Is it useful to study chinese now??

Question

Since China is developing right now will chinese be popular in the world? Should i learn chinese? if so what type of chinese i should learn "Mandarin or Cantonese"?? Please let me know, THANK YOU

Answer 1

I wouldn't study Chinese if I were you. Chinese people tend not to trust foreigners, so if you're not Chinese yourself, they will be very critical of you. I study languages in university, and the Chinese teachers here even admit you can't learn the language properly in 3 years (Belgian university: quite good level I suppose). You will keep making mistakes, and the negotiations will fail. Or as a translator: they won't accept your translations anymore. Companies are mostly aware of this, so they will employ a translator of Chinese origin.


"Chinese holistic thinking has developed due to the Chinese language based on thousands of pictures. The Chinese think much more about the big picture than about individual small details. It is important for negotiators to realize the Chinese need all the facts and will ask hundreds of questions before they begin to think about the big picture (5). Negotiations tend to last much longer in China due to this thinking process. Negotiators must become prepared to answer all the questions. An unprepared negotiator will quickly lose the trust of the Chinese.

Finally, the Chinese cynicism toward foreigners relates to the country’s long history of attacks from different points of the globe. Chinese are very leery about rules and laws. Families and relationships are valued much more than civil laws (5). Therefore, once again, personal relationships are more important that any contract. Trust must be earned before a negotiation can even begin (4)."

Answer 2

PORCELAIN CHINA- You learned Chinese for 6 years and only ended up knowing a few numbers? How much time did you devote each day, a second?
I am studying Chinese at university and its a great idea to learn it, many people are in my course. And as for the person who talked about not being able to learn Chinese in 3 years? Any good university course should take four years and include a year abroad.
I would definitely recommend Chinese. It is hard to learn the characters but much easier to actually start speaking it. And Mandarin is the only real option for learning Chinese, the others are minor dialects.

Answer 3

Quite a few schools in England ( including the one I work at) are introducing Mandarin, either as part of the curriculum ( accepted wisdom says it takes 4-5 years to get up to GCSE ( 16yo) level) or as evening classes ( just the basics) or clubs. There is also a school of thought that says that since so many Chinese are learning English, it is unneccessary for us to learn much of what is after all a very complicated language. But exposure to and a little understanding of any language goes a long way these days!
Jx

Answer 4

I became fluent enough to converse easily in four years (my Chinese still isn't PERFECT but it's comfortable). Someone here said that the Chinese don't take kindly to foreigners learning their language but I found the opposite to be true. They LOVE it and are eager to help you learn anything you want about tones, reading characters and their culture!

Learn Mandarin, everything else is just a dialect.

All the best - it's really fun!

Answer 5

I studied Chinese for 6 years. It is difficult, what I only learned is counting and some basic words. It is not like the ABC alphabets were you can read and pronouce it easily. They use characters on reading a single word. Every character has it's own meaning. I flanked and gave up.
NOTE: I'm sorry totallyfree2rhyme for not learning Chinese as fast as you can. I'm just telling what I experienced and I'm being HONEST. To KAY maybe you can study Mandarin (it is a widely use Chinese language), I'm not trying to discourage you with my answer. TO SIA or CHIE SIE for reading this :)

Answer 6

Yes, you're right. You should study Mandarin Chinese because it's more valuable dilect since that's what is spoken as the official government tongue in the PRC and Taiwan.

Answer 7

You're probably right. It's a difficult language. If you have a different tone on parts of the word, It has an entirely different meaning. I'm trying to learn Spanish to move to Costa Rica. I'm fed up with this country.

Answer 8

Yes, it's a very good idea to learn Chinese! I don't know which one would be better, but you'll sure have a big step up on everyone else and you'll be needed in many ways! Good Luck!

Answer 9

If you want to find out Mandarin but you have no clue in which to start then a program for Mandarin is the ideal on the internet program for the beginners since it genuinely starts with the basis.

Answer 10

IT IS USEFUL TO KNOW A DIFFERENT LANGUAGE THAN ENGLISH, I KNOW SPANISH AND ENGLISH WHICH IS COMMON NOW A DAYS. WHICH EVER OF THE TWO WILL BE USEFUL. MY SON LISTEN TO "NARUTO" ON-LINE ON U-TUBE AND HE ACTUALLY PICK-UP A WORD OR TWO, JUST BY LISTENING TO IT AND SD HE WOULD LOVE TO LEARN ACTUALLY MANDARIN WHICH IS A POPULAR LANGUAGE.
GOOD LUCK