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55 TV series to speak fluently. This was very interesting. For ease of numbers lets say that this means 20 episodes at 30 minutes per episode, so about 10 hour

55 TV series to speak fluently. This was very interesting. For ease of numbers lets say that this means 20 episodes at 30 minutes per episode, so about 10 hour per series. So, after 550 hours of Mandarin, would I be fluent? And, in addition, did he watch it with subtitles or not? Anyone on HN know of a study? Edit: Didn't know about fluentu but someone beat me to it - http://www.fluentu.com/chinese/blog/2015/02/11/mandarin-chinese-movies-on-netflix/ http://www.fluentu.com/chinese/blog/2015/02/11/mandarin-chin... Edit 2: Math correction

mdorazio 10y ago
For what it's worth, I'll chime in with my personal experience as a white guy who learned Mandarin. 5500 hours is just under two years of consistent 8-hour days. In my opinion, spoken Mandarin is not actually all that difficult compared to other languages once you adjust to the presence of tones (there is basically no conjugation or changing word prefixes/suffixes on the fly, tense uses simple particles, etc.). After 500 hours of classroom study and about 4000 hours of immersion in Taipei and Beijing, I was pretty close to fluency in speaking. I think you probably could be as well. However, even after all that time I was only able to read and write at an elementary school level. Reading, writing, and speaking any dialect of Chinese are basically three separate skills. You can easily know how to say words and have no idea how to write them, or know the meaning of a character, but not know its pronunciation, or my favorite - be able to easily read an entire sentence, but then only know how to write half the characters properly if asked to write it out 5 minutes later. So, in my opinion, yes 5500 hours would get you to spoken fluency in Mandarin without too much difficulty. But unless you are really good at memorizing things (I'm not), don't expect to be able to read and write at a native level in that time frame unless you had exposure to written Chinese growing up.
- startupdiscuss 10y ago
  My math was off. It is 550 hours. That is much more reasonable. Do you think it is still possible to be fluent in speaking? The reading and writing part surprises me. Is that different from English? I don't remember what it was like to learn it in the first place so I don't remember if I initially had trouble writing something I had read.
  - mdorazio 10y ago
    Not in a normal sense. I know the DoD has immersive programs for training interpreters and SIGINT people to language proficiency as quickly as possible, but I don't think 550 hours is nearly enough for Mandarin. Even assuming 12 hours a day of full immersion, you're looking at fluency in 45 days. This is only feasible if you've already had a lot of exposure to the language. For example, many people outside the US are exposed to English movies, TV shows, ads, and grade school language programs growing up, which makes it easier to later learn English seriously. If you're not a Chinese American, this situation is unlikely for Mandarin. Yes, most other writing systems, including English, use phonetic alphabets. If you learn the set of letters, you can at least sound out any word, and make a good guess at spelling something you know how to say. Chinese is a logographic writing system. There are thousands of "letters" that you have to learn individually, and there are generally only hints in the logograms about pronunciation or meaning, so you're basically memorizing how to read and write every single word individually. If you don't know how to write the character, you can't "sound it out" like you can in English. You're just stuck. This also leads to frustrations in even using dictionaries to look up word meanings.
mathyou 10y ago
I think that 10 hour per series, and 55 series means 550 hours. Usually people learning English use several resources to learn like books, podcasts, music, online tests for preparing English exams.
- startupdiscuss 10y ago
  Ugh! You're right!
magic_beans 10y ago
This guy's whole point was that not everyone learns language in the same way. For him, watching TV shows in English got him there. But for you, reading books or listening to radio or using flashcards might get you there.
NikosAmoiridis 10y ago
Just a quick correction my dear friend. Let me do the math for you. 55 tv series 20 episodes per season 6 season per series 30 minutes per episode 3.300 hours of English, with English Subtitles most times. And I was teached English at school. I did not start from zero. ;)

mdorazio 10y ago

For what it's worth, I'll chime in with my personal experience as a white guy who learned Mandarin. 5500 hours is just under two years of consistent 8-hour days. In my opinion, spoken Mandarin is not actually all that difficult compared to other languages once you adjust to the presence of tones (there is basically no conjugation or changing word prefixes/suffixes on the fly, tense uses simple particles, etc.). After 500 hours of classroom study and about 4000 hours of immersion in Taipei and Beijing, I was pretty close to fluency in speaking. I think you probably could be as well. However, even after all that time I was only able to read and write at an elementary school level. Reading, writing, and speaking any dialect of Chinese are basically three separate skills. You can easily know how to say words and have no idea how to write them, or know the meaning of a character, but not know its pronunciation, or my favorite - be able to easily read an entire sentence, but then only know how to write half the characters properly if asked to write it out 5 minutes later. So, in my opinion, yes 5500 hours would get you to spoken fluency in Mandarin without too much difficulty. But unless you are really good at memorizing things (I'm not), don't expect to be able to read and write at a native level in that time frame unless you had exposure to written Chinese growing up.

startupdiscuss 10y ago
My math was off. It is 550 hours. That is much more reasonable. Do you think it is still possible to be fluent in speaking? The reading and writing part surprises me. Is that different from English? I don't remember what it was like to learn it in the first place so I don't remember if I initially had trouble writing something I had read.
- mdorazio 10y ago
  Not in a normal sense. I know the DoD has immersive programs for training interpreters and SIGINT people to language proficiency as quickly as possible, but I don't think 550 hours is nearly enough for Mandarin. Even assuming 12 hours a day of full immersion, you're looking at fluency in 45 days. This is only feasible if you've already had a lot of exposure to the language. For example, many people outside the US are exposed to English movies, TV shows, ads, and grade school language programs growing up, which makes it easier to later learn English seriously. If you're not a Chinese American, this situation is unlikely for Mandarin. Yes, most other writing systems, including English, use phonetic alphabets. If you learn the set of letters, you can at least sound out any word, and make a good guess at spelling something you know how to say. Chinese is a logographic writing system. There are thousands of "letters" that you have to learn individually, and there are generally only hints in the logograms about pronunciation or meaning, so you're basically memorizing how to read and write every single word individually. If you don't know how to write the character, you can't "sound it out" like you can in English. You're just stuck. This also leads to frustrations in even using dictionaries to look up word meanings.

mathyou 10y ago

I think that 10 hour per series, and 55 series means 550 hours. Usually people learning English use several resources to learn like books, podcasts, music, online tests for preparing English exams.

startupdiscuss 10y ago
Ugh! You're right!

magic_beans 10y ago

This guy's whole point was that not everyone learns language in the same way. For him, watching TV shows in English got him there. But for you, reading books or listening to radio or using flashcards might get you there.

NikosAmoiridis 10y ago

Just a quick correction my dear friend. Let me do the math for you. 55 tv series 20 episodes per season 6 season per series 30 minutes per episode 3.300 hours of English, with English Subtitles most times. And I was teached English at school. I did not start from zero. ;)