你学中文了吗？

I thought about one of gonzo's recent comments regarding being integrated into the "fabric" of Chinese society.

The best way to start is by learning the language.

If you previously had no idea where to start or how to start, you now have no excuse.

http://ocw.mit.edu/resources/res-21f-003-learning-chinese-a-foundation-course-in-mandarin-spring-2011/index.htm

If you don't want to start, shame on you.

Great free resource.

There's also a long-running thread (over 20 pages) in the Bar on learning Chinese that has unfortunately been allowed to slip off the front page - it's full of ideas and resources:

http://raoulschinasaloon.com/index.php?topic=131.0

If you previously had no idea where to start or how to start, you now have no excuse.

http://ocw.mit.edu/resources/res-21f-003-learning-chinese-a-foundation-course-in-mandarin-spring-2011/index.htm

Champion notion, you got me searching the Open University equivalent out of curiosity:

http://www.open.edu/openlearn/languages/chinese?seeall=1

Great free resource.

There's also a long-running thread (over 20 pages) in the Bar on learning Chinese that has unfortunately been allowed to slip off the front page - it's full of ideas and resources:

http://raoulschinasaloon.com/index.php?topic=131.0

bump (or should i say ding?) that thread ~ ill be back to post on it soon ~ am planning on doing anothr hsk

I'll just take this opportunity to announce that I have decided to take HSK 5 on July 21st after my classes have ended. I'm taking it for no reason (obviously don't need it for my job or anything, and I certainly don't have designs on a job in which I speak chinese in the future), I just kinda want to prove what level I'm at, cause I've had a haphazard approach to learning chinese. And It's nice to have a goal to work towards to make me really focus on studying this semester.


I'm also loudly declaring it so that I will be shamed, SHAMED if I pussy out and don't take it. So July 21st. I actually already feel really nervous!

@Borkya：加油

@Fozz：OK, it is 已经 bumped 了.  yli and bobrage I hope it was OK to steal your links for the big thread.

Since we are in the Cabana, maybe I can take this thread in a slightly different direction?

What do you think of foreigners in China who do not learn the language, or apparently make no effort to learn the language?

I have been here for "a long time".  My Chinese is OK, and just OK.  I can get by in speaking and listening in most situations, and even read fairly well.  If you start talking to me about politics or religion or something or ask me to read a novel or even most newspaper articles, I'll get lost very quickly.

However, by all rights, and with my own knowledge of language learning and what it takes, I should be fluent by now.  I have friends who have done it.  But I am just not 'there' yet.

On the other hand, my Chinese actually looks fantastic compared to the vast majority of foreigners I know, some of whom have been here longer than me! (holy crap you can read characters!)  A lot of people seem quite happy to learn little more than the Chinese for smokes/booze/taxi home.

And this brings me to my final point.  Learning Chinese in China often turns into a huge d**k measuring contest.  We had a thread about 'the language douche ^TM' that kind of went south, but there's a definite class of foreigner here that likes to lord it over other Laowai with their superior language ability (e.g. you are speaking to a Chinese friend in a bar in English and someone will join you but make a point of using only Chinese...).

A final point is that I am pretty sure experiences will vary quite a bit depending on race and/or ethnicity.  I'm a tall, pale white Scot for reference.

I don't think one has to learn Chinese when one is in China. I have been here for five years and my Chinese is, to be quite honest, not worth a dime. I can buy groceries, ask for help, explain terms in my classes and engage in small talk with the local dog walkers. It matters not a jot to me how much or how little Chinese other laowai know and if they turn it into a competition, my answer is merely "Good, good, you win. Now can I get back to reading the collected works of Mark Twain?". I don't travel, I don't go to bars and I spend most of my time improving my knowledge of English, literature and history, all of which is what puts money in my bank account and, showing my black-hearted captalist center, that is what matters to me. I know,least adventurous laowai in China but learning Chinese serves, as I see it, no professional purpose for me, so I study it but only as far as I need it for daily survival. 

Yeah,that's a good point.  Learning a certain amount of Chinese will of course  make your life easier for sure, but really getting good at it?   That's a bit of a gamble on a long term investment.  Look how many fluent Chinese speakers are still teaching English, hehe!  I've spent a lot of my free time here teaching extra English classes for an hourly rate instead of hitting the books.  A man only has so much energy...

Yes, sir, I'll start forthwith!
Seriously that looks like a great resource but I'm with EricTheRed. It takes time to fully prepare for classes and I'm working on prerequisites for graduate studies because my undergrad classes are too old - over 10 years old. Isn't it ironic that I'm teaching one of the prerequisites in China? I love this place.
A master's will improve my teaching and possibly allow me to teach additional subjects. Chinese is interesting, at least in my opinion, but forgive me for saying that beyond practical use Chinese skills seem like a novelty similar to playing the guitar.
Thanks for the idea, but I'll maintain my original plan.
For what it's worth my Chinese is weak. I can get along and read about 50 characters. I'm not proud of that but no one has offered to pay me to speak or teach Chinese. Tragic, I know.
 

 

I'll just take this opportunity to announce that I have decided to take HSK 5 on July 21st after my classes have ended. I'm taking it for no reason (obviously don't need it for my job or anything, and I certainly don't have designs on a job in which I speak chinese in the future), I just kinda want to prove what level I'm at, cause I've had a haphazard approach to learning chinese. And It's nice to have a goal to work towards to make me really focus on studying this semester.


