[Photo/IC]

Online voting for The Chinese Character and Chinese Word of the Year 2014 started on Nov 20 in Beijing.

The annual event is hosted by The Commercial Press, People Daily Online and the National Language Resources Monitoring and Research Center. It first started in 2006. 

The event aims to select words that are meant to capture the spirit of China and the world in the past year. Most of the words are often closely related to current events.

In the past few years, the most popular Chinese words and characters have been included in the lists, such as 正能量 (positive energy) in 2013, 钓鱼岛(Diaoyu Islands)in 2012 and 涨 (to rise) in 2010.

This year's candidates for the list have been accumulating as well. 打虎 (fights the tigers, or corruptive officers), 反腐 (anti-corruption), 依法治国 (rule by law) are already on the waiting list.

The event has four parts: online users' recommendations, experts' voices, online polling and final announcement. Online users can vote through People's Daily Online's Wechat account or weibo platform until Dec 7, providing both the words and relevant reasons.

The final result will be announced on Dec 19, including The Chinese Character of the Year, the Buzzword of the Year, the New Word of the Year and the Cyber Word of the Year.

"We hope that people can feel the vitality in the living Chinese words through this event and thus care more about our valuable culture embedded in the language," said Yu Dianli, manager of The Commercial Press.

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