Learning Chinese can be frustrating and difficult, partly because it's very different from European languages. Following a teacher, textbook or language course is not enough. They show you the characters, words and grammar you need to become proficient in Chinese, but they don't teach you how to learn them! Regardless of what program you're in (if any), you need to take responsibility for your own learning. If you don't, you will miss many important things that aren't included in the course you're taking. If you study on your own, you need to be even more aware of what you need to do, what you're doing at the moment and the difference between them. Here are some of the questions I have asked and have since been asked many times by students: How do I learn characters efficiently? How do I get the most out of my course or teacher? Which are the best learning tools and resources? How can I become fluent in Mandarin? How can I improve my pronunciation? How do I learn successfully on my own? How can I motivate myself to study more? How can I fit learning Chinese into a busy schedule? The answers I've found to these questions and many others form the core of this book. It took eight years of learning, researching, teaching and writing to figure these things out. Not everybody has the time to do that! I can't go back in time and help myself learn in a better way, but I can help you! This book is meant for normal students and independent language learners alike. While it covers all major areas of learning, you won't learn Chinese just by reading this book. It's like when someone on TV teaches you how to cook: you won't get to eat the delicious dish just by watching the program; you have to do the cooking yourself. That's true for this book as well. When you apply what you learn, it will boost your learning, making every hour you spend count for more, but you still have to do the learning yourself. This is what a few readers have said about the book: "The book had me nodding at a heap of things I'd learnt the hard way, wishing I knew them when I started, as well as highlighting areas that I'm currently missing in my study." - Geoff van der Meer, VP engineering "This publication is like a bible for anyone serious about Chinese proficiency. It's easy for anyone to read and written with scientific precision." - Zachary Danz, foreign teacher, children's theatre artist About me I started learning Chinese when I was 23 (that's more than eight years ago now) and have since studied in many different situations, including serious immersion programs abroad, high-intensity programs in Sweden, online courses, as well as on the side while working or studying other things. I have also successfully used my Chinese in a graduate program for teaching Chinese as a second language, taught entirely in Chinese mostly for native speakers (the Graduate Institute for Teaching Chinese as a Second Language at National Taiwan Normal University). All these parts have contributed to my website, Hacking Chinese, where I write regularly about how to learn Mandarin.

China-savvy producer Stewart Lee Beck and language professional Katie Lu take you on an entertaining journey to the heart of the Chinese language to deepen your understanding of China and its people.

"DeFrancis's book is first rate. It entertains. It teaches. It demystifies. It counteracts popular ignorance as well as sophisticated (cocktail party) ignorance. Who could ask for anything more? There is no other book like it. ... It is one of a kind, a first, and I would not only buy it but I would recommend it to friends and colleagues, many of whom are visiting China now and are adding 'two-week-expert' ignorance to the two kinds that existed before. This is a book for everyone." --Joshua A. Fishman, research professor of social sciences, Yeshiva University, New York "Professor De Francis has produced a work of great effectiveness that should appeal to a wide-ranging audience. It is at once instructive and entertaining. While being delighted by the flair of his novel approach, the reader will also be led to ponder on some of the most fundamental problems concerning the relations between written languages and spoken languages. Specifically, he will be served a variety of information on the languages of East Asia, not as dry pedantic facts, but as appealing tidbits that whet the intellectual appetite. The expert will find much to reflect on in this book, for Professor DeFrancis takes nothing for granted." --William S.Y. Wang, professor of linguistics, University of California at Berkeley

This book addresses how the new linguistic concept of 'Translanguaging' has contributed to our understandings of language, bilingualism and education, with potential to transform not only semiotic systems and speaker subjectivities, but also social structures.

This second edition, like the earlier first edition, introduces some of the main varieties of Chinese as found before and after the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949. While continuing to stress the basic importance of the traditional usages, such as the regular characters to be found in all materials published before the adoption of the simplified forms in 1956 and still in use in some areas, the present revision goes further in contrasting variant usages and in providing additional material relevant to the PRC. Closely related with the author's Beginning Chinese and its companion volume, Character Text for Beginning Chinese, this text is based on a new approach which not only takes into account the advantages of the oral-aural method but gets the student more quickly into material that he is likely to encounter in actual written Chinese. Unique features are the emphasis on compounds and their extensive use in various types of exercises. The 1,200 combinations are based on 400 characters; in all, the book contains 120,000 characters of running text. All compounds appear in illustrative sentences accompnied by English translations, in dialogues as a means of audio-lingual reinforcement, and in narrative or expository form. Additional exercises include maps, booksellers' book lists, correspondence, poems, table of contents, and brief passages from the works of outstanding writers such as Sun Yatsen, Hu Shih, Mao Tse-tung, and Lu Hsun. Supplementary lessons present reading material using the simiplified characters adopted in mainland China.

It is a recognized fact that English has been gaining much importance at school, in daily life and in travelling abroad. Taking these fields of application into consideration and aiming at making this international language easy to use, this book has been set to meet the need of the learners of English. Graded subjects have been dealt with in a simplified way so as to eliminate boredom and make the reader more interested in this language. It is well known that the mere mention of grammatical rules is of no use unless such rules are brought into practice through exercises. To fulfill this aim, the book offers plenty of drills accompanied with a key. Also, to keep pace with the modern techniques of learning a foreign language, multiple choice exercises have been included. Therefore, it is advisable for those who are poor in English to go through the book from beginning to end. In addition to the essential subjects, the book contains information on writing a composition, setting a letter as well as the use of various idioms. Much attention has been paid to correcting the common mistakes which a lot of readers tend to make. Such mistakes are made in the use of prepositions, the verb "to be", the verb "to have" and the verb "to do" as well. Furthermore,