Confused with the usage of 怎麼

Language Learning Chinese
1

你 怎么 学 中文？

The interpretation of this sentence means I am asking, How do you learn Chinese? But it could also be interpreted as me asking why you learn Chinese, right? So, how do I use 怎么 correctly?

Interpretation 1: How do you learn Chinese?

Interpretation 2: Why do you learn Chinese?

2

Kind of, in a sense of “How did you come to study Chinese?”

3

Both are possible. You often need to ask for clarification.

Another use of 怎麼：
「你怎麼會在這裡？」

  1. “In what manner did you arrive here?” (Like “what form of transportation?” Not often used)
  2. “What are you doing here?” (As in, “you shouldn’t be here” or “Aren’t you supposed to be somewhere else?” or “what possessed you to be here?”)

「你怎麼學中文？」can both be

  1. What methods did you use to learn Chinese?
  2. Why did you learn Chinese?

But most people mean the second one. But sometimes they want to know the answer to the first one. Usually they don’t listen for a reply either way…

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4

Why and how are conflated in English too.

5

No. “Why did you learn Chinese?” would be 你為什麼學中文？

Although I did notice when I first moved to Taiwan that some Taiwanese people tend to confuse 怎麼 and 為什麼

Although they usually say 你怎麼會講中文？which is just a rhetorical question to express shock and disbelief.

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6

There is a lot of overlap.

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7

True. I guess it’s like “Why did you learn Chinese” vs. “How did you come to learn Chinese”. Both mean the same thing, but one is asked with “why” and the other with “how”.

I didn’t see that Tempogain had already said this above.

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8

i don’t think they confuse.

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9

I was just thinking 怎麼 and 為什麼 in general. Using 怎麼 in the “why” sense just sounds a little more colloquial, a little less harsh.

10

I don’t think you will hear 你怎麼學中文 very often in Taiwan. It’s more typical to hear 你怎麼會學中文 when asked why you study Chinese.

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11

‘Why’ as a word is also redundant in English as we already have ‘for what’. And 為什麼 literally means ‘for what’.

12

Probably means how did you learn / are learning chinese. Why would be a more specific ‘ni wei semma yao xue zOng wen’ (I used Taiwan accent pinyin for the laughs)

13

While colloquially both meanings are possible, to say Why did you learn Chinese, in addition to the 為什麼 approach, when sticking to using 怎麼, you would usually add 會, to form 你怎麼會學北京話.

Just saw @hannes already made the same clarification.

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