characters
- Despite the promotion of traditional Chinese characters, they are still used by only some 50 million people, including those in Taiwan, Macau, Hong Kong and many overseas communities. They remain in use in Mainland China however for artistic, scholarly and advertising purposes, however, and show no sign of disappearing from the Mainland.[30] Simplified Chinese has come to dominate the written form of Chinese used nearly all over the world, due to the size and rising influence of mainland China.[31] The United Nations has also used simplified Chinese since 1973.[32] Forcing over a billion people to relearn traditional characters contrary to their schooling would be difficult, confusing, and time-consuming.[23]
- Chinese text written before the 20th century was in Classical Chinese, which is much different from the Written vernacular Chinese used today, even in traditional characters. Learning to read the older texts requires additional study, even from Chinese-speakers educated in traditional characters. Many versions of the Chinese Classics have been published in simplified characters.[33]
- Acceptance of simplified characters is increasing, mirroring acceptance of the pinyin romanization system that was once a PRC and now an international standard, although with much greater resistance and to a significantly lesser extent. In the 1960s and 1970s, Chinese as a foreign language was taught in countries like France and the United States solely in traditional characters. In the 1990s, universities in the United States were split between simplified and traditional, with simplified growing and traditional being taught mainly for the benefit of those who wish to learn Classical Chinese, or Chinese for use in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macau, or overseas Chinese communities. Today, in terms of teaching and learning Chinese as a foreign language outside of China, the simplified characters has "become the first choice because of student demand".[34]
- With today's division of labor, not all students need to learn to read classical texts.[2] Schoolchildren can learn simplified characters first, and then traditional characters later if they want to be linguists or historians.[33]
Pro-Traditional characters
- While written communication with the large population of mainland China and other communities requires the use of simplified Chinese, there are compelling practical reasons which require the use of traditional characters. The Republic of China (ROC) is the largest community of traditional character users and ROC President Ma Ying-jeou pushed for the removal of simplified Chinese translations which were available for use by Mainland internet users on government websites before June 15, 2011. Government documents and websites are to only use traditional characters and while simplified characters are not banned in Taiwan the president strongly encouraged the exclusive use of traditional characters, even in the tourism sector.[35] This move to protect traditional characters ensures that visitors to the Republic of China will need to learn traditional characters if they wish to use Chinese.[36]
- Another common practical reason for the continuation of traditional characters is the expansive cultural legacy of Chinese history and art prior to simplification. The written form did evolve over the centuries but the traditional character set used today is much more closely related to the written Chinese which has been in use for thousands of years. As such the traditional characters are said to provide access to Chinese culture prior to simplification.[2]
- Those wishing to communicate or do business with overseas Chinese communities in the Western World require knowledge of traditional characters given their dominance in such communities and the negative connotations many in these communities associate with simplified characters.
The long history of Chinese characters and the role of the Chinese Communist Party in the design and adoption of simplified characters means that there is often a strong political aspect to the debate on the usage of traditional and simplified Chinese characters.
Pro-Simplified characters
- While the use of simplified Chinese is often associated with the PRC and its ruling Communist party the connection today is not as simple as it once may have been. Many simplified Chinese texts are published outside of mainland China. Overseas communities are now increasingly using simplified characters, especially when publications are intended for a mainland Chinese audience.[citation needed] Chinese newspapers in Singapore and Malaysia are mainly published in simplified Chinese. Most university Chinese programs in the United States and France teach simplified characters,[34][37] and the number continues to rise.[34] The internet is also increasingly diverse, with many websites including Wikipedia offering an easy switch between simplified and traditional scripts.
