hey everyone,
im struggling to learn chinese right now, and i find one of my many problems are all those pesky conj, prepositions and adverbs. i was just wondering if anyone knew of a book i could get in taiwan that would help me out, or a website that dealt speicifically with all that stuff. thanks so much
[quote=“fish132132”]hey everyone,
im struggling to learn chinese right now, and i find one of my many problems are all those pesky conj, prepositions and adverbs. i was just wondering if anyone knew of a book i could get in taiwan that would help me out, or a website that dealt speicifically with all that stuff. thanks so much[/quote]I don’t think that there is such a book because Chinese grammar just don’t have these CONJ, PREP AND ADVERB STUFF.
In any C-C Chinese dictionary, you can not find the characters have part of speech marked.
The Conj, prep, and adverb are of English grammar.
I suggest you just have s+V in mind and remember almost all Chinese sentences are only around 15 characters long.
As long as you can get the meaning of the characters, you may understand the Chinese sentence, I guess.
I get confused by all those technical terms, but i wonder if fish is really asking about stuff like “cai2” (meaning a late action), “you4” (meaning an early action), “zai4” (meaning it will happen again), “lian2 …” (meaning even … is not … ). Etc.
Fish, i don’t know any books to recommend, but a good chinese dictionary will list all the usages of these sorts of words with example sentences. Real chinese dictionaries can be difficult to buy overseas, if you need to order the guys here will surely be able to recommend a title.
I have heard many teacher said Chinese is difficult to learn. Because all Chinese words are individually, and if you combine some words together, they may changed their part of speech and meanings. For example, “Huo3” means fire, it’s a noun. But if you see three words Huo3 Hong2 de., it means a color red as a fire, and equal to flaming, then Huo3 becomes a modifier to describe how the red color is. It’s very hard to learn a part of speech in one Chinese word.
I think the best way to learn Chinese is that you buy a electric Chinese-English dictionary. If you find some words you haven’t met, then you search this word in electric dictionary, dictionary will show many phrase begining with this word. If you can’t find out, maybe you start at a wrong word, you can choose words near this word and find again. That will easier in reading.
[quote=“Auphie”]I have heard many teacher said Chinese is difficult to learn. Because all Chinese words are individually, and if you combine some words together, they may changed their part of speech and meanings. For example, “Huo3” means fire, it’s a noun. But if you see three words Huo3 Hong2 de., it means a color red as a fire, and equal to flaming, then Huo3 becomes a modifier to describe how the red color is. It’s very hard to learn a part of speech in one Chinese word.
I think the best way to learn Chinese is that you buy a electric Chinese-English dictionary. If you find some words you haven’t met, then you search this word in electric dictionary, dictionary will show many phrase begining with this word. If you can’t find out, maybe you start at a wrong word, you can choose words near this word and find again. That will easier in reading.[/quote]
You made a very good point in the first paragraph.
But in the second paragraph, I think it will make things even worse.
I wonder the learner can study the composition of radicals instead of the grammar of Chinese.
Why would a learner want to study radicals over grammar? Believe it or not, grammar is important, since it, you know, lets you be able to SPEAK.
To answer the question:
One good book I’ve found is “A Concise Chinese Grammar” (ISBN: 962-238-329-7, from Heping Books Ltd.) I found it in Page One at Taipei 101, I think.
[quote=“Tetsuo”]Why would a learner want to study radicals over grammar? Believe it or not, grammar is important, since it, you know, lets you be able to SPEAK.
To answer the question:
One good book I’ve found is “A Concise Chinese Grammar” (ISBN: 962-238-329-7, from Heping Books Ltd.) I found it in Page One at Taipei 101, I think.[/quote]
First, I say, we have started a very good discussion.
Secondly, I think in the case of Chinese language learning, compostions of characters are more important than grammar. I just don’t think there is a Chinese grammar. The grammar that you are using now is rather a duplication of English grammar. If you want to say it is a Chinese grammar, there are just too many exceptions while English grammar can explain 99% of the sentence structure of English language.
Thirdly, when you talk, you have no time to think of grammar.
Every language has grammar. That is a simple fact of linguistics. It may not match closely, or even at all, to English grammar, or any other language’s grammar, but it does exist. And of course learning Chinese as a second language, the learner is going to be influenced by their native language - it’s their only frame of reference. Just because English-speaking learners use English-derived terms to refer to Chinese grammatical concepts doesn’t mean they’re “forcing” Chinese to fit English grammatical patterns, all it means is that they’re trying to find a point of reference to help understand the functioning of a particular piece of language. Sure, Chinese grammar doesn’t match English grammar, and anyone who has ever learned the language knows that and understands that. The terms used are just labels of convenience.
And for your information, English grammatical terms and rules actually aren’t English, per se. They stem from an old attempt to force English to conform to the grammatical structures and rules of classical Latin. Yet despite the fact they were superimposing the grammatical concepts and terms of another language (in this case Latin), it still helped describe the structures of English. And it’s not 99%, not by a long stretch. There’s far too many exceptions and oddities in English for it to even approach that figure.
Grammar is the backbone of the language, be it spoken or written, and without a knowledge of it - whether gained through conscious study or immersion and deduction - you cannot function in that language. If Chinese didn’t have grammar, these would be correct:
的工作媽媽秘書是.
他你我.
But they’re not, because they don’t conform to Chinese grammar. And how about this: 他. If Chinese had no grammatical constrictions, that could be a verb, a conjunction, an adjective, anything. But it can’t. If you seriously think Chinese has no grammar, give me an example of a sentence where 他 indicates what we would call a verb in English.
