Today's tip for learning Chinese (and probably any other language out there, too):
When you learn something completely confusing, bizarre, and contrary to anything you've ever learned before, it's not the language's fault. That's just how it is, and it makes sense to over a billion people. So instead of blaming the language for being bizarre, and WRONG, just accept that it is actually RIGHT, and figure out how to fit it into your comfort zone.
When I took Chinese in college, I was overwhelmed by all the different ways to answer in the affirmative. After learning hao, keyi, and shi, I figured I had enough. When the next chapter tried to add another one (xing), I refused. I would not learn it, using instead the ones I knew. I went for 3 more semesters without ever using xing. It may have been a Chinese word, but to me it didn't exist.
This worked great until I actually went to China, where the answer to every question seemed to be xing.
My refusing to learn it didn't change the fact that it's part of the Chinese language-- and it's actually really useful!
This isn't the only time I tried to skip or omit something because it didn't fit into my brain's definition of how Chinese "should" be. But once I switched my position to instead fit my brain into China's definition of how Chinese should be, I was able to learn a lot more a lot faster.
I highly recommend it.
3 comments:
Good post! I had a hard time with "xing" too. Just too much for my brain at the time. As my kids can attest, I have zero issues with "bu xing" now ;)
Did you know about the online reading class the FSI offers? Might be up your alley if you want to do something official.
Easier said then done. In all cases.
I totally agree. You have to just change the way that your brain approaches language. And I totally agree with Smart Helm: it's difficult to do! The big thing is that you shouldn't just give up. After a few semesters/years speaking any language, it gets easier to switch mental gears.
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