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Posts Tagged ‘chinese’

Chinese New Year Symbolism Explained

Sunday, November 22nd, 2009

Symbolism is a significant phenomenon with very strong associations to the Chinese culture. Amongst the many aspects of the Chinese culture that revolves around the use of symbols is the event of the Chinese New Year.

The various unique symbols and rituals that are associated with the Chinese New Year have nothing to do with the solar calendar as the world follows. The event of Chinese New Year is not celebrated on the first of January, however, in the eyes of the Japanese people, these symbols have great cultural and historical value.

You will find the collection of Chinese new years symbols to be representing profound knowledge in an interesting and awe inspiring visual manner. The collection of New Year symbols is a fine example of balanced art between form and function.

The undeniable physical beauty of the Chinese New Year symbols is a testament to the region’s artistic talents. The meaning behind the symbols gives us the mystical insight into the beliefs and traditions of the people of China.

It’s the right time now to discuss how different Chinese New Year is in comparison with the Western New Year. The most vital difference is that the Western world follows the solar calendar where as the Chinese follow the lunar calendar traditionally.

As the name suggests, the lunar calendar is based on the revolutions of the moon. Most of the calendars hence printed in China have both the Gregorian as well as the Chinese lunar calendar dates. This makes it easier for the people to compare the dates and keep note of current trends.

The spirit is joyous and anticipation is for prosperity when the Chinese New Year arrives. This is why you will find the collection of Chinese New Year symbols to be very positive with regards to their meanings.

Flowers play a vital part in the symbols created for the Chinese New Year. Traditionally the Chinese had an affinity to utilize natural god-gifted products and so flowers were a perfect choice. The plum blossom and water narcissus are two of the most popular Chinese new year flower symbols.

One other important traditional symbol of the Chinese New Year is the hong-bao which is actually a lai-see envelope. This envelope carries money that children are given by the elders of a particular family on the eve of the New Year. This is accepted to be one of the Chinese New Year symbol.

New Year symbols from China are used to foster good luck for the forthcoming year. If you are interested in learning more about Chinese Alphabet Symbols follow the links.

Tags: party, culture, Religion, Language, china, festival, symbol

Attract Chinese Tourists By Learning Chinese

Saturday, August 8th, 2009

To boost the country’s tourism, a lot of programs have been thought of and implemented by both public and private sectors. Enhancing tourism can do a lot of favor to companies and to the general public. Learning different languages is one of the programs being offered and targeted by companies and institutions to boost the country’s tourism. As this also has effect to uplifting the rate of employment and the economy in general.

We can find so many foreigners in our country perhaps because they found our country to have some valuable assets and attributes that aren’t available in other countries. Many may say that the natural resources or the tourist spots are the very reasons why a foreigner or a group of foreigners would like to set their feet on another country.

A higher percentage of these foreigners have this as their reason for visiting a country. A meager percentage of these foreigners, however, may say that the locals or the peoples attributes are contributing factors to their visit.

This article shall deal with a tip that would enhance the frequency of visit of any foreigner. This will focus more on an attribute that the locals should posses in order to reap more tourists.

This one and very important attribute is hospitality. What does it take to be hospitable? Well, it takes good communication. Good communication skills can be very rewarding to someone who possesses them. You can integrate and interact with varying personalities and even different nationalities when you have this skill.

But the question is: what language or languages does one need to know and learn in order to have some advantage over the others? Well, I will leave this unanswered so that anyone with good research skills will be able to see and then learn for himself or herself the answer to this question.

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Tags: learn chinese, speak mandarin, society, chinese, speak chinese, learn to speak chinese, learn mandarin, Language

Learn More About The Ancient Chinese Language

Tuesday, July 28th, 2009

China has a rich culture that many writers and historians are now headed to China to make a name for themselves. However, they need first to study Chinese language. This article will deal with the Chinese language.

An authority to the study of Chinese language says that there are two elements to the Chinese language: the written language, based on individual symbols called characters, each of which represents an idea or thing; and the spoken language, which includes a number of different dialects.

As has been said and written by a reliable source, the written language originally had no alphabet, but it was easily understood by literate people with different dialects. The Pinyin has been developed in China as early as the 1950s and is now commonly being used. This is a system using the Latin alphabet. It represents the spoken sounds of Putonghua (based on Beijing-area Mandarin), which is an oral representation of Chinese characters.