- Character simplification began in 1956 and had origins going back to the early 20th century before the founding of the PRC.[23] Even the Kuomintang developed a draft plan for character simplification in 1935, and as late as 1946 made positive statements about simplified characters like "As long as it doesn't use [romanization] or [bopomofo], anything can be considered guoyu".[38] Character simplification was not a part of the Four Olds nor the Cultural Revolution (both began in the mid 1960s). Whether traditional characters were "destroyed" or not is a matter of opinion, others might say they were "modified". Chinese culture is not static; Chinese people no longer wear Han Chinese clothing and this is not considered a big loss to Chinese culture.[23]
- Simplified Chinese characters were not entirely developed by the PRC as some of the simplified characters were taken from Japanese Shinjitai, such as 学 from 學 (xué, to study).[24]
- Promotion of traditional characters is sometimes characterized as a Taiwanese plot to sabotage China's language policy and to promote Sinocentrism and Chinese cultural nationalism, thereby undermining China's relation with national minorities and isolating China from the world.[21]
- Those who use simplified characters often remark that the issue is a simple one which has been made overly complicated by political considerations. They claim that the use of simplified characters or traditional characters should be decided based on pragmatic or aesthetic reasons, not political ones.[33] Also, they say that character simplification is relatively minor among political issues in the Chinese world.[23]
- The Chinese government did not intend to "cut off traditional culture"; it made special efforts to reprint classical literature in simplified texts, and does not forbid anyone from learning traditional characters on their own. The government tried to restrain the Anti-Four Olds campaign, which was a grassroots movement which had nothing to do with character simplification. Culture is not something so fragile or easily destroyed as by script reform.[39]
Pro-Traditional characters
- In the communities where traditional characters are used simplified characters are strongly associated with communism and often have strongly negative associations. As an extension of this, continuing to use traditional characters is a way of maintaining national identity.[40] School children in these areas are strongly discouraged from using simplified characters. In Taiwan especially, simplified characters have been regarded as "Communist" and are studiously avoided.[41]
- More specifically, character simplification, along with the "Anti-Four Olds" and the Cultural Revolution, is sometimes characterized a "Communist plot" to cut off traditional Chinese culture and values.[42] Simplified characters were banned in Taiwan until 2003.[43] Simplified characters are also branded in Taiwan as "bandit characters" (匪字, literally gangster characters).[44] In the past simplified characters was a variation only learned by specialists doing intelligence work at the height of the Communist China era.[42] Over time, many immigrants who left the PRC quickly learned traditional characters and consider simplified character materials from the PRC to be propagandistic.[42]
- The use of two different writing systems allows the Communist Party of China to selectively censor. For example, the book Whispers and Moans was very popular in Hong Kong but a simplified character edition was blocked by Beijing's Central Bureau of Censorship. The book, which is about the sex trade in Hong Kong, was said to conflict with the mainland's Marriage Law.[45]
Developments in recent years
In recent years, the official Campaign of Simplification of Chinese Language has caused many controversial discussions in the general public to higher level of the government in mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and amongst some international organisations.
In November 2007, scholars and representatives from Japan, Korea, mainland China, and Taiwan came to Beijing and joined the Eighth Annual International Conference of Chinese Language Study. The conference was conducted and hosted by the National Office of International Promotion of Chinese Language and Board of Language Usage & Applications of the Ministry of Education of China. Immediately after, Korean media reported that the scholars and representatives reached a few conclusions after long discussion in the conference. One of those conclusions was that scholars would be using Traditional Chinese characters to standardise 5000 common Chinese characters across the countries and would continue to allow the use of Simplified Chinese characters if there happened to have one across those different areas. However, Chinese officials claimed that they did not reach such an agreement but would like to see the harmonious coexistence of Traditional and Simplified Chinese. Still, to many, that was the approval from Chinese Government because they were no longer absolutely opposed to the use of Traditional Chinese.[46][47]
In March 2008, a Mainland author, Wang Gan, published a review article on his personal blog about the possibility of the re-introduction of Traditional Chinese, What About Abolishing Simplified Chinese within the Next 50 Years?.[48]
Twenty-one members of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) delivered a proposal to add Traditional Chinese characters to the primary school curriculum. The proposal was rejected by the Minister of Education, who explained, 'Our nation has its fundamental governing principles. [One of them, by law, is] to promote the usage of Simplified Chinese and Mandarin. This is the basic condition… Thus, we will not consider re-introducing Traditional Chinese education in our primary school curricula.'[49][50][51][52]
On 5 July 2008, on his visit to Taiwanese writer Koarn Hack Tarn's home, Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou promised that he would not introduce the usage of Simplified Chinese into the territories just because of the local newly passed policy to let Mainland tourists visit Taiwan but to provide side-by-side translation so that Mainland visitors could appreciate the aesthetic nature of Traditional Chinese. And he also told journalists that he wished all Chinese people would eventually be using Traditional Chinese in the near future.[51]
In early 2009, the ROC (Taiwan) government launched a campaign to obtain World Heritage status for Traditional Chinese characters in a bid to preserve them for the future.[53] At the Eleventh National People's Congress, a representative from Taiwan, Ms. Chen Jun, called for the Chinese government to support the world heritage campaign. She also suggested the introduction of Traditional Characters education into mainland primary and secondary education to improve passion for and understanding of traditional Chinese culture and language.[54]
During a March 2009 CPPCC meeting, member Pan Qinglin proposed that simplified characters should be abolished and Traditional Character usage reimplemented over the course of ten years. His proposal was widely criticized as frivolous.[55]
At the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences China Studies Forum in April 2009, it was announced that some adjustments would be made to the simplified characters. Experts acknowledged that some of the earlier character simplifications were problematic and inhibited understanding. Academics expressed support for the concept of "know traditional, write simplified" and specifically rejected the idea of reintroducing traditional characters as too costly and impractical.[56] They cited a survey of ninety-one top-ranked senior classical Chinese literature and Chinese language students from Beijing Normal University testing their ability to write Traditional Characters, which only three students passed.[57]
See also
^a In Taiwan, traditional characters are officially known as "proper charachers" (traditional Chinese: 正體字; simplified Chinese: 正体字; pinyin: zhèngtǐ zì), while most Chinese speakers outside Taiwan, whether using simplified or traditional characters, refer to traditional characters as complex characters (simplified Chinese: 繁体字; traditional Chinese: 繁體字; pinyin: fántǐ zì).
