Hello, InferKNOX, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:
Firstly, I would like to offer my sincerest apologies for editing "Tai Chi Chuan" to "Taiji Quan" before discussing. I only discovered the rigorous discussion process after having saved the edits. I mean(t) no disrespect of any kind and actually wanted & looked for such a function, but stupidly failed to find it. I hope I have not stepped on anyone's toes, and if I have, that you will please forgive my ignorance regarding the netiquette of Wikipedia, and we can work together peacefully and effectively to spread accurate information.
I undid your move of the page. While it is fine to make bold edits to Wikipedia, there are conflicting sources for the name in English and the article title has been where it's at for many years amicably. If you can present evidence that a majority of reliable sources in English use Taiji Quan over Tai chi chuan, please do so on the talk page. Thanks, Steven Walling04:08, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you and I am using that avenue now. Although I originally was leaning towards the name being "Taiji Quan", I learnt that the most common usage is in fact "Taijiquan" and thus am working towards consensus on recognition of this this fact. InferKNOX (talk) 09:45, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The reason to edit to Taijiquan
The martial art is practically unanimously called such among Taijiquan masters, associations, organisations and anyone whose origins are in line with that of Taiji itself. There is a serious splintering in international Taiji schools, etc, at the moment, making it difficult for new students to effectively gather information and act upon their desire to join this spectacular martial art and the various naming conventions only add to this splintering, as the Taiji leaders call it something distinct (Taijiquan) from the majority of unlearned individuals.
For these individuals, this raises questions of whether there are practical distinctions between the two and what they may be, adding confusion to something that individuals like Wu Bin, the International Wushu Federation, as well as the various Taiji associations and organisations are working to simplify and harmonise. Thus using "Tai Chi Chuan" as the term for something called "Taijiquan" by the heads of the martial art, is in a sense spreading misinformation.
I'm still a beginner in the Traditional Yang Style Taijiquan, but hope to do my part, whatever that may be, and work together with the various schools, associations and organisations to consolidate this splintering and to do my best to help promote uniformity, cohesion and a standardised hierarchy that all can appreciate and adhere to.
For references, you can review material from the various Chinese masters and I'm sure you'll see the relative unanimity I speak of.
Thank you for your efforts. The argument that needs to be made here is that the article should be labled the "correct" name of the art rather than the possibly incorrect and definitely declining "most common name in English". If anyone on Wikipedia argues that you must follow a convention, please note there are many guidelines that state that any guideline or perceived "rule" can and should be bent or broken if it stands in the way of improving an article.Herbxue (talk) 22:26, 14 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Whilst I can see that you are very passionate about this issue InferKNOX, and by your own admission you are a beginner at Tai Chi Chuan, you have made various statements in favour of changing the name of the article and yet you have not presented any evidence which proves that your assertions are correct. It may be the case that your teacher calls it "Taijiquan", and that articles you read refer to it this way that is understandable. However I have been teaching Tai Chi for almost thirty years and I can assure you that most people call it by the English spelling and not the Chinese one. Changing the title of an article to a special spelling only recognised by a minority of English speakers does not improve the article or make it more accessible in any way imaginable. My teacher called the art "T'ai Chi Ch'uan", which is the spelling I would personally prefer, and I have just published a book called "The Chinese Art of T'ai Chi Ch'uan", however if I am making a poster or advertising my class I recognise that most people call it "Tai Chi" and this is the spelling I use because it is the recognisable one. Using the English language spelling is not spreading misinformation, languages are not designed by using dictionaries or even by recognised conventions set out in rule books by authorized bodies but are simply composed by the conventions and usages of the languages' speakers, in fact the same is true of the "Tai Chi" schools. Schools which emphasize links with China may favour the Chinese spelling but my school was established in Britain in 1934 and we use the English spelling, Tai Chi is international now and the English Wikipedia spelling of the name "Tai Chi" reflects this.--Chuangzu (talk) 23:21, 18 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
