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Martha is reading
The Book of the Earth,

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a novel by the famous
Chinese artist Xu Bing.

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It has collected hundreds of emojis and icons

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in a writing that can be read by
anyone, of any nationality,

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because it is freed from words
of any particular language.

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then he turned on the radio
and saw that it was raining,

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that the temperature dropped
and thought about taking an umbrella.

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Is this a glimpse of our future?

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For 5,000 years,
writing technology

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has allowed people to communicate
through space and time

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and made civilization itself possible.

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Of common roots,

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writing became a
myriad of different scriptures.

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But today, a new technology
digital communication

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is becoming universal
across the globe.

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Will this new technology bring
a new universal way of writing?

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As writing changes,
Will we change with her?

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THE SECRET HISTORY
OF WRITING

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EPISODE 3

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CHANGING THE WRITING

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This is the square
Dolmabahce in Istanbul.

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Every year, Turks gather here
to commemorate the anniversary

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of the death of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

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Mustafa Kemal was the founder
of modern Turkey,

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and its influence is still felt in
many aspects of Turkish life,

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especially when someone
from here take a pen,

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because, in 1928, Mustafa Kemal
did something extraordinary.

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It changed the way
What the Turks wrote.

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The written word is so important
in all the days of life,

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that there may be few
more radical acts

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than to force an entire nation
to learn a new writing.

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However, what happened
in Türkiye in the 1920s,

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It was just part of a movement
that traveled the world

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in the 20th century.

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There were a series of deed reforms
that threatened to replace

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to the multitude of systems
traditional writing

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with a unique and universal writing,

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that of the Latin alphabet.

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The Latin alphabet was the writing
of the Roman Empire.

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But its global spread
It was due to printing.

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It was because the Latin letters

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They turned out to be easier to
print than other writings,

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that the printing press took off in Europe from a
way it didn't in other places.

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The resulting explosion in information,

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led to revolutions
scientific and industrial that,

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at the beginning of the 20th century,

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took Europe to unprecedented levels
precedents of wealth and power.

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This link between the Latin alphabet

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and the rise of society
western industrial,

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led the leaders of
other parts of the world,

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that they wanted to take to their countries
along the same path,

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Let's see, in Western writing,
the key to modernity.

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Latin writing,
It's a western thing,

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and even the idea of modernization,

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It is very oriented towards the West.

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Intellectual leaders thought that
ancient Chinese writing could not

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adapt to Western civilization.

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Could it be adoption
of the latin alphabet

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a shortcut to mass literacy,

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for mass communication
and towards a modern society?

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Or was changing the writing a
recipe for confusion and conflict?

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The history of the reform
of writing in Türkiye,

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begins with the fall
of the Ottoman Empire.

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For more than 600 years,
the ottoman turks

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They had ruled vast territories,

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which sometimes included
much of southeastern Europe,

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Western Asia and North Africa.

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But then came the First
World War.

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British soldiers in the City
Santa captures Turkish prisoners.

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With military defeat at the hands
of the Western allies,

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Türkiye lost its empire
and won a new reformist leader

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called Mustafa Kemal.

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Mustafa Kemal was an Ottoman officer.

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His project was basically to combine
his own political ambitions,

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with some kind of planning
modernizing,

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for what was left of the empire
Ottoman, and therefore, the desire

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to establish a writing system
modern, westernized.

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Mustafa's plan
Kemal to westernize

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the turkish writing system,

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was based on decades of dissatisfaction

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with the way Turkish was written.

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From the very beginning
of the Ottoman Empire,

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their rulers had chosen
represent the Turkish language

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with the writing of the Koran,
the Arabic alphabet.

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But the spoken Arabic
and spoken Turkish,

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They are two very different languages.

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The problem of the Ottomans
was that the turkish

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not very compatible
with Arabic writing.

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I mean, it's almost
diametrically opposite,

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since Arabic has a
incredible number of consonants

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and, on the other hand, it has a quantity
very limited vowels.

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On the contrary, spoken Turkish
uses few consonants

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but a great diversity of vowels.

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Vowels that are not represented
in the Arabic alphabet.

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The idea that writing
Arabic was a discordance,

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It was something more or less recognized
by members of the elite.

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The Ottomans had
been evaluating the idea

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to reform your alphabet
for at least 50 or 60 years.

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But Mustafa Kemal was not
a man of half measures.

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Instead of reforming the Arabic alphabet,

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decided to replace it completely
with the Latin alphabet of the West.

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It was in the summer of 1928
who came up with the idea,

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and then he ran a campaign
public relations,

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because he traveled throughout Anatolia
and his instrument was a slate.

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There is a fascinating photograph,
that has become iconic,

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where do you see him pointing
to the new letters.

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With the Latin alphabet,

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it was easier to spell
Turkish words phonetically,

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so it seemed like it would be
easier to learn to read.

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There was little reason to

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oppose the logic in which
This transformation was based,

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given that 90% or even more,
of the population was illiterate.

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It was very fast, almost
overnight.

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I think it took a year
so that everyone fits,

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including the press.

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From night to morning,
They tell you what to insert

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more and more Latin writings,

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so you could still keep
the usual Arabic alphabet,

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But at the end of the year,

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you were going to have to put it
all in Latin script.

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But Mustafa Kemal was not satisfied

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with the introduction
of a new writing.

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I was also determined
to ban the old one.

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And, in 1929, the writing
Arabic was banned.

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It was illegal. You couldn't use it.

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At first glance, it seems
unnecessary to prohibit a writing

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that literate Turks had
been using for centuries,

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but Mustafa Kemal was aware of
that the meaning of Arabic writing,

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was not limited to words
that he represented.

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The Sufis are an example of this.

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They are famous for their swirling trance,

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and his deep study of Islam.

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Sufis try and achieve
a direct communion with God,

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through rituals like these.

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but also through
of the text of the Koran.

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They believe there are hidden meanings
not only within the words,

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but within them
Arabic alphabet letters.

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Cemalnur Sargut, a
renowned Turkish Sufi writer,

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told me something about the meaning
sacred of Arabic letters.

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Each letter of the Arabic alphabet,

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each of the 29 letters represents
one of the names of Allah.

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And the meanings multiply.

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For example, many chapters of
Quran begins with the Muqatta'at.

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Mysterious groups of three,
four or five letters

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that do not spell any
well-known word in Arabic.

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The most common Muqatta'at
It's Alif Laam Meem,

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the equivalent of A, L and M
in the Latin alphabet.

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As Cemalnur explained to me,

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For the Sufis, these letters are
a kind of spiritual code.

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Alif means Allah is one and only.

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Laam means resurrection,

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the energy used to
moment of resurrection.

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Meen means body. The body of
prophet or the bodies of prophets.

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One of the most
important in the Koran,

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one of the most important
In Islam, it is reading and writing.

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So the pen means
universal wisdom,

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the essence of intelligence, as well as
the full extent of wisdom.

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That's why it needs to be
written somewhere.

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The spiritual connection
between writing and religion,

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It extends to the act of writing itself.

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Mahmut Sahin
He is a Turkish calligrapher

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but, 80 years after the reform
from the writing of Mustafa Kemal,

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still mainly writes
with Arabic letters.

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Writing is an art.

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This art involves many
sacred mathematics and geometry.

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Of course, that comes
from a divine source.

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Without a pen there is no civilization.

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Even the materials
used in writing

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They acquire a sacred meaning.

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We never throw away pencil scraps
nor the scraps of paper we use.

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We keep them and when we die,

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a ceremony is held
Islamic religious.

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The body of the deceased
washes with hot water

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and to heat the water, we burn
the remains of pencils and papers.

