View source for Traditional Chinese characters

{{Short description|Standardized set of Chinese characters}}
{{Use American English|date=May 2020}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox writing system <!-- This article is about the specific modern character sets used to write Chinese languages that do not feature simplified forms. Both "kanji" and "Chinese characters in general/jiu zixing" are distinct topics for our purposes. -->
| name        = Traditional Chinese
| type        = [[Logographic]]
| languages   = [[Chinese languages|Chinese]]
| published   = {{ubl|Taiwan: ({{hlist|class=inline|[[Chart of Standard Forms of Common National Characters|1979]]|[[Chart of Standard Forms of Common National Characters|1982]]}})|Hong Kong: ([[List of Graphemes of Commonly-Used Chinese Characters|1986]])}}
| fam1        = [[Oracle bone script]]
| fam2        = [[Small seal script]]
| fam3        = [[Clerical script]]
| fam4        = [[Regular script]]
| sisters     = {{hlist|[[Simplified characters]]|[[Kanji]]|[[Hanja]]|[[Chữ Nôm]]|[[Bopomofo]]|[[Khitan large script]]|[[Khitan small script]]|[[Sawndip]]}}
| sample      = Hanzi (traditional).svg
| imagesize   = 100px
| iso15924    = Hant
| direction   = * Left-to-right
* Top-to-bottom, columns right to left
| official script = {{csv|{{flag|Taiwan}}|<br>{{flag|Hong Kong}}| <br>
{{flag|Macau}}}}
| footnotes = </div>{{Infobox Chinese
| child = yes
| s = 正体字
| t = 正體字
| j = zing3 tai2 zi6
| y = Jing tái jih
| p = Zhèngtǐzì
| s2 = 繁体字
| t2 = 繁體字
| p2 = Fántǐzì
| j2 = faan4 tai2 zi6
| y2 = Fàahn tái jih
| l = Orthodox form characters
| l2 = Complex form characters
| w = {{tonesup|Chêng4-tʻi3-tzŭ4}}
| w2 = {{tonesup|Fan2-tʻi3-tzŭ4}}
| mi = {{IPAc-cmn|zh|eng|4|.|t|i|3|.|zi|4}}
| ci = {{IPAc-yue|z|ing|3|.|t|ai|2|.|z|i|6}}
| bpmf = {{bpmfsp|ㄓㄥˋ|ㄊㄧˇ|ㄗˋ}}
| tp = Jhèng-tǐ-zìh
| tp2 = Fán-tǐ-zìh
| bpmf2 = {{bpmfsp|ㄈㄢˊ|ㄊㄧˇ|ㄗˋ}}
| mi2 = {{IPAc-cmn|f|an|2|.|t|i|3|.|zi|4}}
| ci2 = {{IPAc-yue|f|aan|4|-|t|ai|2|-|z|i|6}}
}}<div>
}}

{{Table Hanzi}}

'''Traditional Chinese characters''' are a standard set of [[Chinese character]] forms used to [[written Chinese|write Chinese languages]]. In [[Taiwan]], the set of traditional characters is regulated by the [[Ministry of Education (Taiwan)|Ministry of Education]] and standardized in the ''[[Standard Form of National Characters]]''. These forms were predominant in written Chinese until the middle of the 20th century,<ref name="BiWei">{{Cite journal |last=Wei |first=Bi |year=2014 |title=The Origin and Evolvement of Chinese Characters |url=https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/229246973.pdf |journal=Gdańskie Studia Azji Wschodniej |volume=5 |pages=33–44 |access-date=29 September 2023 |via=CORE}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Kornicki |first=P. F. |author-link=Peter Kornicki |title=New Word Order: Transnational Themes in Book History |year=2011 |publisher=Worldview Publications |isbn=978-81-920651-1-3 |editor-last=Chakravorty |editor-first=Swapan |pages=65–79 |chapter=A Transnational Approach to East Asian Book History |editor-last2=Gupta |editor-first2=Abhijit |chapter-url={{Google books|bjJBrKfCKIYC |page=65 |plainurl=yes}}}}</ref> when various [[Chinese family of scripts|countries that use Chinese characters]] began standardizing simplified sets of characters, often with characters that existed before as well-known [[variant Chinese characters|variants]] of the predominant forms.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pae |first=H. K. |title=Script Effects as the Hidden Drive of the Mind, Cognition, and Culture |publisher=Springer |year=2020 |isbn=978-3-030-55151-3 |series=Literacy Studies (Perspectives from Cognitive Neurosciences, Linguistics, Psychology and Education) |volume=21 |location=Cham |pages=71–105 |chapter=Chinese, Japanese, and Korean Writing Systems: All East-Asian but Different Scripts |doi=10.1007/978-3-030-55152-0_5 |s2cid=234940515}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Twine |first=Nanette |title=Language and the Modern State: The Reform of Written Japanese |publisher=Taylor & Francis |year=1991 |isbn=978-0-415-00990-4}}</ref>

