3 ms·
> Chinese is hard in unnecessary way both in language speaking and writing. Is spoken Mandarin really "hard in an unnecessary way"? I think it's quite straight
by dmurray 1y ago
> Chinese is hard in unnecessary way both in language speaking and writing.
Is spoken Mandarin really "hard in an unnecessary way"? I think it's quite straightforward, except for the tones. The tones are difficult for anyone who isn't a native speaker of a tonal language. But they are trivial to learn as a child, and easy to learn for native speakers of say Thai (a mostly unrelated language that also happens to use tones). Uneducated people in all walks of life speak both Mandarin and their local dialect well.
Written Chinese really is objectively difficult, and it's a believable argument that before Mao it was intentionally gatekept that way to have a caste of intellectual "elites".
- em-bee 1y agoin addition, chinese grammar is very easy. what makes learning chinese hard is the writing because it is difficult in itself and you can't use it to reinforce the learning of spoken words or vice versa.
- teleforce 1y ago>The tones are difficult for anyone who isn't a native speaker of a tonal language That's the the majority of the world's population.
- dmurray 1y agoSure, but it's a tiny minority of Chinese learners. "Hard in an unnecessary way" implies that it's objectively difficult and complex, not just different from what certain outsiders are used to.