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Whatever the
practical justification,

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discard the Arabic alphabet had
a high cost for many Turks.

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There is, of course, the trauma
psychological and cultural,

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of people very attached to their religion,

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for whom language, writing,
It is not just a writing,

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It is the writing of the Quran.

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One of the biggest problems
it is the breaking of the link

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between us and our ancestors.

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You can't read the titles
owned by his grandfather,

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nor his work in the library,
in its original text.

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The new generation cannot
read old tombstones.

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A generation grew up that did not
You can read your grandparents' tombstones.

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But, for Mustafa Kemal,

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this brutal break with the past
It was precisely the objective.

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The adoption of Latin writing
It wasn't just a practical matter.

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to improve literacy,

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It was also an attempt to alter
the trajectory of Turkish history,

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distance her from her Islamic past
towards a type of society

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secular, technological, like
was being created in Europe.

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For Mustafa Kemal, that was in
reality, the attraction of the West.

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There is a linguistic justification.
for the... for the reform,

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but there is also a
civilizing justification.

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It's because he wants to become European.

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So writing is crucial.

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It is one of the most daring reforms,

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because it really impacts.

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It has a promise of enlightenment.

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That is, seen from the perspective
from the 1920s,

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This is a way of saying,

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that this is our first step
towards the creation of a nation,

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and to spread literacy
and the education of the masses.

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The writing itself
It is very symbolic.

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It is something that everyone recognizes.

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Symbolically, I think
It is a very powerful play,

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and is very well received by the West.

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00:16:07,440 --> 00:16:10,570
It's a great public relations event.

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Ataturk lives quietly, dedicating
time to teach the little ones

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of his six adopted daughters, the alphabet
that made all of Türkiye learn.

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00:16:21,280 --> 00:16:23,680
But the Turks were not
the only people

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what they should have learned
a new way of writing.

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In the 1920s,
the latin alphabet,

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with its promise of modernity,
was advancing through Asia.

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00:16:39,680 --> 00:16:42,050
The story of what happened next,

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illustrates the power of writing
to shape who we are.

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There is nothing more evocative
of the Islamic world,

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than the call to prayer.

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But there is something else that tells us

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that we are in a Muslim country.

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Arabic writing is everywhere,

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because writing is not only
a means of communication,

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It is a sign of identity,

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and with a change of writing, comes
a fundamental change in identity.

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This is Bukhara in Uzbekistan.

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It was once an important city
oasis on the Silk Road

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between China and the Mediterranean.

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00:18:15,920 --> 00:18:19,250
In the 19th century, this as the
most Islamic states

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of Central Asia, was absorbed
by the expanding Russian empire.

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00:18:24,640 --> 00:18:28,010
Under the tsars, languages
Turks of the region,

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They continued, however,
writing with the Arabic script,

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the one that had been used here, since
Muslim conquests of the 8th century.

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00:18:38,680 --> 00:18:42,290
But in 1917, the Russian empire collapsed

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and the communist party took power.

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00:18:46,320 --> 00:18:51,010
Their leader, Lenin, was determined
to modernize and secularize

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all aspects of society,
throughout the new Soviet Union.

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00:18:55,040 --> 00:18:57,910
So in Asia
Central, as in Türkiye,

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that meant changing the writing.

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00:19:03,960 --> 00:19:07,290
Shahnoza Soatova is a philologist

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00:19:07,320 --> 00:19:10,960
and expert in reform
of writing in Uzbekistan.

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00:19:12,520 --> 00:19:15,880
The politics of Latinization,
It was Lenin's idea.

244
00:19:16,020 --> 00:19:19,880
It was a way to get rid
of the legacy of the tsars,

245
00:19:21,020 --> 00:19:26,580
but also, the idea of Latinization
It was all over the world.

246
00:19:26,620 --> 00:19:30,980
I wanted to export the revolution and
integrate with Europe and the West,

247
00:19:31,120 --> 00:19:33,180
with the help of the alphabet.

248
00:19:35,620 --> 00:19:40,780
So in 1929, the Soviet Union
He decreed the change to Latin letters.

249
00:19:47,040 --> 00:19:51,200
As in Türkiye, the new writing was
part of a literacy campaign.

250
00:19:52,760 --> 00:19:58,440
But, as also in Türkiye, it caused
a brutal break with the past.

251
00:19:59,520 --> 00:20:02,600
Because Arabic writing
was quite linked,

252
00:20:02,630 --> 00:20:04,570
figuratively, in the structure

253
00:20:04,600 --> 00:20:07,000
from cities like Samarkand.

254
00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:24,930
Virtually all panels of each
building in this magnificent place,

255
00:20:24,960 --> 00:20:26,920
They are covered by writings.

256
00:20:29,000 --> 00:20:32,570
It is a work of Arabic calligraphic art,

257
00:20:32,600 --> 00:20:34,680
expressed in architecture.

258
00:20:42,160 --> 00:20:44,970
Some of the panels look
geometric patterns,

259
00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:49,960
but in reality, they are also written
in angular kufic calligraphy.

260
00:20:52,000 --> 00:20:56,330
For example, in the very center
of that design on the portal,

261
00:20:56,360 --> 00:20:59,170
there is a rhombus, in the middle
of which, in dark blue,

262
00:20:59,200 --> 00:21:01,290
there is the name of Allah, four times,

263
00:21:01,320 --> 00:21:03,960
Made to look like a repeating pattern.

264
00:21:05,080 --> 00:21:08,930
On the sides around that
rhombus, highlighted in turquoise,

265
00:21:08,960 --> 00:21:10,840
There is the name of Muhammad.

266
00:21:19,960 --> 00:21:24,380
In a short period, people
that for a thousand years

267
00:21:24,460 --> 00:21:27,880
had written and read in Uzbek
with Arabic writing,

268
00:21:28,060 --> 00:21:33,180
and he had an inheritance in that
invaluable culture,

269
00:21:33,960 --> 00:21:39,080
was forced to start
to use Latin writing.

270
00:21:39,760 --> 00:21:43,440
Latinization was, in essence,
a political project.

271
00:21:44,760 --> 00:21:47,960
But, returning to Moscow,
politics was changing.

272
00:21:48,960 --> 00:21:52,010
Lenin's successor, Joseph Stalin,

273
00:21:52,040 --> 00:21:55,730
I was less interested
in the world revolution

274
00:21:55,760 --> 00:21:58,890
than in consolidating its total control

275
00:21:58,920 --> 00:22:02,440
over all the subject peoples
under a new Russian empire.

276
00:22:03,480 --> 00:22:08,440
And once again, a new policy
It meant a new writing.

277
00:22:10,980 --> 00:22:15,620
Since 1940, mandatory use was ordered

278
00:22:15,980 --> 00:22:20,320
of Cyrillic throughout the Soviet Union.

279
00:22:20,580 --> 00:22:25,020
The Latin alphabet disappeared

280
00:22:25,480 --> 00:22:31,020
and Cyrillic became a tool
for the policy of Russianization.

281
00:22:31,560 --> 00:22:35,570
The Russian Cyrillic alphabet
was the writing of Central Asia

282
00:22:35,600 --> 00:22:37,490
for five decades,

283
00:22:37,520 --> 00:22:41,090
but then the politics of Russia
changed again.

284
00:22:41,120 --> 00:22:45,010
In 1991 the Soviet Union collapsed.

285
00:22:45,040 --> 00:22:48,330
and Uzbekistan became
an independent country.

286
00:22:48,360 --> 00:22:52,010
The Uzbeks now had
a new political identity,

287
00:22:52,040 --> 00:22:55,250
and for the leader of the nation,
Islam Karimov,

288
00:22:55,280 --> 00:22:57,970
there was no stronger way
to point out this change,

289
00:22:58,000 --> 00:23:00,800
than change the alphabet once again.