- ^ Keller, Andrée Tabouret. (1997). Vernacular Literacy: A Re-Evaluation. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-823635-2
- ^ a b c d e Chao, Eileen; Wang, Eugene; Hsuan, Meng; Matloff, Norman. "The Chinese Language, Ever Evolving". Room for Debate (The New York Times).
- ^ Ba Jin. (1999) "随想录·汉字改革".《汉字文化》.Issue 4, 1999. Beijing.
- ^ Ramsey, S. Robert (1987). The Languages of China. Princeton University Press. p. 147. ISBN 978-0-691-01468-5.
- ^ a b Norman, Jerry (1988). Chinese. Cambridge University Press. p. 81. ISBN 0-521-29653-6.
- ^ a b Karlgren, Bernhard (1974). Analytic Dictionary of Chinese and Sino-Japanese. Dover Publications, Inc., New York, 1974. Originally published in 1923. p. 1205.
- ^ "说文解字爱的解释". Zdic.net. Retrieved 2014-09-27.
- ^ a b Gunde, Richard. (2002). Culture and Customs of China. Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-30876-4
- ^ 2004年中国各省市文盲率排名
- ^ a b Hodge, Robert; Louie, Kam (1998). The Politics of Chinese Language and Culture: The Art of Reading Dragons. Psychology Press. pp. 62–64.
- ^ "演講紀錄". Theme.taipei.gov.tw. 2005-03-31. Retrieved 2014-02-09.
- ^ a b Macaraeg, Ruel A. (2006), The "Success" of Chinese Script Reform: A Critique of Assessment Methodology in China's Character Simplification Program
- ^ Aldrich, John (1995), "Correlations Genuine and Spurious in Pearson and Yule", Statistical Science 10 (4): 364–376, doi:10.1214/ss/1177009870, JSTOR 2246135
- ^ Street, Brian V.; Regie Stites (2001). Literacy and Development: Ethnographic Perspectives. London: Routledge. pp. 171–187. ISBN 978-0-415-23451-1.
- ^ 方舟子. "简体字引起混乱吗?". Retrieved 2014-02-09.
- ^ Varadi, Joe. "Simplified Chinese?". Retrieved 2 July 2011.
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- ^ http://www.hdpark.net/html/xinwen/shiping/2009/0418/927.html[dead link]
- ^ Liu, Jennifer Li-chia. Yan, Margaret Mian (1997). Interactions I-II: A Cognitive Approach to Beginning Chinese. Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-21122-0.
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- ^ a b Kaplan, Robert; Baldauf, Richard (2008). Language Planning and Policy in Asia. Multilingual Matters. pp. 69, 71, 74.
- ^ a b Mair, Victor (2006-12-13). "Simplified characters inside and outside of the People's Republic of China". Pinyin News. Retrieved 2012-03-02.
- ^ a b c d e f "The Chinese Character—no simple matter". China Heritage Quarterly. Australian National University. Retrieved 2012-03-02.
- ^ a b c d e f Poser, Bill (2007-01-03). "Notes on Chinese Character Simplification". Language Log. Retrieved 2012-03-02.
- ^ Smith, Arieh. "Reflections on China: The folly of simplified characters". The Chicago Maroon. Retrieved 2 July 2011.
- ^ Defrancis, John (1984). The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy, p. 117. University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8248-0866-5.
- ^ a b McBride-Chang, Catherine. Chen, Hsuan-Chih. (2003). Reading development in Chinese Children. Praeger/Greenwood publishing. ISBN 0-89789-809-5.
- ^ Japanese Simplications
- ^ Advantages and Disadvantages on Traditional Characters vs Simplified Characters, 2002, published by Government of City of Taipei, Republic of China [1] In point 3, it reads "Traditional characters is aesthetically pleasing, and therefore it is widely used by people who practice Chinese calligraphy throughout the world including countries such as Japan, Korea as well as mainland China. It is because traditional characters is able to express the artistic essence of calligraphy."
- ^ "Taiwan promotes traditional Chinese characters". Etaiwannews.com. 2009-01-01. Retrieved 2014-02-09.
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- ^ [2][dead link]
- ^ a b c Zhou, Raymond (2008-03-22). "'Jianti' and 'fanti' are equally good". China Daily. Retrieved 2012-03-04.
- ^ a b c Xing, Janet Zhiqun (2006). Teaching and Learning Chinese as a Foreign Language: A Pedagogical Grammar. Hong Kong University Press. pp. 31–32, 105, 323. ISBN 978-962-209-763-6.
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- ^ Norden, Bryan W. Van (2011). Introduction to Classical Chinese Philosophy. Hackett Publishing. p. 242. ISBN 9781603846158.
Most contemporary Chinese language programs at U.S. colleges and universities emphasize the simplified form.
