Mandarin Weekly #53

大家好！ (Hi, everyone!) Welcome to the latest Mandarin Weekly, with yet more links and information for those of us learning Chinese.

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Sentence structure

Chinese sentences have a specific structure. In this posting from Hollie at Written Chinese, we learn about simple and complex sentence structure:

http://www.writtenchinese.com/simple-guide-to-chinese-sentences-structure/

Twitter: @WrittenChinese

Chinese nouns

When we first start to learn Chinese, we assume that there are the same word categories as in other languages — nouns and verbs, for example. But it turns out that the categories aren’t identical. In this article, we learn more about nouns, and how Chinese nouns are a bit special:

https://mandarinwithmanu.wordpress.com/2016/01/14/nouns-are-weird/

Twitter: @MandarinWManu

The two uses of 让 (ràng)

The character 让(ràng) can be used in two different (and almost opposite) ways, which can be a bit confusing for Chinese learners. In this article from DigMandarin, Sarah explains the differences, with many examples:

http://www.digmandarin.com/tackling-the-two-opposite-meanings-of-rang.html

Twitter: @DigMandarin

Character bites

Chris, from Fluent in Mandarin, returns with more short introductions to Chinese characters: 自 (zì), 着 (zhe), and 去 (qù):

http://www.fluentinmandarin.com/content/chinese-character-bites-38/

http://www.fluentinmandarin.com/content/chinese-character-bites-39/

http://www.fluentinmandarin.com/content/chinese-character-bites-38/

Twitter: @Fluent_Mandarin

Animal sounds

Every language represents animal sounds in a different way. What do Chinese animals sound like? This article from Winnie at FluentU, will tell you:

http://www.fluentu.com/chinese/blog/2016/01/11/chinese-animal-sounds/

Twitter: @FluentU

Office vocabulary

Ever wonder how to describe simple office items in Chinese? LearnChineseNow provides a gentle introduction:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMdgqWwmQgA

Twitter: @LearnChineseNow

Hungry? Or full?

How can you indicate that you’re hungry in Chinese? Or, perhaps that you have had your fill? LearnChineseNow provides the vocabulary

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FD2GQHlaCDM

Twitter: @LearnChineseNow

Exceptionally hungry? Or exceptionally full?

Yeah, but what if you’re really, really hungry? ChinesePod provides us with a way to make something super-strong:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvxXfVBYh9w

Twitter: @ChinesePod

On the other hand…

How can we say “on the one hand… on the other hand…” in Chinese? It’s surprisingly straightforward, as we see in this article:

https://www.languageunity.com/chinese-sentence-patterns-part-8-survival-chinese/

Complaining

We can also complain, or refer to problems, using a different construct:

https://www.languageunity.com/chinese-sentence-patterns-part-9-survival-chinese/

It’s all about the children (radical)

All About Chinese continues its list of characters based on certain radicals, this time showing us those based on 子:

http://allaboutchinese.tumblr.com/post/136997661085/allaboutchinese-all-about-chineses-%E9%83%A8%E9%A6%96%E7%B3%BB%E5%88%97

Snowman in summer

A short story about a (naïve and/or optimistic) snowman who wants to see the summer, with audio, characters, and pinyin:

http://chinese-at-ease.com/learn-chinese-online-snowman-wants-go-summer-1/

Twitter: @ChineseAtEase

The most difficult characters

Ollie Linge describes and analyzes several of the hardest-to-learn, hardest-to-remember Chinese characters:

http://blog2.skritter.com/2016/01/hacking-most-difficult-chinese.html

Twitter: @SkritterHQ

Turbocharge your Chinese learning

A list of eight tools, each of which can help to speed up your learning of Chinese:

http://www.lingholic.com/8-ways-to-dramatically-accelerate-your-chinese-learning/

Twitter: @Lingholica

The Force is still getting up

Mania over the latest Star Wars movie continues, and with it, we have the following famous lines translated into Chinese:

http://www.duchinese.net/blog/13-learn-chinese-with-star-wars

Twitter: @DuChinese

Beijing-style

How would you say that you want Beijing-style food? This discussion provides some insights:

http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/%E5%8C%97%E4%BA%AC%E9%A3%8E%E5%91%B3%E7%9A%84-%E5%B0%8F%E5%90%83%E5%BA%97.3123788/

地 and 的

These two characters are pronounced the same… almost. What is the real difference between the pronunciations, and how can we remember it more easily?

https://www.reddit.com/r/Chinese/comments/415kqu/why_is_%E5%9C%B0_differently_pronounced_from_%E7%9A%84/

Using 吧 at the end of a sentence

How do you use 吧 (ba) in Chinese? Is it considered rude or informal?

http://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/16963/proper-use-of-ba

The envelope, please

Red envelopes are a traditional way to give gifts in China. How does the phrase look and work in Chinese, and what does it really mean?

http://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/16944/what-is-%E6%8A%A2%E7%BA%A2%E5%8C%85-%E8%AE%A2%E9%98%85%E5%BC%80%E5%A5%96%E6%8F%90%E9%86%92

Another use for 是

The verb 是 (shì), before a verb, can somewhat alter the meaning of the verb. How and why, is discussed here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/ChineseLanguage/comments/41cgoy/saw_%E6%98%AFverb_for_the_first_time_and_dont_know_what/

More, please

How can we say that we want to have more of something, or add to what we have? This discussion should make that clearer:

http://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/16936/to-add-which-should-i-use-%E6%96%B0%E5%A2%9E-%E6%B7%BB%E5%8A%A0or%E5%A2%9E%E6%B7%BB

Components of 你

The 你 character is is one of the most common. This discussion quickly turned into a fascinating exposition on character components:

http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/50703-is-the-component-in-%E5%B0%94-from-%E5%88%80-or-%E5%8B%B9/