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Assimil Chinese with Ease | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
 Keith Diglot Moderator JapanRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6776 days ago 526 posts - 536 votes  1 sounds Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 17 of 79 08 December 2006 at 11:17pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Here is one 'definition' from a C-E dictionary. http://www.mandarintools.com/cgi-bin/wordlook.pl?word=bao4&s earchtype=pinyin&where=whole&audio=on 报 bào to announce; to inform; report; newspaper; recompense; revenge; 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Keith Diglot Moderator JapanRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6776 days ago 526 posts - 536 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 18 of 79 08 December 2006 at 11:38pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I worked on lesson 4 last night and I'ved decided to put another hour into lesson 4 today. This lesson is a bit harder to pronounce. As I've mentioned before, I've got all the spaces removed and in this lesson the individual words have not been stretched out. So each word is rather quick.
There is a shi or a renshi in 7 of the 9 sentences and a ta in every sentence. Those shi's are real killers for the back of the throat. The ta is also a bit stressful. I think I'm neglecting my bu sound since I'm speaking so quickly I don't have much time to evaluate my performance. I know what the bu should sound like but I don't have a chance to hear me say it. But never fear! It will all come in good time. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| onebir Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 7162 days ago 487 posts - 503 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 19 of 79 09 December 2006 at 9:46am | IP Logged | ||||||||
The character can obviously mean newspaper in some circumstances, but when it's spoken, it's almost always accompanied by another character to clarify the meaning. When you actually get to china and try communicating, go ahead and use the assimil sentence and see how far it gets you... 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| maxb Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 7182 days ago 536 posts - 589 votes 7 sounds Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Mandarin | Message 20 of 79 11 December 2006 at 7:16am | IP Logged | ||||||||
You can definetely say bao4 for newspaper as well for instance in expressions like 我不爱看报 (I don't like reading the newspaper). Edited by maxb on 11 December 2006 at 7:20am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| onebir Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 7162 days ago 487 posts - 503 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 21 of 79 11 December 2006 at 4:33pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I'm not saying it's not correct. I'm saying your chances of being understood are lower than if you use a two character combination like baozhi, particularly if you haven't been talking about something similiar (ie reading books, in your example) just beforehand. Spoken mandarin often uses additional characters/syllables (which are unnecessary in the written language) to reduce ambiguity. Particularly when the context hasn't been established. (When it has been established, things go monosyllabic way too fast for my taste) Add to this the fact that the assimil course is designed for foreigners who are likely to make mistakes which reduce their chances of being understood (pronounciation/tone/grammar), and it seems to me an error of judgement on the part of the authors of that course not to use bao4zhi3 or wan3bao4. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6581 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 22 of 79 11 December 2006 at 4:39pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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So, Keith, what's the course like? What do you actually do? And, most of all, is it any good? I've been thinking about getting it, but is it worth the money? What does a lesson actually look like? And now for a sentence that doesn't end with a question mark.
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| Keith Diglot Moderator JapanRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6776 days ago 526 posts - 536 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 23 of 79 11 December 2006 at 5:47pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Ari, the course has mini-dialogues and they are not spoken by the same two people all the time. I believe I am doing the "chorus" method by myself. I listen for 10-20 times and then I chime in and speak the sentences at the exact time they are spoken. Although, I do only one of the two parts at a time. At first I stumble and can't get half a sentence out. But after 3-5 minutes, I can get the sentences out on time and I start paying attention to my tone and pronunciation. I do each lesson for one hour, 15-minute sessions at a time. The audio quality is top-notch. It's definitely worth the money. I posted the English text of the first lesson in this thread. The lessons get longer. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Keith Diglot Moderator JapanRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6776 days ago 526 posts - 536 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 24 of 79 12 December 2006 at 4:38am | IP Logged | ||||||||
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It seems the chorus method is done on only one sentence at a time. I am not doing one sentence, but several sentences which constitute half of a mini-dialogue. The second 15-minute session I will do the other half. I might say I'm using the Jerry Dai method! But we don't know exactly how he studied his dialogues. Maybe if I'm lucky, he will come to this thread and post something.
At this stage, my goal is to program my internal system to speak correctly and without hesitation. And also without effort. I am going to overlearn all the material in this course. I don't want to "know" something but not be able to say it or to have to think for a second before speaking. I will be able to speak on my own when I am really comfortable with the words. When the words are super familiar to me, I will be able to use them with no problem. For me, if something is new and I don't feel comfortable with it, I will really hesitate to use it. It will feel funny and I will be second-guessing and monitoring my language output. So I just want to bypass the thinking stage. I don't want to have to think about it. I just want to use it and I know I can only use what I am comfortable with. And the best way for me to get comfortable with the language is to hear it and repeat it a thousand times. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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