Ministry of Education says “TV” is against the rules

Improper station logos

The Ministry of Education says that 40% of the country’s satellite TV stations are in violation of the law.

According to China’s laws on language use, broadcasters are supposed to use Mandarin and standardized characters unless they have a particular need to use a local dialect or have been approved to broadcast in a foreign language. This requirement extends to station logos as well, which means that CCTV (an abbreviation of the English name China Central Television) and BTV (Beijing TV) are in violation.

But wait: doesn’t the Ministry of Education operate China Educational TV, which goes by the English-language initialism CETV?

As it turns out, the station converted over to Chinese-language titles at the beginning of the year, giving the Ministry the moral authority to condemn the rest of the industry for failing to promote standard Chinese. Here’s part of an interdepartmental letter sent to China Education TV by the Ministry’s Department of Spoken and Written Language Management on January 15:

China Education TV:

At the start of 2009 we were pleased to see that the China Education TV logo had been changed from the English-language CETV1 and CETV3 to the Chinese characters 中国教育1 and 中国教育3. This change conforms with the stipulation in the Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Standard Spoken and Written Chinese Language that “The standard spoken and written Chinese language shall be used as the basic spoken and written language” for “broadcasting, films and TV programs” [Article 14], and we hereby express our gratitude and admiration to the media for setting an example in the use of standard written and spoken language.

Television media is an important platform for spreading the party and governmental policies as well as advanced culture. A station logo, as an important symbol of a TV station, ought to comply with national rules and regulations on language so as to uphold national culture. The abbreviations of well-known international TV stations, like the BBC (English abbreviation for British Broadcasting Corporation), NBC (English abbreviation for National Broadcasting Company), and NHK (abbreviation of the Japanese Romanization Nippon Hoso Kyokai), are formed from the language or phonetic transcription of that particular country. However, in recent years, some stations in this country have employed English-language abbreviations rather than the national spoken and written language standard or the Pinyin Romanization, and a mix of Chinese and English can be found in certain programs. Such conditions do not meet the requirements of national language usage laws and as they are not conducive to the spread and promotion of national language standards, they affect publicity and misdirect the use of spoken and written language in society. For this reason, we will work with national broadcasting and television administrations to take steps to bring things in line with the law.

At present, the logos of fifty channels carried on satellite feed, comprising 15 CCTV channels and 31 province-level satellite channels, along with CETV1, Shenzhen TV, Shandong Education TV, and Beijing TV Kaku, fall into the following five categories:

1. Thirteen channels (26%) use English exclusively: 12 from CCTV (CCTV1 – CCTV12), and Shandong Education TV (SDETV).
2. Seven channels (14%) use a mix of English and Chinese (including Pinyin abbreviations): 3 from CCTV (CCTV News, Kids, and Music), Beijing TV, Inner Mongolia TV, Chongqing TV, and Tibet TV.
3. Four channels (8%) use an image with no text: Heilongjiang TV, Shanghai TV, Shandong TV, and Hunan TV.
4. One channel (2%) uses Pinyin and characters with no image: Beijing TV Kaku.
5. Twenty-five channels (50%) use an image and Chinese text: CETV1, 23 provincial channels, and Shenzhen TV.

It is obvious that the twenty channels (40%) in categories 1 and 2 need to change their logos.

Beijing TV overhauled its own logos at the start of 2009, abandoning a three-pointed transmission tower for a series of plain text logos and switching from numbered channels (BTV-1, BTV-2) to subject titles (BTV北京, BTV文艺). It told The Beijing News that its new logos had been approved by SARFT and were therefore entirely legal.

The newspaper was unable to obtain any comment from CCTV, but a reporter from the Beijing Times had better luck:

Yesterday, a reporter asked CCTV about the Ministry of Education’s recommendations. A CCTV employee said that they were not aware of the situation. As for the issue with station logos, the individal said that CCTV’s logo had been in use for decades and was a valuable mark that should not be arbitrarily changed. Were change actually necessary, it would require a directive from CCTV’s parent organization.

CCTV is under the direct control of SARFT. The Administration previously expressed its lack of concern that the abbreviation would confuse foreigners who are more used to CCTV meaning “closed-circuit television,” so it is unlikely to sacrifice a major brand just to placate some departmental-level copy-editors.