- ^ Tsu, Jing (2011). Sound and Script in Chinese Diaspora. Harvard University Press. pp. 4–6.
- ^ Kraus, Richard (1991). Brushes with Power: Modern Politics and the Chinese Art of Calligraphy. University of California Press. p. 163.
- ^ Guo, Yingjie. (2004). Routledge. Cultural Nationalism in Contemporary China: The Search for National Identity under reform. ISBN 0-415-32264-2.
- ^ Rogers, Henry. (2005) Writing Systems: A Linguistic Approach. Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 0-631-23464-0.
- ^ a b c Farr, Marcia. Radloff, Sharon M. Reynolds, Rachel. Hymes, Dell. Isaacson, Carl. Judd, Elliot. Koliussi, Lukia. Lindquist, Julie. Markelis, Daiva. Miller, Laura. Miller, Peggy J. Morgan, Marcyliena. Nardini, Gloria. Cho, Grace. Gundlach, Robert. Rohsenow, John S. Moss, Beverly. Ethnolinguistic Chicago: Language and Literacy in the City's Neighborhoods. (2003). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. ISBN 0-8058-4345-0. p. 338.
- ^ Taiwan affairs office under PRC. "Gwytb.gov.cn." Mainland literature embraced in Taiwan. Retrieved on 2009-01-12.
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- ^ Yang, Yishan. Whispers and Moans: Interviews with the Men and Women of Hong Kong's Sex industry. (2006). Blacksmith Books. ISBN 962-86732-8-9. p. 17.
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- ^ Wang Gan, 2008-03-02, 五十年内,废除简化字如何
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text:
Don't ever count Rafael Nadal out. Not in his career. Not in a match.
When Rafa lost to a near-unknown in one of his first tournaments back from a long injury, it gave a lot of people pause. As it should. But that's been his only loss since the start of his comeback, which now covers four tournaments.
In Sunday's final of the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, when Rafa was down a set and a break to Juan Martin del Potro, who had been playing very strong throughout the tournament, it looked to be over. Not so much.
It almost feels like Rafa is hustling his opponent sometimes. He's not, but it did take him a long time to get into top gear against del Potro, who was coming off a surprising win over #1 Novak Djokovic, his first loss in about five months. It came at 2-3 in the second, when Rafa broke back and didn't lose another game in the set. Then he broke in the first game of the third, and it was over from there.
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But tennis fans in Miami will have to wait until next year for Rafa, as he pulled out of the upcoming Masters event there. With Roger Federer deciding a while ago not to play there, that leaves one of the biggest non-major tournaments without two of the top five players in the world.
On the women's side, the Indian Wells championship was never in question. Caroline Wozniacki had a good run in the tournament, but she does not match up well against Maria Sharapova. She can get into a battle of moon balls (very high shots) with other players, as she did in the semifinals against Angelique Kerber, but not so much against Maria. Sharapova was locked in and easily overpowered Wozniacki in straight sets.
On to Miami!


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By Vision Reporter
President Yoweri Museveni traveled to the western district of Kasese on Wednesday to assess the damage caused by the floods after River Nyamwamba burst its banks which left four people dead.
A seven-month-pregnant woman was among the dead at St Paul's Health Centre IV in Kasese Municipality a day after she was evacuated from Kilembe Mines Hospital.
The expectant mother and three others died in the process of being evacuated from the hospital to save them from floods.
President Museveni inspected the damage caused by the floods after River Nyamwamba burst its banks leaving scores displaced. PHOTO/PPU
On May 8, River Nyamwamba, which is next to the Kilembe hospital, burst its banks again, following a heavy downpour in the Rwenzori Mountains.
Two newborn babies and a 77-year-old woman died in the stampede as patients and their caretakers fled the hospital to escape the raging floods.
The St Paul Health centre IV in-charge, Dr. Ibrahim Kakule Masinda, named the deceased as Sharon Tusingwire, 30, wife to Sharif Nyaruhima of Mowlem village in from Hima Town Council.
Kakule said she was one of the 58 patents evacuated from Kilembe and relocated to the health facility.
"By the time she reached here she was in a coma and her foetus was already dead, leading to internal foetal death," he said on Friday.
"When we received her she was critically ill and in a coma. She did not come out of this coma. When we scanned her to ascertain the status of the pregnancy, we discovered that the foetus was dead," he said.
He said Tusingwire's husband, who had gone home on Thursday to organise the family after the evacuation from Kilembe, had not returned.