[[Simplified characters]] as codified by the [[People's Republic of China]] are predominantly used in [[mainland China]], Malaysia, and Singapore. "Traditional" as such is a [[retronym]] applied to non-simplified character sets in the wake of widespread use of simplified characters. Traditional characters are commonly used in [[Taiwan]], [[Hong Kong]], and [[Macau]], as well as in most [[overseas Chinese]] communities outside of Southeast Asia.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Yan |first1=Pu |last2=Yasseri |first2=Taha |year=2016 |title=Two Diverging Roads: A Semantic Network Analysis of Chinese Social Connection ("Guanxi") on Twitter |journal=Frontiers in Digital Humanities |volume=4 |article-number=11 |arxiv=1605.05139 |doi=10.3389/fdigh.2017.00011 |doi-access=free}}</ref> As for non-Chinese languages written using Chinese characters, Japanese [[kanji]] include many simplified characters known as {{tlit|ja|[[shinjitai]]}} standardized after World War II, [[Differences between Shinjitai and Simplified characters|sometimes distinct from their simplified Chinese counterparts]]. Korean [[hanja]], still used to a certain extent in [[South Korea]], remain virtually identical to traditional characters, with variations between the two forms largely stylistic.

There has historically been a [[debate on traditional and simplified Chinese characters]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=O'Neill |first=Mark |date=8 June 2020 |title=China Should Restore Traditional Characters-Taiwan Scholar |url=https://www.ejinsight.com/eji/article/id/2488630/20200608-China-should-restore-traditional-characters-Taiwan-scholar |access-date=30 March 2021 |website=EJ Insight |publisher=Hong Kong Economic Journal}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Sui |first=Cindy |date=16 June 2011 |title=Taiwan Deletes Simplified Chinese from Official Sites |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-13795301 |access-date=30 March 2021 |publisher=BBC}}</ref> Because the simplifications are fairly systematic, it is possible to convert computer-encoded characters between the two sets, with the main issue being [[ambiguities in Chinese character simplification|ambiguities in simplified representations]] resulting from the merging of previously distinct character forms. Many Chinese online newspapers allow users to switch between these character sets.<ref name="yzzk">{{Cite web |last=Lin |first=Youshun |author-mask=Lin Youshun (林友順) |year=2009 |script-title=zh:大馬華社遊走於簡繁之間 |trans-title=The Malaysian Chinese Community Wanders Between Simplified and Traditional Characters |url=https://www.yzzk.com/article/details/%E5%B0%81%E9%9D%A2%E5%B0%88%E9%A1%8C/2009-25/1365566312660/%E5%A4%A7%E9%A6%AC%E8%8F%AF%E7%A4%BE%E9%81%8A%E8%B5%B0%E6%96%BC%E7%B0%A1%E7%B9%81%E4%B9%8B%E9%96%93 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210523114033/https://www.yzzk.com/article/details/%E5%B0%81%E9%9D%A2%E5%B0%88%E9%A1%8C/2009-25/1365566312660/%E5%A4%A7%E9%A6%AC%E8%8F%AF%E7%A4%BE%E9%81%8A%E8%B5%B0%E6%96%BC%E7%B0%A1%E7%B9%81%E4%B9%8B%E9%96%93 |archive-date=23 May 2021 |access-date=30 March 2021 |publisher=Yazhou Zhoukan |language=zh}}</ref>

