City University of Hong Kong Dep
Department of Chinese, Translation and Linguistics
Research Seminar
"“Kanji” (Japanese characters) and
“Hanzi” (Chinese characters) "
Presented by
Prof. Eiji Matsuoka
Tokyo Gakugei University and Beijing Foreign Studies University
Date: 27 November 2007, Tuesday
Time: 4:30pm - 6:00pm
Venue: P4910 (Lift 1, 4/F, Purple Zone), Academic Building, CityU
Abstract
This talk will cover the following two topics.
Topic 1: Unification of “Kanji” (Japanese characters) and “Hanzi” (Chinese characters)
In 1945, Japan and China started to simplify the shape of Han characters, including “Kanji” in Japan and “Hanzi” in China. In 1989 , Dr. Xie (谢世涯) , a scholar in Singapore, proposed to unify the shape of Japanese simplified characters into Chinese simplified characters. But it is very difficult to do so because of their cultural and historical backgrounds.
Topic 2: Chinese pronunciation for “Kokuji” (国字, Japanese original characters)
Now in China, the newspapers and TV often need to use “Kokuji”, the Japanese original characters, for writing and broadcasting Japanese personal and place names. Unfortunately, there hasn’t been any rule for their pronunciation that people can follow. In this talk, I would like to present our thoughts about their pronunciation and give 34 examples for illustration. Especially, we focus on the four characters “丼”,“峠”,“栂”，“匂”, whose pronunciation is very difficult to identify. Nevertheless, it is very interesting for us to analyze and solve this problem.
Speaker
Prof. Matsuoka, is professor of Japanese and Chinese language and culture, Tokyo Gakugei University, and currently the Director of Beijing Research Centre of Japanese Studies, Beijing Foreign Studies University. He was the chief delegate of Japan National Body to edit ISO/IEC 10646 (Unicode) during 1990-2005. In 1999, he won Unicode Bulldog Award in U.S.A. He edited the Sanseido New Reikai Japanese Dictionary（例解新国語辞典 as a secretary of its editorial group from 1978 to 1984, and “Sanseido Crown Chinese-Japanese Dictionary（クラウン中日辞典）” as Editor-in-Chief from 1994 to 2001. Prof. Matsuoka was born in 1951 at Hamamatsu, Japan. He graduated from Tokyo Normal University in 1975 and studied at the Graduate School of University of Tokyo from 1975 to 1979. He majored in Chinese classic literature, especially literature in Six Dynasties, and sociolinguistics.
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