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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| hkboy Groupie Hong Kong Joined 5674 days ago 65 posts - 86 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Cantonese, Mandarin | Message 137 of 169 05 June 2012 at 2:49am | IP Logged |
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[QUOTE=zhanglong] Cantonese
An interesting article discussing Cantonese education in Hong Kong: Thanks! I'm going to read this now. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 138 of 169 05 June 2012 at 7:33am | IP Logged |
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Flirted with the idea of becoming a Sinologist and studying one language from each of China's language
families, but as attractive as that may sound now, I think a prerequisite would be to get C1/C2 level in Mandarin. Without a thorough understanding of Mandarin and Chinese phonology, I won't be able to navigate my way through the more difficult and largely undocumented Chinese languages. I certainly can't attend a Chinese university without a mastery of Mandarin so if getting a University degree in Chinese linguistics is my goal, I must dedicate myself to a more structured approach than ad hoc language studies. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 139 of 169 06 June 2012 at 3:24am | IP Logged |
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Cantonese
I'm working my way through 流行粤语快速入门. Along the way, I'm making note of the pinyin and adding the jyutping pronunciation of each character. It's a fun little book in that it teaches Cantonese through Mandarin, so each page has many parallel translations. I'd like to finish this text this month and be able to set it aside after internalizing the grammar. It supplements my other sources and give me stuff to talk to other people about, since it's all about daily interaction. Mandarin Working on translating 论语 as so many others before me have done, I wonder if I should just read an English translation first, as a guide. It's fun to think that I am reading words written and thoughts expressed thousands of years ago. Right now, the translation I am reading is in simplified Chinese, but of course, the originals certainly were written differently. The Confucian analects formed the foundation of Chinese thought and helped to shape the mindset of much of East Asia. An English/Chinese translation can be found here. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 140 of 169 08 June 2012 at 8:02am | IP Logged |
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Tibetan
And now, travel to Tibet has been cancelled for all international tourists. Chinese nationals can still go there, but everyone else...no go. Tibetan Travel Ban What a shame. I hope that this policy does not last. Tibet has one of the most beautiful landscapes ever. 'nuff said. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 141 of 169 08 June 2012 at 3:22pm | IP Logged |
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And here is an interesting article about Shanghainese...
If you look on the page, you can find a link to a Shanghainese input method. Saving Shanghainese 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 142 of 169 08 June 2012 at 3:30pm | IP Logged |
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What does Shanghainese sound like?
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| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 143 of 169 14 June 2012 at 9:09pm | IP Logged |
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An interesting resource for the study of Chinese languages:
Chinese Dialect Dictionary It includes, among others, Mandarin, Cantonese, Shanghainese, ChaoShanese, and pronunciations from the Song Dynasty Rhyming Dictionary. Mandarin The more I study, the easier it is for me to see how Chinese students convert English into Chinglish. I can use Mandarin for a lot of day to day interactions, but I will soon need to focus on writing characters. Cantonese I listened to fifteen chapters of audio from a particular textbook and was surprised that I could finish the text in less than 80 minutes. I also knew much, if not most, of the grammar, and a lot of the vocabulary. What this means is that I know more Cantonese than I thought! Yay! Tibetan My copy of Joe Wilson's Translating Buddhism from Tibetan is a massive tome but if comprehensiveness is what you're looking for, this is one place to find it. I really need to find qualified folks to oversee my progress, because I have no idea if I am in left field with this language. Perhaps I will post in Tibetan and see if anyone comments. 潮汕話 One of my students challenged me to learn their hometown language. While this is fun, I really can't spend too much time on this without completing my other goals. More on this language in later posts... (I'm considering a project in Php/MySQL to organize all of the information I'm collating on the Language of China. The danger is that as I learn more about different "dialects" and how they are all related, I'm not getting better in my primary languages. My concern is that I will know how to say "Hello" in five languages but not really know any of them to any level above A1. I can't let that happen.) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| zhanglong Senior Member United States Joined 4927 days ago 322 posts - 427 votes Studies: Mandarin, Cantonese | Message 144 of 169 17 June 2012 at 10:22pm | IP Logged |
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Today, I had a very interesting conversation.
One of the students in the center was considerably older than all the others. I thought he was somewhere in his sixties. I sat down next to him and started talking to him, and before long, he told me about his life story. He is actually in his eighties and is a living history of China in the modern era. He has lived through World War II when the U.S. and China were allies against the Japanese. He lived through the famines of the 20th Century. The coming of Mao. The Cultural Revolution. The opening of China to the west. On a day where the first female Chinese astronaut entered space, this student and I talked at length about many things, but the thing that struck me the most was his reasons for studying English. He says that he realizes that he does not have much time. He says that no one goes on forever, but he wanted, with whatever time he has left, to do something important. He suffers from what he calls a poor memory, but in all other aspects, he is solid, healthy, and strong. He counseled students younger than his granddaughter to study hard. His method for learning English? He speaks haltingly, pausing each word as if he were thinking so hard that the words are created out of the mists of time to appear on his tongue. "I would rather...study...something slow...and learn it. If I study too fast...I cannot remember." I can't accurately convey the wisdom, character, and spirit of this man who has lived through one of the most dynamic periods in Chinese history. I celebrate his example, though. If he can study every day, why not anyone else? He started studying English when he was 78. He is now 80. After two years, he is still at an intermediate level because he suspended his studies after he got sick, but for now, he's back and working hard every day. He listens to everyone and is able to hold his own in English and Chinese with kids sixty or more years younger than he is. At the end of a long day, he goes home to his wife. They eat together, he does some housework, and then goes to sleep by 11pm every night. He said "I prefer time over money. I don't care about money. Time...time is the important thing." So as he said, he's using what time he has to improve his English. What are you doing with your time? 1 person has voted this message useful |
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