290
00:23:01,800 --> 00:23:05,680
Cyrillic came out,
but the Arabic did not return.

291
00:23:06,100 --> 00:23:09,910
There are certainly some reasons
politics of why we returned to Latin.

292
00:23:09,940 --> 00:23:13,110
First of all, Cyrillic
carried the Russian ideology,

293
00:23:13,240 --> 00:23:16,400
and after winning
our independence,

294
00:23:16,740 --> 00:23:21,280
We wanted to escape from Russian influence,

295
00:23:21,310 --> 00:23:27,300
of Russianization,
of Russian ideology,

296
00:23:27,440 --> 00:23:32,360
and approach a common Turkish area,

297
00:23:32,390 --> 00:23:36,500
to Türkiye, to Europe, to the world.

298
00:23:36,640 --> 00:23:40,900
For this reason we had to
change the alphabet.

299
00:23:42,240 --> 00:23:47,200
In 1929 we moved from the alphabet
Arabic to Latin alphabet,

300
00:23:47,340 --> 00:23:50,900
Then in 1940, we changed from
Latin alphabet to Cyrillic alphabet.

301
00:23:51,040 --> 00:23:55,900
In 1993, we rejected Cyrillic
and we returned to the Latin alphabet.

302
00:23:56,740 --> 00:24:01,500
In 1995 we renovated and updated
partially some Latin characters,

303
00:24:01,640 --> 00:24:04,800
moving to a modified alphabet.

304
00:24:07,240 --> 00:24:10,250
No country has changed
your alphabet more often,

305
00:24:10,280 --> 00:24:13,760
in such a period of time
relatively short, like Uzbekistan.

306
00:24:14,840 --> 00:24:17,510
But through all these
dizzying changes,

307
00:24:17,540 --> 00:24:19,150
there has been a constant.

308
00:24:19,280 --> 00:24:22,730
The attraction of the Latin alphabet
as a means of connection

309
00:24:22,760 --> 00:24:28,000
with a wider world, and as a symbol
of a nation that embraces modernity.

310
00:24:32,320 --> 00:24:36,110
But the march east of the
Latin alphabet, at one point I would put it

311
00:24:36,140 --> 00:24:40,540
in contact with a culture that
He carries writing in his heart.

312
00:24:45,800 --> 00:24:49,210
In any park in China, it is usual

313
00:24:49,240 --> 00:24:53,400
meet people of all ages
writing words with water.

314
00:25:06,360 --> 00:25:08,690
They are not using an alphabet,

315
00:25:08,720 --> 00:25:13,160
but writing characters in
ancient Chinese pictorial writing.

316
00:25:24,020 --> 00:25:26,780
In China, the character has evolved

317
00:25:27,220 --> 00:25:31,980
towards the most art form
concise, essential and pure.

318
00:25:32,220 --> 00:25:38,180
It is an art form that has made
impossible for you to hide,

319
00:25:38,620 --> 00:25:42,780
that hides any
his defect in his writing.

320
00:25:45,720 --> 00:25:48,480
If he was trained from a very young age,

321
00:25:48,720 --> 00:25:51,480
about 3 or 4 years old,

322
00:25:51,720 --> 00:25:54,480
and learned how to hold
the brush, how to rotate it,

323
00:25:54,720 --> 00:25:58,480
how to move it, through
exercises and more exercises,

324
00:25:58,920 --> 00:26:00,550
their muscles are different,

325
00:26:00,580 --> 00:26:03,680
compared to others
who were not trained.

326
00:26:06,040 --> 00:26:09,450
Chinese writing
has been used continuously

327
00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:11,960
for more than 3,000 years.

328
00:26:16,980 --> 00:26:20,570
Western civilizations
including Ancient Egypt,

329
00:26:20,700 --> 00:26:23,900
cuneiform and languages
writings from Mesopotamia,

330
00:26:24,480 --> 00:26:27,800
those civilizations,
At some point they fell.

331
00:26:27,980 --> 00:26:30,500
Once a civilization collapses,

332
00:26:30,530 --> 00:26:34,900
the writing used to record
its history falls into disuse.

333
00:26:34,980 --> 00:26:36,700
Chinese writing is different.

334
00:26:36,780 --> 00:26:40,700
As civilization continued,
education continued

335
00:26:40,980 --> 00:26:44,200
and their written language continued to be used.

336
00:26:49,240 --> 00:26:53,490
But for much of the century
past, those who ruled China,

337
00:26:53,520 --> 00:26:58,010
were determined that the old
chinese writing disappeared,

338
00:26:58,040 --> 00:27:01,200
to be replaced
for something simpler.

339
00:27:09,540 --> 00:27:14,980
At the beginning of the 20th century, China faced
internal and external problems.

340
00:27:22,720 --> 00:27:25,250
China had yet to industrialize.

341
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:29,480
people still lived
a traditional way of life.

342
00:27:36,280 --> 00:27:41,640
The resulting economic weakness made
the country imprisoned by Western powers.

343
00:27:44,880 --> 00:27:47,830
The intellectuals and
Chinese scholars reflected

344
00:27:47,860 --> 00:27:50,220
on why China was in recession.

345
00:27:50,880 --> 00:27:55,330
It was probably due
because the Chinese characters

346
00:27:55,360 --> 00:27:57,520
They are difficult to learn,

347
00:27:57,580 --> 00:28:01,520
which lowered the effectiveness
of learning.

348
00:28:02,080 --> 00:28:05,420
That was the reason there were so many
illiterate

349
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:09,050
Popular discontent
for the decline of China

350
00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:12,450
It exploded on May 4, 1919.

351
00:28:12,480 --> 00:28:16,410
The streets of Beijing were filled
of students who protested

352
00:28:16,440 --> 00:28:18,770
demanding radical change.

353
00:28:18,800 --> 00:28:22,970
It was a moment that announced
30 years of political turmoil,

354
00:28:23,000 --> 00:28:27,960
that would lead to a civil war in
China and a war between scriptures.

355
00:28:30,100 --> 00:28:33,540
Many people experienced
with different ways

356
00:28:33,570 --> 00:28:35,640
to reform Chinese writing.

357
00:28:35,900 --> 00:28:39,470
The high point was around

358
00:28:39,600 --> 00:28:45,040
of the movement of May 4, 1919.

359
00:28:45,700 --> 00:28:48,550
At that time, some suggested

360
00:28:48,680 --> 00:28:54,540
discard chinese characters
and adopt Western letters.

361
00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:03,350
The most enthusiastic supporters.
of the writing reform

362
00:29:03,380 --> 00:29:05,630
They were from the Chinese Communist Party.

363
00:29:05,760 --> 00:29:09,970
They turned to their allies
ideology of the Soviet Union,

364
00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:13,680
that they had already Latinized
the alphabets of Central Asia.

365
00:29:14,700 --> 00:29:17,840
In the 1930s a group
of people from Vladivostok,

366
00:29:17,870 --> 00:29:21,320
In the Soviet Union, he proposed
a new Latinized writing.

367
00:29:21,500 --> 00:29:27,120
They created a system to write
Chinese words with the Latin alphabet.

368
00:29:27,640 --> 00:29:31,610
The new system was designed
for easy reading and writing,

369
00:29:31,640 --> 00:29:33,960
spelling the words
phonetically.

370
00:29:35,000 --> 00:29:39,800
His name was Latinxua Sin Wenz.
New Latinized writing.