They're both English spellings, it's just that one is using the outdated Wade-Giles translation and the other is using the standardised Pinyin translation. My argument is not based on bias, and in fact my Sifu and his school use Tai Chi Chuan; nor is it based on ignorance, despite my being a beginner of the practice. I argue for it, because of the splintering I talk of above, and the fact that standardisation is one of the key factors towards achieving cohesion. Even now it is very difficult to ascertain legitimacy of items pertaining to Taiji, what more in a generation or two, when the unchecked offshoots will be so vast that the central, 'correct' martial art is lost in the shuffle? I fear, however, that based on what you said, your argument is the product of personal preference due to teaching and habit. As someone so long in it, surely you see what I'm saying? I honestly don't see any harm it could do to anyone, having the standard name Taijiquan on Wikipedia, as anyone searching for "Tai Chi" or "Tai Chi Chuan" would simply be redirected there, and on the page it would be clearly stated that those spellings they were redirected from are the formerly used Wade-Giles translation, thus all those learning about the martial art would understand the current standing and from where it came. The other point is that using the Wade-Giles translation, people will always revert to the incorrect "Tai Chi" and "Tai Chi Chuan", when it should be "T'ai Chi" and "T'ai Chi Ch'uan" respectively. Is it then better that there be such rigid grasp to something for popularity's sake, that deterioration is preferable to correctness, which itself is not entirely unpopular? --InferKNOX (talk) 11:03, 19 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Your title change tai chi chuan
I believe you changed the article title of "Tai Chi Chuan" to "T'ai Chi Ch'uan" wrongly. I don't know how you did it but the long and important article history of the "Tai Chi Chuan" version (also from the talk page) has disappeared. Please reverse the title change and correct this, or ask an knowledgeable editor to carry out such an article change. --VanBurenen (talk) 11:09, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think I see your concern now. You're interested in the histories of the "Tai Chi Chuan" page and the corresponding discussion page. In that case, you need to go to the Tai chi chuan page, which will redirect you to "T'ai Chi Ch'uan". Just under the title you will then find a link saying "(Redirected from ...)". Click on the link to go to the former Tai chi chuan page, then you can view the histories of both that page and corresponding discussion page. I hope that clears that up for you. InferKNOX (talk) 11:48, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That, of course, is unacceptable. You can not require from a visitor to go through the exercise of checking all possible variations of "redirected from" to accidentally find the one with the most complete history. I strongly believe that this has to be solved another way. The history of the text that is now to be found under the title "T'ai Chi Ch'uan" is not where one should expect it, namely under the button on top of that page. --VanBurenen (talk) 11:57, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
PS: please don't change the title of this discussion. It is the reference I use for communicating about this problem. Thank you. (At least till some later date, when the history issue has been solved.) --VanBurenen (talk) 12:01, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There is a way to move a page and keep the page's history intact at the new title. I will look into correcting that today. It might involve deleting the new page and then moving again the correct way. I have to ask, though, after a cursory look at the discussion at the old page, is there consensus for the move? It didn't appear that there was... I won't make any changes until I'm sure that there is consensus for changing the title of the page. WikipelliTalk12:44, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, InferKNOX, for reverting this. And I see on the talk page that you found the formal procedure. User:Wikipelli is willing to do the conversion, as you see above, however, depending on consensus. --VanBurenen (talk) 17:22, 6 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Wikipelli, however we need it with only the "T'ai" in uppercase and "chi ch'uan" in lowercase, ie "T'ai chi ch'uan". It's minor, I know, but actually relevant. Thanks again. InferKNOX (talk) 11:24, 7 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Tai Chi. Since you had some involvement with the Tai Chi redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion (if you have not already done so). Other related redirects are nominated at the same link. ~Kimelea(talk)03:12, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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Thank you very much! It's nice to know the hard work I'm trying to put into improving taijiquan & the sub-pages is noticed, and even nicer to know it's appreciated. ^_^ ~ InferKNOX (talk) 21:03, 5 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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I hadn't realised the inappropriate usage. I made the assumption of using it in such manner from seeing it used in the infobox on the taijiquan page. Thanks for pointing my mistake out to me before I got any further. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 22:39, 4 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that you've added some links pointing to disambiguation pages. Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.