== Terminology ==
Traditional characters are known by different names throughout the Chinese-speaking world. The government of Taiwan officially refers to traditional Chinese characters as {{zhi|s=正体字|t=正體字|p=zhèngtǐzì|first=t|l=orthodox characters}}.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://law.moj.gov.tw/Law/LawSearchResult.aspx?p=A&t=A1A2E1F1&k1=正體字|script-title=zh:查詢結果|date=2014-09-26|publisher=[[Ministry of Justice (Republic of China)]]|access-date=2014-10-07}}</ref> This term is also used outside Taiwan to distinguish standard characters, including both simplified, and traditional, from other [[variant Chinese characters|variants and idiomatic characters]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Academy of Social Sciences |title=Modern Chinese Dictionary |year=1978 |publisher=The Commercial Press |location=Beijing }}</ref> Users of traditional characters elsewhere, as well as those using simplified characters, call traditional characters  {{zhi|s=繁体字|t=繁體字|first=t|p=fántǐzì|l=complex characters}}, {{zhi|c=老字|p=lǎozì|l=old characters}}, or {{zhi|s=全体字|t=全體字|p=quántǐzì|first=t|l=full characters}} to distinguish them from simplified characters.

Some argue that since traditional characters are often the original standard forms, they should not be called "complex". Conversely, there is a common objection to the description of traditional characters as "standard", due to their not being used by a large population of Chinese speakers. Additionally, as the process of Chinese character creation often made many characters more elaborate over time, there is sometimes a hesitation to characterize them as "traditional".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Norman |first=Jerry |title=Chinese |year=1988 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |pages=81}}</ref>

Some people refer to traditional characters as "proper characters" ({{zhi|c=正字|p=zhèngzì}} or {{zhi|c=正寫|p=zhèngxiě}}) and to simplified characters as {{zhi|s=简笔字|t=簡筆字|p=jiǎnbǐzì|first=t|l=simplified-stroke characters}} or {{zhi|s=减笔字|t=減筆字|p=jiǎnbǐzì|first=t|l=reduced-stroke characters}}, as the words for ''simplified'' and ''reduced'' are homophonous in [[Standard Chinese]], both pronounced as {{transliteration|zh|jiǎn}}.

== Use by region ==
{{Further|Written Chinese#Evolution}}
The modern shapes of traditional Chinese characters first appeared with the emergence of the [[clerical script]] during the [[Han dynasty]] {{circa|200 BCE}}, with the sets of forms and norms more or less stable since the [[Southern and Northern dynasties]] period {{circa|the 5th century}}.

=== Mainland China ===
[[File:廣州日報印務中心.JPG|thumb|left|The ''[[Guangzhou Daily]]'', an official Communist Party newspaper, uses traditional Chinese characters in its branding.]]
Although the majority of Chinese text in mainland China are [[Simplified Chinese characters|simplified characters]], there is no legislation prohibiting the use of traditional Chinese characters, and often traditional Chinese characters remain in use for stylistic and commercial purposes, such as in shopfront displays and advertising.<ref name="etaiwannews">{{cite web|url=http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=826842&lang=eng_news |title=Taiwan promotes traditional Chinese characters |publisher=Etaiwannews.com |date=2009-01-01 |access-date=2014-02-09}}</ref> Traditional Chinese characters remain ubiquitous on buildings that predate the promulgation of the current simplification scheme, such as former government buildings, religious buildings, educational institutions, and historical monuments. Traditional Chinese characters continue to be used for ceremonial, cultural, scholarly/academic research, and artistic/decorative purposes.<ref name="etaiwannews" />

In the People's Republic of China, traditional Chinese characters are standardized according to the [[Table of Comparison between Standard, Traditional and Variant Chinese Characters]].<ref name=tygfhzb>{{Cite web |date=5 June 2013 |title=国务院关于公布《通用规范汉字表》的通知 |trans-title=Notice of the State Council on the publication of the "List of Commonly Used Standard Chinese Characters" |url=http://www.gov.cn/zwgk/2013-08/19/content_2469793.htm |website=Gov.cn |publisher=[[State Council of the People's Republic of China]] |language=zh}}</ref> Dictionaries published in mainland China generally show both simplified and their traditional counterparts.<ref>{{Cite book |last=DeFrancis |first=John |author-link=John DeFrancis |title=[[The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy]] |date=1984 |publisher=University of Hawaii Press |isbn=0-585-31289-3 |location=Honolulu |oclc=45733542 |page=291}}</ref> There are differences between the accepted traditional forms in mainland China and elsewhere, for example the accepted traditional form of {{zhi|c=产}} in mainland China is {{zhi|c=産}} (also the accepted form in Japan and Korea), while in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan the accepted form is {{zhi|c=產}} (also the accepted form in Vietnamese [[chữ Nôm]]).<ref name="tyhzzxb">{{cite book|title=印刷通用汉字字形表 (List of character forms of General Used Chinese characters for Publishing)|publisher=文字改革出版社|date=1986|language=Chinese}}</ref>

