Hello from 慢速中文 slow-chinese.com

[Guoke]

Why do your 'ji', 'qi' and 'xi' sound kind of strange to me?

I mean your 'ji' sounds more like 'zi', 'qi' more like 'ci' and 'xi' more like 'si'.

Edited September 18, 2009 at 06:22 AM by Guoke

[gato]

I mean your 'ji' sounds more like 'zi', 'qi' more like 'ci' and 'xi' more like 'si'.

http://www.slow-chinese.com/?p=408

#18: 七夕——东方的情人节

Are you saying that he's pronouncing 七夕 as cisi instead qixi? I don't hear what you are hearing.

[HashiriKata]

七夕 in the recording does sound like some half way between cisi and qixi to me.

[Guoke]

Are you saying that he's pronouncing 七夕 as cisi instead qixi? I don't hear what you are hearing.

Yes, pay attention to his pronunciations of the characters in red:

#21: 中秋节

民以食为天，那就先从吃说起吧...各地的月饼都有自己独特的风格

#18: 七夕——东方的情人节

现在的中国人不但热衷于过西方节日……今天我就给大家介绍一个传统而又现代的中国节日——七夕。

#15: 学习雷锋好榜样

[xiaocai]

Why do your 'ji', 'qi' and 'xi' sound kind of strange to me?

I mean your 'ji' sounds more like 'zi', 'qi' more like 'ci' and 'xi' more like 'si'.

Yes... I think 楼主 might be from 苏南 or 浙北, I'm I right?

[Guoke]

Yes... I think 楼主 might be from 苏南 or 浙北, I'm I right?

...from 浙江台州市

Is that how they pronouce 'ji', 'qi', and 'xi' in 浙江

[xiaocai]

Kind of, but not exactly. There are many mutually unintelligible dialects in 浙江 and each one will carry their own characteristic accent, even most of them belong to 吴方言 family. I just made an assumption based on the accents I've come across, but I'm a not 吴方言 native and only have had minimal exposure to it and therefore can't draw any conclusions.

[xianhua]

I've just listened to the most recent podcast about the film 'Nanjing, Nanjing'. I would suggest sticking to less emotive and more neutral topics - like Chinese festivals - if you are going to gain a widespread international audience. Apart from that - all good!

[Meng Lelan]

I've just listened to the most recent podcast about the film 'Nanjing, Nanjing'. I would suggest sticking to less emotive and more neutral topics - like Chinese festivals - if you are going to gain a widespread international audience. Apart from that - all good!

Disagree. I think the neutral topics have their place in Slow Chinese, but eventually Slow Chinese will need to introduce a few controversial topics in the future in order to expand the audience's understanding of changes in China.

[PhilipLean]

I can't agree that this is a "controversial topic". It might be confronting to people who are new to learning about modern China

I've just listened to the most recent podcast about the film 'Nanjing, Nanjing'. I would suggest sticking to less emotive and more neutral topics - like Chinese festivals - if you are going to gain a widespread international audience. Apart from that - all good!

This Slow Chinese article reviews an important new film, "City of life of Death", a film that tries to take a balanced approach to events in Nanjing, often referred to in western media as the "Rape of Nanjing". It covers a subject that is one of the core events in the formation of the modern Chinese sense of identity.

For anyone trying to understand modern China, the legacy of the Japanese occupation and war with China is a central and sometimes very confronting topic.

Chinese children in school are taught about the Japanese and the Japanese occupation in a way that would bring racial vilification charges against the teachers in my country. I saw (about 18 months ago) a western made documentary on China showing "Chinese youth playing patriotic video games" in a video parlor, the documentary went on to explain that the villains in the shoot em up games were Japanese.

Many times in conversation with otherwise sensitive and rational young Chinese people I have heard the views of dislike and hate expressed towards Japan, and Japanese people, this by young Chinese who had usually never met a Japanese person. If the conversations allowed it I would comment that views like that were similar in my country until the early 1950s, mainly due to atrocities inflicted on Allied prisoners of war, but that we have moved past that now.

This week's article is about a film that does not take the usual view. The film tries to show other sides. The review explains that and gives examples.

