I’ve mentioned this before in passing, but it’s worth going into in depth. Being a Chinese language specialist, one of my pet peeves is the lack of distinction amongst the general public between the concepts of “dialect” and “language.” Granted, the definition is not very clear-cut, and linguists are at a loss to clearly define the issue. The standard joke is that a language is simply “a dialect with an army and a navy.” This has more than a grain of truth, considering that many of what are considered distinct “languages” vary less with other languages than some “dialects,” but invariably some international border is involved. For instance, the Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian are all apparently quite mutually understandable, and at one point (until the break up of Yugoslavia) were actually considered to be a single language, but now, for entirely political reasons, are distinguished from one another. In fact, some from the region will go to great lengths to point out the differences. While differences do exist (and some are stark — such as variations between using the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets), most honest speakers admit that the differences are, at best, rather cosmetic. Hindi and Urdu are another example of languages which many admit are only distinguished due to their war-torn border.

What does this have to do with China, you ask? Well, China is on the opposite end of the continuum. China claims “Chinese” to be a single language with multiple dialects. Everyone from China unthinkingly parrots this line — even my fellow linguists. The immediate problem is that Chinese “dialects” like Cantonese and Mandarin vary more than many distinct “languages” do from each other. They are much more different than say Spanish and Italian. They are at least as different as German and English. They are obviously related, but a speaker of one Chinese “dialect” will almost never understand a speaker of different “dialect.”

So why do so many claim them to be a variants single language? Well, it is certainly in the interest of the Chinese government to claim as much. This is an oft-made claim to “national unity.” Another reason for the confusion is the Chinese writing system, which is arguably “the same” between dialects. This is a rather unique situation to Chinese. Because characters bear semantic meaning, and not a particular sound, this means that if the syntax (word order) and word choice is consistent between two dialects, that their written script would be identical. The problem is that the natural word order and word choice is not the same. Cantonese, Taiwanese, Mandarin, etc. all vary considerably in these terms. So why the claims of the writing being the same? Well, speakers of other dialects learn to read and write in a standardized form — which means Mandarin word order. For a basic example, Cantonese speakers, when writing the word for “he,” will write the same word as a Mandarin speaker (which incidentally is pronounced “ta” in both), but when speaking, the same person would say a completely different word — “keui.” Look here for some more variations. This split between oral and written language is called diglossia, which we’ll discuss tomorrow (next week — sorry, I’m editing this 2/1/08 — I’m just too tired this afternoon to get into this)…

An interesting outgrowth of this is the fact that, technically there is no distinct word in Chinese for the Mandarin dialect. There are plenty of terms, for sure, but they all, technically apply to Chinese in total (e.g., 中文zhong wen /中国话zhong guo hua — “Chinese language”) or are racial terms, which, once again, also cover most of the “dialects” (e.g., 汉语han yu — “the language of the Han), or they are linguistic notions — 国语guo yu (the common word for it in Taiwan, meaning “national language”) or 普通话pu tong hua (used mostly in the Mainland, meaning “common language). The dialects all bear names related to specific places, but Mandarin bears the mantle of the entirety of China.

It’s an ad for Pimsleur, but what is this “great reason” to learn French? The models? They don’t look particularly French, and while the guy looks normal enough, the girl is absolutely frightening. I thought it was a transvestite when I first saw the ad. I’m still not sure… Are these people famous?

So what on Earth are they talking about? Why would this ad get people to learn French?

When abroad, one thing I’ve notice is how much I come to miss English slang.  Judging from comments from fellow travellers, I’m not alone in this.  It’s not that other languages are bereft of slang — in fact, they often have brilliant turns of phrase that you miss as soon as you go home — but nothing ever compares to your first language in terms of expressiveness.  I’ve often found myself wondering things like how to say “d’oh!” in Spanish, or “booyah!” in Chinese (click here for a theory on the Japanese version of “d’oh”).  Everyone on Earth has a bit of a love affair with their home language.  While John McWhorter has pointed out that English speakers, since the 1960’s, have uniquely rejected the higher registers of their language (i.e., why we cringe at high language and prefer simple talking to organized speeches), our innate preference for native slang expressions, and our disappointment when equivalent expressions can’t be found in the new language, seem to indicate that, on some level at least, our love of our own language remains strong.

Go here first to read about the differences in color perception.

A savvy little primer/quiz with audio is available here.

And the chart…

Via about.com

 When you’ve got the hang of that, go here for some insight into differences in impression of color in Japan.