The PRC tends to print material intended for people in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, and overseas Chinese in traditional characters. For example, versions of the ''[[People's Daily]]'' are printed in traditional characters, and both ''People's Daily'' and ''[[Xinhua]]'' have traditional character versions of their website available, using [[Big5]] encoding.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.people.com.cn/BIG5/|title=People's Daily|date=2024-11-11|access-date=2024-11-11}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://big5.news.cn/gate/big5/www.news.cn|title=Xinhua News|date=2024-11-11|access-date=2024-11-11}}</ref> Mainland companies selling products in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan use traditional characters in order to communicate with consumers; the inverse is equally true as well. In digital media, many cultural phenomena imported from Hong Kong and Taiwan into mainland China, such as music videos, karaoke videos, subtitled movies, and subtitled dramas, use traditional Chinese characters.

=== Hong Kong and Macau ===
{{Expert needed|China|reason=The differences between traditional characters as used in Taiwan versus in Hong Kong|date=September 2023}}
In [[Hong Kong]] and [[Macau]], traditional characters were retained during the colonial period, while the mainland adopted simplified characters. Simplified characters are contemporaneously used to accommodate immigrants and tourists, often from the mainland.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Li |first=Hanwen |author-mask=Li Hanwen (李翰文) |script-title=zh:分析：中國與香港之間的「繁簡矛盾」 |url=http://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/trad/hong_kong_review/2016/02/160224_monitoring_simp_trad |access-date=2018-07-01 |website=BBC News |date=24 February 2016 |language=zh}}</ref> The increasing use of simplified characters has led to concern among residents regarding protecting what they see as their local heritage.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lai |first=Ying-kit |date=17 July 2013 |title=Hong Kong Actor's Criticism of Simplified Chinese Character Use Stirs up Passions Online |url=https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1284691/hong-kong-actors-criticism-simplified-character-use-stirs-passions?page=all |access-date=2018-07-01 |website=Post Magazine |publisher=South China Morning Post }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=2016-03-01 |title=Hong Kong TV Station Criticized for Using Simplified Chinese|work=SINA English |url=http://english.sina.com/china/2016/0229/894388.html |access-date=2018-07-01}}</ref>

=== Taiwan ===
[[Taiwan]] has never adopted simplified characters. The use of simplified characters in government documents and educational settings is discouraged by the government of Taiwan.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Chiang |first=Evelyn |date=2006-04-11 |title=Character Debate Ends up Being Nothing but Hot Air: Traditional Chinese Will Always Be Used in Education, Minister Says |work=Taiwan News |url=https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/91775 |access-date=25 May 2021 |archive-date=25 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210525121443/https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/91775 |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=2011-06-17 |title=Taiwan Rules out Official Use of Simplified Chinese |work=Taiwan News |agency=Central News Agency |url=https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/1628627 |access-date=25 May 2021 |archive-date=25 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210525111309/https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/1628627 |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |script-title=zh:寫作測驗 |trans-title=Writing Test |url=https://cap.rcpet.edu.tw/test_5_1.html |website=Guozhong jiaoyu huikao |language=zh |quote=若寫作測驗文章中出現簡體字，在評閱過程中可能被視為「錯別字」處理，但寫作測驗的評閱方式，並不會針對單一錯字扣分……然而，當簡體字影響閱讀理解時，文意的完整性亦可能受到影響，故考生應盡量避免書寫簡體字}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |script-title=zh:轉知:各校辦理課後社團，應檢視授課教師之教材內容，避免有不符我國國情或使用簡體字之情形 |url=https://www.tres.ntpc.edu.tw/modules/tadnews/index.php?ncsn=17&nsn=2512 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210525111310/https://www.tres.ntpc.edu.tw/modules/tadnews/index.php?ncsn=17&nsn=2512 |url-status=dead |archive-date=25 May 2021 |website=Xin beishi tong rong guomin xiaoxue |language=zh }}</ref> Nevertheless, with sufficient context simplified characters are likely to be successfully read by those used to traditional characters, especially given some previous exposure. Many simplified characters were previously variants that had long been in some use, with systematic stroke simplifications used in folk handwriting since antiquity.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Cheung |first=Yat-Shing |title=Sociolinguistics Today: International Perspectives |year=1992 |publisher=Routledge |editor-last=Bolton |editor-first=Kingsley |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=fAYOAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA211 211] |chapter=Language Variation, Culture, and Society}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Price |first=Fiona Swee-Lin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-FRIYcHARa0C&q=Guangdong+traditional+characters&pg=PA67 |title=Success with Asian Names: A Practical Guide for Business and Everyday Life |year=2007 |publisher=Nicholas Brealey |isbn=978-1-85788-378-7 |via=Google Books}}</ref>

