? Where to find English articles on Mandarin learning/teaching?

[Jenny311]

Hi! Everyone! I'm Jenny, a Mandarin teacher and translator. I'm very glad to find this forum, which looks a very good place to share info and resources on mandarin learning.

As I’m currently doing a translation degree, I need to look for an article in English to translate as my degree project. Mandarin learning / teaching is the topic I’m interested in.

Do you know where I can find some English articles on Mandarin learning/teaching, be 3000 – 8000 words long and published in recent years?

I’ve tried to look for them for long time but couldn’t succeed. If you can give me some help, please. Thank you very much!

PS: Actually, I've found a very good one, but since the published date is too old, I can't use it for my project. I would like to recommend it to everyone here:

Why Chinese Is So Damn Hard?

http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html

[Luobot]

Hi Jenny,

I enjoyed reading the article in your link. Thanks for posting it. I came across the following astonishing claim early in the article:

Chinese is not only hard for us (English speakers), but it's also hard in absolute terms. Which means that Chinese is also hard for them, for Chinese people. If you don't believe this, just ask a Chinese person.

Of course I know that Chinese is hard for me, as a native English speaker. But I’d like to throw the question to you, as a native Chinese speaker and Mandarin teacher, do you agree with the article that Chinese is also hard for Chinese people?

[imron]

This article and the points it raises have been discussed before in a very long running thread here.

[Jenny311]

Thanks for reading and reply.

I'm sorry sometimes I'm confused by my 2 status: Mandarin teacher and translator. Currently I'm creasy about doing my translation project. So when I said that's a good article, I think it's mainly from a translators point of view, because the language style in that article is quite interesting and good for my project.

On the other hand, I've not considered the points in the article from a teacher's point of view. Sorry I'm not able to discuss it now.

I really hope I can finish my translation project ASAP( and before the deadline!), so that I can devote myself into Mandarin teaching career totally.

[xianu]

Jenny,

You might do a search of articles in the Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association (JCLTA) and possibly pose your question to the Chinese listserv at Kenyon. (you will need to sign up with them, and I honestly can't remember how I did it). The CLTA is also part of ACTFL (something something (American Council?) Teachers of Foreign Language) in which you will probably find a boatload of articles on teaching foreign languge to Americans and English speakers. CLTA also has stuff on heritage learners of Chinese.

[ipsi()]

I'm assuming that you're doing this as part of a University Curriculum? If so, the University should have access to databases like Proquest, which I would highly recommend taking a look at if you haven't already.

[Luobot]

Jenny - You might also try emailing the author of the article that you sited. He might be able to suggest more current articles that have similar characteristics to his.

Imron – the “long” in that “long running thread” is quite an understatement! That’s got to be the longest running thread on the site. Amazing how fast you responded, though. Hmmm … must be that sword in your avatar.

[imron]

Amazing how fast you responded, though

Actually, initially I was just responding to the OP's final sentence, but I guess it turns out we were replying to the post at the same time, and luckily my answer made sense for your post too And yes, that thread is the longest thread in the forums.

[Jenny311]

Many thanks to everyone replied. I’ll try the approaches suggested.

Yes, it’s a university’s curriculum and I can access databases. But what I found there are all academic papers which are quite difficult to translate!

I like the above one “ Why Chinese is….”, because its language style is quite interesting and easy to read, though it’s also an academic paper. I’ve also contact the author David Moser, who is a very nice guy. He did kindly try very hard to supply his articles to me, but unfortunately none of them meets all the requirements of my project.

Another article that I found its language style interesting is :

http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,,2048074,00.html

Never mind French and Spanish ...

This language style is also good for my translation project, too. But it’s just not long enough……Shame!

Thanks again, everyone!

[asialinks]

There is another interesting article at BBC news... how hard is to learn chinese?

hope this is useful!

[Jenny311]

Dear xianu and ipsi(), I've tried the sources you suggested. Unfotunately, they are also academic papers/dissertasions, which are hard to translate. But it's good to know them, so that I can learn from them in the future. Thanks!

I also have read some articles from Gardiance or BBC, they are quite good, but too short for my project.

The requirements are:

3000 – 8000 words long

published in recent years(maybe after 2003)

So, apart from academic paper and newspaper, is there any other resources available? Like magazines? Is there any magazines online?

Maybe I should not limit my topic only on Mandarin learning, other topics about Chinese culture, or about China, are also fine. As long as it's something in this field that I'm familiar with.

Sorry I might ask too much. But I'm desperate now after several rejections of my proposal from my superwiser. Please help if you can. Many thanks!