371
00:29:40,500 --> 00:29:42,800
During the 1930s,
The system was popularized,

372
00:29:42,850 --> 00:29:45,500
the communist party
gave great support, since

373
00:29:45,580 --> 00:29:47,500
the party wanted to serve the people.

374
00:29:47,550 --> 00:29:50,450
His ideas were simple,

375
00:29:50,500 --> 00:29:53,370
and they are written here, on the cover.

376
00:29:53,400 --> 00:29:55,890
"To quickly remove
to illiteracy,

377
00:29:55,920 --> 00:29:58,300
"we must promote the new writing."

378
00:29:58,500 --> 00:30:00,820
"The Chinese written language
should be latinized,

379
00:30:00,850 --> 00:30:04,700
"because the characters are too
complicated and difficult to learn."

380
00:30:04,730 --> 00:30:06,590
"We believe that Latinization

381
00:30:06,640 --> 00:30:10,950
"it is the best and only tool
to eliminate illiteracy."

382
00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:17,000
This paragraph was a quote from
Mao Zedong in this article.

383
00:30:19,240 --> 00:30:21,950
When the forces of
Mao marched south,

384
00:30:21,980 --> 00:30:24,130
conquering more and more territory,

385
00:30:24,160 --> 00:30:26,600
I followed him from behind,
the Latinxua Without Wenz.

386
00:30:27,680 --> 00:30:31,410
It was used in newspapers, books,
in school textbooks

387
00:30:31,440 --> 00:30:33,600
and in train schedules.

388
00:30:39,040 --> 00:30:41,570
Preserved in the
Beijing National Library,

389
00:30:41,600 --> 00:30:44,930
thousands of posts
they attest to the Latin impulse

390
00:30:44,960 --> 00:30:46,800
across the country.

391
00:30:50,280 --> 00:30:54,410
The librarians were very friendly,
and they allowed me to see some

392
00:30:54,440 --> 00:30:58,000
dating from the 1930s to 1950s.

393
00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:09,250
It's fascinating to see Chinese
written in Latin letters,

394
00:31:09,280 --> 00:31:11,210
the Latinxua Without Wenz,

395
00:31:11,240 --> 00:31:14,450
because you have the feeling
that you can understand it,

396
00:31:14,480 --> 00:31:17,410
which is not usually the case,
when you look

397
00:31:17,440 --> 00:31:19,440
a page with Chinese characters.

398
00:31:20,480 --> 00:31:25,210
It feels more familiar, and that
It happens more than anything, due to the fact

399
00:31:25,240 --> 00:31:28,930
that this content is sprinkled
with words I can understand.

400
00:31:28,960 --> 00:31:31,290
"Stalin." "Trumen."

401
00:31:31,320 --> 00:31:34,370
But there is a whole
variety of content.

402
00:31:34,400 --> 00:31:39,050
There is a lot of poetry and there are many articles

403
00:31:39,080 --> 00:31:42,250
about how to write
the new latin writing,

404
00:31:42,280 --> 00:31:45,490
including small images
on how to hold the pen,

405
00:31:45,520 --> 00:31:51,490
and also how to form
the cursive of Latin letters.

406
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:56,410
Curiously, many
They have the order of the strokes,

407
00:31:56,440 --> 00:31:58,250
one, two, three,

408
00:31:58,280 --> 00:32:02,210
which is something you see in books
school for chinese characters,

409
00:32:02,240 --> 00:32:05,010
where the order of the strokes
It is very important,

410
00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:07,800
but that is not something
so common in the West.

411
00:32:09,280 --> 00:32:14,730
What is obvious is the character
overtly political about all this.

412
00:32:14,760 --> 00:32:17,010
Here we have Gorky

413
00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:21,730
stabbing a fat capitalist
with a huge pen,

414
00:32:21,760 --> 00:32:26,690
giving the idea that the pen
It is more powerful than the sword.

415
00:32:26,720 --> 00:32:31,930
Perhaps emphasizing the need
of mass literacy.

416
00:32:31,960 --> 00:32:34,250
But even in the 1950s,

417
00:32:34,280 --> 00:32:37,450
all content was
written on both systems.

418
00:32:37,480 --> 00:32:40,290
In Latin letters
and in Chinese characters,

419
00:32:40,320 --> 00:32:43,730
which shows that even
After decades of publication,

420
00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:46,750
the editors could not be
sure that readers

421
00:32:46,780 --> 00:32:48,480
They would understand the new system.

422
00:32:49,520 --> 00:32:52,690
The revolution could have
triumphed for that time,

423
00:32:52,720 --> 00:32:55,200
but the new writing
I hadn't done it.

424
00:32:56,420 --> 00:33:01,980
Initially, the president
Mao planned to replace

425
00:33:02,010 --> 00:33:06,540
Chinese characters for Latin ones,

426
00:33:06,920 --> 00:33:10,460
but there were many obstacles

427
00:33:10,490 --> 00:33:14,040
which made it very difficult.

428
00:33:14,220 --> 00:33:19,540
People from different areas,
spoke different dialects,

429
00:33:19,620 --> 00:33:24,100
and it was very difficult for them to adapt

430
00:33:24,130 --> 00:33:27,340
to a uniform phonetic system.

431
00:33:31,600 --> 00:33:34,410
Throughout China they speak
dozens of dialects,

432
00:33:34,440 --> 00:33:37,450
and the pronunciation of
The words vary greatly.

433
00:33:37,480 --> 00:33:40,410
For example, in the areas
Mandarin speaking,

434
00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:42,970
The word for love is pronounced "ai",

435
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:47,410
but in the Cantonese dialect,
love is pronounced "nuo."

436
00:33:47,440 --> 00:33:51,490
Translated phonetically, both
words would look very different,

437
00:33:51,520 --> 00:33:54,650
but, in Chinese writing,
both are represented

438
00:33:54,680 --> 00:33:56,490
for the same character.

439
00:33:56,520 --> 00:34:00,970
So even if the languages spoken
They sound completely different,

440
00:34:01,000 --> 00:34:04,010
the written characters
They are shared everywhere.

441
00:34:04,040 --> 00:34:08,520
In this way, the writing
china unites the chinese people.

442
00:34:09,640 --> 00:34:13,660
Only Chinese characters can
overcome the dialect barrier.

443
00:34:13,940 --> 00:34:16,740
Regardless of the dialect,
when one writes it,

444
00:34:16,770 --> 00:34:18,560
everyone understands it.

445
00:34:20,280 --> 00:34:24,050
The Chinese people have
a deep and emotional attachment

446
00:34:24,080 --> 00:34:26,040
to his old writing.

447
00:34:28,480 --> 00:34:32,170
Every character is soaked

448
00:34:32,200 --> 00:34:35,220
of a long history.

449
00:34:35,480 --> 00:34:41,020
Each character, when going back
when it is created with its shape,

450
00:34:41,080 --> 00:34:47,020
the evolution of its form
over time,

451
00:34:47,080 --> 00:34:50,920
allows us to reveal the mystery of the
ancient culture and history.

452
00:34:51,180 --> 00:34:54,320
There are still many
questions to answer.

453
00:34:54,580 --> 00:35:00,320
When the secret is discovered, the joy
It is beyond description.

454
00:35:02,520 --> 00:35:06,970
Chinese writing is the embodiment
of Chinese civilization.

455
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:09,490
Every character tells a story

456
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:12,170
about how the ancestors
of the chinese people

457
00:35:12,200 --> 00:35:14,680
They saw the world around them.

458
00:35:17,240 --> 00:35:19,960
For example, the character for woman

459
00:35:21,000 --> 00:35:23,720
It is combined with the character for a child,

460
00:35:25,000 --> 00:35:28,960
to give a character
which means good.

