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While generally speaking, the answer will be “no” this question is not as silly as it seems. There are some situations in which some use of Chinese is acceptable. For example, if a candidate wants to mention a person, place or name of a book, poem or film. In many cases these will also have English names but if the candidate is unfamiliar with these, using the Chinese name in this case is perfectly acceptable. Whether or not the examiner is familiar with place or work of art has no bearing on test scores.
Even so, it is best to limit the use of Chinese names to an absolute minimum. For example, if a candidate wished to speak about a Chinese work of literature such as “Three Kingdoms” or “Dream of Red Mansions” during part 2 this might involve plenty of Chinese names for people and places, possibly confusing an examiner unfamiliar with these works. When talking about a book or a movie, it is much better to talk about one that they have read or watched in English.
As IELTS is of course a test of English, only English is graded and any Chinese (or any other language) produced will be disregarded. A few Chinese names used out of necessity will have no meaningful impact on the total language sample produced by a candidate over the course of the test and will therefore not be penalized. Use of Chinese words more generally will become a problem if the candidate relies on their use in order to get their point across. This would hint at shortcomings in lexical resource, which would certainly have an impact on their component score in this area. In the writing exam, use of Chinese characters should be avoided at all cost.
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