Will I ever learn Chinese
Is it even possibly to learn Chinese? Linguistics professor Jeanette Sakel tried it out, telling us about her successes and failures along the way.
- Update frequency
- every 2 days
- Average duration
- 19 minutes
- Episodes
- 30
- Years Active
- 2024
How a linguist would learn a new language
In this final episode of ‘Will I ever learn Chinese’ I discuss how I would approach learning a new language in future, outlining the techniques, materials and approaches for different l…
Language learning methods and approaches
We’re coming to the end of the first series of ‘Will I ever learn Chinese’. In these last two episodes, I am looking at language learning techniques and summarise my process of learning…
Language learning and linguistic fieldwork: the excitement of the puzzle
I love puzzles, be it crossword puzzles, jigsaw puzzles or the puzzle that is learning or analysing another language. My PhD thesis, for example, is a grammatical description of the sma…
Linguistic relativity: thinking differently in Chinese
I’m always amazed by how similar the languages of the world are when I’m learning a new language. Languages are able to express the same concepts, often in strikingly similar ways. The …
Speaking Chinese in China: the real deal!
In this episode I’m talking about traveling to China for the first time and using my newly acquired language in the real world. Wherever I travel, I like to be able to speak at least a …
Researching Chinese
Learning Chinese gave me a new understanding of language acquisition, and a new direction for my research. By going through the process myself, I experienced the mechanisms of language …
Language immersion and conforming in another language
In this episode I reflect on my immersive learning approach, surrounding myself by the language and using the language in a lot of different environments. Immersion made a big differenc…
Language attrition: the other side of the coin
When looking at language acquisition and learning, we rarely consider the other side of the coin: language attrition. This means a language is disappearing, the speaker can’t speak it a…
How much Chinese did I learn in a year?
During the first few months of learning Chinese, I wanted to turn my learning into an experiment: how much Chinese would I be able to learn in a year? This motivated me greatly, but of …
Artificial intelligence for language learners
A hot topic in second language learning and teaching circles, artificial intelligence proved to be a game-changer for my learning of Chinese. I suddenly had that ‘friend’ who would happ…
Accent and dialect
In this episode I’m looking at accent and dialect. Many learners have a distinct foreign accent. Is that inevitable, or are their ways to work on your accent (and if so, is it necessary…
Free-styling it
My spoken Chinese was getting more and more ‘fluent’, in that I could have uninterrupted conversations in real life, using my online conversation lessons with teachers to iron out any i…
Working with Chinese teachers
This episode is about me, finally, finding teachers to Chinese. At first I was learning in a vacuum at home, building confidence in understanding the language, but now that I had taken …
Finding Chinese speakers
In this episode I’m finally taking the plunge, looking for more speakers of Chinese to talk to. I’m considering tandem language exchange programmes and finding Chinese friends, eventual…
What does 'fluent' mean?
Would I ever be able to speak Chinese fluently, and what would that mean? I had reached a stage where I was starting to speak more coherently, but on some days it felt like I was not ab…
Revision time and starting to speak 'for real'
In this episode I explain how I initially learnt and revised vocabulary, and how I prepared for the next stage of my learning journey: speaking for real. Well, I had a number of attempt…
Intermediate Chinese: all those wonderful tools!
In this episode I explore how I honed my different Chinese language skills: understanding, speaking, reading and writing. I look at all those wonderful tools, most of which are free, th…
HSK: to test or not?
In this episode I'm looking at language tests and certificates. Would that be a goal for me, and which test should I aim for? Would preparing for a test really motivate me?
I try to find…
How do you write a text message in Chinese?
How do you even write Chinese text messages when you don't have a keyboard with 5000 or more characters? In this episode I look at ways in which Chinese is used today, and at some of th…
The Chinese writing system
In this episode I'm looking at the history of the Chinese writing system and why it is so successful that it is still used today. In my own learning, once I knew enough characters and h…