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<p>A language, whose spoken component is paramount and can be spontaneously creolised, is separate from a writing system, which is inorganic, artificial and something which must be invented. </p>
<p>Chinese can be written using hanyu pinyin or hanzi, or even [url=<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiao’erjing]xiao’erjing[/url">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiao’erjing]xiao’erjing[/url</a>] (Chinese written in Arabic). The last one has a particularly rich cultural history because of the Silk Road.</p>