Wikipedia:Manual of Style (China-related articles)

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These guidelines are under development. Discuss it and improve it.

To write and edit China-related articles, please follow the conventions below. Note

• see Wikipedia:Manual of Style for general cases
• see Wikipedia:History for notes on the style of history articles
• see Wikipedia:History standards for China-related articles for notes on the style of history of China-related articles
• see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Chinese) for naming convention of the title of an article, various Chinese names, etc.
• see Wikipedia:China-related topics notice board for ongoing news and tasks relevant to China-related topics.

Contents 1 Insertion of Chinese characters 2 Introductions 2.1 Introductory sentence 2.1.1 Templates 2.2 Box format 3 Characters 3.1 Simplified and Traditional 4 Romanization and tones 4.1 Use of Hanyu Pinyin 4.1.1 Tones 4.1.2 Apostrophes 4.1.3 Hyphens 4.2 Cantonese 5 Ruby characters

Insertion of Chinese characters

This edition of Wikipedia is in English, so do not use characters or romanized forms excessively, such as for common words, making this a kind of English–Chinese bilingual edition. However, if the term does not have an established translation (that is, has multiple translations or none), feel free to provide the Chinese characters, which will be useful to the content of the article. Proper nouns' Chinese characters should also be supplied, unless it is Wikified and the target article in the English Wikipedia contains the characters. Note that cross links to Chinese Wikipedia will not help researchers who need more information in English.

It is usually helpful to add Chinese text to disambiguate Chinese terms that have been transliterated into English. Chinese words are often spelt inconsistently. The addition of native text especially for the article title term is valuable to researchers who need to consult other Chinese scholars on the same subject.

If there is a term you have trouble translating, please bring it up in the Talk page, then, if you wish, drop a short note at Talk:List of China-related topics for other Wikipedians' attention.

Also, to help establish a simple and clean appearance, if a term is Wikified and has an article, do not provide characters or romanization again. For example, the following is redundant.

Li Shimin (李世民), along with King...

It could easily be rendered as:

Li Shimin, along with King...

which simplifies the article. If the reader wishes to find out about the native text, he or she can simply click on the link (where the writer should direct the Chinese characters if not already present).

If, however, there is no article, then it is essential to insert traditional or simplified Chinese characters and full Hanyu Pinyin with tone-marks, as a minimum. Those characters can later be removed once a stub/article has been created. Non-English insertions should minimize interruption to the flow of reading. They should always be put within parenthesis, as if they were call-outs not part of the sentence. Try reading the sentence aloud by skipping everything within the parenthesis. If an English reader can read the sentence in a grammatically correct way without any unpronouncible interruption, then the sentence is in acceptable form. For example:

"His name was Li Shimin (李世民)."

is okay but

"His name was 李世民."

is not a readable English sentence. Chinese insertions to list and table entries can be done without parenthesis because these items are seldom read like sentences.

Introductions

All encyclopedia entries whose title includes a Chinese name or term should include the relevant Chinese characters and hanyu pinyin representation.

There are two preferred alternative ways to introduce this information: within the introductory sentence, or in a box to the right in the introduction. Contributors to the individual article concerned should decide together the most appropriate alternative for that particular page.

Introductory sentence

• Topic (characters; pinyin: pinyin, Wade-Giles: Wade Giles; also other-romanization, other-romanization...) ...

  for example, Zeng Guofan (曾國藩; pinyin: Zēng Guófán; Wade-Giles: Tseng Kuo-fan)...

If the topic itself is romanized according to a particular system (and, in the case of pinyin, has tone marks present in the first sentence's bold highlight), then you should avoid re-listing the romanized form in the brackets following it. However, in the case of pinyin, it is acceptable to first list the title without tones, and to re-list the title with tones indicated.

• Tǒpīc (characters) OK
• Topic (characters; pinyin tǒpīc) OK
• Tǒpīc (characters; pinyin tǒpīc) Discouraged (note the repetition of Tǒpīc)

If the topic is one in which simplified and traditional characters vary, then you should add the other version. Order is potentially politically charged, and there is no solution to this problem. Either order is acceptable. The simplified version should be presented first for modern mainland/Singapore subjects and the opposite should be done for modern Taiwan/Hong Kong/Macau subjects. A suggested format is as follows:

• Topic (Traditional Chinese: characters; Simplified Chinese: characters; pinyin: pīnyīn; Wade-Giles: W'ade Gil'es; also other-romanization, other-romanization...) ...

