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 Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2010 7:51 pm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-12050067 Quote: China has banned newspapers, publishers and website-owners from using foreign words - particularly English ones. China's state press and publishing body said such words were sullying the purity of the Chinese language. It said standardised Chinese should be the norm: the press should avoid foreign abbreviations and acronyms, as well as "Chinglish" - which is a mix of English and Chinese. The order also extends existing warnings that applied to radio and TV. China's General Administration of Press and Publication said that with economic and social development, foreign languages were increasingly being used in all types of publications in China. It said such use had "seriously damaged" the purity of the Chinese language and resulted in "adverse social impacts" on the cultural environment, reported the People's Daily newspaper. If words must be written in a foreign language, an explanation in Chinese is required, the state body said. Your thoughts on this? Personally, I'm not sure how banning English and other foreign words is going to be effective. For example, if Chinese people want to learn English, where are they going to learn or practice their English if China's banning English all over the place from TV, radios, websites, and newspapers?
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Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2010 10:57 am
People in English speaking countries wouldn't understand this.
It shounds pretty extreme but I can see why they're doing this. English has so much of an affect on so many people and English words are replacing others, and they are used to such amazing frequency you sometimes wonder where has all the vocabulary of your own language disappeared to.
Even the grammar and idioms take over people sometimes. I recall a native Hebrew speaker saying to me lately, "I'm running low on groceries", in Hebrew (which sounded extremely stupid, btw), or another who told me that something "shouldn't go to waste". When I was younger we used to "approach" tests, now we "write" them.
I think banning English words is extreme but I get where it's coming from.
Here English words are used frequently on television, but they've come up with the rule that they have to put a small subtitle with the translation of the word whenever it's said in a commercial and I'm pretty sure they're encouraging the subtitle writers to translate fully.
I don't think the random use of English words is actually helping someone learn English. Sometimes the meaning and pronunciation can be sweked, and it doesn't help you with grammar.
I think it was best if instead of dubbing films and television series, everyone used subtitles, it's a great way to learn a language. Luckily for me that's how it's done here and I've learnt so much English from television.
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Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2010 12:24 pm
Im A Little Pea People in English speaking countries wouldn't understand this. It sounds pretty extreme but I can see why they're doing this. English has so much of an affect on so many people and English words are replacing others, and they are used to such amazing frequency you sometimes wonder where has all the vocabulary of your own language disappeared to. Even the grammar and idioms take over people sometimes. I recall a native Hebrew speaker saying to me lately, "I'm running low on groceries", in Hebrew (which sounded extremely stupid, btw), or another who told me that something "shouldn't go to waste". When I was younger we used to "approach" tests, now we "write" them. I think banning English words is extreme but I get where it's coming from. Here English words are used frequently on television, but they've come up with the rule that they have to put a small subtitle with the translation of the word whenever it's said in a commercial and I'm pretty sure they're encouraging the subtitle writers to translate fully. I don't think the random use of English words is actually helping someone learn English. Sometimes the meaning and pronunciation can be sweked, and it doesn't help you with grammar. I think it was best if instead of dubbing films and television series, everyone used subtitles, it's a great way to learn a language. Luckily for me that's how it's done here and I've learnt so much English from television.
I can sort of see why they're doing this as well, but another one of my questions regarding this is, would this have an effect on foreign-name brands and companies? Like can Chinese media still say Google when referring to the American search engine, or Windows and Macintosh?