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Let me know if you are willing to help deal with comments if I nominate for GA. The process usually involves responding to comments by reviewers. If you say yes I will nominate and of course help where I can. It is a bit of a judgement call whether to undergo peer review first but as I said on the Talk page I believe the article is close and we can add in a few more references while we wait for the review to start.Peter Rehse (talk) 22:42, 28 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for calling upon me for that purpose. Will try to correct & get other editors to correct the shortcomings of the article. I wouldn't want to rush into it too early & have it come up short. I hope to get it to GA status & raise the quality of the derived family styles likewise or as close as possible. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 07:52, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Well the peer review was a bust but that might be a good thing. The box was checked and nothing bad was said. On the talk page I ask for consensus on moving to GA and suggest we remove the fighting effectiveness section since that is in my mind the biggest roadblock with respect to references. Its a big step so I would be more comfortable with consensus. I also changed the way archiving was done since some of the previous archiving was lost because of name changes.Peter Rehse (talk) 11:48, 19 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Why is it better to say "Hanzi" instead of "Chinese Characters"? Everyone knows what Chinese characters are and the article isn't about Chinese so there's even less assumed background info we can grant the reader. This is an encyclopedia intended to be read by everyone. What value does the loanword "Hanzi" have over "Chinese characters"? You might not know this, but most people who know English simply aren't going to understand automatically what "Hanzi" means, because they have never seen that word in their life. see WP:MOS, we use plain English and avoid jargon. - Metal lunchbox(talk)11:10, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The reason is that the terms aught to be quoted as they are used in the martial art itself. Those learning/researching taijiquan may have heard/read certain loanwords commonly used in the practise of the martial art itself and want to see the loanword's relation to the martial art & it's deeper meaning. Choosing translations over valid loanwords strips the articles of terms that make up the "essence" that the loanwords attempt to convey. It is exactly for the purpose of English readers understanding the martial art that it is important to include these loanwords. If it's valid, there's no need to change/translate it, so please don't do so. Thanks. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 12:40, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am not suggesting that jargon not be included in the article. As I think you are suggesting, the article should introduce and explain the important domain-specific language related to the topic. Along the lines of what I said on my talk page, I do not see why we ought to quote the language used in the domain. Readability is more important than mirroring the sources. the Manual of Style I link to above I think is helpful to understand this aspect of WP. What "essence" does "hanzi" carry that "Chinese characters" does not? Seems needlessly opaque. - Metal lunchbox(talk)13:00, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The argument in this case isn't so much whether "hanzi" is more valid than "Chinese characters", but rather that hanzi is a valid loanword within the context of taijiquan, is already present, is (now) first referenced as a loanword for "Chinese characters", by means of parentheses, is Wiki-linked, and is a term used repeatedly in the section & is thus also acts as a more concise way of saying "Chinese characters"; making replacing it with the translation seemingly counter-productive. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 13:37, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I have noticed the further edits since my change in that section. I have not reverted or made further edits. As long as the word "Chinese characters" is used to make the meaning clear, it doesn't matter much whether Hanzi is also used alongside. I just want the article to be readable, without the user having to look up words that they already know, clicking on Hanzi to discover its just another word for "Chinese characters" with more "essence". - Metal lunchbox(talk)13:42, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm glad we both feel this compromise is adequate & am glad we may have done that little bit more to make the article better for those seeking to understand taijiquan. Thank, Metal Lunchbox. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 14:40, 29 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Taoism & qi in taijiquan
Hi Chuangzu, I noticed your comment here and would like to request contributions from you in the taijiquan article. These valid aspects of taijiquan would add valuable insight into taijiquan in, perhaps, the philosophy section, which could use more input, as highlighted in the talk here. I hope for a positive response in the interest of improving the taijiquan article. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 12:42, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thankyou for your comments InferKNOX. Yes I wrote that some time ago but I have pretty much given up on getting my point across.
