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Non ethnic-Chinese people, including Koreans, Japanese and Westerners, who learnt the simplified version of Chinese, will have much more difficulty reading traditional Chinese.
Yeah probably. Westerners who are fluent in Mandarin that I know of are the ones who studied it in Taiwan. I haven't really met any non ethnic-Chinese who became fluent in Chinese in China or back in their home countries so I don't know if they have any difficulty reading traditional characters.
I'm well aware of how many non-Chinese people are learning Mandarin, but I don't think many would prioritise it over English. Especially Europeans.
Some people, especially Asians or Western asianophiles or "global citizens" have the unrealistic daydream that some new global language will rise because English has been forced upon everyone trough gunboat diplomacy. English and French are seen as a representative of colonialism, eurocentrism and the white man, so thus not desirable (though Han has been a tool of equal oppression in Asia). Mandarin is seen as a more neutral and globally "justifiable" global language, but deal with it, most Europeans don't care even if there would be 5 billion Chinese - we are interested in European languages. We are stuck with English. End of story.
I speak six languages, but can only read and write four of them.
I'm fluent in English.
Fluent in French (although my grammar is laughable).
Spanish (learning).
Italian (learning).
Arabic (learning - can't read or write it and am learning phonetically.)
Mandarin (learning - can't read or write it and am learning phonetically.)
German - I don't exactly speak German, but I lived there as a child for two-and-a-half years, so I can manage a sentence here and there, and not a few words, I guess, but I'm not interested in pursuing it at this time, so I'm not really learning any more of it on purpose.
Increasing number of westerners are showing interest in Korean language and culture because of the global spread of K-pop. K-pop groups have held concerts around the world with tickets fastly sold out. Western K-pop fans listen to Korean music even they cannot read Korean.
In Asia, we go further to regularly watch Korean tv dramas set in Korean dynasties and modern Korean society, usually translated into local languages.
On the contrary, most people in the world who listen and sing English songs already are not English beginners.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ariete
Some people, especially Asians or Western asianophiles or "global citizens" have the unrealistic daydream that some new global language will rise because English has been forced upon everyone trough gunboat diplomacy. English and French are seen as a representative of colonialism, eurocentrism and the white man, so thus not desirable (though Han has been a tool of equal oppression in Asia). Mandarin is seen as a more neutral and globally "justifiable" global language, but deal with it, most Europeans don't care even if there would be 5 billion Chinese - we are interested in European languages. We are stuck with English. End of story.
Increasing number of westerners are showing interest in Korean language and culture because of the global spread of K-pop. K-pop groups have held concerts around the world with tickets fastly sold out. Western K-pop fans listen to Korean music even they cannot read Korean.
In Asia, we go further to regularly watch Korean tv dramas set in Korean dynasties and modern Korean society, usually translated into local languages.
On the contrary, most people in the world who listen and sing English songs already are not English beginners.
That's exactly why Mandarin is not going to be that popular anytime soon. You need a lot more than economic might to push a language into global position, such as cultural output, which China barely has any.
Last edited by Greysholic; 11-07-2015 at 07:32 AM..
Korean pop groups speak a lot of English when they tour overseas even they sing mainly in Korean. Japanese musicians speak less English.
K pop nowadays is more global than J pop. K pop is now successful in attracting lots of fans outside of Asia. J pop still have its fans mostly from East and Southeast Asia only.
Japanese cuisine has long been established in the West. Korean cuisine is on the rise in popularity.
With the notable exception of Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan movies, Chinese/HK/Taiwanese movies and music attract mostly only ethnic Chinese around the world. Most people around the world, including people in Japan and Korea, probably have never heard of Jay Chou , Donnie Yen and other active Chinese-speaking stars.
Some people, especially Asians or Western asianophiles or "global citizens" have the unrealistic daydream that some new global language will rise because English has been forced upon everyone trough gunboat diplomacy. English and French are seen as a representative of colonialism, eurocentrism and the white man, so thus not desirable (though Han has been a tool of equal oppression in Asia). Mandarin is seen as a more neutral and globally "justifiable" global language, but deal with it, most Europeans don't care even if there would be 5 billion Chinese - we are interested in European languages. We are stuck with English. End of story.
Exactly, English is being forced unto the world by non native speakers.
unlike 19th century linguists who knew that Native American languages were polysynthetic, East Asian isolating, Turkic agglutinating, how reconstruction of Proto languages worked, etc we have modern folks who think everything outside Europe must be exotically complex, Japanese is objectively a difficult language outside of the keigo and script, and standard average European must be the norm
A Serbian guy on YouTube claimed English could be learned in two weeks which is why we used a "poor language" unlike Russian or Mandarin and I pointed out Mandain was isolating and Russian was the main tongue in the formed ussr territories and he just laughed and got 999999 up votes after calling me the n word (I'm not black)
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