=== Singapore ===
Traditional characters were recognized as the official script in Singapore until 1969, when the government officially adopted Simplified characters.<ref name="reflection on use of simplified Chinese in Singapore">{{Cite conference |last=Chia |first=Shih Yar | author-mask=Chia Shih Yar (谢世涯) |script-title=zh:新加坡汉字规范的回顾与前瞻 |trans-title=Review and Prospect of Standardization of Chinese Characters in Singapore |url=http://www.huayuqiao.org/articles/xieshiya/Simplified/5_XinJiaPoHanZiGuiFan-XP.htm |conference=Paper presented at The Fourth International Conference on Chinese Characters. Convened by The Society of Chinese Philology, Jiangsu Educational Publishing House and State Language Commission of PRC. Suzhou, China. 26–27 Nov 1997 |language=zh |via=huayuqiao.org}}</ref> Traditional characters still are widely used in contexts such as in baby and corporation names, advertisements, decorations, official documents and in newspapers.<ref name="yzzk"/>

=== Philippines ===
The [[Chinese Filipino]] community continues to be one of the most conservative in Southeast Asia regarding simplification.{{citation needed|date=April 2015}} Although major public universities teach in simplified characters, many well-established Chinese schools still use traditional characters. Publications such as the ''[[Chinese Commercial News]]'', ''[[World News (newspaper)|World News]]'', and ''[[United Daily News (Philippines)|United Daily News]]'' all use traditional characters, as do some Hong Kong–based magazines such as ''[[Yazhou Zhoukan]]''. The ''Philippine Chinese Daily'' uses simplified characters.

[[File:Announcement in a Filipino Chinese daily newspaper (Traditional Chinese).jpg|thumb|center|Job announcement in a Filipino Chinese daily newspaper written in traditional Chinese characters]]

=== North America ===
With most having immigrated to the United States during the second half of the 19th century, Chinese Americans have long used traditional characters. When not providing both, US public notices and signs in Chinese are generally written in traditional characters, more often than in simplified characters.<ref name=":0">For instance, {{Cite web |url=https://www.irs.gov/irm/part22/irm_22-031-001.html |work=[[Internal Revenue Manual]] |title=22.31.1.6.3 |date=6 November 2012 |quote=The standard language for translation is Traditional Chinese |publisher=Internal Revenue Service }}</ref>

== Use on computers ==
=== Encoding ===
{{Main|Chinese character encoding}}
{{See also|Han unification}}
In the past, traditional Chinese was most often encoded on computers using the [[Big5]] standard, which favored traditional characters. However, the ubiquitous [[Unicode]] standard gives equal weight to simplified and traditional Chinese characters, and has become by far the most popular encoding for Chinese-language text.