Templates

Most China-related articles currently show great inconsistency in how romanization information is presented. To help promote better consistency, the following templates are offered, to closely reflect the styles recommended above:

Template	Example	Result
{{zh-st}}	{{zh-st |s=周恩来 |t=周恩來}}	Simplified Chinese: 周恩来; Traditional Chinese: 周恩來
{{zh-ts}}	{{zh-ts |t=陳水扁 |s=陈水扁}}	Traditional Chinese: 陳水扁; Simplified Chinese: 陈水扁
{{zh-stp}}	{{zh-stp |s=周恩来 |t=周恩來 |p=Zhōu Ēnlái}}	Simplified Chinese: 周恩来; Traditional Chinese: 周恩來; pinyin: Zhōu Ēnlái
{{zh-tsp}}	{{zh-tsp |t=陳水扁 |s=陈水扁 |p=Chén Shuǐbiǎn}}	Traditional Chinese: 陳水扁; Simplified Chinese: 陈水扁; pinyin: Chén Shuǐbiǎn
{{zh-stpw}}	{{zh-stpw |s=周恩来 |t=周恩來 |p=Zhōu Ēnlái |w=Chou En-lai}}	Simplified Chinese: 周恩来; Traditional Chinese: 周恩來; pinyin: Zhōu Ēnlái; Wade-Giles: Chou En-lai
{{zh-tspw}}	{{zh-tspw |t=陳水扁 |s=陈水扁 |p=Chén Shuǐbiǎn |w=Ch`en Shui-pien}}	Traditional: 陳水扁; Simplified: 陈水扁; pinyin: Chén Shuǐbiǎn; Wade-Giles: Ch`en Shui-pien
{{zh-stpl}}	{{zh-stpl |s=天安门 |t=天安門 |p=Tiān'ānmén |l=Gate of Heavenly Peace}}	Simplified Chinese: 天安门; Traditional Chinese: 天安門; pinyin: Tiān'ānmén; literally "Gate of Heavenly Peace"
{{zh-tspl}}	{{zh-tspl |t=天安門 |s=天安门 |p=Tiān'ānmén |l=Gate of Heavenly Peace}}	Traditional Chinese: 天安門; Simplified Chinese: 天安门; pinyin: Tiān'ānmén; literally "Gate of Heavenly Peace"
{{zh-cp}}	{{zh-cp |c=上海 |p=Shànghǎi}}	Chinese: 上海; pinyin: Shànghǎi
{{zh-cpw}}	{{zh-cpw |c=北京 |p=Běijīng |w=Pei-ching}}	Chinese: 北京; pinyin: Běijīng; Wade-Giles: Pei-ching
{{zh-cpl}}	{{zh-cpl |c=紫禁城 |p=Zǐjìnchéng |l=Purple Forbidden City}}	Chinese: 紫禁城; pinyin: Zǐjìnchéng; literally "Purple Forbidden City"

Note that the "t" and "s" parameters can be specified in any order.

{{zh-ts |t=東 |s=东}} and
{{zh-ts |s=东 |t=東}} produce the exact same result.

Rather, it is the choice of {{zh-st}} or {{zh-ts}} that determines the order of display.

Box format

Image:Sun.jpg
Names
Known in English as:	Sun Yat-sen
Chinese:	孫逸仙
Pinyin:	Sūn Yìxiān
Wade-Giles:	Sun I-hsien
Jyutping:	Syun1 Jat6 Sin1
Known in Chinese as:	孫中山
Pinyin:	Sūn Zhōngshān
Wade-Giles:	Sun Chung-shan
Jyutping:	Syun1 Zung1 Saan1
Family name:	Sun
Non-simplified Chinese:	孫
Simplified Chinese:	孙
Given	names
Register name (譜名):	Deming (德明)
Milk name (乳名):	Dixiang (帝象)
School name (學名):	Wen (文)
Courtesy name (字):	Zaizhi (載之)
Pseudonym (號):	Rixin (日新), later
	Yixian (逸仙), both
	Yat-sen in Cantonese
Alias (化名):	Zhongshan (中山)
Styled:	Guofu (國父),
	"Father of the Nation"

Using a box removes the characters and romanization from the opening sentence, thus making it more readable, while retaining the information off to the side so that the reader can still see it—look right for an example. This is especially helpful for biographies of prominent individuals born before the 20th century who went by multiple names.

It is up to the contributors to each individual article to determine together what information should or should not be included in such a box. For biographical articles, additional names or a portrait might be appropriate to include—see Chiang Kai-shek, Li Po, or Sun Yat-sen for examples. Templated boxes have also been implemented for Chinese emperors, such as Kangxi Emperor.

Characters

Chinese characters on the English Wikipedia should be encoded in Unicode. Big5 and GB encoded characters are acceptable as a draft for people who have no other means of entering characters, but should be converted to Unicode later. After a Chinese text has been converted to Unicode, the Big5 or GB versions should be removed.