And yes, learning the composition of characters is an important part of learning the whole Chinese language. But if someone is just interested in reaching some level of communicative efficiency, they’re not going to be interested in understanding the composition and structure of characters, because characters have little to do with speaking. Speaking and listening comprehension is entirely possible - and for some people more desirable - without knowing a single solitary character. And sure, when you talk you have no time to think about grammar, but that doesn’t mean you don’t USE it. The point of learning the grammar of a language is to internalize it, so that you don’t HAVE to think about it. And you do have time to think of grammar. No-one’s forcing you to keep talking without a pause. It’s entirely reasonable for someone in the early stages of learning a language, any language, to pause and think about how to say something. You may not specifically think “OK, now here I need to use an adverb”, but you can think about correct structure and sequencing.
I fully agree to what you say.
But the fact is the Chinese hasn’t prduced a proper Grammar for herself. The grammar book the Chinese are using are not Chinese but English. So I don’t think it is a good idea for people to use the present grammar to learn Chinese.
In the future, if the real Chinese grammar comes out, it will be a great helper like what you have said.
I think you’re getting “grammar” and “grammar books” confused.
And hundreds of thousands of people have learned Chinese using the books available now, so there’s obviously no problem using what’s available. They may not be optimal, but they’re usable.
[quote=“Tetsuo”]I think you’re getting “grammar” and “grammar books” confused.
And hundreds of thousands of people have learned Chinese using the books available now, so there’s obviously no problem using what’s available. They may not be optimal, but they’re usable.[/quote]
I agree to what you said again.
What I mean is the Chinese grammar that we are using now is too bad to be useable.
You can never see a Chinese grammar book in any bookshelves in Chinese families. Their only funtion is for tests.
Then in daily life, we Chinese never read any Chinese grammar book.
You can ask any Chinese to confirm what I have said.
No, really? 
That’s because you are native speakers. You don’t need grammar books, you already know the language. I’ve never seen a grammar book for English sitting on the coffee table of an average New Zealand home either, that doesn’t mean they have no function for non-native speakers.
And let me put it to you bluntly. If the currently available guides and instruction books for Chinese grammar are really “too bad to be useable,” how is it that before coming to Taiwan I learned enough Chinese - and of course Chinese grammar - to be able to work as a professional translator? Hmmm?
Wonder no it is all talk funny, you do, yes? 
runs
[quote=“Tetsuo”]No, really? That’s because you are native speakers. You don’t need grammar books, you already know the language. I’ve never seen a grammar book for English sitting on the coffee table of an average New Zealand home either, that doesn’t mean they have no function for non-native speakers.
And let me put it to you bluntly. If the currently available guides and instruction books for Chinese grammar are really “too bad to be useable,” how is it that before coming to Taiwan I learned enough Chinese - and of course Chinese grammar - to be able to work as a professional translator? Hmmm?[/quote]
What I mean is with an English grammar book, I can explain 99% of the English sentences.
But the Chinese grammar book that we are using now can hardly explain 60% of the Chinese sentences. But if I use the Chinese grammar to explain the English sentence, it works far better.
Why, because the first Chinese grammar book is 马氏文通。 It was writtten by one of the first Chinese boys studying in France.
So the Chinese grammar book that we are using now is a Latin grammar, not a Chinese grammar.
And it is a shame on Chinese that we Chinese haven’t written a real Chinese grammar even today.
Wonder no it is all talk funny, you do, yes? runs[/quote]
Careful, you might trip over that corked hat of yours 
Take it from a learner of Chinese - this is not true. Most of the time, now, when I see a Chinese sentence or sign, I know almost all of the characters, but I frequently can’t figure out what the sentence means. How the words are put together is the grammar of Chinese, and is something that non-native speakers have to learn
Shengmar - I believe you are not helping your students learn Chinese by telling them Chinese has no grammar - all languages do. It is also no help to suggest students study the radicals instead of grammar.
In another thread, you were wondering why your white students had no success with learning to read and write Chinese. I think I can see part of the problem from your posts here.
Take it from a learner of Chinese - this is not true. Most of the time, now, when I see a Chinese sentence or sign, I know almost all of the characters, but I frequently can’t figure out what the sentence means. How the words are put together is the grammar of Chinese, and is something that non-native speakers have to learn
Shengmar - I believe you are not helping your students learn Chinese by telling them Chinese has no grammar - all languages do. It is also no help to suggest students study the radicals instead of grammar.
In another thread, you were wondering why your white students had no success with learning to read and write Chinese. I think I can see part of the problem from your posts here.[/quote]
I am new on Mandarin teaching and I am open to opinions from all the people. Actually, I am trying to find a Chinese grammar book but I can’t find it. I hate the latin version Chinese grammar book because they can hardly help.
Take any paragraph for example, here you can try a bit if you like.
"万年冰洞之谜
Hi all,
"万年冰洞之谜
[quote=“shengmar”]I fully agree to what you say.
But the fact is the Chinese hasn’t prduced a proper Grammar for herself. The grammar book the Chinese are using are not Chinese but English. So I don’t think it is a good idea for people to use the present grammar to learn Chinese.
In the future, if the real Chinese grammar comes out, it will be a great helper like what you have said.[/quote]
I thought Li and Thompson produced a Chinese grammar book, both in English and Chinese.
[quote=“Auphie”]Hi all,
"万年冰洞之谜