Tōyō kanji

The tōyō kanji, also known as the Tōyō kanjihyō (当用漢字表, "list of kanji for general use") are the result of a reform of the Kanji characters of Chinese origin in the Japanese written language. They were the kanji declared "official" by the Japanese Ministry of Education (文部省) on November 16, 1946. They were replaced in 1981 by the Jōyō kanji.

History

Thousands of kanji characters were in use in various writing systems, leading to great difficulties for those learning written Japanese. Additionally, several characters had identical meanings but were written differently from each other, further increasing complexity.

Prior to World War II, language scholars were concerned with these problems in learning fluent Japanese. One of their more radical proposals was to abolish the Chinese kanji characters entirely and make use of an entirely phonetic system. When the Ministry of Education tried to implement this reform, however, it encountered strong opposition from scientists, writers and the general public, and the idea was finally dropped.