Sand mining poses risk to Kasese's largest river
Kasese floods: Rwenzururu king petitions gov't
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2 New Family-Friendly Apps for Kids (5 and Under)
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Pregnancy is a very exciting time, but can also be extremely stressful with all of the uncertainty and changes taking place. OB-on-the-Go (www.obonthego.com) is a new app that offers pregnancy information women… Read More
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School is out and summer is here. Kids don't have to suffer from summer tedium, not when parents have iPhones, iPads and iPods to help quell the boredom. Here are five free… Read More
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Check out these free apps to help plan summer activities, become closer with friends and family and simplify your everyday life. Path About Path The go-to lifestyle app for staying connected with… Read More
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Another great way to get ideas for egg decorating is the new Martha Stewart iPhone App. Find great ideas by the dozen in this brand-new app from MS. There are tons of… Read More
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All kids love animals — whether it's looking at them at the zoo or playing with their own pets, sometimes it's good to learn responsibility before actually going to the pet store… Read More
New High-Tech Tool to Help Parents with Potty Training The Littles
Pull-Ups Brand, parents' potty training partner for nearly 25 years, is kicking off the New Year with a new high-tech tool to help the approximately 4 million moms who will start potty… Read More
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Aside from the copious amount of games offered in Apple's App Store, toy manufacturer's are making toys that give playing with an app a whole new experience. Instead of just playing on… Read More
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Spay/neuter: What does the science say?
By Christie Keith
January 8, 2008
It's become an absolute tenet in the canon of good pet ownership that spaying and neutering our cats and dogs is healthier than leaving them intact. We've all heard the dire warnings about mammary tumors and uterine infections in bitches, unwanted marking and aggression in male dogs, and of course, the various societal or public health benefits of preventing the unwanted reproduction of dogs and cats.
But with all that talk, facts have been a bit scarce. Last month, the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association took a big step towards changing that, bringing together in one article a great deal of the research on the pros and cons of spaying and neutering pet dogs and cats.
The AVMA this week published the article publicly, so that pet owners could access it without paying the usual $10 fee. They have asked that if you choose to share the article, that you do so by giving out the link to it (which is at the end of this post) rather than copying the PDF file, so please honor that request — if not because it's the right thing to do, then because it might lead to even more articles being made public in the future.
Author Margaret V. Root Kustritz, DVM, PhD, DACT presents a comprehensive overview of research on the varying effects of sterilization surgery on male and female cats and dogs, as well as animals of different ages at the time of surgery. She begins by pointing out something that will be news to a lot of people:
Currently, most veterinarians in the United States recommend that elective gonadectomy [spay/neuter surgery] be performed in dogs and cats at 6 to 9 months of age. However, there does not appear to be any scientific evidence to document that this is the optimal age.
In other words, while veterinarians commonly recommend spaying and neutering be done on pet dogs and cats at around 6-9 months of age, that's just a habit, and not based on medical fact.
Pet Overpopulation and Social Benefit
After an overview, Kustritz tackles the societal perspective and the contentious issue of pet overpopulation. Obviously, animals who have been sterilized cannot reproduce, so their offspring will never find their way into the shelter system. In addition, she cites multiple studies showing intact dogs and cats are more likely to be surrendered at shelters than spayed or neutered dogs and cats — although one study showed the opposite; she speculates that the animals in that study may have been altered as part of the treatment of their behavioral problems.
She then uses numbers from 18 years ago to offer support for a hypothesis of "pet overpopulation." Her figures are given as a range, but the top of that range would be 18.6 million dogs and cats euthanized in shelters each year, when the figures I've seen for last year were more along the lines of 4-5 million… still 4-5 million too many and a tragedy, but her argument on the societal benefit of spay/neuter would have been stronger if it wasn't based on such outdated statistics. She indicated that owner ignorance about canine and feline reproduction was behind many relinquishments to shelters, citing in this case a 2004 study.
She then cited some more early 90s studies:
Owners that adopt animals from humane organizations routinely sign a spay-neuter contract. However, compliance with such contracts is typically [less than] 60%. Up to 90% of veterinarians support mandatory gonadectomy of dogs and cats prior to adoption.
The "gold standard" for communities now is to not adopt unaltered pets, and while I'm sure it does still happen, it's certainly far less common than it was 15 years ago, when the studies she cites were conducted.
She concludes this section by saying that veterinarians are largely untrained in early-age sterilization of kittens and puppies, and that remedying that, as well as requiring the sterilization of all animals adopted from shelters before adoption and "increased education of dog and cat owners about small animal reproductive physiology can only be of benefit in addressing these societal issues."
I want to remind everyone that this section deals with societal issues, not the individual health issues of pets — the medical aspects of early spay/neuter are addressed later in the article, along with a full discussion of the issues around spay/neuter surgery — after the jump.
The Effect of Spay/Neuter on Behavior
Spaying and neutering have been shown to reduce aggression between animals that is directly caused by the presence of a female in heat (estrus). That's very straightforward and doesn't really need any explanation.
She states that the trainability of working dogs is not altered by sterilization, and that age of sterilization also has no effect on the trainability of working dogs. The citation for this assertion was simply "personal communication" with R. Daniels at Canine Companions for Independence, which is disappointing, as it is completely contrary to the experience of many working dog trainers. Service and assistance dogs are working dogs, certainly, but dogs do many kinds of work in many different settings, and I don't believe you can extrapolate from one type of work to another.
