Messages

1

English & Linguistics / English and Chinese 2

« on: December 22, 2005, 10:47:25 PM »

Oh, thanks JB.

"I went" will be like "I"+"go"+"yesterday", or "I"+"used to" +"go";

"I have gone" will be like "I"+"already"+"go";

"I had gone" is just like "I have gone"+"before 1999"., so "I"+"already"+"go"+"before 1999";

"I am going" will be like "I"+"~ing"+"go", and this "~ing" thing is a separate word meaning "doing" or "going on" which helps to describe the ongoing, so:

"I was going" will be like "I"+"~ing"+"go"+"yesterday".

So basically words like "used to", "~ing" are employed to help form the tenses. I feel that Chinese can handle all the cases but less powerful in this than English.

2

English & Linguistics / English and Chinese 2

« on: December 22, 2005, 05:53:41 AM »

What does "immersion" mean here? Is it like daily dialogues taking place under certain situation or background?

3

English & Linguistics / English and Chinese 2

« on: December 21, 2005, 11:05:25 PM »

Ok, welcome back~

The second thing I can think of is: tense

There is no tense in Chinese. There is no "did" or "done", just "do".  For example:

I called Jon Boy yesterday.

In Chinese, it will be like "I"+"yesterday"+"call"+"Jon Boy". If there was no "yesterday", "I called Jon Boy" is probably fine in English, depending on the context, which might be in the middle of a conversation, and suggests that "I _already_ called Jon Boy" . But "I"+"call"+"Jon Boy" will be confusing in Chinese, or more like a baby's talk. If there is no words (such as "yesterday") in a sentense suggesting time, there should be words like "already", "used to", or "will"(future tense is the similar).

I hope I am explaining clearly enough.

Thanks for watching and stay tuned.

Edit:This is simply random thoughts, nothing professional at all.

4

English & Linguistics / English and Chinese,

« on: December 21, 2005, 10:15:12 PM »

This linguistic board is too hard for me. Let me be selfish and bring up a topic from my perspective.

I can't help comparing these two languages when I was studying English or teaching Chinese. Lemme start with a simple sentense:

"His hair is long."

Yeah, that was in English. But if it is said in Chinese, the words are EXACTLY the same. I mean it is like "His" +"hair"+"is"+"long", with each of these four words replaced by its corresponding word in Chinese , and the sequense remains the same.

However, there is also another way of saying this, and it's like:

 "HE" +"hair"+ "is"+ "long".

In the previous case, the subject is "his hair" but in the latter case, the subject becomes "he" instead.

Is there a smiliar case in English? I don't know. Tell me.    

Thanks for watching Lenny Channel, have a good day and stay tuned.