Zhou Youguang

This is a Chinese name; the family name is Zhou.

Zhou Youguang
200px Zhou Youguang in the 1920s
Native name	周有光
Born	Zhou Yaoping 13 January 1906 (age ) Changzhou, Jiangsu, Qing Empire
Residence	Beijing
Nationality	Chinese
Alma mater	Saint John's University; Guanghua University
Known for	"Father of Pinyin"; supercentenarian
Notable work	The Historical Evolution of Chinese Languages and Scripts
Political party	China Democratic National Construction Association
Spouse(s)	Zhang Yunhe (m. 1933–2002)
Children	Zhou Xiaoping (1934–2015) Zhou Xiaohe (1935–1941)
Relatives	Granddaughter: Zhou Hexin (b. 1959) Great grandson: Andy Zhou (b. 1993)
Chinese name
Chinese	周有光
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Zhōu Yǒuguāng Wade–Giles Chou1 Yu3-kuang1 IPA [ʈʂóu̯ i̯òu̯ku̯áŋ]
Birth name
Chinese	周耀平
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Zhōu Yàopíng Wade–Giles Chou1 Yao4-p'ing2

Zhou Youguang (Chinese: 周有光; born Zhou Yaoping, 13 January 1906) is a Chinese supercentenarian, linguist and sinologist, often credited as the "father of (Hanyu) Pinyin", the official romanization for Mandarin in the People's Republic of China.

Education and early career

Zhou was born in Changzhou, Jiangsu Province on 13 January 1906. Zhou enrolled in St. John's University, Shanghai, in 1923, where he majored in economics and took supplementary coursework in linguistics. He left during the May Thirtieth Movement of 1925 and transferred to Guanghua University, from which he graduated in 1927. Zhou spent time as an exchange student in Japan, and spent his early career working as a banker and economist overseas (mainly in New York City), but returned to Shanghai in 1949 when the People's Republic was established.

Designing Pinyin

In 1955, the government placed Zhou at the head of a committee to reform the Chinese language in order to increase literacy. While other committees oversaw the tasks of promulgating Mandarin Chinese as the national language and creating simplified Chinese characters, Zhou's committee was charged with developing a romanization to represent the pronunciation of Chinese characters. Zhou says the task took about three years, and was a full-time job. Pinyin was made the official romanization in 1958, although then (as now) it was only a pronunciation guide, not a substitute writing system.

Later activities

During the Cultural Revolution Zhou was sent to live in the countryside and be "re-educated", like many intellectuals at that time. He spent two years in a labour camp.

After 1980, Zhou worked with Liu Zunqi and Chien Wei-zang on translating the Encyclopædia Britannica into Chinese, earning him the nickname "Encyclopedia Zhou". Zhou has continued writing and publishing since the creation of Pinyin; for example, his book Zhongguo Yuwen de Shidai Yanjin 中國語文的時代演進, translated into English by Zhang Liqing, was published in 2003 as The Historical Evolution of Chinese Languages and Scripts. In total he wrote ten books since 2000, some of which have been banned in China. In his old age he has become an advocate for political reform, and was critical of the Communist Party of China's attacks on traditional Chinese culture when it came into power.

Zhou became a supercentenarian on 13 January 2016 when he reached the age of 110.

Personal life

File:Zhouyouguang2012.JPG

Zhou Youguang at home in Beijing in 2012

Zhou was married to Zhang Yunhe from 30 April 1933 to her death on 14 August 2002; the couple were married for and had two children: a daughter Zhou Xiaohe (born 1935) who died in 1941 at the age of 6, and a son Zhou Xiaoping (born 1934) who died at the age of 80 on 26 January 2015.

In early 2013, Zhou and his son were interviewed by Dr. Adeline Yen Mah at their residence in Beijing. Dr. Mah documented the visit in a video and presented Zhou with a Pinyin game she created on iPad.

See also

• Yuen Ren Chao

External links

• (Chinese) Centenarian scholar Zhou Youguang's blog (百岁学人周有光的博客)