Which actually brings to mind another "societal" issue — that of the continued existence of working dogs. Even if spaying and neutering them didn't impact their trainability, it would make it pretty hard to use your best working dogs to produce another generation of working dogs — and where will our police dogs, drug dogs, search and rescue dogs, guide dogs, stock dogs, and other working animals come from if they're all altered?
I think that each type of work and the needs of each breeding population needs to be looked at individually, and far more comprehensively, before a blunt statement in a veterinary article that sterilization has no effect on the trainability of working dogs is made — particularly when it's backed up by nothing more than a personal communication. I'd like to see this statement qualified quite a bit, or even removed.
She then looks at the sexual behavior of male cats, which she says makes them "undesirable, and often unsafe, household pets." Neutering tomcats decreases their unwanted behavior. Intact female cats and intact dogs of both sexes may still have some undesirable traits, but not to the extent of intact male cats. I'm sure a thousand cat breeders will yell at me, but I can't really argue with that. I've had intact male dogs for almost a quarter century, but managing an intact male cat is a task I'd never want to take on.
She says that other types of behavior problems are not "typically affected" by sterilization, although she cites one large study that found that noise phobias increased while separation anxiety and submissive urination decreased in dogs altered prior to the age of 5 months.
She then says that "several studies" have seen an increase in aggression both against humans and other dogs after spaying, and adds that "The reason for this possible tendency has not been defined but may be attributable to a decrease in estrogen and oxytocin concentrations, both of which may exert antianxiety effects in some species. This tendency also may be a breed-specific phenomenon."
She then looks at how the ability to think — cognitive function — is affected by spaying and neutering. One small study (only 6 dogs) found that intact dogs had a slower progression toward cognitive problems than neutered males. Male hormone deprivation has been associated with similar problems in other species, including humans. But in another study, investigators looked directly at the brains of laboratory beagles between 9 and 10. 5 years old, and found more neurons with DNA damage in the intact dogs than neutered dogs.
Physical Health and Spay/Neuter
Dr. Kustritz then moves into the literally massive amount of literature on the positive and negative health impacts of spaying and neutering, including cancer and orthopedic disease.
First is some well known territory: Mammary gland tumors in female dogs, which are the most common type of malignant tumors in the dog — half of all canine mammary tumors are malignant, and up to 77 percent of those metastasize, often to the lungs. This risk increases as the dogs and cats get older, and some breeds are at greater risk than others, including "the Boxer, Brittany, Cocker Spaniel, Dachshund, English Setter, English Springer Spaniel, German Shepherd Dog, Maltese, Miniature Poodle, Pointer, Toy Poodle, and Yorkshire Terrier."
Only the Japanese domestic breeds and Siamese cats are stated as being at increased risk for feline mammary tumors.
Unspayed dogs and cats have an overall 7 times greater risk of developing mammary tumors than spayed dogs and cats. When you break that down, however, it's much clearer:
Dogs have an overall incidence of mammary tumors of 3.4 percent. Dogs spayed before their first heat have only a 0.5 percent of the chance of getting a mammary tumor that intact female dogs have; this is a 1.7 percent chance overall, although it may be more or less depending on breed and other factors. Dogs spayed after they've had two heats have 26 percent of the risk of intact female dogs, or around 1.3 percent overall (again, dependent on breed and other factors). [Update: See this comment for additional discussion of this statistic.] I didn't see any mention if pregnancy changed those statistics, as it does, for instance, in human females.
On the other hand, ovarian and uterine tumors are uncommon in dogs and cats, and rarely metastasize or are malignant. Spaying cures them.
On the male side of things, neutered male dogs are at increased risk of prostatic cancer. The incidence of prostate tumors in dogs is between 0.2 and 0.6 percent, with almost all of them being malignant adenocarcinomas. Neutered males have 2.4 to 4.3 times the risk of intact dogs.
Testicular tumors are, of course, not found in dogs who have had their testicles removed, but testicular tumors in dogs tend to appear late in life and are rarely malignant; neutering at that time will cure them in most cases.
Spayed and neutered animals have a 200 to 400 percent greater risk of developing a form of bladder cancer (transitional cell carcinoma, or TCC) than intact animals, but the reason is unknown.
Spaying and neutering can increase the risk of osteosarcoma (bone cancer) by 1.3 to 2 times, although the cause and effect relationship is unknown.
Hemangiosarcoma is a tumor of the heart or spleen; the heart tumor has a fairly high incidence in dogs. Spayed and neutered dogs are at greater risk of developing these tumors. Spayed females have 2.2 times the risk of a spleen tumor and 5 times the risk of a heart tumor, compared with the risk for unspayed females.
Neutered males have 2.4 times the risk of a heart tumor than intact males. The reason for this increased risk is unknown.
Orthopedic Issues
Unlike in humans, there is no increased risk of osteoporosis in spayed animals.
Early age sterilization delays the closure of the covering on the long bones, and makes them a little longer than they would have been. There is no increased rate of fracture associated with this.
