Learning Chinese is a Piece of Cake…….

The alphabet was invented by the Phoenicians thousands of years ago.  The alphabet teaches you the basic sounds of a language so you can apply them in reading, writing and speaking of a language.  Gaining knowledge by applying basic concepts is how we are taught in schools in America (western thought).  In Chinese there is no alphabet so you have to learn the language in a different way; lots repetition and memorization.  But how are adults from the western world supposed to do that?

The Chinese language is a very ancient language.  Its modern written language comes from pictographs that have evolved over thousands of years so there is no alphabet.  Having no alphabet makes learning Chinese one of the most difficult achievements in the world.  If you want to sit down and read a newspaper in Chinese, you have to know on average a minimum of two thousand four hundred different characters.  Now how does a person who has been educated using western thought learn that many characters when there is no alphabet?  Step one; learn how to learn Chinese.

If you think you can memorize several thousand characters with flash cards, be my guest because you can only get so far before the brain reaches its limits and then starts to forget.  Of course there are some basic characters that you have to memorize in the beginning (and it will be as familiar as a bunch of scribbles).  These basic characters are important for learning most of the rest of the characters.  Simple characters such as the character for wood 木 for example.  When you look at it and use your imagination you can see a tree with roots (stick figure tree).  Even just training your mind to use your imagination allows it to organize and make sense of the basic characters.  When you have memorized the basic characters you can start to learn the more complex characters.  Now you are applying your western style of learning to a language that has no alphabet.

Learning the complex characters takes more time than the basic ones. Now you have to apply basic concepts that you learned but you also have to memorize quite a bit still.  Complex characters are composed of basic characters called radicals.  Like the character for chair 椅 has the radical for wood on the left side of the character.  This shows that wood has something to do with the character; when you picture a chair in your mind is it made of wood?  You can learn Chinese when you can make some sense of it.  Step two; find an outlet to learn Chinese from.

I have been studying Chinese for two and a half years now and still have a very difficult time finding an outlet of which to study Chinese at my skill level.  Here in Beibei the university has provided us with a Chinese teacher to teach us introductory Chinese.  I have learned introductory material in a classroom setting three times now (which does me no good).  I am at an intermediate level and need more than what that class provides.  I have thought of a few ideas; read children’s books and get tutored by some of my Chinese friends while I teach them English.  Also it helps being immersed in the language by living in China. 

Isn’t it amazing how you can distinguish how people learn knowledge based off of how they learn their language?  Whether it is applying basic concepts (western thought) or memorizing all concepts (Chinese).  We shall see how I progress as I continue to learn this language.  Every day I can read more on the restaurant menus and street signs and the people become more understandable.  Piece of cake right?