Study Chinese Online From China

How to Think in Chinese. It’s Important!

September 15, 2006 on 12:31 pm | In Studying |

STUDY MINI-TUTORIAL

Recently on Chinesepod.com I posted some sentences from the day’s lesson. I found the feedback from Connie, a Chinesepod host, to be extremely helpful. The first examples are my original sentences, and the second sentences are Connie’s correct sentences.

The key here is not to learn grammar, but to see how the English mind orders things differently than Chinese when expressing an idea. First look at the English sentence, but just think about what it means. Visualize the context, the meaning, the circumstances. Then try to express it in Chinese, or your own English. You’ll see that if you try to write down the thought in your own English, it probably won’t be the same exact sentence as mine.

This is because thoughts are separate from language. We’re just used to matching it up with one language, our first language. This is what we must ‘break’ or expand upon, creating a match to another language.

What we are trying to do is make the mind capable of the following, the first we already can do, the second is where we are now, and the third is our target:

Thought—>English

Thought—>interlanguage
(mixed up English/Chinese grammar with Chinese words)

Thought—>Chinese
Thought—>English/Chinese

—————————————————————————————

I lost my heart. Ohh! I see it…it’s in the palm of your hand.

diū liǎo wǒ de xīn。 é！ kàndéjiàn。 。 。 zài nǐ de shǒuzhǎng shàng。
丢了我的心。哦！看得见。。。在你的手掌上。

Wǒ de xīn diū le. Ò，wǒ kànjian le，zài nǐ de shǒu xīn li.
我的心丢了。哦，我看见了，在你的手心里。

• I was looking at the word ‘dui’ and wanted to use it in a sentence. In my excitement I started off the sentence with that ‘verb’. Chinese sentences never start with a verb, in fact English sentences don’t either. So why did I? If you look closely at my first sentence you’ll see that actually it is a butchered English construction, I’ve left off the “(I) lost my heart.” Chinese for the most part starts off with the subject (my heart) and then says what happened (was lost). I must beat it into my brain, subject first, subject first, think subject. Don’t first think of me, me, me.

• Chinese thinking is very linear and sequential, especially because there is no conjugation. Right? Well there is a sort of conjugation, using ‘le’. It happens a lot with the second phrase when expressing a thought. I forgot, again I think it’s my English phrase-generator that is muddling things up. Chinese goes like this:

(1st phrase introduces the subject)
我的心丢了。
(2nd phrase gives more context about what happened)
哦，我看见了

• My last mistake was actually the easiest to correct, the grammar is correct, just I didn’t use the proper words for ‘in the palm of your hand’. That was because I used a dictionary!

在你的手掌上。vs
在你的手心里

I dropped my cell phone. Ahh, I found it. Ohh no, it’s broken.

shǒujì diào le。 ā ， zhǎo de dào。 āiyā ， wǒ de shǒujì huài le。
手记掉了。啊，找的到。哎呀，我的手记坏了。<>

.Wǒ de shǒujī diào le. A，zhǎodào le. Āiyā，wǒ de shǒujī huài le.
我的手机掉了。啊，找到了。哎呀，我的手机坏了。

• While we’re used to thinking of English as very much focused on the individual, I find that Chinese is actually much more self-centered! In the first sentence I left of ‘I’, but see Connie’s, the ‘wo de’ comes up front and center.
• In my second phrase, again I have forgotten the nice progression of the sequence of events, leaving off the ‘le’. I got the ‘le’ in the first phrase right, but my freshman Chinese didn’t have a sophmore level second phrase sophistication. Note to myself, think about what happens next, it’s important in Chinese…and my life for that matter.

I can’t find my soul mate. Don’t be anxious, it’s best to look slowly.
àiren zhǎobùdào。
A: 爱人找不到。

bié zháojí ， mànmàn zhǎo jiù hǎo le。
B: 别着急，慢慢找就好了。

Wǒ zhǎobudào wǒ de zhīxīn àirén .
我找不到我的知心爱人。
Bié zháojí，zuìhǎo shi mànmàn zhǎo.
别着急，最好是慢慢找。

• Here’s where I think a lot of traditional academic teaching and examples breaks down. The mind doesn’t really think so narrowly as making a noun always the subject, or a person the subject. In my first sentence the subject is ‘looking for’ 找不到, and thus I should have put it at the front of my sentence.
• Actually, I also think my first sentence is correct, but that Connie saw it as incorrect because I hadn’t introduced the context. If we had already been talking about ‘my soulmate’ I could have used my sentence. But when starting tabla rasa, I need to slowly introduce that idea.
• In the second sentence, the Chinese logic is much simpler and step-by-step than my original sentence.

别着急，慢慢找就好了。
(don’t worry) (slowly look) (it’s best)

别着急，最好是慢慢找。
(don’t worry) (it’s best) (to do) (slowly look)

SUMMARY: There are a couple things to do when thinking in Chinese, first put the subject first. Second, in your followup phrase, express clearly the next event, using a ‘le’ or other connector word like ‘jiu hao’.