Use Xiaozhuan to copy your name 100 times! You heard me right, this is the homework of Zhejiang University students

"Students, the midterm exam week is coming. I don't assign other homework, just a simple small task: everyone uses Xiaozhuan to copy their own The name is on the A4 paper 100 times, and it will be handed over to me in a week." Before the end of a modern Chinese class, Associate Professor Luo Tianhua, Department of Chinese, School of Humanities, Zhejiang University left a "strange" for the undergraduates homework.

There was an uproar in the class, confusion and excitement intertwined - how to find the Xiaozhuan font corresponding to my name? How can Xiaozhuan be written beautifully? What's the point of copying 100 times? These have left question marks in the hearts of the students. But the students are also "not surprised", because Luo Tianhua's classroom style has always been humorous and divergent, turning decay into magic.

Understand the changes from ancient to modern times in transcription

Liu Yiwei from the 2019 Chinese Language and Literature Base Class of the School of Humanities was very puzzled when she heard this assignment: "What? Writing Xiaozhuan? Why do I need to write Xiaozhuan when I learn modern Chinese? Write my name 100 times? It’s not too exhausting! But fortunately, it’s not writing a thesis. Liu Yiwei encountered unexpected things.

In order to write the correct Xiaozhuan font, she consulted "Shuowen Jiezi", found her name word by word, and used All the transcriptions were completed in the fragmented time between three or four classes. Contrary to expectations, in fact, copying 100 times is faster than she imagined; and when she first started writing, she had to try not to think about the name of her simplified characters, otherwise she might forget how to write Xiaozhuan, so this is not a brainless task .

The name of Xiaozhuan not only inspired her pictographic associations, but also made her feel that the fonts at this stage had already had a fixed structure and outline. "Dao" is changed to "刂".

Liu Yiwei introduced that through this assignment, she remembered the small seal script of her name quite clearly and will never forget it forever. What's even better is that she also learned the practice skills of small seal script from her circle of friends. "At first I thought this homework was the teacher's whim, but after that we learned about the evolution of ancient and modern Chinese characters, which should pave the way for the next class!

Read dictionaries to stimulate interest

Perhaps the students in the modern Chinese class do not fully understand the purpose of this assignment. Luo Tianhua said that if he wanted to talk about the origin of using Xiaozhuan to copy his name, he had to go back to when he was an undergraduate student. He was also assigned a similar homework by his teacher, but at that time he was asked to use Xiaozhuan to copy his name 50 times. He was also very confused by the teacher's approach when he was a student, thinking that it was a "meaningless" and time-consuming assignment. But when he became a linguistic researcher, he realized more and more that the "meaningless" in it is "meaningful".

"When you write Xiaozhuan seriously, you can feel that the ancient characters are very close to us, and you can more clearly feel the weakening of the pictographic form of the ancient characters." Luo Tianhua said that during the copying process, there may be I unconsciously compared it with the simplified characters currently used, and felt the evolution of Chinese characters in the process. Xiaozhuan is the last stage of the development of ancient characters, so if you want to learn ancient characters, Xiaozhuan is the first step.

Luo Tianhua's criteria for judging homework is very simple, just correct and neat, and writing with aesthetic feeling will give more points. Although some students may go to online recognition websites to find Xiaozhuan fonts, he prefers that they use textual research and verification from dictionaries such as "Shuowen Jiezi" and "Kangxi Dictionary" to cultivate basic skills for academic research.

In addition to building the awareness of reading dictionaries, it is also very important to stimulate students' interest. Among the previous students, there are also students who take this assignment very seriously. For example, Zhu Ruohan, the author of this small seal script with a brush, has exquisite and smooth writing; another student, Zhou Shihan, who writes small seal script with a brush to a huge length, is now a direct Ph.D. student in the Chinese Department of Zhejiang University. Although the homework of writing names in Xiaozhuan has ended, many students will not stop there, but hope to continue learning and contacting. For example, Li Xinrui, a 2019 Chinese language and literature base class, said that she wants to spend the New Year When I was young, I used Xiaozhuan to write a pair of Spring Festival couplets.

The meaning of "inheritance"

Every student who took Luo Tianhua's modern Chinese class was given the task of copying the names in Xiaozhuan 100 times. Luo Tianhua has kept this handwritten homework and other paper homework from previous students, carefully bound them into a volume, wrapped it with a cover and the student roster, and stored it in the bookcase in the office. This is the testimony of the "inheritance" of his modern Chinese class.

Luo Tianhua said: "Every homework is the hard work of the students, so I have to keep it well. Especially the small seal name, I believe they will remember this homework in the future, and even remember this "strange" teacher. We also have homework marked with the International Phonetic Alphabet for self-chosen essays. A counselor used to be my student. When he came to the office to find me, I showed him his homework. Hahaha..."

This assignment of "passing down from generation to generation" also reflects the characteristics of paleontology in the Chinese discipline of Zhejiang University.

Zhejiang University has an excellent research tradition and strong strength in ancient philology. It has platforms such as the national key discipline of Chinese classical philology, the Chinese History Research Center of the Ministry of Education's key research base for humanities and social sciences, and the national language promotion base. With the support of the national "Strengthening Foundation Program", the Chinese discipline of Zhejiang University serves the needs of the inheritance and innovation of China's excellent traditional culture in the new era, cultivates top-notch talents in the direction of paleography, and cultivates talents who are committed to building a Chinese discourse system and paying attention to the future of the nation and the destiny of mankind. Builders and leaders of Chinese culture. Through this unforgettable homework experience, I believe that the students of the Chinese Department of Zhejiang University will be better inspired.

The original text was published on the Renmin Account of Zhejiang University Read the original text

Editor: Shang Juntian