(Sorry for my machine translation, but it is as good as I can do)

"Many wars in the previous films, the Japanese is simply the image of the devil, they have no humanity, no thinking, only know to kill, so the discussion, there is no sense justice; Lu Chuan's view is that should the Japanese as a normal people who do are the things people do, though very harsh, but we should make an objective to analyze the reasons."

People trying to understand China need to know that like most countries, not everything is pretty.

There is an excellent review of this movie here http://twitchfilm.net/reviews/2009/05/city-of-life-and-death-review.php

[gato]

I've just listened to the most recent podcast about the film 'Nanjing, Nanjing'. I would suggest sticking to less emotive and more neutral topics - like Chinese festivals - if you are going to gain a widespread international audience.

You think the BBC got to where they are today by concentrating their programming on British festivals?

[xianhua]

You think the BBC got to where they are today by concentrating their programming on British festivals?

Precisely, the BBC is a media outlet with a political motive, namely, western democracy: good, anything else: not so good. The news is factual, but selected on a basis which attempts to influence its viewers in a particular way. If the author wishes to go down this route then so be it. I just think by doing so he’d alienate a proportion of viewers, which is a shame, as the concept is great.

[gato]

Precisely, the BBC is a media outlet with a political motive, namely, western democracy: good, anything else: not so good. The news is factual, but selected on a basis which attempts to influence its viewers in a particular way. If the author wishes to go down this route then so be it.

I think you are probably taking too big of a leap in concluding from one movie review that's it's headed down the road of becoming a propaganda organ. Surely there's a happy medium between ideological and intellectually-neutered, which I'm sure many people would prefer to either extreme.

[PhilipLean]

But where is the objective position on this topic, the Japanese in China and Nanjing ?

At the popular level the extreme views remain. At the business and political level a more pragmatic approach is taken.

Of course this is not helped by the whole of WWII effectively being deleted from Japanese text books and the Japanese population being largely unaware of the history.

The author of Slow Chinese has set out to talk about his impressions of China.

In the current climate it would be hard to review a film like this without risking the ire of someone.

That the film could be made reflects a slow change in attitudes in China, itself a topic for discussion as China continues to receive information from outside.

[xiaocai]

Precisely, the BBC is a media outlet with a political motive, namely, western democracy: good, anything else: not so good. The news is factual, but selected on a basis which attempts to influence its viewers in a particular way. If the author wishes to go down this route then so be it. I just think by doing so he’d alienate a proportion of viewers, which is a shame, as the concept is great.

I believe as a personal website the owner has the right to express what he feels towards a particular issue. And as a Chinese, I think all of us should remember this as a tragedy in our history, not to revenge, but to stop it from happening again. I just don't feel their is anything to be shamed about. And as human beings, I think it is understandable that we all have emotional moments. If you don't want to bear with it, you don't have to, because there are other websites you can go.

Edited September 24, 2009 at 02:23 PM by xiaocai

[llibbill]

thanks so much Xin Yu, you are great and I enjoy your podcast. 你真的给我们学汉语者带来很大的帮助

[HashiriKata]

The film may be controversial as some people were saying (I myself haven't seen it), but I don't think the podcast itself is controversial.

[gato]

It's a good film. You can watch it online here:

http://tv.sohu.com/20090527/n264199426.shtml

《南京!南京!》

[realmayo]

The [bBC] news is factual, but selected on a basis which attempts to influence its viewers in a particular way.

If that's occasionally true I'm fairly sure it's unintentional.

& I wouldn't want slow-chinese.com to stop talking about interesting topics for fear of not being impartial.

[animal world]

Xinyu, i want to compliment you on the fine site you created. Not only is your idea of "slow" Chinese useful and original, your site also has a very professional finish. You have added nice pictures and enjoyable, varied music.

I noticed one or two lessons were much shorter than the average. Perhaps for those, you could also add a "normal speed" version. This is not necessary, just a suggestion.

Contrary to some previous posts, i welcomed your addition of the Nanjing movie. Yes, the movie is controversial but your observations were not. Please keep on adding current events and trends.

May i recommend that you submit your site to the Open Directory Project? Once you have your site accepted by them, you'll find that a lot of search engines of various countries will have added your site. This can only mean more traffic!

Good luck with this project!

Here's the link to the Open Directory Project. It's a long time ago since i submitted a site to them but if you have any questions, please PM me and i'll try to help, if i can.

http://www.dmoz.org/about.html