On The Course Of The Esperanto Movement In Modern China

Esperanto movement is a part of the reformation of Chinese characters movement in modern China, which reflects nation's existential crisis. Since the Western civilization has taken over the East, China suffered unprecedented change, which is that it was defeated, humiliated the country and forfeited its sovereignty. To change difficult situation of lagging behind and suffer beating, people actively explore ways from various aspects. In the condition, the language as cultural carrier is reviewed and Chinese characters shows crisis situation. The case began from the late Qing period.It is said that Chinese characters rationality is suspected which primarily is concerned with the thought about "enlightening people" to deal with the invasion by foreign powers."Greater China" is defeated by "Little Japan" who has get certain achievement from learning West in Sino-Japanese War, the outcome brings Chinese scholars strongly stimulation, they work hard to change present situation and require to learn from the West in the economic, political, cultural, ideological fields just like Japan. For learning from the West, it is necessary to open the official wisdom, but also to open people wisdom, so that more people can read, recognize the changes of the international environment and the situation of the nation and accept new knowledge.Only enlightening people can make the state prosper, which is the consensus accepted by advanced scholars. Why does Westerners have encountered literacy, while Chinese people literate small? They find it is related to degrees of difficulty of each character. Western characters have simple structure, are consistent with language and easy to grasp; Conversely, Chinese characters have complex strokes and are separated from language. They believe that the difficult to learn Chinese characters affected the popularity of education, improvement of public knowledge, the country's economic development, and even the military's combat effectiveness. In order to master Chinese characters, it is imperative to reform Chinese characters. They start to express opinions about reforming Chinese characters. One of the most radical opinions is the abolition of Chinese characters and make Esperanto which is emerging in West replace Chinese characters. Under influence of the ideology, Esperanto movement in China begins, and the trend of Esperanto movement has different characteristic under different conditions. Generally speaking, in the late Qing period, Esperanto in China has initially spread. Esperanto organizations like Esperanto school, Esperanto Society establish Esperanto Society, books and publications about Esperanto are published subsequently in the country. As emerging language, Esperanto is considered to be easy to learn and the value of neutrality is shared by people of different ethnic groups and different faiths. On the one hand, Esperanto advocates make Esperanto link with cultural innovation to promote the "new learning"; on the other hand, they make Esperanto movement be a part of the anarchist movement. With cultural and political functions, these two aspects are in tentative stage.During the early Republic of China period, especially the period of the New Culture Movement, Esperanto movement in China gets larger development, presents feature of agitating with cultural movement. In the early Republic of China period, the old order is abolished, the new order doesn't construct, there appears an anti-intellectual trend, cultural issues have not been resolved is the root which makes solve political problems hard, and vigorous new culture movement sets off. New Culture Movement advocated removal of the inherent traditional culture, including language which is the carrier of traditional culture, which not only provides favorable condition for appearing of the climax of Esperanto movement, but also makes early Esperanto movement with political and cultural features develop toward the direction of culture.There is the period of political revolution after the New Culture Movement, the neutral cosmopolitanism of Esperanto gets challenge, Esperantist are in contradiction of persisting universal ideals of peace, or turning to service the value of particular party. Meanwhile, they also think how to develop the Esperanto movement which impacts by domestic war and slide into low ebb. After the establishment of the national government, especially the occurrence of the September18th incident in1931, Esperantist raise slogan of using Esperanto to"emancipate"China, make Esperanto movement combine with the national liberation movement. Esperanto movement shows its unique political and cultural face in the process of development. With the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War and the subsequent civil war, the development of Esperanto movement increasingly is squeezed, but the stake is hanging by a thread,with stubborn insistence of Esperantist, they manages to push Esperanto movement forward. From the perspective of development of Esperanto movement in modern China, China to carry out the case from the perspective of modern, Esperanto has obvious differences in function in China and other countries in the world. Chinese Esperanto movement adapts their relationship with modern Chinese society and serves the modern Chinese society, combines with Chinese specific cultural movement and the specific political movement, appears social outlook which is beyond language itself.