Our Lee style T'ai Chi and related Taoist Arts are very firmly rooted in the Taoist tradition so personally I view lineage as a Confucian concept.
Our style is not derived from the Chen Village Story but originates from Weihai in Shandong province in China. I think that T'ai Chi is not based on documents, writing or talking but is in fact an actual embodiment of Taoist philosophy and teaching techniques through the movements and exercises themselves. This seems evident from the opening paragraph of the Tao Teh Ching. I was recently reading a Facebook post about this very issue and a large proportion of those commenting in the group called The Kwoon on Facebook seemed to think that lineage was not an important issue in T'ai Chi. The history of particular T'ai Chi styles is of historical interest of course. What is more important to a student is the current ability of a particular teacher and not a report about someone who may have died a hundred years previously. I would have to agree that viewing a lineage of ancestry of various teachers from a particular style seems largely irrelevant to people visiting Wikipedia in the hope of learning something useful about T'ai Chi. In my view it is simply an attempt to promote a certain type of style which has gained popularity in China as a result of various social and political events which are well known. During the seventies for example Taoism and T'ai Chi in China suffered an enormous setback and even before this T'ai Chi was systematised and standardised according to Communist principles which are not related to T'ai Chi training as such. I have read one story for example of a visit to the White Clouds monastery in Beijing and how the monks there actually clock off at the end of the day and change into their normal clothing, it seems likely that they are there for the benefit of tourists and may not even be Taoists at all. Our style came to London in 1930 so has not shared in the simplification and systematisation of T'ai Chi styles that occurred in the 1950's. Few people enquiring about Taoism and it's links with T'ai Chi today will be aware of the true history of Taoism and T'ai Chi and it's related disciplines in China.Chuangzu (talk) 00:44, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Your points are valid, however, I put it to you that your viewpoint is a bit too cynical. You are stating that taiji's origin and movement through time is irrelevant on the basis that it is not the main point of taiji, which is a flawed way to look at it. Sure, it's about the philosophy and there has been damage to the true taiji of old, but that's why we're here, to tell the world that. When I began taiji, I wanted to know what it truly was, but there was so many different people saying so many different things, that I felt I needed to find the source and work from there to have a clearer perspective. That's why, for example, I took interest in polarising the name (which has ridiculously many incorrect variations) here to simply taijiquan (or at least t'ai chi ch'uan), as well as improving the lineage tree here, so that people can trace how taiji came from then to now, not to promote anything, but to help give people an understanding of who those in the centre of it were and are, and what they say it is.
What you speak of, regarding the setback and so on, though, is of great importance and deserves inclusion in the article. That is why I ask you to contribute, as I am unable to contribute in that regard. The point is to show it in it's entirety, so as to eliminate these sort of fringe aspects of taiji that are relatively unknown and so that people do ask about everything to do with taiji and realise it for what it is. If you don't contribute that which you say, all that is left is what others have been able to contribute, which is simply that lineage history, which you point out as being the lesser element of the art.
By the way, I'm also a member of The Kwoon, and I must be honest that the one-upmanship and cynicism in the group has it that I rarely think to comment, as the passive aggression and condescension is too unwelcoming, a sad aspect of the group; leading me to continue being in it simply to learn from my seniors, who although brimming with knowledge, seldom display wisdom and/or wude. ~ InferKNOX (talk) 18:46, 21 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
lines broken in tai chi lineage tree
I was adding one another disciple in the Template:Yang-style t'ai chi ch'uan lineage tree, but the lines at most right are broken, actually disappear. I was trying to fix them but whatever I did they are still hidden. So could you help on it?
I added him properly and fixed the damage. You should try to ask the ones that made edits on a page before saving edits on code that you are not sure about, but well done for coming forward and asking for help when you saw it broke. ;) InferKNOX (talk) 20:23, 2 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]
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