Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm interested in knowing which should be easier for an English speaker to learn, Chinese (Mandarin) or Japanese. Besides, please it would be interesting if you would share comments on which one should be more useful to learn.
Nihongo mochiron....don't forget btw that Japanese uses Chinese letters and not the other way around but it's not like you can't do solely with Japanese letters (Hiragana but...) , so skip Kanji for now.
In terms of words again: Japanese while Chinese or Korean are another level of difficulty both in terms of pronunciation and hard to remember words.
I would say Chinese (Mandarin) is easier,Chinese language is more logical and easier to pronounce.
It is like English,
In English you say I am having breakfast
In Chinese you say I eat morning meal.
In English you say enjoy your meal
In Chinese you say eat full.
From what I have read, the tonal system of Chinese would be one of the greatest difficulties, along with its writing system. When it comes to Japanese, the grammar would be the most difficult, as well as their writing system too.
According to this site, both would be exceptionally difficult for an English speaker. However Japanese would be the hardest to learn:
Japanese for sure, and while I have never studied Chinese, it seems like there is little to no wasei eigo or gairaigo words to help you out. In Japanese, there are ample words from foreign languages, and you pronounce the words quite differently than the original often, but it can definitely give you major hints if you do not know the meaning. For example, to say "chocolate" it is "チョコレート", pronounced like "cho co lah to". In contrast, in Chinese (according to Google, could be wrong), "chocolate" is "巧克力", or "qiaokeli". If you cannot read the Chinese characters in Japanese (kanji), you often cannot say the word, but there are loads of hiragana and katakana to help you along, but in Chinese, the entire language is written in kanji, not to mention the various tones used to specify meaning. Japanese you never have to worry about the pronunciation of the word, and just say it like it is like in English, but the writing system is a bit possibly a bit more difficult as there are three different writing systems used in one sentence often, and the grammar is not as simple and straightforward as Chinese.
The biggest hindrance to learning Chinese that I've experienced are the tones and lack of a phonetic alphabet. The grammar isn't difficult to learn, the sentence structure is sensible, but the tones throw you for a loop if you're coming from an atonal language such as English. If you hear Japanese people talking in a social setting, rather than in an anime or TV show, it tends to be pretty flat; Chinese is way more expressive and undulating, which is trickier for a lot of people. Most English speakers will say a word with an "upward" tone if they are unsure of it, or asking a question; in Mandarin, that sound is the second tone, so the impulse to do that if you're unsure can make it harder to understand.
To read Japanese properly you will still need to learn Chinese characters (kanji), but if you're learning and only know the phonetic alphabets you'll still get the general gist of things. Anecdotally, I'd say that most of the foreigners I know who learn Japanese can also read/write, where probably less than half the foreigners I know who learn Chinese are able to effectively.
Mandarin is more useful globally, and will open more doors in terms of work, travel, etc. But, it takes a much bigger effort.
According to the Foreign Service Institute, Chinese is a Category V foreign language (takes approximately 88 weeks or 2200 hours to become proficient for an English speaker), which is the highest level.
However, Japanese is a Category V* foreign language, which is considered more difficult than other languages in the same category (Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean, and Arabic). So I guess Chinese is easier for Americans.
Chinese is not the only one who use tones to express ,Vietnamese do too.
In Cantonese the difference in 'respectable old man' and 'dirty useless old thing ' is in the tone.
Mandarin is the official dilalect,more refined and logical,there is less play in tone variation.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
