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Pleco is by far the best app for learning Chinese. It's a good dictionary and it's regularly updated with new words. It also has flashcard functions to help cycle new vocabulary.
I've also used Hello Chinese to revise some basic points. If you are a beginner, it should certainly help.
If you don't know any Chinese characters (Hanzi), you should also try to get Heisig's book. It may seem expensive, but you will be able to study it for many months, and use Heisig's system to learn new vocabulary for your whole life. It comes in two editions:
* If you want to communicate with people from mainland China or Singapore, then learn Simplified Chinese :
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Remembering-Simplified-Hanzi-Meaning-Characters/dp/0824833236
* If you want to communicate with people from Hong Kong, Macao, Malaysia or Taiwan, then learn Traditional Chinese:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Remembering-Traditional-Hanzi-Meaning-Characters/dp/0824833244
Simplified Chinese is easier to learn than Traditional Chinese. But if you plan to learn both systems, it's probably better to start with Traditional and then learn Simplified later.
0 votedNovember 5, 20180Content
I share your frustration with current copyright laws. Copyright protection started out in the 18th century as the life of the author plus 25 years, which is reasonable protection for artists and their widows/widowers/orphans. But the copyright term keeps getting extended, so almost nothing has come out of copyright in my lifetime. This is largely due to the efforts of the major Hollywood studios (especially Disney) who want to keep all of their film libraries in copyright. The European Parliament is beginning to resist this, but I am not optimistic. I try very hard to obey the copyright laws, but it seems that the other side keeps changing the rules of the game whenever I am about to win.
Corrections
30-Day Challenge - Today's Rant.
This is the problem. For the past few months, I've been avidly reading different kinds of books, mainly literature. You may say... "well, good for you". OK, but the problem is that I already ran out of interesting books to read for free. I blame the copyright. I miss the old days when Ares*1 and I were inseparable,*2 I would download thousands of movies, and books for free. Fortunately, in Latin- America*3, there are still some legal vacuums that allow us access to books for free, but those books are in Spanish --a language that I already know-- and I'd like to read in English, but there's no way!
The copyright protection in English speaking countries has become a lot more severe, especially in international treaties that as a condition demand from the signatories countries to protect the copyright. Even inon YouTube, music from different artists has been taken down as a requirement*4 from the music companies, what a pity.
Probably many people would disagree with me, but bear in mind that we belong to different cultures.Comments
This is an excellent piece, Barbara. You meaning is almost always clear and you make effective, natural use of so many idioms: "This is the problem", "I blame the X", "bear in mind that", and many more. Most of the minor mistakes are caused by collocation or by the English system article system (definite article, indefinite article, zero article+plural), which is common even at C2 level.
*1: I'm a bit puzzled by this. Ares is the god of war, not the god of reading (at least in British culture). So I guess that Ares is a real person that you used to read with - is that right?
*2: This is a comma splice: you have joined two complete sentences with a comma. This is completely unacceptable in formal English; you must use a semi-colon (as in this sentence). However, this piece has some quite informal language ("no way!"), so it might be acceptable here.
*3: It's difficult to show this with the editing tool, but there's no hyphen in "Latin America".
*4: The meaning of this sentence is completely clear, but I don't think the "as a requirement" pattern is the best choice here. "Requirement(s)" has slightly different emphases in the singular and the plural: https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/requirement
Here are a couple of alternatives:
Even on YouTube, music from different artists has been taken down at the demand of the music companies, what a pity.
Even on YouTube, music from different artists has been taken down to meet the requirements of the music companies, what a pity.
0 votedNovember 5, 20181I think that the Ms Maria's explanation of the phenomenon is the best explanation so far. In the cultures that I know, the vast majority of foreign language students are female, so you would expect more women to be polyglots (assuming a normal distribution of ability). But my anecdotal experience is also that more self-proclaimed polyglots are men.
I'd never call myself a polyglot, because I'm certainly not one. When people ask me how good my Mandarin is, I usually ask if they've seen Fawlty Towers* and say that my Mandarin is as good as Manuel's English or Basil's Spanish.... ;-)
* If you haven't seen them before, you can meet Basil and Manuel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-oH-TELcLE
0 votedNovember 5, 20180- In this context, it suggests that the person is getting promotions by being (too?!) friendly with the managers, not because they are doing very good work. They get promotions by going to the pub/golf club/staff canteen with the right people. It does *not* suggest corruption, just that they are very good at making people like them.0 votedNovember 5, 20180
