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TAC 2011 - Team 唐 － Cantonese, et al. | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| jimbo Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 6294 days ago 469 posts - 642 votes  Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Japanese, Latin | Message 9 of 59 02 December 2010 at 8:01am | IP Logged | ||
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I bought the six text books (two each for elementary, intermediate, and advanced Cantonese) and the dictionary written by Sidney Lau.
The dictionary is good (apart from some mixed up pages in the index of my copy). My only complaint about the dictionary is that there is no way to look up the words apart from the Cantonese pronunciation. If I knew the Cantonese pronunciation, I wouldn't have to look up the word in the dictionary! (A radical index at the back would have been helpful. I've started to make one of my own but that is going to take a while.) The text books look very thorough but they were written a long time ago. Elementary Cantonese was published in 1972. A few weeks ago in this forum, someone posted a link to some privately done audio recordings of the first four books in the series. The only downside I see is that nobody else uses his system of romanization. (Then again, since he wrote a complete set of texts and a good dictionary so I can work with that. Especially since he included the Chinese characters in the books.) I plan to work my way through the Sidney Lau books next year. I figure two months per book should be fine. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| indiana83 Groupie United States ipracticecanto.wordp Joined 5490 days ago 92 posts - 121 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Cantonese, Italian | Message 10 of 59 08 December 2010 at 6:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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any updates? any questions?
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| jimbo Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 6294 days ago 469 posts - 642 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Japanese, Latin | Message 11 of 59 09 December 2010 at 2:51am | IP Logged | ||
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Cantonese is way cool. I'm going to have to work at it but I think I'll actually be able learn it to a reasonably entertaining level. (Need to go back and watch some of my favorite movies in Cantonese. They were a big help when I was learning Mandarin.)
Items of interest: 1. Tones. Going to be a slog to learn these properly but they are much less brutal than tones in Taiwanese Min-nan-hua (which I still haven't been able to get down). 2. Romanization. I have too many systems in my head but Jyutping is hurting less than I thought. I like it when they indicate the tones by number rather than my marks over the vowels which I mix up with other languages. 3. Public reaction. People are very encouraging. I wasn't sure if people would have a "don't butcher our language" attitude or a "thanks for trying" attitude. Lots of Hong Kong people seem surprised that I would "waste" my time learning Cantonese because "it is useless". Odd. 4. Pronunciation of some sounds. Most sounds aren't too difficult but I have trouble with the 香 in Hong Kong. Need to work at it. 5. Study materials. I still like my text book. Including key phrases like "let me off here" in the first chapter make me a fan. Simple Tang poems are interesting to look at in Cantonese. (I need to focused and finish the text book first but a bit of authentic material thrown in makes learning more fun.) 春曉 孟浩然 春眠不覺曉 處處聞啼鳥 夜來風雨聲 花落知多少 春 ceon1 曉 hiu2 孟 maang6 浩 hou6 (also hou5) 然 jin4 春 ceon1 眠 min4 不 bat1 (also fau2) 覺 gok3 (also gaau3) 曉 hiu2 處 cyu3 (also cyu2 and syu3) 處 cyu3 (also cyu2 and syu3) 聞 man4 (also man6) 啼 tai4 鳥 niu5 夜 je6 來 loi4 (also lai4 and loi6) 風 fung1 (also fung3) 雨 jyu5 (also jyu6) 聲 sing1 (also seng1) 花 faa1 落 lok6 (also laai6) 知 zi1 (also zi3) 多 do1 少 siu2 (also siu3) N.B. Some characters have multiple pronunciations depending on the context (e.g. can depend on part of speech, meaning, and .... I'm not sure what else. Personal preference perhaps.). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 newyorkeric Diglot Moderator Singapore Joined 6379 days ago 1598 posts - 2174 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Mandarin, Malay Personal Language Map | Message 12 of 59 09 December 2010 at 2:51am | IP Logged | ||
Thanks, I checked it out on Amazon, where you can play samples. It sounds a lot like earworms. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| smallwhite Pentaglot Senior Member Australia Joined 5308 days ago 537 posts - 1045 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin, French, Spanish | Message 13 of 59 09 December 2010 at 9:44am | IP Logged | ||
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I liked those sentences with tones going 123456 :D
But this one is not correct: > 香 港 靠 誰 帶 領 出 困 局 領 is ling5 not ling6. > 度 dou6 can also mean "over there" in Cantonese 度 only represents the "place" part of "this place, that place, which place", ie., "here, there, where". I don't think the single word 度 can mean "over there"... do you have the example sentence? > 一碗細牛腩麵 This is correct if there are 2 sizes to choose from on the menu. It's like "a small fries, a large coke", like the name of a menu item. You can also say 一碗細ge3牛腩麵. 一細碗牛腩麵 is not for ordering, but rather, for describing to your friend what you had this morning. I only had 一細碗牛腩麵 for breakfast this morning, so I'm very hungry now. It's like "a small bowl of noodles". The word 細 can only go at the end if you say "一碗牛腩麵, 細 ge3", which is like giving additional info afterwards, as in "a bowl of noodles, a small one". I hope that makes sense :D 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| jimbo Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 6294 days ago 469 posts - 642 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Japanese, Latin | Message 14 of 59 09 December 2010 at 11:28am | IP Logged | ||
Thank you for your comments. They are helpful.
The example I have is another one of the funny tone examples 123456 + clipped 1, clipped 3, clipped 6. 差佬去元朗度捉惡賊。 Caa1 lou2 heoi3 jyun4 long5 dou6 zuk1 ok3 caak6 元朗度 was explained to me to mean 元朗那裡 (N.B. 元朗 is a place name) Maybe I shouldn't have translated 那裡 as "over there". It doesn't seem like it is used as a single word but as following a place name. This usage is new to me. Then again, maybe they are just trying to be poetic to make entertaining example sentences. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Li Fei Pro Member United States Joined 5123 days ago 147 posts - 182 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 15 of 59 31 December 2010 at 6:14pm | IP Logged | ||
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Just found your log, Jimbo. Looks like you've made good progress. Do the holidays slow you down or give
you extra time? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jimbo Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 6294 days ago 469 posts - 642 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Japanese, Latin | Message 16 of 59 01 January 2011 at 1:37am | IP Logged | ||
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The holidays have been great!
I've been burning through my first Cantonese textbook, Cantonese for Everyone. I should be able to finish it in another week or two. I need to get out on and try to use the new words and phrases I'm learning to move from the "yeah, that makes sense" phase of the program to actually owning it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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