Because some of the numerous dialects of spoken Chinese are totally different from each other, all of them use tones to distinguish different words. Mandarin, which is spoken in the Beijing region and in northern China generally, has four common tones. Cantonese, spoken in Southeastern China, has nine tones and is quite different from Mandarin. Cantonese is probably most common among Chinese-American immigrants. Today Putonghua, is the official language of government and education, and everyone is expected to learn to speak it.

It has also been said that written Chinese characters have no “pronunciation” and can be spoken in a variety of ways depending on the dialect used and that there have been a number of ways of rendering Chinese words into English. For many years the most used was the Wade-Giles system, which did not in fact represent Chinese sounds very well. In the United States this is most often the system encountered in older textbooks and even transliterated shop names.

This basic knowledge could be a guide to anyone who wishes to learn the language which is said to be the most spoken language in the world. Learners have to know the historical background of the language and of China in order for them to have deeper appreciation and interest in learning them.

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Tags: learn chinese, learn mandarin, speak chinese, Language, learning chinese, society, learn chinese online

Improve Your Chinese Language Skills With These Facts

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009

People are a lot luckier when they know a language or two (excluding their mother tongue). Many believe in this notion but a few of them do not really care. Rich people or those who could afford to spend a fortune painstakingly face the difficulties associated with learning a language not their own just so they could be educated with the language of other culture and race. Whatever their motives are, they are probably good enough.

At presently, the flavor of the month goes to learning the Chinese language over any other languages because of the surging or overwhelming rise of Chinas stature in the economic world.

Learning Chinese is difficult. The following facts, which were taken from the internet source in verbatim, can justify how difficult it is to learn the Chinese language. However, this is just an opinion. When a person is directly involved in the study of the language, he or she may find it a lot easier.

In spoken Chinese, words are made up of one, two or more syllables. Each of the syllables is written with a separate character. Each character has its own meaning, though many are used only in combination with other characters.

Every character is given exactly the same amount of space, no matter how complex it is. There are no spaces between characters and the characters which make up multi-syllable words are not grouped together, so when reading Chinese, you not only have to work out what the characters mean and how to pronounce them, but also which characters belong together.

The Chinese writing system is an open-ended one, meaning that there is no upper limit to the number of characters. The largest Chinese dictionaries include about 56,000 characters, but most of them are archaic, obscure or rare variant forms. Knowledge of about 3,000 characters enables you to read about 99% of the characters used in Chinese newspapers and magazines. To read Chinese literature, technical writings or Classical Chinese though, you need to be familiar with at least 6,000 characters.

There are approximately 1,700 possible syllables in Mandarin, which compares with over 8,000 in English. As a result, there are many homophones – syllables which sound the same but mean different things. These are distinguished in written Chinese by using different characters for each one.

Many can afford to study the Chinese language but only a few of them could see the essence of learning and applying what they have learned.

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Tags: Language, speak mandarin, learning chinese, society, learn chinese, chinese, speak chinese, learn mandarin

The Type Of People Who Learn Chinese

Wednesday, June 24th, 2009

Different people have diverse reasons why they need to study Chinese. However, in this article you will find the characteristics of people who study the Chinese language.

People who study the Chinese language are audacious. Why? Because audacious people are those who are not afraid to try on things that are different. They are those who go for excitement and something new and perhaps complicated. The Chinese language can look very complicated and hard to learn. But adventurous people are not afraid to learn new things.

People who learn or study the Chinese language are wise. Wise people have visions. Visions that would actually lead them to places of fame and success at the right time. Come to think of it, when you learn the Chinese language today, you would be enriched with the necessary skills and knowledge of the Chinese culture which you could use at present and in the near future.

People who learn or study the Chinese language are sensible. Sensible people have visions. Visions that would actually lead them to places of fame and success at the right time. Come to think of it, when you learn the Chinese language today, you would be enriched with the necessary skills and knowledge of the Chinese culture which you could use at present and in the near future.

When you have internalized the Chinese language it is as though you have also internalized Chinese culture. This is so vital because China has gain quite a reputation in the world economy, being the second largest economy in the world. With these as your armour in these days of crises and economic recession, you would rise up and come out undefeated. Wise people are able to hurdle lifes challenges and obstacles. People who learn or study the Chinese language are zealous.

The intricacies that surround this may be difficult to bear for those who are not passionate. The passion to study Chinese may have sprung from the passion to learn the culture of Chinese. And the passion to learn Chinese culture springs from the inner passion to improve ones self and expand ones horizon so as to learn cultural diversity.

