I'm curious about studying a little chinese. What should I know about it and where to I start?
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 4:51
2GET
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 10:12
4GET
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 11:53
5GET
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 11:55
6GET
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 11:56
6get
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 12:01
7GET
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 12:47
I started to teach myself chinese (thinking it couldn't be much harder than Japanese) – I'd say it's impossible. The difficulty is 1: getting the right "pitches" for pronouncing words will probably require somebody telling you if you're saying the word right or not. 2: The written language is rather difficult, and is totally unlike any romantic (and from what it seems... eastern too) dialect.
If you want to learn it through college/whatever, then I'd say start by reading the general overview of the language, and if you don't know Japanese, familiarlize yourself with that first, as that's more "english-like" than Chinese ever will be. Japanese's writing system evolved from Chinese too, so it would be a plus there. After all that, then you'd be ahead enough to probably get through learning it.
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-17 14:26
The tones in Chinese aren't that hard. I know almost no Chinese but I can read pīnyīn almost perfectly. The only tone I have a little trouble pronouncing is the falling-rising tone represented by a caron.
ǎ ě ǐ ǒ ǔ ǚ Ǎ Ě Ǐ Ǒ Ǔ Ǚ
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-18 5:19
When I try to pronounce Chinese tones I always get them long.
So "wo shi fenlanren" becomes "wooooooo shiiiii feeeeeenlaaaaaaaaaaanreeeeeen!" D:
As a Chinese I'd say the 8# post has a good point.
The written language is difficult.
It took us a couple of years to do the hand-writing again and again and again.. ,in primary school.My middle finger deformed a little bit doing too much of that.
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-21 16:03
WTF this thread ill challenge you to a shaolin showdown for the most powerful shen gong wu everr made
EVERYBODY WAS KUNG FU FIGHTING! HA!
THOSE KICKS WERE FAST AS LIGHTNING!
IN FACT IT WAS A LITTLE BUT FRIGHTENING!
BUT THEY FOUGHT WITH EXPERT TIMMING!
start by going to china. the spoken language is so easy you'll shit creampuffs but the written language is so hard you'll shit bricks
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-22 10:02
qu ni de.
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-23 4:03
>>1
My advice, as as native speaker, is don't do it unless you're really committed to it. Do you really want to learn a language where kids who grew up with the language still sometimes have trouble pronouncing some sounds and was hard enough to read/write that the PROC government decided to simplify it?
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-28 5:27
Chinese is not a language, there's mandarin and catonese. And cantonese is the harder of the two...As a native speaker, I know it's possible for foreigners to speak perfect mandarin, but they couldn nearly never master the art of cantonese.
Name:
Anonymous2007-01-28 6:14
>>18
I think I know what you mean...
I'm learning mandarin (putong hua) that introduces a new concept for most occidentals : tones. There's only four different (well in fact, five) but cantonese got nine, am I right ? Is that because you're saying mastering cantonese is unreachable for us ?
While its difficult for non-native speakers to learn the language, it is equally difficult to perfect the spoken element of any language foreign.
I'd like to hear you roll your 'R's perfectly in Spanish, or speak any of the native american langauges 'prefectly.'
Any language which posesses sounds that do not exist in your native tongue would be extremely difficult to learn... since most people are almost incapable of distinguishing said spoken elements even when listening to a native speaker speaks.
It isn't just a "foreigner" trying to learn cantonese, buddy. You really think Japanese people who're just learning English really suck that bad when it comes to words with "L" sounds? No, they don't. The "L" sound simply doesn't exist in Japanese. You try making a sound that doesn't exist in your language. Your brain automatically shifts it to the 'best fit' ... which would be the "r" series in Japanese. Hence the joke spelling of 'Engrish.'
Name:
Anonymous 2007-01-28 23:04
If you are really serious about learning the language take a class. Purchase the books, purchase the tapes and if you are fortunate enough to take it at a local college make use of every facility available to you. I am currently taking mandarin now and it's honestly kicking my butt. The characters are a little easier for me to do than the proper pronounciations. If you feel you want to try it on your own make friends with chinese people who might be willing to help you.
For every non-native spanish speaker who can roll their r's correctly, there're a few dozen who can't.
Just because you can doesn't mean everyone else can. Hey, Jordan can dunk like its the easiest thing in the world, it must mean its fucking easy, right?