One study did find an increased incidence of fractures in overweight neutered male cats.
There was an increased incidence of hip dysplasia in dogs who had been spayed or neutered prior to 5 months of age in one large study of 1,842 dogs, however, the diagnosis of hip dysplasia may have been in doubt with some of the dogs in the study.
In humans, rupture of the cranial cruciate ligament (or CCL, a ligament in the knee) is more common in women than men and more likely to occur during certain phases of the menstrual cycle, which leads researchers to believe there is a hormonal cause for this condition. In dogs, CCL rupture is more common in spayed females and neutered males.
Despite the common refrain that "altering doesn't make your pets gain weight," Dr. Kustritz states that "obesity is the most common nutritional disorder of cats and dogs," and goes on to say:
The most commonly reported risk factor for obesity is gonadectomy, with spayed or castrated dogs and cats much more commonly designated by veterinarians as being overweight or obese, compared with the weight designations for sexually intact animals.
One study found that there was no difference in food intake, body weight, or depth of back fat in two groups of dogs, some altered at 7-8 weeks old, and the others at 7 months.
However, another large study — a retrospective study, which means they "looked back" at dogs who had already been altered rather than having a test population specifically for the study — found that dogs altered prior to 5 months of age had a lower rate of obesity than those altered at greater than 5 months.
Two studies found that the metabolic rate of spayed and neutered cats is lower than intact cats, but no such clear-cut cause and effect relationship is known in dogs.
Female dogs do experience increased appetite after being spayed when compared to dogs of the same age who are unspayed — including those who had a "sham surgery." This contests the common explanation that spaying doesn't make female dogs fat, it's just that they're getting older. Dr. Kustritz writes:
Estrogen may act as a satiety factor, which would explain these changes. This does not address the correlation between obesity and castration in male dogs.
Urinary Tract and Genital Abnormalities and Disorders
For unknown reasons, female dogs have a greater risk of bladder infections.
Female dogs spayed before puberty may have some abnormalities of their vulvas, and Dr. Kustritz writes:
It is the author's experience that bitches spayed as adults will have vulvar atrophy, which achieves the same result. A juvenile vulva in an otherwise healthy dog is of no clinical relevance.
Female dogs who are overweight and have a recessed vulva, especially if they also suffer from urinary leaking (incontinence), are more likely to develop a chronic rash in the area.
Male dogs neutered at 7 weeks of age had a smaller penis than dogs neutered when older, and male cats neutered prior to puberty had less ability to extrude the penis. It's not known if this is a health issue or not.
I'm a little confused by her statements on feline lower urinary tract disease (FLUTD), She first states neutering has no effect on the rate of FLUTD in male cats:
Despite numerous vehemently declared anecdotes of an increase in the incidence of urethral obstruction in male cats castrated when young, numerous studies have failed to detect a correlation between gonadectomy of cats at any age and a decrease in diameter of the urethra or an increase in incidence of FLUTD, with or without urethral obstruction.
She then goes on to apparently contradict that:
In 1 large study,136 investigators identified gonadectomy as a risk factor for development of FLUTD in both female and male cats and also identified an increased risk of development of FLUTD in overweight or obese cats. In that study, sexually intact female cats had a relatively reduced risk for development of FLUTD.
She offers no explanation for this apparent contradiction.
The condition usually called "spay incontinence" in female dogs, which she calls "urethral sphincter mechanism incompetence, formerly known as estrogen-responsive urinary incontinence," is common — as many as 20 percent of spayed dogs suffer from it. Here we have another one of those contradictions I can't quite resolve.
She first says that "Studies have failed to detect a correlation between age at time of OHE (spay) and likelihood of developing incontinence."
Yet her very next sentence contradicts that:
In a study of 983 female dogs, bitches were significantly less likely to develop incontinence when spayed at [greater than] 3 months of age…. An exact cause-and-effect relationship has not been defined, with research currently focusing on altered gonadotropin secretion after gonadectomy.
Endocrine System and Hormonal Issues
Dr. Kustritz states she's not aware of any increase in the incidence of adrenal gland disease (Cushing's, Addison's) in dogs or cats related to altering, even though "the incidence of adrenal gland disease in ferrets is higher in the United States than in European countries where ferrets are not routinely spayed or castrated."
Pyometra is an infection of the uterus. She somewhat surprised me by saying that there are no statistics on the rate of pyometra in dogs and cats in the United States, due to high rates of spaying. I certainly hear about quite a bit of pyo among breeders who I know, although I'm not saying that comes close to any kind of scientific documentation. But I know quite a few bitches who have had to be spayed due to a uterine infection.
She continues to say that in "other countries, 15.2% and 23% to 24% of bitches developed pyometra by 4 and 10 years of age, respectively. Pyometra is more common in [bitches who have never had a litter] than in bitches with a history of carrying a pregnancy successfully to term."
She adds, "There is a significant likelihood that cats will have clinical evidence of uterine disease when queens reach 5 years of age."
