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Strategies & Market Trends : Booms, Busts, and Recoveries -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (35665)	7/2/2003 4:57:28 PM
From: RealMuLan	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 74559

>>When people take their offspring to a new country, within a month or three, they start adopting the ways of the new place and within a year, you wouldn't know the difference << No, not Chinese. Most of Chinese here in the US, including myself, still prefer, if they have a choice, to read Chinese, speak Chinese, and watch Chinese TV series. And Internet is such a wonderful thing can make all these happen easily. And those who have children here, spend a lot of money sending their kids to Chinese language schools. And few Chinese in the US like to eat McDonalds when they have a choice. >>In English, one need only learn the 26 letters of the alphabet. In Chinese, it's a huge jumble of ideographs. << You are wrong on this.<g> One only needs 5 basic forms of lines to organized ALL the Chinese characters, comparing to 26 letters for English. That is why a trained (5-day training) Chinese typist can type 300+ Chinese characters ONE minute vs. 100 or so English words a minute for a trained English typist. >>Language is just a tool<< Maybe for Western language, not for Chinese. Chinese characters themselves are a form of art. that is why we have calligraphy. And Japanese like to collect them, but not in Japanese, only in Chinese characters. For example, there are 100+ dif. ways to write one Chinese Character. And each one can be seen as a piece of art. >>Chinese isn't an effective language. << more effective in a sense you only need 1,000 words to deal with every day life. >>I first realized how similar Japanese and Chinese was when standing in the British Museum in the 1980s and some Japanese guy was standing beside me, moving his lips while looking at some 3000 year old Chinese writing. I asked him whether he was reading it and how come and how much of it he could read and he said he could read most of it. << It was a Chinese who brought Chinese language to Japanese in 200 DC. There was NO written form of Japanese before and that is why they used so many Chinese characters, and thus that Japanese guy could read most of it, just like I could read most of Japanese before late 1950s. >>Increasingly, smaller languages will be pushed aside in the interests of young people being able to earn a living.<< I do not think smaller language will be pushed aside. I think they only need to go bi-lingual, or even multi-lingual. >>Just as in China, the local dialects will gradually fizzle out in favour of Mandarin<< hehe, Maurice, apparently you do not know many Chinese who speak dialects. Whenever it is possible (means they have another person who speak the same dialect, they will use it). When I was in school, gave a ride for a couple of Chinese friends from Shanghai. They spoke Shanghai dialect all the way (about an hour) through, I could not understand a lot of them). So dialect will never fizzle out. >>You for example use American and don't learn another dialect of Chinese. << Maurice, the only reason for me to use/speak English rather than another Chinese dialect is I have to make a living here in the US. What else can I do? At least I have not given myself an English first name. Since I think it is high time for Americans to learn a little bit Chinese pronunciation<g> Well, you post is fascinating, I can learn a lot of things from your post, although I disagree with some of it<g>.