Western writing style to debut

"You have no idea how inconvenient and inefficient it is to write English in vertical Chinese scripts."

Ku Chung-hwa, professor of sociology at National Chengchi University

The Executive Yuan is set to approve during its weekly Cabinet meeting tomorrow the adoption of the Western writing format for government documents.

According to the decree governing the writing of official document (公文程序條例), the scripts of official documents -- except for charts, graphics and statistical reports -- have to run from right to left and from top to bottom. The new measure will see scripts running from left to right.

Arguing that it is necessary to have a consistent Chinese writing system for official documents and to be in line with global trends, Premier Yu Shyi-kun in February asked the Cabinet's Research, Development and Evaluation Commission to study the possibility of changing the writing style of official documents during a Cabinet meeting.

"As it's our goal to make English the quasiofficial language within the next six to 10 years, the use of English is bound to increase in official papers and private publications," Yu said.

Although some have argued that the change will jeopardize the centuries-old Chinese tradition, Chiu Hei-yuan (瞿海源), a sociology professor at the National Taiwan University, expressed a different view.

"I don't think adopting the Western writing format will do any harm to Chinese tradition because tradition should lie in something deeper," he said. "It seems a more natural way of writing since we're in a technological age where communication and writing in English are common."

Endorsing Chiu's opinions, Ku Chung-hwa (顧忠華), professor of sociology at National Chengchi University and chairman of the Taipei Society, said that he agrees with the Cabinet's proposal.

"It's time to liberate the obsession for writing formats of Chinese scripts," Ku said. "You have no idea how inconvenient and inefficient it is to write English in vertical Chinese scripts."

Kent Wang (王建輝), a linguist and an English professor at the Soochow University, however, cast doubts on the Cabinet's rationale that the change will put Taiwan in line with the international trend.

"How do you connect with the world if foreigners don't understand Chinese in the first place? Basically it's a domestic issue and doesn't have anything to do with the rest of the world," he said.