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XMNN posted:If any of you guys are in the UK or have access to iPlayer there's a really good series called Maps: Power, Plunder and Possession on their at the moment about maps (obv) and how they reflect/inform our views of the world. Very good program and by the bloke who wrote 12 Maps That Changed the World which is an excellent book for map likers.
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Nov 7, 2014 10:17
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i hope somebody can translate this
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Nov 7, 2014 10:35
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:Are there any maps where China does the same thing and points out the backwards nature of the Greater Western White Devil or something? I'd like to see some old-timey racism from someone else's perspective for a change If anything the Chinese were more, if not exactly racist, condescending to culturally non-Chinese "barbarians" than Europeans. Europe was aware that there were vast riches in the rest of the world and went out to go get them; the European identity as the greatest civilization in the world was more a product of the Empire period from the 15th to 19th centuries than a cause for it. China was convinced that it was the center of the world. They went on believing this (and doing some pretty heinous imperialist poo poo but on a relatively smaller scale than Europe) until they crashed headlong into fact of European technological and military superiority. Ironically this was mostly because Europeans had gone out looking for wealth that they were perfectly ready to believe didn't already exist in Europe. The Chinese had the technology for blue-water sailing around the same time as Europe but not the inclination to practice it. So anyway, the Chinese Imperialist perspective. China was the definition of civilization; barbarians could become Chinese (although I really doubt non-Asian looking people would ever have been accepted) but if you didn't adopt Chinese culture you weren't civilized. There was quite a bit of argument over what exactly entailed adopting Chinese culture because the Qing were not Chinese but were very careful to explain to the Han that they weren't barbarians.* Sovereignty did not exist as a concept in the Chinese world view. The Emperor wasn't just the rightful sovereign of the world, he was the actual sovereign of the world.** All foreign rulers were either vassals of the Emperor and paid tribute, or they were vassals negligent of their rightful tribute to the Emperor. That's why you get this surprisingly serious argument between English representatives and the Chinese court about whether the English monarch is subservient to the Emperor. The Chinese worldview did not accept sovereign states or rather, the Emperor was the only sovereign entity in the world. The English were unwilling to negotiate from the premise that their monarch was subordinate to the Chinese Emperor. If you think about it, it's not just a petty dispute it's a serious problem in bilateral negotiations if one side does not recognize the other side's sovereignty and views everything that happens in the context of dealing with subordinates who have obligations and limitations. So naturally if everyone is a subject of either the Emperor or one of his vassals, an imperialist attitude goes with that. It tends to get overlooked in comparison to the vast territories acquired in European empire-building but the history of Imperial China is a history of wars of expansion and conquest. In fact it's deliberately swept under the rug in modern Chinese historiography because China's narrative about Imperialism is that China is a victim, and let's just ignore how China doubled in size between 1700 and 1900 that was always China anyway how dare you hurt our feelings! China south of the Yangtze, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang and Tibet were all acquired in wars of conquest and more or less in that order. Ask the Vietnamese if you want a non-Chinese opinion of Chinese Imperialism, to them Chinese history is just a long litany of invasions. The Treasure Fleet of the Ming Dynasty has been thoroughly rehabilitated by history; the actual official Chinese name for the fleet was the "Foreign Expeditionary Armada" which gives you a clearer picture of the situation. The image of the fleet sailing around giving presents has a kernel of truth but conceals the more fundamental truth that the fleet sailed around protecting Chinese interests. Here's a quote from the "Treasure Fleet" when it visited Sri Lanka to deposit Yang Rong posted:Straight-away, their dens and hideouts we ravaged, I mean if that doesn't ooze disdain for a lower form of being I don't know what does. The "treasure fleet" destroyed pirate bases, extracted tribute from the king of Malaysia, brought the King of Sumatra home to be executed, regime-changed Sri Lanka, destroyed more pirate bases, and participated tangentially in a war against the Mongols. It did bring gifts, but to rulers who acknowledged fealty (however theoretical) to the Ming Emperor. Rulers who refused got a cold shoulder and rulers who were being an annoyance fell in line or died. More recently, aside from conquering and then re-conquering Xinjiang and Tibet when they tried to break away during the warlord period, China's biggest claim to Imperialist fame is the genocide of the Dzungar people. There are no more Dzungars, thanks to Chinese armies. The 19th century is when China decided it was a victim of imperialism rather than an Empire, which obviously is right when they started getting their asses kicked by the West. But they never actually stopped kicking the asses of the Tibetans and central asians and Tibetans and Mongols and Tibetans. They just kept on kicking the barbarians' asses while simultaneously complaining that the West should really stop kicking their asses because asskicking is wrong. *Actually the extent to which the early Qing believed what they were saying to their Han subjects is very questionable. The Qing were excellent propagandists. They showed up in Tibetan Buddhist regalia in their Tibetan possessions, prayed to Allah and followed Islamic laws in their western Muslim possessions, adopted Chinese regalia and performed Confucian rituals in conquered China, and wore furs and carried hawks in Manchuria. Naturally modern Chinese historiography's attitude can be summed up as "but with us it was for real!" **Of which China was literally the center. Official Chinese courts didn't accept the idea that the world was round for an embarrassingly long time (not sure how and when, probably varied by courts) because that would mean that China wasn't literally at the center of the world. This was a deal-breaker for Chinese officials. Arglebargle III fucked around with this message at 04:03 on Nov 10, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 12:11
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BBJoey posted:Noble Civilized Whites (and honorary whites) vs the Uncivilized Savages Italy is green though.