She says that spay is curative for pyometra, and morality rates are as low as zero in dogs and 8 percent in cats.
Prostate disease other than cancer — benign prostatic hypertrophy-hyperplasia (BPH) — is common in intact male dogs. One study found that more than 60 percent of intact male dogs had BPH, while by contrast, all neutered dogs in the study had very atrophied prostate glands.
By the age of 9, nearly every intact male dog will have some degree of BPH, which can make them more susceptible to prostatitis, or inflammation or infection of the prostate. Treatment for both usually includes neutering.
One study found that neutered male dogs have a greater risk of diabetes, but this might have been due to obesity.
Spayed and neutered cats have an 8.7 times greater risk of developing diabetes than intact cats — she doesn't say whether obesity is a factor here, but I would expect it must be.
Spayed and neutered dogs have an increased risk of hypothyroidism, for unknown reasons.
Life Span
Even though obesity is more common in spayed and neutered dogs and cats and is correlated with shorter life span, spayed and neutered dogs and cats nonetheless tend to live longer than intact animals. She speculates, "In dogs and cats, this may be a reflection of enhanced care of animals by owners who have made the investment of surgery or a decrease in risk-associated behaviors (such as roaming)" in altered animals, rather than an actual medical result of being spayed or neutered.
Her Conclusions
Dr. Kustritz makes a distinction between the effect of spaying and neutering on individual, owned pets, and animals in shelters. As many veterinarians understandably do, she considers shelter animals to be "a population," and recommends making decisions based on the good of the population and societal benefit rather than the individual animal. For that reason, she believes all dogs and cats in shelters who are offered for adoption should be spayed or neutered.
On the other hand, she believes that pets should be evaluated on an individualized basis by their owner and the pet's veterinarian:
Pets should be considered individually, with the understanding that for these pets, population control is a less important concern than is health of each animal. Dogs and cats should be maintained as household pets. Responsible owners should ensure that their pets are provided appropriate and regularly scheduled veterinary care.
Because the behavior of unaltered male cats is so extreme, she recommends that all tomcats be neutered prior to puberty unless intended for breeding, and all breeding males be neutered as soon as their breeding use is over.
She then outlines a veterinarian-client interaction that I would give money to see in real life, and that I sincerely hope is the kind of thing actually taking place somewhere, even though I've never seen anything remotely like it. Imagine, she says, an owner with a new puppy, an 8-week-old Labrador female, coming into the vet's office.
The owner has no intention of breeding.
Spaying the puppy before her first heat would reduce her chance of mammary gland tumors, which are both common and deadly.
On the downside, because of her breed, spaying would increase her risk of cruciate ligament rupture, hemangiosarcoma, and obesity. But the rate of hemangiosarcoma is low, and obesity can be controlled if the owner is alerted to watch out for it and told how to prevent it, which leaves only the risk of the cruciate rupture.
The risk of CCL injury is lower than that for mammary gland tumors, and can possibly be staved off by keeping the dog in good physical condition. For this puppy, spaying before her first heat is clearly in her best interest — but after 3 months of age, to reduce the risk of spay incontinence.
Her final words:
The information provided here on the risks and detriments of gonadectomy is not intended to promote or to minimize the importance of gonadectomy as a means of controlling animal populations or possible impacts on animal health or behavior of a specific animal. The veterinary profession recognizes the need for individual assessment of risk and benefit when evaluating vaccination protocols for animals. Elucidation of the genome in various species may lead to individualized diagnostic and treatment plans for each animal in the future. It behooves us as veterinarians dedicated to the provision of the best possible care for animals to educate clients and evaluate each animal carefully when making recommendations regarding gonadectomy.
The idea that "one size fits all medicine" can ever be good medicine is a false one, when disucssing spay/neuter or anything else. I'm very glad the AVMA made this article, with all its references, available to the public. Even though I believe most dog and cat owners will continue to spay and neuter their animals, the age at which they do so, and their awareness of some health complications they need to be aware of, may well be influenced by the information it contains.
The article, in two different PDF formats, is here.


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The Graduate Center offers more than thirty doctoral programs in the arts, humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences, including History.
Learn about the Graduate Center's core faculty,
including Distinguished Professor David Joselit (pictured),
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Based on her recent book Las relaciones exteriores de Mexico 1821 - 2000 (2012), Ambassador Roberta Lajous will lecture on the peaks and troughs of bilateral relations between Mexico and the United States. Read more


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Internet on a Phone? What a Noble Concept from GE
The GE InfoLink (left) is the latest phone that is doing what cellphones have been doing for a while: Internet. This phone's small LCD will display information such as sports scores, RSS feeds, weather, stocks, etc. There are also no fees associated with this subscription, except for the fee (and embarrassment) of… »


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Cultural Diversity Training
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For the past 30 years, the Spring Institute has been helping organizations and employees raise cultural diversity awareness to new levels and develop skills that enable them to meet the challenges inherent in a culturally diverse workplace.
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