35 Facts About Huang Kan

Huang Kan, courtesy name Jigang, born into a family of Hubei ancestry in Chengdu, Sichuan province, was a Chinese phonologist, philologist and revolutionary.

Huang Kan then went to study in Japan and became a student of the Chinese scholar and philologist Zhang Taiyan.

Huang Kan was the first to question established theories of rhyme schemes in ancient literature.

Huang Kan proposed twenty-eight variations instead of the older version of twenty-six variations established by his teacher Zhang.

Huang Kan proposed a new categorization of the ancient consonantal system that separated the oldest nineteen sounds from the existing theory of forty-one sounds.

Huang Kan Yunhu was a high-ranking government official in the late Qing dynasty.

In 1903, at the age of eighteen, Huang Kan tested into the Hubei Liberal School, Wuchang Xuetang.

Huang Kan was not afraid to challenge or embarrass authority figures.

Huang Kan's father was old friends with Zhang Zhidong, the Viceroy of Huguang.

Huang Kan started studying at Waseda University in 1903, which was during the period leading up to Xinhai Revolution, the revolution that eventually overthrew the Qing monarchy.

Huang Kan joined Tongmenghui, a major resistance group against the Qing dynasty.

Huang Kan then continued living in Japan as a political refugee.

Huang Kan became Zhang Taiyan's student there, learning philology and phonetics.

Huang Kan was the first to propose a convincing initial systems of Old Chinese.

In 1911, Huang Kan moved to Shanghai after his mother's death in Hubei.

Huang Kan reset the parameters of the phonetic development of the Chinese language to nineteen consonants and twenty-eight vowels.

Huang Kan outlined and gave examples of how these ancient sounds have developed into contemporary phonetics.

Huang Kan termed them as "original sound" and "changed sound".

Huang Kan famously said, "I shall only write books when I reach fifty years old".

Unfortunately, Huang Kan died right around the age of fifty so the majority of his works were only published after his passing.

Huang Kan taught at Peking University, National Central University, Jinling University, Shanxi University, and some others for more than twenty years collectively.

Huang Kan, although opposing the imperialist government, did not support the New Culture movement, either.

Huang Kan asked his students to imagine a telegram delivering the death of someone's mother.

Huang Kan was a very famous academic during his time for both his uncompromising political stance as well as his teaching style.

Huang Kan's lectures were often so popular that the lecture halls were filled with admirers standing by the doors and windows to listen.

Huang Kan was known to have prepared his lectures extremely extensively, often departing from textbook content and structure.

Huang Kan was said to incorporate other studies and fields into his lectures.

In 1903, Huang Kan first married Wang Caiheng by arrangement of their parents.

Huang Kan unequivocally supported Huang's political stance and teaching career and took care of their children.

However, during the long distance marriage, Huang Kan went to Shanghai in pursuit of Huang Kan Shaolan, who was a student of Zhang Taiyan.

Huang Kan convinced her to marry him using a fake name.

Huang Kan complied because he could not have gotten married with the same identity twice.

Huang Kan regretted the decision once Huang went back to Beijing and started dating a student of his, Peng.

In 1923, Huang Kan married one of his own students Huang Juying, who graduated from college that year.

In 1916, when Zhang Taiyan was jailed by Yuan Shikai, Huang Kan arrived at his teaching position in Peking University.