The modern Chinese dialects are classified into seven major groups, and Mandarin (普通话) is the e standard foundation language. About two-thirds of Chinese people speak Mandarin as their first language, which covers all of north and southwest China. Some dialects, such as Cantonese and Hakka, can sound like totally different languages from Mandarin; in fact, these dialects are often treated as such. In addition, in many countries’ Chinatowns, the emigrants there speak Cantonese and Hakka. Foreigners who encounter these dialects often feel confused and frustrated because they are so different from standard Mandarin. However, most Chinese, especially the younger generation, can speak and understand Mandarin without any problem, whether Mandarin is their first language or not. If you intend to learn Chinese, it is still recommended to learn Mandarin first.

Editor in Chief | Cao Jing

To learn Chinese is an experience unlike any other language that I have studied before.  I’ve spent two years digging into this ever-more complex pile of vocabulary, slang, and sentence structure and yet, somehow, I only recently realized that no teacher or professor has ever actually defined “Chinese.”

As students, we’re told that we are learning Putonghua or the “Beijing Dialect,” but no additional details, besides the difference in pronunciation. It adds to the idea that “Chinese” is just this monolithic block of Beijing-dialect speakers, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Linguistically speaking, the line between a language and a dialect is blurred, eluding a clear definition for professional linguists, let alone a more casual researcher like me.  The block of language families that make up Sinitic languages, for example, does include Mandarin, but also Shanghainese, Cantonese, Taiwanese, and almost every other regional variant from Heilongjiang to Hong Kong Island.

So, maybe Putonghua is a good enough shorthand for us to begin to grasp the complexity of the linguistic reality in China.  Maybe it is the most useful, being the lingua franca, the link bridging each dialect together, one that helps a traveler or student see a more cohesive whole.

But are we missing something by using that shorthand? What could we gain as learners and cultural observers if we dared expand our classes to include Guangdong hua or Shanghainese?

It’s a question I have a bit of experience with.  While studying French in the past, I went to live in a small city in the western reaches of France, where the countryside juts off into the English Channel.  They brought us there specifically to learn French, away from the prying eyes of English speaking tourists clogging the streets of Paris and Nice.

People there spoke natural French, exactly as people here speak natural Mandarin.  But, the language that was native to the area was a dialect called Breton, which was more closely related to Welsh than French.  Over the last century though, Breton had started to disappear, as parents realized their kids had a better chance out in the world being native French speakers. Breton offered them no such wider advantages.

There is a similar phenomenon happening in Shanghai, according to Sixth Tone.  Children go to school and are educated in English and Mandarin, and are sometimes prohibited from speaking Shanghainese at all during the school day.  People claim that the Shanghainese language, part of a different sub-family of Sino-Tibetan than Putonghua, is dying out as a result.

Once I really began to explore the relationship of that small region to its ancestral language, I became increasingly aware of the fact that I would be missing out on small bits and pieces of culture without it.  It helped me to not only understand the place within a particular historical context, but to also form a deeper connection to it, as evidenced by this similar story, continents and years later.

Is there something missing from our time in China if we don’t speak Sichuanese while trekking the peaks near Chengdu or Hokkien while wandering the tulous in Fujian?  I honestly can’t say for sure either way, but there most definitely could be something missing.

What I can say for sure is that the one time I went with fellow Dig Mandarin contributor Rachel Deason to get some photos framed in an art shop near People’s Square, the proprietor started speaking Shanghainese, laughing as we tried to parse out his meaning. He asked if we could understand Shanghainese before eventually switching back to Mandarin despite our best efforts to interpret his words.  It was a simple conversation on a hot summer afternoon, not a lot in the grand scheme of things – especially in a city that moves as fast as this one.  But when we left, I kept wondering how the rest of that afternoon would have gone if we’d known just a bit more Shanghainese, what experience we might have had, or perhaps even made a friend of that octogenarian shopkeeper.  Those are the kind of moments I don’t want to miss the next time they come around.

And that’s why I’m going to start learning “Chinese”…again.

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That’s the Taxi Chinese Plateau.  And there are a lot of reasons why it is so difficult to get over.  For me, those boiled down to two main points: time and questioning if it actually matters.

The Quick Fix: Making Time

Like going to the gym, eating right all the time, and getting enough sleep, most of the people working full time in China just don’t think they have the time to learn Chinese.  But it isn’t really about the time, is it?

Speaking from personal experience, it can be incredibly hard to motivate yourself to head to two hours of language classes, homework unfinished – or probably never started – at the end of a full day of meetings, projects, and deadlines.  Language studies take a back seat, even though progressing in Mandarin undoubtedly will help you get that next promotion or next job.

It’s borderline crazy to try and just wake up one day and start going to class, thinking that just because you paid, you have to get your money’s worth.  After all, sunk costs shouldn’t factor into decision making, right?  And it’s been a tough week, you deserve a break.  Your couch is calling and you must answer.

The best thing you can do is talk to someone about it.  No, not your best friend over beers on a Saturday.  Your boss.  Let them know that this matters to you and that you want to have the freedom to pursue mastering the language of the country you live in.  If you’re up for a contract renegotiation, try and get them to cover part of the courses – that way, you both have a financial interest in keeping the classes going.  It’s easier to hit the gym when you have a buddy counting on you and it’s easier to go to class when you are accountable to more than just yourself, too.