461
00:35:38,640 --> 00:35:40,960
The character for the field,

462
00:35:42,760 --> 00:35:45,960
when combined with
character that means strength,

463
00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:49,720
gives the character of a man.

464
00:35:52,800 --> 00:35:54,600
Chinese culture and civilization,

465
00:35:54,630 --> 00:35:57,470
are engraved in the form
of Chinese characters.

466
00:35:57,500 --> 00:36:01,580
If we started using Latin letters,
this story would be deleted.

467
00:36:01,700 --> 00:36:05,380
So of course
this plan was rejected.

468
00:36:06,000 --> 00:36:08,970
In 1949, Chairman Mao
declared the birth

469
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:11,250
of the People's Republic of China.

470
00:36:11,280 --> 00:36:14,240
The communists had
emerged victorious.

471
00:36:15,480 --> 00:36:20,330
But, at that moment, Mao quietly
had buried Latinxua Sin Wenz.

472
00:36:20,360 --> 00:36:24,370
The cultural cost of leaving
Chinese writing was to pay a price

473
00:36:24,400 --> 00:36:29,440
too high for the supposed
efficiency of the Latin alphabet.

474
00:36:31,160 --> 00:36:34,450
But that left the problem
to achieve mass literacy

475
00:36:34,480 --> 00:36:38,490
with complex writing,
that throughout Chinese history,

476
00:36:38,520 --> 00:36:41,600
had always been
in the elite sphere.

477
00:36:51,820 --> 00:36:53,340
Okay, class starts.

478
00:36:54,420 --> 00:36:56,140
Hello, Teacher.

479
00:36:56,420 --> 00:36:58,840
The teacher sits first.

480
00:36:59,020 --> 00:37:01,140
Okay, students, please sit down.

481
00:37:01,220 --> 00:37:02,640
Thank you teacher.

482
00:37:25,620 --> 00:37:29,040
What was I singing?

483
00:37:29,620 --> 00:37:31,040
Is it an old poem?

484
00:37:31,520 --> 00:37:32,940
Yeah!

485
00:37:33,480 --> 00:37:36,090
To be able to read and write Chinese,

486
00:37:36,120 --> 00:37:39,680
you need to learn several thousand
of pictorial characters.

487
00:37:40,840 --> 00:37:44,480
It seems like a daunting task.
for a six year old child.

488
00:37:45,540 --> 00:37:48,900
It doesn't matter how we teach them
the characters to the students,

489
00:37:49,040 --> 00:37:50,900
we must trace them to their origins,

490
00:37:50,940 --> 00:37:53,600
just like the origin of water,

491
00:37:53,640 --> 00:37:56,700
from the source, filtering through the
rock crevices.

492
00:37:56,740 --> 00:38:00,700
Those are the water drops,
splashing the stone wall.

493
00:38:01,640 --> 00:38:04,000
We call that "water."

494
00:38:14,040 --> 00:38:16,250
How can we
learn so many characters?

495
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:18,100
We don't really need that.

496
00:38:18,140 --> 00:38:21,700
Because most of the characters,

497
00:38:21,740 --> 00:38:24,400
can be reduced to a root
smaller essential.

498
00:38:29,200 --> 00:38:31,810
I think that Westerners

499
00:38:31,840 --> 00:38:35,850
have some fantasies
about Chinese characters.

500
00:38:35,880 --> 00:38:39,930
In the largest character dictionary,

501
00:38:39,960 --> 00:38:41,930
we have around...

502
00:38:41,960 --> 00:38:46,250
More than 50,000 Chinese characters.

503
00:38:46,280 --> 00:38:48,650
That is a very large amount.

504
00:38:48,680 --> 00:38:52,090
But if you consider the basic unit,

505
00:38:52,120 --> 00:38:55,370
the basic elements, it's not that big.

506
00:38:55,400 --> 00:38:58,730
There are around 300 basic elements,

507
00:38:58,760 --> 00:39:04,650
so it's not that complicated
as some Westerners think.

508
00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:06,930
So what is...? What's that?

509
00:39:06,960 --> 00:39:08,650
A fruit basket.

510
00:39:08,680 --> 00:39:10,610
Orange. Orange.

511
00:39:10,640 --> 00:39:12,000
Grapes.

512
00:39:12,960 --> 00:39:14,450
Onions.

513
00:39:14,480 --> 00:39:19,210
Dr. Thomas Hope is a neuroscientist
interested in how we read.

514
00:39:19,240 --> 00:39:22,410
He agrees to
it's easy to exaggerate

515
00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:24,960
the differences between scriptures.

516
00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:29,690
Perhaps the most obvious difference
among the scriptures

517
00:39:29,720 --> 00:39:32,620
pictographic and Latin is
that the Latin writings

518
00:39:32,650 --> 00:39:34,210
They only have about 26 letters,

519
00:39:34,240 --> 00:39:37,410
while the scriptures
pictographic images seem to have thousands

520
00:39:37,440 --> 00:39:39,450
and thousands of characters.

521
00:39:39,480 --> 00:39:41,850
But of course
you can't learn to read,

522
00:39:41,880 --> 00:39:43,790
just learning the letters.

523
00:39:43,820 --> 00:39:46,350
I know this. I have seen
my children learn to read.

524
00:39:46,380 --> 00:39:47,390
That's a hat.

525
00:39:47,520 --> 00:39:50,710
It's not enough. you have to
learn to understand and recognize

526
00:39:50,740 --> 00:39:54,590
also the words, and once
you have managed to recognize the words,

527
00:39:54,620 --> 00:39:56,630
Well, there are thousands and thousands of words,

528
00:39:56,760 --> 00:40:00,670
So what that means is that
the real problem of learning

529
00:40:00,700 --> 00:40:03,710
what you must solve, to achieve
a skilful reading,

530
00:40:03,740 --> 00:40:07,010
is at least approximately
similar in these two scriptures.

531
00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:12,010
As a scientist, Thomas is interested
whether brain science can

532
00:40:12,040 --> 00:40:16,840
shed light on the issue of
accessibility of different scripts.

533
00:40:17,880 --> 00:40:22,050
For him, a key experiment
was devised by Dr. Tae Twomey,

534
00:40:22,080 --> 00:40:25,970
who came up with a way to
compare how the same brain works

535
00:40:26,000 --> 00:40:28,270
when you are reading
a phonetic writing,

536
00:40:28,300 --> 00:40:31,380
regarding when you are reading
a pictographic writing.

537
00:40:32,320 --> 00:40:36,450
Take advantage of the fact
that Japanese readers

538
00:40:36,480 --> 00:40:38,680
both must learn
types of writings.

539
00:40:41,520 --> 00:40:45,050
In my Japanese experiment,
we ask the participant to read

540
00:40:45,080 --> 00:40:48,610
a Japanese word written in
any of the kanji characters

541
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:50,870
or hiragana kana characters,

542
00:40:51,000 --> 00:40:55,440
and we compare whether the activation
of the brain is different.

543
00:40:56,480 --> 00:40:59,730
To write in your language,
the japanese use

544
00:40:59,760 --> 00:41:02,960
chinese pictographic characters,
which they call kanji.

545
00:41:04,000 --> 00:41:07,730
But in most texts,
these kanji characters will be found

546
00:41:07,760 --> 00:41:10,930
along with letters called hiragana kana,

547
00:41:10,960 --> 00:41:13,600
that spell the words
phonetically.

548
00:41:15,520 --> 00:41:20,210
For example, the pronoun "I"
can be written phonetically

549
00:41:20,240 --> 00:41:22,240
with three letters kana.

550
00:41:24,720 --> 00:41:28,440
Or be represented
for a single kanji character.