=== Input methods ===
{{Main|Chinese input methods}}
There are various [[input method editors]] (IMEs) available for the [[Chinese input methods for computers|input of Chinese characters]]. Many characters, often [[Varieties of Chinese|dialectical]] variants, are encoded in Unicode but cannot be inputted using certain IMEs, with one example being the [[Shanghainese]]-language character {{unichar|20C8E|CJK UNIFIED IDEOGRAPH-20C8E}}—a composition of {{zhi|c=伐}} with the {{kxr|口}} radical—used instead of the Standard Chinese {{zhi|t=嗎|s=吗|first=t}}.{{Citation needed|date=June 2007}}

=== Typefaces ===
{{Further|List of CJK fonts}}
[[Typefaces]] often use the initialism {{code|TC}} to signify the use of traditional Chinese characters, as well as {{code|SC}} for [[simplified Chinese characters]]. In addition, the [[Noto fonts|Noto]] family of typefaces, for example, also provides separate fonts for the traditional character set used in Taiwan ({{code|TC}}) and the set used in Hong Kong ({{code|HK}}).<ref>{{Cite web |title=Noto CJK |url=https://www.google.com/get/noto/help/cjk/ |website=Google Noto Fonts }}</ref>

=== Webpages ===
Most Chinese-language webpages now use Unicode for their text. The [[World Wide Web Consortium]] (W3C) recommends the use of the [[language tag]] {{code|zh-Hant}} to specify webpage content written with traditional characters.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Internationalization Best Practices: Specifying Language in XHTML & HTML Content |url=http://www.w3.org/TR/i18n-html-tech-lang/#ri20040429.113217290 |access-date=2009-05-27 |publisher=W3C }}</ref>
[[ISO 15924]] offers {{code|Hant}} to mark text in traditional Chinese and {{code|Hntl}}<ref name="IETF">{{cite web |title=IETF Language Subtag Registry |url=https://www.iana.org/assignments/language-subtag-registry/language-subtag-registry |access-date=15 July 2025 |language=en |date=2025-06-23}}</ref> for text mixing traditional Chinese and Latin characters, sometimes used for [[Pe̍h-ōe-jī#Han-Romanization mixed script|Taiwanese Hokkien]].

== Comparison with other scripts ==
In the [[Japanese writing system]], {{Transliteration|ja|[[kyujitai]]}} are traditional forms, which were simplified to create {{Transliteration|ja|[[shinjitai]]}} for standardized Japanese use following World War II. Kyūjitai are mostly congruent with the traditional characters in Chinese, save for minor stylistic variation. Characters that are not included in the {{Transliteration|ja|[[jōyō kanji]]}} list are generally recommended to be printed in their traditional forms, with a few exceptions. Additionally, there are {{Transliteration|ja|[[kokuji]]}}, which are kanji wholly created in Japan, rather than originally being borrowed from China.

In the [[Korean language|Korean writing system]], [[hanja]]—replaced almost entirely by [[hangul]] in [[South Korea]] and totally replaced in [[North Korea]]—are mostly identical with their traditional counterparts, save minor stylistic variations. As with Japanese, there are autochthonous hanja, known as {{Transliteration|ko|[[gukja]]}}.

Traditional Chinese characters are also used by non-Chinese ethnic groups. The [[Maniq people]] living in [[Thailand]] and [[Malaysia]] use Chinese characters to write the [[Kensiu language]].<ref name="Glossary of Aslian Languages.">{{Cite journal |last=Phaiboon |first=D. |date=2005 |title=Glossary of Aslian Languages: The Northern Aslian Languages of South Thailand |url=http://sealang.net/sala/archives/pdf8/phaiboon2006glossary.pdf |journal=[[Mon-Khmer Studies]] |volume=36 |pages=207–224 |via=Southeast Asian Linguistics Archives |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240106093538/http://sealang.net/sala/archives/pdf8/phaiboon2006glossary.pdf |archive-date= Jan 6, 2024 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Bishop |first=N. |date=1996 |title=Who's Who in Kensiw? Terms of Reference and Address in Kensiw |url=http://sealang.net/sala/archives/pdf8/bishop1996who.pdf |url-status=dead |journal=[[Mon-Khmer Studies]] |volume=26 |pages=245–253 |via=Southeast Asian Linguistics Archives |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110719030049/http://sealang.net/sala/archives/pdf8/bishop1996who.pdf |archive-date=2011-07-19 |access-date=2010-12-12}}</ref>

== See also ==
* [[Modern Chinese characters]]
* [[Chữ Nôm]]
* [[Ambiguities in Chinese character simplification]]

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

{{Clear}}
{{List of writing systems}}
{{Chinese language}}
{{Portal bar|Language|Taiwan|Hong Kong}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Traditional Chinese Characters}}
[[Category:Chinese characters]]
[[Category:Chinese language reform]]