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Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2010 6:36 pm
Im A Little Pea People in English speaking countries wouldn't understand this. It shounds pretty extreme but I can see why they're doing this. English has so much of an affect on so many people and English words are replacing others, and they are used to such amazing frequency you sometimes wonder where has all the vocabulary of your own language disappeared to. Even the grammar and idioms take over people sometimes. I recall a native Hebrew speaker saying to me lately, "I'm running low on groceries", in Hebrew (which sounded extremely stupid, btw), or another who told me that something "shouldn't go to waste". When I was younger we used to "approach" tests, now we "write" them. I think banning English words is extreme but I get where it's coming from. Here English words are used frequently on television, but they've come up with the rule that they have to put a small subtitle with the translation of the word whenever it's said in a commercial and I'm pretty sure they're encouraging the subtitle writers to translate fully. I don't think the random use of English words is actually helping someone learn English. Sometimes the meaning and pronunciation can be sweked, and it doesn't help you with grammar. I think it was best if instead of dubbing films and television series, everyone used subtitles, it's a great way to learn a language. Luckily for me that's how it's done here and I've learnt so much English from television. I can see where you're coming from, since I don't speak English at home most of the time. It really is annoying how much English has influenced other languages...including my mother tongue, Gujarati. And tbh, governments should step in to prevent an absurdly large number of English words from entering other languages, because from what I see, people who speak these other languages as first languages are too willing (cough, helpless, cough) to use English words. =/
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Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2010 7:08 pm
I think this is stupid, and I don't believe in censorship, at least to this extent (I can understand it for obviously harmful material, like child porn or snuff films) and if someone wants to use English words on their website or what-have-you, that's their right. What if the word doesn't exist in Chinese? What will they do then? Not to mention, loan words are a natural part of a language. You'd be hard-pressed to find a language that has never borrowed a word from another, I'd actually wager they don't exist at all (except maybe in extremely isolated areas). I think trying to maintain a language and culture is good, but there's a point where it's too far. Like France, where they require French songs to be played at least for an hour on radio stations and generally create a new word for new objects (such as computers and e-mail) rather than borrowing a word. Why can't China do something like that, rather than infringing on its citizens right to use the words they choose?
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Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2010 10:16 pm
I don't like the idea of banning. But it is China and it doesn't surprise me. Didn't they ban Google a while back?
I think some measures to "publish" your own vocabulary as well are fine though. Sure, all languages loan words from other languages, but this is having such a massive effect. It is fine if you don't want to lose some too much of your vocabulary (and even idioms!) of your language due to massive loaning.
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Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 3:32 am
I'm a little biased but I think it's pretty fair from a really basic standpoint. China is such an industrious, looming country that it's difficult to cling on to their culture. Not only that, but English has a nasty habit of dominating other countries' and their lovely languages. It's suddenly "cool" to speak English in foreign countries, ugh. There seems to be entirely new languages developed from fusions with English and I don't like it at all (hence biased.). I'm not talking about loan words, but the complete utter mutation of another language and English. D:
Anyway.. I don't agree with banning it altogether as that's entirely too far, but forcing their media to limit the use and utilize subtitles would be a lot more efficient. Not that I'm surprised they automatically went to such an extent. Damn it, China! Instead of being so trigger happy with censoring, they should work to promote their own culture instead of annihilating others'.. I mean, really. emo
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Posted: Fri Dec 24, 2010 4:35 am
Im A Little Pea When I was younger we used to "approach" tests, now we "write" them. We don't "write" tests either, at least where I'm from, we "take" tests. eek Quote: I don't think the random use of English words is actually helping someone learn English. Sometimes the meaning and pronunciation can be sweked, and it doesn't help you with grammar. I think it was best if instead of dubbing films and television series, everyone used subtitles, it's a great way to learn a language. Luckily for me that's how it's done here and I've learnt so much English from television. Yeah, when Germans say "Jack" it sounds almost exactly like "Check". That's just a name, but yeah, random English words don't do much. I strongly oppose subbing original English things, which may make me a hypocrite, because I hate when things get dubbed into English. BUT, sooo much on TV is originally in English, and I only watch TV here to get exposed to more German... If things were just dubbed it'd be so easy to just listen and not learn any German. I wish everything had a dubbed option available but could choose between the dubbed version and the original with subtitles >.<;; So on one hand, I wanna give China a thumbs up on trying to keep their language, but on the other hand.... It seems like with the globalization of the modern world, the preservation of any one language is likely just not going to work. Mixing is almost (sadly) inevitable...
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