The Real Issue: Why Bother?

Why keep learning Chinese?  I can get myself from Point A to Point B.  Everyone at my favorite restaurants speaks to me in English.  Everyone in the street speaks to me in English.  And they all tell me my Chinese is amazing after only hearing me say  你好 (nǐ hǎo).  Do I really need to devote myself to learning one of the hardest languages in the world (for many Romance language and English speakers) if it is almost never been useful in my daily life?  I’m not even sure how long I’ll be in China, anyway!

No one can answer that question for you. There are no practical tips to get over the hump, nothing as easy as “talk to your boss.”

It’s the question I struggled with for months after I finished my first round of evening classes.  Then, I got some perspective.

Here’s how:

First, open a map online.  Find the addresses of all your favorite spots in the city and chart them.  Now, zoom out to see the entire city.  If you’re like many people, myself included, your daily life barely covers a fraction of the city you live in.  One of the reasons we move overseas is to broaden our horizons.  If your entire life is centered on two or three central districts, how much broader is that than your life would have been back home?

Now, consider this: that is your comfort zone now.  And, one of the reasons you rarely venture out of it is because navigating in a world of characters and regional dialects is daunting for even the most seasoned China Hand.

But, what parts of the city could you be missing out on?  What galleries, restaurants, parks, shops, and museums are waiting just a few metro stops out of your new comfort zone?

Now, take a look at this map:

It’s every major language spoken in Mainland China.  That huge swath of blue is the area that speaking good Mandarin opens up for you to explore in a way no mere tourist ever could.  It lets you ask questions, dig around, and find places and experiences that are unavailable to non-Mandarin speakers.

And the other areas, you ask?  There, it is so much easier to get around using the local lingua franca, Mandarin Chinese, than trying to brute force it with English.  And exploring is why you moved here in the first place, isn’t it?  You could have stayed home, saved for a bit, and spent a month touring the sites from Beijing to Xi’an to Hong Kong and had a blast dipping your toe in a culture so different to your own.

But, you moved here; you dove in.  You were curious.  And your curiosity deserves to be let off its leash.  Let it lead you somewhere you never knew existed.

No one is saying you have to speak perfect Mandarin to get it done.  But, there is a major difference between piling into a cab on your first day in a new city, armed with the cross-streets of what TripAdvisor says is the best restaurant in town, and hopping into that same cab and asking the driver where his favorite wonton spot is.

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I’m not judging you because I do the same thing. Like I said, flashcards are pretty unavoidable; yet, they still leave you struggling when it comes to remembering sounds. Frankly, there is just too much information to remember using a standard flashcard. Additionally, you can’t find using them to be interesting any more (I certainly don’t). Flashcards in general are just not that interesting. What’s worse, you aren’t building a relationship between the word you’re trying to learn and any other words in Mandarin, just a binary link to English.

What you need to better help you retain all the information that comes with Chinese, or with any language for that matter, are mnemonic devices. As you progress from beginner to advanced student, you may notice that you develop your own systems for remembering the concepts and words you use most. However, you may not notice the holes in your learning system until you come across something you know that you should know already.

Those systems you create are mnemonic devices. In order to work, they have to make a connection in your brain between the new information you’re trying to remember and a piece of older information you already know. They can do that in a few different ways.

If you’re wondering why I’m going through all this effort when traditional flashcards are your go-to method, it will make learning Chinese more interesting for you if you give a try. Using a card with meaning on one side and hanzi on the other is a way to make the connection between pieces of information, technically making it a mnemonic.

But, there are other ways, for example, let’s take imagery. It takes the word out of its context and forces it to go somewhere new, interesting, and memorable. Of course, the best-known example is Chineasy, a program where traditional characters are superimposed on pictures of their meanings so learners can see the resemblance.

You can also do what so many have done for European languages and use cognates or Link Words. Link words sound like the target word, to create a scene that also includes the meaning of the word in question. Within cognates, you can set the scene visually, or by putting new words into a sentence that includes their pronunciation even use both methods.

Now we’re starting to get somewhere for flashcard studying. The ideal flashcard, then, will help you learn pronunciation, reading, and meaning at once and do so in a way that help you remember it longer—not a short order.

So, let’s take a look at a couple of contenders then.

It has the imagery—that much is clear. The pronunciation hints at the bottom seem to be hitting the mark, at least for me considering my admittedly wacky tones. Where this card is lacking is in driving home the character itself. The concept is clear, the meaning is conveyed, I remember the word, but being deprived of a sentence context, it is harder to learn the character.

If you’re not advanced enough for sentences and just want exposure to characters before diving in, these cards are a good option. Otherwise, it is best to refocus on these. They aren’t quite tongue twisters, so let’s call them character twisters.

The homonyms are put together and linked with the pictures, just like the single-word cards, but without the English meaning, you’re left to decipher it on your own. Of course, they are intended for more advanced students. The advance students probably know the words themselves, but need a sentence that uses all the characters at once. The character twisters, if you will, seem to pick up right where the single word cards left off and vice versa.

Of course, there are a million ways to try and learn to read Chinese. None of them are a cure at all, nor will be a quick fix. It takes native speaking school children all of primary school to get the basics straight, when all’s said and done. But, these flashcards are certainly an improvement on the flashcard format. So I believe these flashcards are probably worth checking out.

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