Bad Sign Number Six Million And Twenty

[bloodyrosemccoy]

If you have ever asked yourself, “What kind of crazy motherfucker picks up a ‘My Chinese Coach’ video game and plows into it headfirst because it looks like fun?”, then, well, I have your answer.

Yes, in a casual attempt to overcome my fear of tone, and because I had not yet done something this summer that was so fucking geeky that I had other geeks trying to push me down and take my lunch money, I have started learning Chinese through the extremely thorough and doubtless infallible world of video games.* And I’m treating it like a video game.

For the record, I’m on Level 9. Soon I will beat Chinese. I’m hoping that when I do, the last thing it teaches me is how to say “A Winner Is You.”


*Of course, this is coming someone who would pick a stack of Rosetta Stone programs over a vacation to Disneyworld if given the choice.

Comments

[beccastareyes]

How are those My *** Coach games? The Spanish one might be a nice refresher since I want to head to Puerto Rico in the fall.

[mfb.livejournal.com]

... 'ey. How many languages do you speak? I always wanted to learn a second or third, but I'm not sure how to go about immersing myself ... I had plenty of exposure to foreign languages when I was younger (I switched about four times going through school -- french, then spanish, then latin, then german), so I like to think I'm still mentally flexible.

* also you're not alone disney sucks

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

... Actually, I love Disneyworld. the point is, I love languages more.

I am actually, as a linguist, fluent in only one language--English. I'm conversational in Spanish and somewhat so in ASL and Swahili, and I can slowly form and parse sentences in Hawaiian and Japanese. But the bane of the linguist is that we often get too distracted to immerse in any one language.

It really depends on how you learn. Language software, books, and games can all help, but nothing really beats conversing. If you can take some sort of immersion class, or if you know a native speaker of the language you want to learn, take every chance you can get to practice it.

[mfb.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I'm really qualified to talk I lived next door to it for years. euugh

Aww, you talk about it enough I was thinking you might've known some Danieljackson-fu. Ambling through language structure is all good fun... it's just irritating to know there's an entire cultural subtext one is missing.

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

I have never seen Stargate, but I'm guessing Daniel Jackson had the added incentive of immersion, as well as the advantage of being fictional. ;) If you want a good portrait of how linguists work with actual language, I'd look at Milo Thatch from Disney's Atlantis: The Lost Empire. They're pretty unrealistic about a lot of things, but the way Milo communicates with the Atlanteans and studies the language is a bit more like it--halting but enthusiastic.

I do pick up a lot of things from immersion, though--I can tell you a lot more about the difference between Kenyan and Tanzanian Swahili after I visited those countries, or a few interesting aspects of Spanish that it'd be hard to explain in a textbook. That's the best way to learn the subtexts.

[evilcresyluna.livejournal.com]

It is only too bad that Learn French or Die* hasn't been reincarnated, I would totally play that all day. Cheapo-roleplaying-esque language video game? I'm there.

*they did a Spanish one too, although I never played it.

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

Oh, my god. That is the best language philosophy I've ever heard.

[evilcresyluna.livejournal.com]

It was literal, too! In the game you were dying all the damn time, you took the wrong alley, you died, you happened to be out THAT night after curfew, you died (but not every night, frequently you had to go out after curfew) - you ordered the chicken at the restaurant because everyone told you how fantastic it was, you died. Still, I had so much fun.

[baby-rissa-chan.livejournal.com]

That sounds awesome!!!

[pandoras-closet.livejournal.com]

You are a very strange and very interesting person, have I told you that lately?

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

*grin* I get that a lot.

[pandoras-closet.livejournal.com]

It's well earned.

[die-monster.livejournal.com]

what?! There are people who would chose the Disney* vacation?! Lies.

[gwalla.livejournal.com]

One of my Aikido senseis says that My Japanese Coach is pretty good, but has some downsides, like glitches and the fact that the vocab quizzes have very few words, and once you've been quizzed on a word you'll probably never see it again in the game (s there's very little reinforcement).

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you sort of have to take the initiative to reinforce on your own. In the Chinese one, at least, you can set the games to either new words, words you've already covered (optimistically referred to as "mastered" words), or both. But mostly it just plows forward.

[stormteller.livejournal.com]

If they have a "My Gaelic Coach" one, I'll be so over that. Chinese sounds fun too though.

[renshai.livejournal.com]

*pushes you down and takes your lunch money*

Actually, who am I kidding, if Rosetta Stone programs weren't so expensive, I'd be able to curse fluently in even more languages than I already do.

[elanid.livejournal.com]

Chinese is the scariest language ever and I love it, I totally endorse people learning it. (Learn Chinese, everyone! It will destroy your life!)

.../distressed student

[gethenian.livejournal.com]

Too bad they don't make Russian or I would be all OVER dat shit.

[cougarfang.livejournal.com]

Is it Simplified or Traditional Chinese?

(My friends know that's one of the easiest ways to get an amusing rise out of me - I have a couple of heated comparisons that I always automatically spout off. For those who've read 1984 I tell them Simplified is the Newspeak of Chinese, and for those who haven't, I tell them it cuts the balls off the Chinese language.

In short: GO TRADITIONAL. OMG. There is so much more meaning/nuance/poetry to complicated characters, and you can actually make good puns with them instead of having people baffledly saying "but it is the same word!" No, no it isn't.)


(Edit: And don't even get me started on Firefly's "Chinese". AAAAAAGH)

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

I believe it's Simplified. *ducks* Perhaps if I have questions you would be willing to answer them?

Dang, even I could tell that Firefly's "Chinese" was a mess. I liked the idea, but the execution didn't seem to work.

[gwalla.livejournal.com]

Since Traditional is used by about five people in Taiwan these days, I'd say Simplified is likely.

[baby-rissa-chan.livejournal.com]

I, for one, support this endeavor whole-heartedly.

...I also love languages and would probably break the sound barrier with my excited squees if I were ever given a stack of Rosetta Stone programs. So far, all I have is the Farsi one, but damn if this stuff isn't awesome.