Talk:China proper/Archive 1

message: What about Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan? 
By the way, where does this term come from. 
Is it a generally accepted one? - Olivier
: I've seen this phrase in literature several times.
: It doesn't include TW for sure. Not sure about HK and Macau. --Menchi 11:19, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan 

message: So I came here, redirected from Inner Asia. Fine. But dismissing Inner Asia as a confusion of Central Asia is not cool. The term "Inner Asia", introduced by Hungarian-born Louis (Lajos) Ligeti and introduced to the U.S. by D. Sinor (Univ. of Indianna), is a widely recognised term in those parts of the world for the region stretching from the Caspian to Manchuria, from the Altai to the Himalayas. It may be preferable to the term "Central Asia" which means many different things to different people. --Iceager 06:00, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Inner Asia 

message: Previously, I put in an paragraph to neutralize the claim "retrocession" of Taiwan which is an POV. I did not touch the orignal text to keep the original author's content intact. I agree that paragraph about sovereignty was a bit awkward there. I am fine with it if you that part was taken away. But since half of the article was about Taiwan, I thought the paragraph with a bit flavor of international law on the topic of sovereignty was not too off. And this would neutralize the POV "retrocession". However, if that paragraph is taken away, then I believe the POV , retrocession, has to go. Either way is fine with me. Both stay, or both go. :)Mababa 01:17, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Nice paragraph. Thanks for sharing with us!!Mababa 09:16, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Retrocession

message: China proper includes Liaoning but excludes Ningxia? That's not the extent of the original 18 provinces. Ningxia was a part of Gansu during the Qing Dynasty. -- ran (talk) 21:32, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Very valid practical points, which I had overlooked. Great work with adding more maps. Regarding Sichuan, the western parts of it belonged to the Amdo province, which has traditionally been a part of Tibet. The dashed lines I have drawn through the province roughly correspond to the borders of Aba Tibetan Qiang Autonomous Prefecture and Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, which make up most of western Sichuan. deeptrivia (talk) 20:27, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Map 

message: ::Indeed, the historical evolution of China from a historical core to a later, larger entity is an indisputable fact.
It's hardly indisputable.
Roadrunner 22:33, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ermm... well. The PRC is certainly larger than Tang China which is certainly larger than Qin China which is certainly larger than Shang China. It's not like China assumed the borders of the ROC, Mongolia and Tuva and all, since the days of Shennong and Huangdi. -- ran (talk) 00:17, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Remove term 

message: After reading the second paragraph, the start of the third seems completely out of place. It's using the term "China proper" itelf, which was deemed controvertial before; furthermore, the same paragraph states that the term is considered offensive by some. It sounds pretty much like "The use of the term 'Gypsy' is controvertial as some Gypsies consider it pejorative"; this would be obviously inappropriate for an encyclopedia. I'd like to reword the sentence, but I don't know how to; only deleting the word "proper" wouldn't work.--cloviz 01:43, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think there is anyway around it and the word Gypsy is not a good analogy. "China proper" is a widely used term for the core provinces of China. I know that this article states that some people consider the use of the term China proper "controversial" or "offensive", but it doesn't say who finds it controversial, which makes me think that this a clear case of a Weasel word. The word "proper" has nothing to do whether whether the territory of China is "proper" or not, instead it refers to the core of China as distinct to its perifery. For instance, in Finland there is a region called Finland Proper - no one is disputing that the rest of the country belongs to Finland. Likewise, people talk about Lesser Poland proper, France proper, England proper, London proper, etc.--Niohe 02:00, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Finland proper is an official region; "London proper" or "France proper" are not defined terms, they are just pairs of words that come handy in some situations and that's why we don't have articles for them. The use of "China proper" is more relevant because it's controvertial and even hard to manage. You should note that many citizens of the PRC disregard historical or anthropological matters on defining their country under the name "China", which they believe to be bound to their current state. Therefore, using the term "China proper" as an accepted word suggests a POV on the issue. I think your last changes improved the neutrality of the article.--cloviz 03:17, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use of "China proper" in the article