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Nov 7, 2014 12:27
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420 Gank Mid posted:Italy is green though.
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Nov 7, 2014 13:05
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Falkland Islanders are mostly descended from the Welsh and Scottish, so it checks out.
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Nov 7, 2014 13:09
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 Writing systems around the world
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Nov 7, 2014 13:12
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Why are North and South Korea different colors? I think the north still uses a couple of letters they don't in the south but it's the same alphabet. There aren't different colors for variations on the Roman alphabet.
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Nov 7, 2014 13:22
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What does traditional Chinese historiography think of other East Asian as opposed to completely unrelated peoples? Like, are white people exotic foreigners while Japanese and Koreans are just lapsed Chinese who insist on being slightly different to Grand Fromage posted:Why are North and South Korea different colors? I think the north still uses a couple of letters they don't in the south but it's the same alphabet. There aren't different colors for variations on the Roman alphabet. I don't know, you'll have to ask the Wikipedia guy who made it. icantfindaname fucked around with this message at 13:28 on Nov 7, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 13:25
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ThePutty posted:i hope somebody can translate this the rest are phonetic names of countries
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Nov 7, 2014 13:37
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icantfindaname posted:I don't know, you'll have to ask the Wikipedia guy who made it. Oh, was hoping it came from some article with an explanation.
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Nov 7, 2014 13:47
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The NK color isn't even in the key. And the selection of scripts is really random. This one is better: 
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Nov 7, 2014 13:53
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icantfindaname posted:
Was the map maker especially lazy or why did he not bother with internal EU borders?
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Nov 7, 2014 13:54
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Torrannor posted:Was the map maker especially lazy or why did he not bother with internal EU borders? Nah it's a map from the year 2017.
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Nov 7, 2014 14:03
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Grand Fromage posted:Why are North and South Korea different colors? I think the north still uses a couple of letters they don't in the south but it's the same alphabet. There aren't different colors for variations on the Roman alphabet. Presumably the dark purple means native Hangul characters only and the lighter purple means a mix of native and Chinese characters. North Korea banned the use of Chinese characters in most publications in 1949. South Korean students are still required to learn numerous Chinese characters, but the actual usage of Chinese characters in the country has declined over time. Grey Area fucked around with this message at 14:07 on Nov 7, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 14:03
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It's weird that the Korea with the closest relationship with China is the one that doesn't use Chinese characters.
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Nov 7, 2014 14:08
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Grey Area posted:Presumably the dark purple means native Hangul characters only and the lighter purple means a mix of native and Chinese characters. North Korea banned the use of Chinese characters in most publications in 1949. South Korean students are still required to learn numerous Chinese characters, but the actual usage of Chinese characters in the country has declined over time. They got rid of the hanja classes for a while, then brought them back. They're a legacy thing in middle school, nobody really cares to learn them and hanja aren't used anywhere anymore. The only place I ever saw them (other than Chinese places) was on restaurant menus occasionally, they'd use 小/中/大 to indicate small/medium/large orders of something occasionally. E: Oh, and some official ID papers or people using their name hanja for their signature. But it's not like it's ever actually used for reading anything in South Korea. That's why the middle schoolers blow it off, there's no practical value to it in Korea. E2: I have no better idea, not blowing you off but from my experience there, South Korea doesn't use Chinese either. I guess it's not exactly banned but the last holdout papers stopped printing with them in the 1980s I believe. Who knows. Grand Fromage fucked around with this message at 14:57 on Nov 7, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 14:22
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Kassad posted:Not a map, but this 1839 letter from a Chinese official to Queen Victoria certainly shows the attitude you're thinking of: That particular letter was basically asking them to please stop inundating their populace with opium.