If you have trouble getting Unicode, try methods listed at Wikipedia talk:Wikipedians/China#Converting CJK text to HTML Unicode.

The use of italics and bold text is to be avoided with Chinese characters, as it tends to make them less legible: 国 国 国 国.

Simplified and Traditional

Main discussion (archived): Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(Chinese)/archive2

In order to accommodate all viewers, both sets should be used in all cases where a difference exists. The traditional form should go first in contexts involving territories where traditional characters are used; otherwise, simplified characters should go first. If you do not know or cannot input the other character version, then leave it out and someone will put it in for you.

Romanization and tones

We usually use Hanyu Pinyin. (See Talk:Transcription of Chinese) When listing multiple romanizations, try to use the following order:

1. Pinyin (necessary)
2. Wade Giles (generally unnecessary, except in cases of famous ancient Chinese personalities or literature)
3. others (unnecessary)

Use of Hanyu Pinyin

Generally speaking there are two main ways to show pinyin tones;

1. Letters and numbers, ie: ni3 hao3
2. Using unicode to add diacritics, ie: nǐ hǎo

Always use the second method, and convert any instances of the first method to the second. Also add diacritics where they have been forgotten. Wikipedia now has clickable characters with diacritics under the edit box.

Italicise the pinyin to differentiate it from the English text.

Pinyin words are written similar to English in regards to capitalization, spacing and punctuation. (See Talk:Transcription of Chinese#Library of Congress Guidelines)

Pinyin officially uses the handwritten style of the lower-case letter a, with no curl over the top (ɑ̄, ɑ́, ɑ̌, ɑ̀, ɑ). On Wikipedia, however, normal a's are used.

Tones

The tone mark is added to the vowel in the syllable that comes first in this sequence: a o e i u ü. For example, ai takes the tone mark on a, and ia also takes the tone mark on a. The only exception is iu which takes the tone mark on u.

The diacritics used are:

1. The first tone is represented by a macron (ˉ) added to the pinyin vowel:

   
   ā ē ī ō ū ǖ Ā Ē Ī Ō Ū Ǖ

2. The second tone is denoted by an acute accent (ˊ):

   
   á é í ó ú ǘ Á É Í Ó Ú Ǘ

3. The third tone is symbolized by an inverted circumflex (ˇ):

   
   ǎ ě ǐ ǒ ǔ ǚ Ǎ Ě Ǐ Ǒ Ǔ Ǚ

   1. Please do not use the breve (a curved downward circumflex) for the third tone.
4. The fourth tone is represented by a grave accent (ˋ):

   
   à è ì ò ù ǜ À È Ì Ò Ù Ǜ

5. The fifth or neutral tone is represented by a normal vowel without any accent mark:
   (There is no need to indicate neutral tones with numbers or with dots before the syllable: "·ma")

   
   a e i o u ü A E I O U Ü
   

See also Standard Mandarin#Tones.

Apostrophes

See: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Chinese)#Apostrophes

Hyphens

See: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Chinese)#Hyphens

Cantonese

After a (very very) long offtopic discussion on Talk:Political divisions of China, Ran tentatively proposes that we include Cantonese pronunciation, given in IPA, on pages related to Hong Kong, Macau, and possibly the Cantonese-speaking regions of Guangdong. The IPA will follow the system set out in Standard Cantonese, with tones given in terms of numbers (1–6) and put in superscript. There's an example at Hong Kong.

It remains undecided whether Jyutping or other Romanization systems should still be included if IPA is shown.

This is still tentative. All comments are welcome on the talk page.

Ruby characters

Ruby annotation is a way of putting pinyin in small letters over the top of a Han character. It cannot be used for normal inline text on Wikipedia because the small size at which characters are displayed means that the even smaller text on top is illegible. However, it is appropriate for Han characters that have a line or paragraph to themselves. It has the advantage of keeping the transcription very close to the character, and is thus didactically helpful. In browsers that do not support it, it degrades gracefully into a transcription in parentheses after the character.

So, instead of or in addition to representing a text like this:

We can represent it like this if we choose:

The markup to display text like this is as follows:

" {{ruby|梦|mèng}} " displays " 梦(mèng) ".

Note that this template also adds a helpful link to the Wiktionary definition of each character.

Browser support under Windows:

• IE — perfect... except if you put it inside a table, in which case it crashes the browser.
• Mozilla / Firefox with support installed — problems with wrapping long lines, but otherwise fine.
• Mozilla / Firefox without support installed — displays in parentheses.
• Opera — displays in parentheses.

List of pages currently using this template.