551
00:41:31,120 --> 00:41:34,010
There are only 50 or so kana characters

552
00:41:34,040 --> 00:41:37,210
and there is always almost 100%
correspondence

553
00:41:37,240 --> 00:41:39,290
between the letter and the sound,

554
00:41:39,320 --> 00:41:43,640
so once you know what
It's every kana, you can read everything.

555
00:41:44,680 --> 00:41:46,450
But the kanji characters,

556
00:41:46,480 --> 00:41:49,760
they are not related
between print and sound.

557
00:41:51,520 --> 00:41:54,770
So we're trying to understand
yes, when the japanese

558
00:41:54,800 --> 00:41:57,490
they read Japanese kanji or Japanese kana,

559
00:41:57,520 --> 00:42:00,560
They use different parts of the brain.

560
00:42:02,080 --> 00:42:06,010
For reading three areas of the brain
are particularly important.

561
00:42:06,040 --> 00:42:10,480
Two are associated with
senses of hearing and vision.

562
00:42:11,720 --> 00:42:15,050
The part of the brain that
try hearing is on the side,

563
00:42:15,080 --> 00:42:18,990
something like close to the ear, and the
part of the brain that deals with vision

564
00:42:19,020 --> 00:42:22,700
It's in the back, basically.
where the optic nerve enters.

565
00:42:23,040 --> 00:42:26,170
The auditory area is part of a
major brain structure,

566
00:42:26,200 --> 00:42:28,010
called temporal lobe.

567
00:42:28,040 --> 00:42:31,310
A place where sensations
They combine with memories,

568
00:42:31,340 --> 00:42:34,260
to give meaning, from
of our experiences.

569
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:39,010
Every reading begins with a
stimulation of the visual region,

570
00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:43,690
and end with that stimulus
interpreted in the temporal lobe.

571
00:42:43,720 --> 00:42:47,690
But that stimulus can travel
by two different paths,

572
00:42:47,720 --> 00:42:51,250
directly from the area
vision to the temporal lobe

573
00:42:51,280 --> 00:42:53,960
or through the auditory area.

574
00:42:58,200 --> 00:43:02,930
It is tempting to assume that reading
hiragana kana phonetic characters,

575
00:43:02,960 --> 00:43:05,290
would activate the auditory pathway,

576
00:43:05,320 --> 00:43:08,550
while direct vision
along the path of meaning,

577
00:43:08,580 --> 00:43:11,830
would be activated by characters
kanji, based on images.

578
00:43:11,960 --> 00:43:15,280
But that's not what
showed the experiment.

579
00:43:16,400 --> 00:43:20,250
I assumed that the way
we read those based on sounds,

580
00:43:20,280 --> 00:43:24,010
compared to a pictographic language,
It would be completely different

581
00:43:24,040 --> 00:43:26,960
and it just doesn't work out that way.

582
00:43:27,960 --> 00:43:30,490
Instead, all three areas are active,

583
00:43:30,520 --> 00:43:34,450
regardless of what type
writing is being read.

584
00:43:34,480 --> 00:43:39,650
We use the same set of regions,
so the network itself is the same,

585
00:43:39,680 --> 00:43:42,690
but the use of the component
It was slightly different,

586
00:43:42,720 --> 00:43:44,610
depending on the writing.

587
00:43:44,640 --> 00:43:48,370
When the subjects were reading
the most phonetic writings,

588
00:43:48,400 --> 00:43:53,450
they tended to prefer precisely
a little more the way of sound,

589
00:43:53,480 --> 00:43:56,490
and when they were reading
pictographic writing,

590
00:43:56,520 --> 00:44:00,210
they tended to prefer only
a little more the visual route,

591
00:44:00,240 --> 00:44:02,320
but they were using both.

592
00:44:04,760 --> 00:44:06,850
Dr. Twomey's experiment suggests

593
00:44:06,880 --> 00:44:09,410
that our brains
they do similar work

594
00:44:09,440 --> 00:44:13,290
both when reading represented words
by Chinese characters,

595
00:44:13,520 --> 00:44:16,010
as written with a phonetic alphabet.

596
00:44:16,040 --> 00:44:18,260
The two writing systems are

597
00:44:18,290 --> 00:44:21,200
equally easy
or difficult to learn.

598
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:26,450
revolutionary political leaders
like Lenin and Mao,

599
00:44:26,480 --> 00:44:30,210
once they saw the latin alphabet
as a necessary ingredient

600
00:44:30,240 --> 00:44:32,090
for a modern society.

601
00:44:32,120 --> 00:44:35,410
But it seems that the key
for mass literacy,

602
00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:38,210
after all, it's not the alphabet,

603
00:44:38,240 --> 00:44:40,650
but the education of the masses.

604
00:44:40,680 --> 00:44:44,210
Just send people
to school, and if you do,

605
00:44:44,240 --> 00:44:47,450
It turns out that they can learn to
read pictographic writings

606
00:44:47,480 --> 00:44:50,680
just as they can learn to read
alphabetical writings.

607
00:45:01,120 --> 00:45:04,010
But today, it's not just human beings

608
00:45:04,040 --> 00:45:06,640
those who should be able
interpret a writing.

609
00:45:10,000 --> 00:45:12,870
Although it is true that the
computer can be called

610
00:45:12,900 --> 00:45:15,450
a kind of brain,
although a very limited one,

611
00:45:15,480 --> 00:45:19,010
to solve any problem,
the computer must first be

612
00:45:19,040 --> 00:45:22,250
taught by a programmer
human, who patiently

613
00:45:22,280 --> 00:45:24,560
and logically analyzed the problem.

614
00:45:26,040 --> 00:45:28,290
In the United States in the 1960s,

615
00:45:28,320 --> 00:45:31,370
they were placing
foundations of the internet.

616
00:45:31,400 --> 00:45:35,690
The natural writing of computers
It is a simple binary code

617
00:45:35,720 --> 00:45:37,490
of ones and zeros,

618
00:45:37,520 --> 00:45:41,210
but, to facilitate interaction
human with computers,

619
00:45:41,240 --> 00:45:45,210
American computer scientists
They developed ASCII,

620
00:45:45,240 --> 00:45:49,490
the American Standard Code
for Information Exchange,

621
00:45:49,520 --> 00:45:54,410
which allows us to communicate with the
computers using human language,

622
00:45:54,440 --> 00:45:57,440
language written with Latin letters.

623
00:45:58,760 --> 00:46:02,450
This universal standard meant
that for many decades,

624
00:46:02,480 --> 00:46:06,410
use a computer
It involved using the Latin alphabet.

625
00:46:06,440 --> 00:46:09,960
That legacy remains
powerful even today.

626
00:46:13,960 --> 00:46:17,210
In this cafe in a Cairo neighborhood,

627
00:46:17,240 --> 00:46:22,200
a group of young people are using letters
Latin to write Arabic words.

628
00:46:23,760 --> 00:46:27,650
This new way of writing a language
that was always written

629
00:46:27,680 --> 00:46:31,040
using Arabic script,
It's called frank.

630
00:46:33,280 --> 00:46:36,420
When you write a message to your friends,

631
00:46:37,080 --> 00:46:39,620
Do you use Arabic letters

632
00:46:39,780 --> 00:46:41,620
or Latin letters, that is, frank?

633
00:46:41,780 --> 00:46:42,820
What do you use?

634
00:46:42,880 --> 00:46:45,620
- Both.
- Both?

635
00:46:45,780 --> 00:46:48,720
I use Frankish and sometimes Arabic, it depends.

636
00:46:48,780 --> 00:46:52,720
So what's the difference
between franco and arab?