Bear with me here…  These are just some random thoughts I had this morning…

The other day, I was helping a Japanese neighbor/friend out with her Chinese homework (she’s currently taking 2nd semester intro Chinese at my university).  She fairly regularly comes to me or my wife for tutoring and homework assistance (which, in my opinion, is a pretty good idea — especially when that sort of resource lives next door).  Through these informal tutoring moments, I’ve been struck by some of the differences between learning a second language and learning a third (or fourth, fifth, etc.) language.  The major difference is simple: the more languages you know, the more resources you have to draw upon.  In this case (a Japanese person, already fluent in English, learning Chinese), it works quite well to do so.  Chinese and English word orders have a lot of overlap, and some of the linguistic concepts of Chinese that give English-speakers fits are the same as in Japanese.  Myself, I’ve always found that the more languages I know, the easier each subsequent language gets.  It impacts all areas of language acquisition — grammar, pronunciation, etc.  For example, I amazed my teacher and classmates at my first-time near-perfect pronunciation of the Arabic phoneme خ‎ (it sounds, quite frankly, like you’re hocking a loogie).  The reason was simple — I had (informally) studied Dutch, and the sound is similar to the Dutch “g.”  My sound repertoire has increased with each language I study.  My familiarity with grammatical concepts, likewise, expands...

Anyway, onwards to the realization of the day: my Japanese friend frequently compliments me as being able to explain Chinese concepts quite clearly to her.  The reason is simple — I can relate it to both English and Japanese.  I make full use of her potential analysis cues.  The question I want to raise is this: when learning a 3rd (4th, etc.) language, wouldn’t it be advisable to always go with a teacher with the same linguistic background?  I know that this is not always feasible (to be frank, I’ve never met anyone with the same combination of languages that I have studied — at least, not at any level that would facilitate instruction), but it seems that this would be the ideal when choosing an instructor.  An instructor’s value may well come more from how he/she manages to activate the students’ knowledge in order to incorporate the new language information than, say, merely target language fluency.  I’m sure that teachers in multi-ethnic, multi-lingual communities (like Malaysia, for instance) make frequent use of students’ background in multiple languages.  So, in summary, when possible, try to get instruction in an L3 from someone who knows some or all of the same languages you do.  You’ll be glad you did…

 Spanish First:

LOS COLORES

If you’re one of those people who see and care about more than the primary colors, click here…  (Dun?)

French (from about.com):

(A quiz game to test your learning)

My favorite part of travel???? — Checking out the local cuisine.  By and large, I enjoy a wide range of foods, and I’m generally willing to try about anything, but some things just don’t sit well with me.  Japan excels in putting together combinations that simply should not be tried by anyone, ever…

Still, there’s only one thing I’ve ever heard of that I will positively, absolutely NOT EVEN TRY: “Three Squeals.”

…the most exotic Guangxi dish is called Chia San Jiao, literally ‘Eat Three Squeals’. It consists of live rat embryos laid out on a plate. The dish’s name is said to have originated from the fact that the animal squeals once when picked up with chopsticks, a second time when dipped in the accompanying sauce and a third (and last) time when it is popped into the mouth.

The Star-Telegram…  My goodness, I thought that the best place would be Omaha…. Live and learn… Live and learn…

In defense of this Fort-Worth news rag, the writer is an LA Times columnist.  I couldn’t find the same article on the Times’ site, although I found other articles by the same writer explaining the language-learning trip, so I’m guessing that even a paper of such dubious credibility as the LAT took a pass on actually printing such a ridiculous headline.  The article isn’t bad per se, just more the drivel you would find on a personal blog (snort, snort) — replete with obnoxious quotes about how poorly she does in her studies (my guess– she did about the same in any journalism classes she had taken prior)…  I am jealous about the trip to Tibet, however (on my to-do list!)…

Update:  WHAT ABOUT TAIWAN??????????  Follow the link to view what, for my money (and, goodness, I’m not alone in this opinion), is the most rigorous and ergo best intensive Chinese language-learning program in the world….  Hint: it ain’t in the PRC…  Still, I doubt the author of the above article would have liked it…  It’s actually pretty tough…

Not to this site… That passed without remembrance on the 19th…

But to my darling wife, tomorrow marks our fifth wedding anniversary. As such, I’ll be taking off early tomorrow to go on an overnight getaway upstate with the Mrs., so no posts for the rest of the week.

To my “honey”:

在我一生中這五年來是最好的。我感謝上帝讓我跟你在一起。我好好愛你哦!