Comments on: 7 Major Differences between English and Chinese https://www.digmandarin.com/6-major-differences-between-english-and-chinese.html Wed, 27 Apr 2022 02:41:34 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.0.7 By: HOOL https://www.digmandarin.com/6-major-differences-between-english-and-chinese.html#comment-19043 Sun, 12 Dec 2021 14:06:45 +0000 http://www.digmandarin.com/?p=5590#comment-19043 In reply to JingjingCheng.

like Chinese old saying and we just translate as a more clear meaning in English ?

]]> By: Guiye https://www.digmandarin.com/6-major-differences-between-english-and-chinese.html#comment-12482 Fri, 14 Aug 2020 00:43:36 +0000 http://www.digmandarin.com/?p=5590#comment-12482 gewciAssss!!
sos unica

]]> By: JingjingCheng https://www.digmandarin.com/6-major-differences-between-english-and-chinese.html#comment-11150 Fri, 08 May 2020 13:09:59 +0000 http://www.digmandarin.com/?p=5590#comment-11150 When we speak chinese,we always like using some complex idioms,and we can use the chinese to describe some very beautiful views,just like“落霞与孤鹜齐飞，秋水共长天一色”.But in English,don’t
have so significant sentences.

]]> By: Richard https://www.digmandarin.com/6-major-differences-between-english-and-chinese.html#comment-11053 Fri, 01 May 2020 12:15:35 +0000 http://www.digmandarin.com/?p=5590#comment-11053 Hi, I enjoyed reading the text you wrote and it got me thinking about sentence length, structure, meaning, purpose and form. I understand this is to help learners notice the differences in languages, but the analysis of language depends on the framework one uses. So I disagree with how some of the points are framed. Point 1. Structure and meaning. In terms of communication, English gives priority (usually) to function or meaning. The combination of function and structure gives us meaning. This is what lets us understand language and what let’s us express what we want to say. I’d say the structure maybe determined by the language, true, but It is impossible to have function without structure, one without the other. To suggest one language emphasis structure over meaning is like saying the egg is more important than the chicken. Which one comes first? Meaning? Here some research on native Chinese texts sentence length, English, and the translated counterparts. Wang and Qin’s ( 2010 ) statistical results of sentence length and clause length indicate that sentences in translated Chinese texts are longer than native Chinese sentences by an average of 2.46 words. The average sentence length (ASL) of English source texts is 18.23 words, in contrast to the ASL of native Chinese texts of 25.81 words, while the ASL of translated Chinese texts reaches 28.27 words. Wang and Qin explain the reasons why sentences of translated Chinese texts are longer than those of English source texts in terms of linguistic typology: as a typical isolating (analytic) language, Chinese usually resorts to lexical means in order to express corresponding meanings usually expressed by infl ections in a synthetic language like English. For example, translating the relative pronoun “that” will possibly end up with a longer Chinese translation, because there is no correspondent word for “that” in Chinese and the translator has to add more words to clarify the relation. Wang and Qin’s conclusion of longer sentences in Chinese translation than both English source texts and native Chinese texts is not immediately supported by Chinese native speakers’ reading experience, because people usually think English sentences are longer than their Chinese counterparts. However, the authors suggest that although sentences in Chinese translation are statistically longer, the difficulty of reading longer sentences is released by Chinese punctuation of commas that helps to shorten the clauses within a sentence. The above empirical observation is also supported by other studies. Point 2. Hmmm. Yes, passive voice is common in certain text types and traditionally when reading scientific papers that have logical positivism as the epistemological view. There are comments I can make about the other points too, but it risks being reductionist and that’s no goal. I think that you have highlighted how the languages use punctuation differently.

]]> By: Enrico Brasil https://www.digmandarin.com/6-major-differences-between-english-and-chinese.html#comment-5823 Fri, 26 Jun 2015 17:25:00 +0000 http://www.digmandarin.com/?p=5590#comment-5823 Nice article.

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