637
00:46:52,780 --> 00:46:56,920
The Franco spelling is pronounced like
Arabic but it is written with Latin letters.

638
00:46:57,080 --> 00:47:00,020
You pronounce it in Arabic,
It's like you speak Arabic,

639
00:47:00,380 --> 00:47:02,320
but we write it differently.

640
00:47:02,520 --> 00:47:05,630
The beginning of the Arabic franc
It was because of the Arab players.

641
00:47:05,660 --> 00:47:08,590
They didn't have the Arabic keyboard,
so the arab players

642
00:47:08,620 --> 00:47:10,690
they simply invented the Arabic franc.

643
00:47:10,820 --> 00:47:13,020
The franc is for young people.

644
00:47:14,020 --> 00:47:17,120
People over 26, 27 years old
They are not familiar with it.

645
00:47:18,320 --> 00:47:20,420
They don't use it much.

646
00:47:22,320 --> 00:47:24,420
Some consider it a great thing.

647
00:47:24,620 --> 00:47:26,620
It's great when they write in frank,

648
00:47:27,120 --> 00:47:28,820
but I don't like it.

649
00:47:29,120 --> 00:47:32,220
When the conversation is long,
It's very difficult for me,

650
00:47:33,220 --> 00:47:37,120
However, sometimes my friends
They say they can't write in Arabic,

651
00:47:37,320 --> 00:47:39,420
so I am obliged to read your frank.

652
00:47:39,680 --> 00:47:41,970
I don't like to use it.

653
00:47:42,000 --> 00:47:44,970
I love speaking in Arabic,
write in Arabic.

654
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:49,130
This is me,
This is where I come from,

655
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:52,250
and that's what it's all about.

656
00:47:52,280 --> 00:47:55,970
I don't like to talk
Arab franc. It's very strange.

657
00:47:56,000 --> 00:47:59,560
It really destroys my culture.

658
00:48:01,040 --> 00:48:04,230
The desire to use computers,
pushed the young Egyptians

659
00:48:04,260 --> 00:48:06,080
to use a Latin script.

660
00:48:07,520 --> 00:48:10,730
Something similar is happening in China,

661
00:48:10,760 --> 00:48:12,930
where technology
threatens to do,

662
00:48:12,960 --> 00:48:15,490
what not even
Chairman Mao could.

663
00:48:15,520 --> 00:48:19,960
Persuade the Chinese people to
adopt the use of Latin letters.

664
00:48:21,760 --> 00:48:26,010
They are the basis of the successor
from Latinxua Sin Wenz,

665
00:48:26,040 --> 00:48:29,010
It is another phonetic writing
called pinyin.

666
00:48:29,440 --> 00:48:31,750
Pinyin is a helpful tool,

667
00:48:31,780 --> 00:48:34,250
used to spell pronunciation

668
00:48:34,280 --> 00:48:35,910
of Chinese characters.

669
00:48:36,140 --> 00:48:41,790
Pinyin is often used with
cell phones and computers,

670
00:48:41,820 --> 00:48:44,640
turning sounds into words.

671
00:48:44,940 --> 00:48:46,930
As we know, written language

672
00:48:47,060 --> 00:48:50,940
it needs to be handwritten, but not
We are not writing but typing.

673
00:48:51,060 --> 00:48:53,190
Especially for young Chinese,

674
00:48:53,320 --> 00:48:57,160
using the Latin alphabet has been
become second nature.

675
00:49:00,020 --> 00:49:02,610
In my daily life, I trust a lot

676
00:49:02,640 --> 00:49:07,680
on keyboards and computers
to record my ideas.

677
00:49:08,020 --> 00:49:10,590
How the keyboard was
designed for english,

678
00:49:10,620 --> 00:49:13,790
When we type, we must use pinyin.

679
00:49:13,900 --> 00:49:19,860
For example, in Chinese, pasta
toothpaste is written like this,

680
00:49:20,720 --> 00:49:23,690
It's like drawing a picture.

681
00:49:24,220 --> 00:49:30,180
And this is pinyin. So you are
They are two different things.

682
00:49:31,520 --> 00:49:37,480
So if I may say so,
It doesn't mean I can write it,

683
00:49:37,520 --> 00:49:41,580
but in English, if I can say it,
I can write it.

684
00:49:43,360 --> 00:49:47,010
As a simple phonetic system,
pinyin is attractive,

685
00:49:47,040 --> 00:49:51,010
but it represents a threat to
traditional Chinese writing.

686
00:49:51,040 --> 00:49:53,640
Let's start writing. Begin.

687
00:49:54,040 --> 00:49:56,940
1, 2, 3, 4, 5

688
00:49:59,240 --> 00:50:02,850
At school children learn
how to write chinese characters

689
00:50:02,880 --> 00:50:05,480
by repetition, which builds
muscle memory.

690
00:50:05,960 --> 00:50:09,130
But, in the adult world,
thanks to computers,

691
00:50:09,160 --> 00:50:12,400
writing by hand is
becoming a rare event

692
00:50:12,800 --> 00:50:15,470
and so muscle memory
begins to fade.

693
00:50:15,900 --> 00:50:19,390
When writing on the blackboard,

694
00:50:19,420 --> 00:50:22,710
sometimes I forget how

695
00:50:22,740 --> 00:50:26,820
certain characters are written.

696
00:50:27,200 --> 00:50:28,740
Which is very embarrassing

697
00:50:28,770 --> 00:50:30,910
for a teacher who specializes

698
00:50:30,940 --> 00:50:32,380
in written language.

699
00:50:32,700 --> 00:50:35,080
Let's play a fun game.

700
00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:37,680
Take a pen and paper!

701
00:50:37,700 --> 00:50:38,780
Will we have to write?

702
00:50:39,300 --> 00:50:41,880
Children write better than me.

703
00:50:43,500 --> 00:50:46,080
Can you write "cough"?

704
00:50:46,900 --> 00:50:48,980
Damn…

705
00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:52,280
I don't know how to write it.

706
00:50:52,300 --> 00:50:54,380
I thought it was another.

707
00:50:54,600 --> 00:50:57,180
Can you write "tickling"?

708
00:51:00,600 --> 00:51:02,680
I don't know the second one either.

709
00:51:02,900 --> 00:51:03,980
Well, the third.

710
00:51:04,700 --> 00:51:05,780
"Shame".

711
00:51:06,100 --> 00:51:07,680
- That?
- "Shame".

712
00:51:08,600 --> 00:51:09,880
Are they finished?

713
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:12,980
The last one. Very interesting.

714
00:51:13,000 --> 00:51:15,080
"Very interesting"?

715
00:51:16,200 --> 00:51:19,280
No. The word is very interesting.

716
00:51:20,100 --> 00:51:21,180
A "Toad".

717
00:51:21,300 --> 00:51:22,380
My God!

718
00:51:26,500 --> 00:51:28,580
I didn't write any!

719
00:51:29,200 --> 00:51:32,280
This word is like a shadow
that I can't catch.

720
00:51:33,000 --> 00:51:36,080
All they can do
Is it a drawing of a toad?

721
00:51:42,000 --> 00:51:44,080
Let's see the results.

722
00:51:44,100 --> 00:51:46,180
Tickle…correct!

723
00:51:46,200 --> 00:51:48,980
"Shame" you don't know it!
That's a shame!

724
00:51:51,200 --> 00:51:52,280
Very embarrassing!

725
00:51:53,200 --> 00:51:56,880
I am a graduate student and not
I can't write even one character.

726
00:51:57,000 --> 00:51:58,080
Very embarrassing.

727
00:51:58,900 --> 00:51:59,980
I'm upset.