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Tags: speak mandarin, chinese, learn mandarin, society, Language, learn chinese

Why Is It Important To Learn Chinese?

Sunday, June 21st, 2009

As almost everyone knows, China is one of the largest economies in the world and as the eight fastest growing economy, it becomes a more important economic player each year. This has led to an explosion in the use of the Chinese language for business, with a corresponding increase in the demand for Chinese language instruction. The number of Chinese language classes and instructional materials has tripled on the last five years alone!

It is increasingly common for primary and secondary schools to offer Chinese classes and in the next few decades, many believe that the popularity of these courses will exceed that of Spanish classes. China is the world’s most widely spoken language and is spoken by 1.3 billion people, with one in four people in Asia being Chinese speakers.

Why learn Chinese? The figures given above demonstrate that it is something which is reapidly becoming a necessity for international business. Chinese culture has made an entry into Western popular culture which has also increased interest on the part of Westerners in learning the language. Chinese cinema, cuisine and literature have been making an impact on Western culture.

Chinese literature and philosophy has been especially influential over Western thinkers and many who discover these works find themselves interested in mastering the language in order to read these texts in the original Chinese. The focus on serenity and balance in traditional Chinese thought is something which has a great appeal to people living in the Western world.

The stressful, busy lives many of us lead make us interested in finding a respite in the knowledge and the currents of thought coming from the East, particularly from Chinese culture. Learning the Chinese language and gaining an understanding of Chinese culture and philosophy can help to restore balance to one’s life.

To learn Chinese… whether it be the arts, the words, the ways, is often found tools to enrich our own daily lives and restore balance. Once again, by doing so, we are merging another cultures layers and sewn them in as our own. The influence of the Chinese culture is undeniable.

Why learn Chinese? It’s an exciting thing to learn a new language and to get a different way of looking at the world. Maybe you’d like to visit China and would like to be able to converse while there, want to speak to a friend who understands the language or undertake learning Chinese simply to broaden your horizons. There are many reasons to learn Chinese and many benefits to learning this fascinating language.

And exhilarating to learn. There is a sense of accomplishment behind learning Chinese, even if it’s not for a job in china, or you cannot take a vacation there… having the richness of absorbing another’s culture into your world view is a step to a better and higher understanding of life itself.

You may learn Chinese in the interests of cultural enrichment. You might need to learn Chinese to keep ahead of the trends in business communication. Perhaps you’d like to learn Chinese to truly understand Chinese literature and philosophy. There is any number of reasons to learn Chinese, all of them offering many rewards.

Start to learn Chinese today! Learn it for travel, for business or simply because you’ve always dreamed of being able to speak the language! Chinese has a long and interesting history and can be your doorway into the rich tapestry of Chinese history and culture.

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Tags: chinese, languages, education, Language, learn chinese, training, foreign languages, speaking

Is Learning Chinese The Way Of The Future?

Saturday, June 20th, 2009

The benefits of learning the Chinese language are outlined here. Three of which will be briefly discussed:

One, to learn Chinese means to compete squarely. We see that China has come up the ladder of success in the global economy. Its reputation has grown and to mention just a few, it is now the second largest economy in the world, Americas largest trading partners, a huge importer and exporter of a variety of products and services. With all these, who wouldnt want to learn Chinese?

Two, learning Chinese is a way to expand or elevate the countrys tourism. China is such a populated country and being the worlds most populous country, one can surmise that the Chinese people are most likely to have excursions in another country. With the 1.4 billion Chinese people, there is a big chance that even a very slim 0.5% could be tourists to your country, thereby boosting tourism and increasing job opportunities.

The frequency of visit would likely increase when Chinese people were able to experience the warmth and the hospitality of such visited country. That one good experience could be spread from one Chinese to another just by good word of mouth. So, one should start learning the Chinese language.

Three, people study or learn Chinese so that one would have numerous career opportunities. Many say that job opportunities are wider when you know how to speak Chinese. As mentioned above, in order to be globally competitive and boost tourism, one should learn Chinesea language that is widely spoken. Not only because of the reason that it is widely spoken but also because China has soared high in the economy that we need to learn Chinese“its economy, language and culture.

The nitty gritty of the business world could only be explained well by some expert and experienced businessman or economist and perhaps one advise that they can give you is to learn Chinese.

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Tags: Language, speak mandarin, learn chinese, society, chinese, learn mandarin, speak chinese