Thread: i want to learn Chinese ...Help!!!plz

Well, the fact remains, one should not use PinYin as a crutch for the same reason one should not use Russian transliteration as a crutch. Admittedly, learning Chinese characters is difficult, but if you aren't up for a challenge you shouldn't try learning a tonal language.

I agree with you BlackMage but not completely My original post was in response to Rounder22's post and intended to highlight problems of not knowing Chinese characters. But in relation to pinyin:

(1) Children in China learn pinyin and 1,306,313,812 or so children can't be wrong!

(2) Don't forget pinyin is the official system in the People's Republic of China that was introduced in the late 1950s to help improve literacy.

(3) Nothing in a Chinese character itself tells you exactly how to pronounce it. For example, 木 mu4 = tree, and (木 + 木)... 林 lin2 = forest.

(4) I imagine that most people studying a foreign language, particularly at the beginning, do not live in a Country where that language is common. Therefore there is much less opportunity to hear how something must be said to be correct and be understood. Accordingly, learning a tonal language is greatly assisted with some sort of guidance in pronunciation.

The upshot of all that is, in my view, that you have to do all of it

(btw - I am a beginner in Mandarin, so my view might not be up to much!)

Originally Posted by майк

(3) Nothing in a Chinese character itself tells you exactly how to pronounce it. For example, 木 mu4 = tree, and (木 + 木)... 林 lin2 = forest

THAT is a great point. A friend of mine once shared an anecdote about the word "to think". I don't remember the character right now... but it is composed of some arrangement of the words "I, heart, mind". Anyway, whenever he would encounter this word in his youth, he would pronounce each of the three words individually.

yeh I am from China, Dalian(many russian tourists there!!), and currently study in australia, i am very interested in russian as many people do, but it's just so hard to me, I spent years on practicing that tricky "P" but still no outcome

ask me anything about Mandarin, here's my email: laki3782@hotmail.com
oh, the name is ashley

Pinyin is the one of the most essential elements of chinese language IMHO, i remember when i first went to primary school, in the very first weeks we started to learn pinyin, and then learnt how to write pronounce and read characters.

an example is that if i wanna tell my friends something like "我今天生病了，不能去你家，明天再说吧 ”using msn, if I am too lazy to type the characters, i can just type pinyin(the pronouncation) instead, like "wo jin tian sheng bing le, bu neng qu ni jia, ming tian zai shuo ba", and the message receiver will still perfectly understand that.

Originally Posted by awjln

yeh I am from China, Dalian(many russian tourists there!!), and currently study in australia, i am very interested in russian as many people do, but it's just so hard to me, I spent years on practicing that tricky "P" but still no outcome

ask me anything about Mandarin, here's my email: laki3782@hotmail.com
oh, the name is ashley

Don't stress too much about the Russian "R", not only Chinese people have problems with it.

My Chinese language partner can't pronounce it and is too worried.

Originally Posted by майк

I agree with you BlackMage but not completely My original post was in response to Rounder22's post and intended to highlight problems of not knowing Chinese characters. But in relation to pinyin:

(1) Children in China learn pinyin and 1,306,313,812 or so children can't be wrong!

(2) Don't forget pinyin is the official system in the People's Republic of China that was introduced in the late 1950s to help improve literacy.

(3) Nothing in a Chinese character itself tells you exactly how to pronounce it. For example, 木 mu4 = tree, and (木 + 木)... 林 lin2 = forest.

(4) I imagine that most people studying a foreign language, particularly at the beginning, do not live in a Country where that language is common. Therefore there is much less opportunity to hear how something must be said to be correct and be understood. Accordingly, learning a tonal language is greatly assisted with some sort of guidance in pronunciation.

The upshot of all that is, in my view, that you have to do all of it

(btw - I am a beginner in Mandarin, so my view might not be up to much!)

Again like i said... Characters aren't necessary in the beginning for this language... Pinyin and proper pronunciation using the 4 tones are... Characters can always be learned later on in your studies without affecting the PinYin and pronunciation you already learned... i chat with chinese friends (who live in China and know english as well) in Instant Messages and we chat in Pinyin not characters for written... so it isnt necessary to learn the characters to communicate in a written language when PinYin is available...

well, i suppose in the beginning, pinyin is okay but there are so many words with the same pinyin but different meanings/characters -- if u are a native, u can figure the meaning by guessing but if u are a foreigner trying to learn the language, its hard to say...

你们好?????/我是木塔力...我喜欢语言学....那么......nimen hao ? i'm mutaaly. i like to learn languages ...then ????
hi...how're u my dears...i know chinese little....so....i can help somewhat >>.. tnkx

Actually,it is interesting to learn new language.Chinese does difficult for the foreigners.'cos it gets two system,sound system and writing system.And there is no connection between them.I think for a foreigner,it is good to say the pinyin,just like english.It is funny and awarding.I think it is enough if u just want to talk to chinese-speaking people.But if u want to read chinese book or go to china,it is far from enough.So u know what should u do,ur action depends on ur purpose.

hi..mayb its too late for me to reply..but i'm interest in meet new friends who willing to learn Chinese/Mandarin or Cantonese..and who can teach me Russian language as well^^

my name is FUN,i came from Malaysia(a country located at South-Eastern Asia),and i'm a chinese
feel free to contact me.. chun_fun91@hotmail.com (email or msn)

hope to hear from u soon XD