Where can I learn Chinese online? (4)

1 Name: Anonymous Linguist : 2007-04-03 17:46 ID:YBjcZuKC

for free and it's pretty good. Can somebody help me?

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3 Name: Anonymous Linguist : 2007-04-07 08:50 ID:gvfaRjY5

I'm going to give you the answer that you probably don't want to hear: You will NOT learn Chinese online. It just will not happen.
1) Chinese is a real language, that means it has a spoken form. You're not going to learn to produce or receive that spoken form without interacting with real speakers. It's 'easier' for Japanese because Japanese has simpler pitch (which most second language speakers will never get right unless they intentionally focus on it), but Chinese tone is much more complex and has rules governing pitch ranges and complete change in tone from the isolated tone form.
2) You will not learn the nuances of Chinese grammar or diction from a book. As appealing as that is, it just doesn't happen. Getting a 1 or 3 sentence description of a word is simply not going to give you all you need in order to use it correctly in spoken and written contexts.
3) Hanzi are written different than their font forms. If you write all hanzi as they appear on your computer, it'd be more than just a little wierd.
That being said, http://zhongwen.com/ is an excellent suppliment to a Chinese class.

4 Name: Anonymous Linguist : 2007-10-18 16:20 ID:9C0Ro+Gb

>>3 agreed

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