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Nov 7, 2014 14:49
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computer parts posted:That particular letter was basically asking them to please stop inundating their populace with opium. It follows the same tone, albeit a more moderated one than the letter from the Qianlong Emperor to George III. Zexu at least had the common sense to not pile on poo poo about how insignificant Britain was and how China was the source of everything in the world. I wonder how things would have gone if there was an embassy and both parties didn't have to play diplomatic telephone or rely on regular mail. XMNN posted:It's weird that the Korea with the closest relationship with China is the one that doesn't use Chinese characters. The North Koreans hate everybody. They even wrote China's role in the Korean War out of their history books. EDIT:  The Zhoushan Island archipelago The British had designs on these islands and they almost became Britain's colony instead of Hong Kong. Sir Charles Elliot pushed for Hong Kong because he didn't want to expand the opium trade and because he felt it would draw Britain into more conflicts. The opium lobby also pushed for Hong Kong because they were already set up there. RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 16:08 on Nov 7, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 15:38
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ThePutty posted:i hope somebody can translate this The map is labelled with terms any English speaker will be familiar with (Sumatra, Bornea, New Guinea etc.) except in the north the puppet state of Manchukoku is labelled as well. In addition, China is referred to as "ChuKwaMinKoku" which I think is the Republic of China (中華民國) although the pronunciation is a bit different from modern readings. The text at the right says roughly "If we can take our Greater East Asia back into our hands, Japan will have risen up. Also, the strong Japanese Army (will have) driven the enemy out of Greater East Asia." The tense is a bit weird but Japanese has changed a fair bit since than so I might just not be grasping the difference between the past and the conditional. Edit: A better translation might go "By rising up we have taken Greater East Asia back into our hands. Japan's strong army has also driven the enemy from Greater East Asia." But don't take my word for it, there's a much better explanation here, with more pages from the booklet included! EasternBronze fucked around with this message at 16:20 on Nov 7, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 16:12
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Grand Fromage posted:E2: I have no better idea, not blowing you off but from my experience there, South Korea doesn't use Chinese either. I guess it's not exactly banned but the last holdout papers stopped printing with them in the 1980s I believe. Who knows. I see lots of proper names in Chinese characters in Korean newspapers. Like the newspaper will usually have its own name in Chinese, a lot of country names, and people names. I wonder what the sociolinguistic effect is. Do the Chinese names look fancier or more formal?
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Nov 7, 2014 16:23
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Thanks for the China post, Arglebargle. I've always wondered how the Chinese managed to combine their superiority complex with getting invaded and conquered every few centuries. For that matter, I don't really understand how those foreign dynasties managed to maintain a solid grip on power when they were part of a vanishingly small minority.
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Nov 7, 2014 16:33
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icantfindaname posted:It's almost like "civilization" is a borderline meaningless term that is very seldom defined with any degree of precision Or that they must be christian in order to be civilized.
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Nov 7, 2014 16:55
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Anosmoman posted:Oh well Jerry Manderbilt posted:How come literally all of the former Yugoslavia is covered? This area has an insane hydroelectric potential. I think China is investing a lot of money into small scale hydroelectric power plants in Bosnia.
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Nov 7, 2014 17:07
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Bloodnose posted:I see lots of proper names in Chinese characters in Korean newspapers. Like the newspaper will usually have its own name in Chinese, a lot of country names, and people names. A lot of people have their name officially registered in hanja, though I think that's being phased out. Now that you mention it I have seen country names in characters in newspapers before. I have no idea. I lived there three and a half years without learning any hanja and it never came up, once you learn hangeul you can read everything. The only comparison I can think of is if you learned English and went to an English speaking country, you'd occasionally run into Latin phrases that you wouldn't know but nobody would say we use Latin in the US.