728
00:52:00,200 --> 00:52:01,870
I think writing in characters

729
00:52:01,900 --> 00:52:04,880
Chinese indicates that you have
a kind of social status,

730
00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:06,080
which indicates culture.

731
00:52:06,200 --> 00:52:08,280
If you can't write, it means

732
00:52:09,200 --> 00:52:12,780
that you are illiterate and you are located
well down in the social classes.

733
00:52:13,200 --> 00:52:16,080
It has a lot to do
with your social status,

734
00:52:16,200 --> 00:52:17,980
but thinking about it,

735
00:52:18,200 --> 00:52:21,080
we don't actually use
now this skill,

736
00:52:21,200 --> 00:52:25,280
because we have other tools
to work with, such as pinyin.

737
00:52:26,760 --> 00:52:28,530
The seductions of technology

738
00:52:28,560 --> 00:52:31,410
They are even taking Chinese
highly educated,

739
00:52:31,440 --> 00:52:34,010
to forget how to write
his old writing.

740
00:52:34,840 --> 00:52:36,800
I mainly use voice dictations.

741
00:52:37,920 --> 00:52:39,730
What is happening today in China,

742
00:52:39,760 --> 00:52:42,590
could it be the future of
writing everywhere?

743
00:52:42,620 --> 00:52:46,190
With new ways to create text
becoming more and more popular,

744
00:52:46,220 --> 00:52:49,340
will there soon be any need
to learn to write?

745
00:52:49,520 --> 00:52:51,100
The power of technology!

746
00:52:55,240 --> 00:52:58,770
Chinese artist Xu Bing
has explored the future

747
00:52:58,800 --> 00:53:02,440
and the past of writing,
in two notable works.

748
00:53:03,520 --> 00:53:06,890
The Earth Book is
a project in which Xu Bing

749
00:53:06,920 --> 00:53:10,930
created a pictographic writing
with emojis and icons,

750
00:53:10,960 --> 00:53:15,280
and then he wrote a short novel,
entirely with its new writing.

751
00:53:15,960 --> 00:53:20,040
Today, this is the new hieroglyphic era.

752
00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:24,730
His work explores the idea
that modern life

753
00:53:24,760 --> 00:53:29,730
has finally allowed the creation of
a universal writing with images.

754
00:53:31,160 --> 00:53:34,210
When you face that work,
your ability to read it

755
00:53:34,240 --> 00:53:36,320
It does not depend on your cultural base.

756
00:53:40,120 --> 00:53:43,970
The plot, a story of a day
in the life of an office worker,

757
00:53:44,000 --> 00:53:45,890
can be understood by anyone,

758
00:53:45,920 --> 00:53:48,450
regardless
of the language you speak,

759
00:53:48,480 --> 00:53:52,160
because the icons are designed
to be universally recognizable.

760
00:53:54,000 --> 00:53:57,010
But the Book of the Earth
suggests that a world

761
00:53:57,040 --> 00:54:01,960
of perfect communication, it is also
a world of cultural uniformity.

762
00:54:03,340 --> 00:54:05,620
You and I have
different backgrounds,

763
00:54:06,240 --> 00:54:08,540
we have different genes,

764
00:54:08,570 --> 00:54:10,870
the way we talk,

765
00:54:10,900 --> 00:54:14,420
the food we like is different.

766
00:54:15,740 --> 00:54:19,130
What if in the future
we become identical,

767
00:54:19,160 --> 00:54:23,620
and the cultural differences between
humans are not important?

768
00:54:24,340 --> 00:54:28,120
Will humans be transformed
on iconic men?

769
00:54:38,960 --> 00:54:42,170
This connection between writing and culture,

770
00:54:42,200 --> 00:54:45,610
It is also the theme of
Xu Bing's most famous work,

771
00:54:45,640 --> 00:54:47,600
The Book of Heaven.

772
00:54:51,240 --> 00:54:54,130
I wanted to make my own book,

773
00:54:54,160 --> 00:54:57,320
to express my feelings

774
00:54:57,350 --> 00:55:00,080
about books and characters.

775
00:55:01,140 --> 00:55:03,680
People like to call it
"The Book of Heaven",

776
00:55:03,740 --> 00:55:06,680
because in China, we call
what we cannot read,

777
00:55:07,240 --> 00:55:11,180
to something we can't
understand, a "Book of Heaven."

778
00:55:13,140 --> 00:55:16,580
I created, I made around
4,000 characters.

779
00:55:16,640 --> 00:55:21,580
They look exactly like
characters, but they are not.

780
00:55:23,240 --> 00:55:25,930
The Book of Heaven consists of thousands

781
00:55:25,960 --> 00:55:28,010
of traditional engravings
in wooden blocks.

782
00:55:28,040 --> 00:55:32,170
But the characters that Xu Bing
carved were all invented by him,

783
00:55:32,200 --> 00:55:34,240
and they have no meaning.

784
00:55:38,960 --> 00:55:43,380
In reality, they are just shapes

785
00:55:43,410 --> 00:55:46,280
or very abstract images.

786
00:55:49,800 --> 00:55:53,350
I locked myself in a small room

787
00:55:53,380 --> 00:55:55,350
for about 2 years,

788
00:55:55,380 --> 00:55:58,360
while doing this work,

789
00:55:58,500 --> 00:56:00,850
carving all these
meaningless characters,

790
00:56:00,880 --> 00:56:02,460
that even I don't understand.

791
00:56:03,000 --> 00:56:06,060
It was very nice.

792
00:56:06,700 --> 00:56:09,460
There are many secrets in this book.

793
00:56:09,700 --> 00:56:15,460
Although it has no content, the entire
structure, number of pages, index,

794
00:56:15,500 --> 00:56:21,260
the title of each chapter, obey
strictly to the traditional order.

795
00:56:21,600 --> 00:56:23,930
In other words, a structure

796
00:56:23,960 --> 00:56:26,320
very rigid controls all of these

797
00:56:26,350 --> 00:56:28,360
Characters that no one knows.

798
00:56:28,600 --> 00:56:31,360
Therefore, the last volume
It's a dictionary.

799
00:56:31,500 --> 00:56:33,940
In the dictionary, the
small characters

800
00:56:33,970 --> 00:56:36,060
They explain the great characters.

801
00:56:36,200 --> 00:56:38,610
The characters we don't know,

802
00:56:38,640 --> 00:56:42,060
explain the characters
that we don't know.

803
00:56:46,280 --> 00:56:51,010
We think of writing as a medium
to communicate what we want to say.

804
00:56:51,040 --> 00:56:55,960
Seen this way, everything that really
What matters is efficiency.

805
00:56:57,760 --> 00:57:01,160
But there has always been more to
writing than in language.

806
00:57:03,200 --> 00:57:07,410
For 5000 years, the
written, they have been a repository

807
00:57:07,440 --> 00:57:10,490
of cultural and religious identities

808
00:57:10,520 --> 00:57:13,200
that they cannot wear
easily in words.

809
00:57:15,560 --> 00:57:20,490
This is the hidden power
and the value of what is written,

810
00:57:20,520 --> 00:57:23,930
because when we write,
We express who we are,

811
00:57:23,960 --> 00:57:27,000
in every word and in none.

812
00:57:28,280 --> 00:57:31,400
The Book of Heaven says nothing...

813
00:57:32,480 --> 00:57:37,440
but nothing could be more
expressive of Chinese culture.

814
00:57:40,180 --> 00:57:43,920
One of the main Zen teachings,

815
00:57:44,280 --> 00:57:47,420
It is communicating without any communication.

816
00:57:47,450 --> 00:57:51,850
Translation: Juan C. Germi
* Nordiken.net *