I'm also loudly declaring it so that I will be shamed, SHAMED if I pussy out and don't take it. So July 21st. I actually already feel really nervous!

I look forward to congratulating you when you ace the exam.
 

If I cared what other people think I should do, I wouldn't have come here in the first place.

Good luck Borkya!

As most of you would know, I have only had a brief visit to China, so I don't really know anything except what you tell and show me and what I read and see in films and on TV. What I would like to know is how to the Chinese folk feel about foreigners not learning to speak the language, particularly when they have been living there for years? Perhaps you could ask your Chinese friends or spouses for a really honest answer, or perhaps set up a discussion with your students. It might also be useful to tell them what I will say about the situation here in Brisbane and no doubt in other places. Most of the people I speak to, find it really annoying when Asian folk (as an example) speak in their own language when it is known that many of them speak English. It could be compared with someone whispering to someone else, so that no one else hears. What is the big secret?
To me and others, it is like living with aliens, because one has no idea what these people are really like in ever day situations and we have no idea how they think. Do the Chinese folk think the same way about foreigners?  Obviously, tourists or short stayers are a different kettle of fish.

Well Granny, I'm not in a place with many foreigners so this may be a completely different point of view than in those areas.

Most Chinese people here have no expectation of foreigners to able to speak Chinese at all. Some of this is because many of them believe Chinese is far too difficult for foreigners to learn and if a foreigner is competent at all in Chinese he/she must be very, very clever and special indeed.

But really foreigners are mostly viewed as transient and therefore why would they learn? Look at the reaction on this forum when someone mentions that they might be interested in living in China forever... well, the Chinese are just as incredulous of this kind of idea.

As far as people speaking their own language to each other, meaning that others can't understand, that's just normal here. People do this in Chinese all the time. Two people from the same area might use their local dialect to talk to each other while others don't understand that dialect. In my area, Mandarin is the second language for everybody. They all have a local dialect that they learned first. I used to live in a city with four distinct dialects. Since no one could understand each other a fifth dialect was used in the city that was kind of a mash-up that everybody in that area could speak.

Now these are small areas. This city is about 45 minutes from Changsha but no Changsha natives could understand any of these dialects. Chinese people, in this province anyway, are used to having all kinds of conversations around them that they can't understand because of how many dialects there are, so some foreigners doing the same is no issue at all.

Last night I was having a few beers at a BBQ joint. My girlfriend and another girl where chatting in Changsha dialect, I and an American guy where speaking in English and another couple of people where using a different dialect from a nearby area. When anyone addressed the table it was in Mandarin. If there was some interesting point or joke to tell the table, someone would translate it into Mandarin for all to understand.

Even sign language was used quite often to order beer. 


With the exception of wanting to practice Chinese, There's really no reason that I would use Chinese to speak to the American guy for a private conversation that doesn't include the others, it's just not as efficient for us.

I suspect the feeling for those people in Brisbane that get annoyed is more about how they feel the country is being taken over by a different culture. If you are hearing a couple people speaking Chinese to each other a couple of times a year, I doubt it would bother anyone, but the feeling (true or not) that English might getting pushed out in certain areas or feeling like you are foreigner in your own native country is unsettling. In the area of China I live in, no Chinese people would feel this way. There's not enough of us foreigners here for that.

Learning chinese while teaching english has got to be one of the hardest ways to learn a language. I never speak chinese to my students (in fact it's my little secret. They don't know I can understand them, heh heh.) and when I'm in school I'm "Borkya the english speaker" and people want me for that. So I act the part.

But now, for me living in China is a long-term thing and I want more than just my relationships with the students and teachers at my school. I want to go out and have chinese friends who I can hang out with, and I want to feel less of an alien in my surroundings. And for me, that means learning the language. I'm not mocking those who don't learn it, but I will say that I have a much more fun life these days now that I can speak Chinese. I do live in a small city with very few foreigners so maybe I am in a unique position where if I want more friends I have to learn chinese because I already know every foreigner.

And maybe I should mention I'm single now and my chinese has definitely come in handy there. 

Thanks Stil, you have given me a much better understanding. There was a group of Asian ladies at a table in the meal room at the Casino. They were squawking in very loud voices and I observed other Asian folk looking at them. The thing I thought I observed was that the onlookers didn't appear to know what was being said. I was almost going to go and ask them what language they were speaking. I can usually pick up if it is Mandarin, because I studied that for a while with a Chinese teacher..... not that I know what they are talking about though. As you say, I guess that most Chinese folk are used to people speaking in a different dialect so they are used to it. We older anglo folk are not used to this and we find it quite rude, whereas my Grandsons will probably come to accept this as normal behaviour. This also got me wondering if foreigners (as a general rule) do anything which is considered ill mannered by Asian standards. For example,I find that most Asians just rush into the lift and people trying to get out have to try to get through as if they are in a game of football. Some go around spitting in rubbish bins and on the floor and hawking up into napkins at tables etc. The list goes on and to be honest, many of we older folk and also many younger ones find this sickening and annoying. Perhaps I'm getting off topic there though, but it was just a thought