WASHINGTON - Naming anything after its Chinese originator is a perfectly good thing in and for itself. Instead of zooming in on petty politics, let us look at the greater picture in world history: Ted Cruz and the US Senate[i] may have ulterior foreign policy motives, such as admonishing China by naming the plaza in front of the Chinese Embassy ‘Liu Xiaobo Plaza’—after the Chinese Nobel Laureate, who is still imprisoned in China for subverting the state. And, yes, Beijing has to put on a little show of protest.
Ultimately, however, measured in Chinese dynasties, any street, building, organization, invention, or movement that bears a Chinese name in America is progress. I just wished US censors and gatekeepers would allow more Chinese words into global scholarship and journalism- instead of omitting or translating [read:‘Orwellian Rules of Writing at The New York Times’[ii]] all things Chinese into misleading Western vocabularies.
[i] TheGuardian, Liu Xiaobo: Anger as US Senate votes to name square outside Chinese embassy after dissident, Feb 14, 2016, London
[ii] www.east-west-dichotomy.com/orwellian-rules-of-writing-at-the-new-york-times/