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Nov 7, 2014 17:35
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Bloodnose posted:I see lots of proper names in Chinese characters in Korean newspapers. Like the newspaper will usually have its own name in Chinese, a lot of country names, and people names. I dunno if this is actually a reason but I'd guess being able to talk about Mr 軫泳 and Mr 眞永 rather than Mr Jinyoung and Mr Jinyoung is clearer too. And I've heard conflicting things about Chinese Character use, like it's still used on dates and street signs occasionally? In any case it's not common anymore though. RocknRollaAyatollah posted:The North Koreans hate everybody. They even wrote China's role in the Korean War out of their history books. People say this in jest about a whole lot of countries but it should really be emphasized, North Koreans really do hate everybody. Their whole national identity is that they're genetically and (under Juche) ideologically superior to literally everyone else, even their closest allies.
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Nov 7, 2014 17:39
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A lot of signs are in Korean/English/Chinese or Korean/English/Japanese. But trust me, I lived there. It's not common. It used to be mixed script like Japanese but that is gone. Doesn't mean you'll never see hanja anywhere but there is no need to learn it for any reason other than personal interest in Korea.
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Nov 7, 2014 17:42
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I've seen Hanja used in Korea at official functions like at the school I attended they would write the name of the school in Hanja and hang that behind the podium, stuff like that. I think the comparison to Latin is pretty apt.
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Nov 7, 2014 18:05
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Is there any simple reason why Korea stopped using mixed script, as compared to Japan? I know Vietnam also abandoned hanzi, was there an ideological reason behind it or was it pretty much once people got the option of not learning the hanzi nobody wanted to?
icantfindaname fucked around with this message at 18:22 on Nov 7, 2014 |
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Nov 7, 2014 18:16
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icantfindaname posted:I know Vietnam also abandoned hanzi, was there an ideological reason behind it or was it pretty much once people got the option of not learning the hanzi nobody wanted to? Mostly colonialism, by the time independence happened, it was too late and to be honest it might simply be that keeping Roman script was preferable during a time of constant crisis from the 1950s to the 1980s.
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Nov 7, 2014 18:24
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My understanding of it is there are three factors. First was Korean nationalism, in the late 1800s people started pushing to use the Korean developed script. Second was the Japanese forced hangeul education during the occupation to increase literacy (they then banned Korean entirely but that ended several years later when the Japanese Empire ended). Third was after the war, they pushed it as a literacy measure since it's a hell of a lot easier to learn. When it was originally developed it was gotten rid of again because it was too easy to learn and the literati class didn't want everybody to be able to read, so they ditched it and went back to hanja only.
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Nov 7, 2014 18:25
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icantfindaname posted:Is there any simple reason why Korea stopped using mixed script, as compared to Japan? I know Vietnam also abandoned hanzi, was there an ideological reason behind it or was it pretty much once people got the option of not learning the hanzi nobody wanted to? Because Chinese characters are mad dumb and nobody wants to have to learn them
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Nov 7, 2014 18:25
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I'm learning it now and while they're pretty and it is kind of fun to puzzle out, it's an utterly absurd writing system in every way and I miss alphabets.
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Nov 7, 2014 18:27
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Grand Fromage posted:My understanding of it is there are three factors. First was Korean nationalism, in the late 1800s people started pushing to use the Korean developed script. Second was the Japanese forced hangeul education during the occupation to increase literacy (they then banned Korean entirely but that ended several years later when the Japanese Empire ended). Third was after the war, they pushed it as a literacy measure since it's a hell of a lot easier to learn. Another reason the Japanese pushed it was to make Korean more like Japanese. The policy the Japanese kept to during the colonial period was that Korea was culturally similar enough to Japan that Korean culture could be entirely replaced by Japanese culture. The ban on Korean came as the most extreme of military administrators came to power in Korea and began pushing the "final solution" to the Korean culture question.
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Nov 7, 2014 18:38
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If you aren't following Mental Floss Magazine's Afternoon Map column (and I can't blame you if you don't as it rarely ever updates) you should as they share some interesting maps. This week it's endonyms of the world. From a few months ago, Pangaea (roughly) with today's borders: 
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Nov 7, 2014 21:03
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Nov 7, 2014 21:07
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Countries that call themselves Scandinavian in a parallel universe where Denmark belongs to Germany.
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Nov 7, 2014 21:13
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Honj Steak posted:Countries that call themselves Scandinavian in a parallel universe where Denmark belongs to Germany. And Finland, Iceland and Estonia have magically become Scandinavian. I think you're onto something there.
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Nov 7, 2014 21:45
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Nordic countries, and now someone is going to post that Polandball comic with Estonia trying to get into the Nordic club.
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Nov 7, 2014 21:58
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The comic is actually called "Scandinavia and the World". http://satwcomic.com/
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Nov 7, 2014 22:05
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