Qinglish- Chinese version of English

Many who do speak English correctly will give the corrections. If the non-native speaker is honest with himself about his lack of expertise, he will ask for a native speaker for translating important documents such as medical, scientific, business and educational. Often I see things here in Israel translated to English, spelled wrong. Part of that is that Hebrew didn't have vowels per se until recently. While it may not matter to the Israelis, if they have foriegn/English speaking contacts, they will use translation services.

Not always, HeronW. If you look at some of the public notices in China they are often a direct translation and can be very funny.

I think there's a natural tendency in humans to adopt local phrases to "fit in." I spoke pretty much vanilla midwestern American English until I moved to Texas. For those who follow comedian Jeff Foxworthy---let me tell you, there really ARE words down here that don't exist anywhere else in the world.

What do you suppose might help Chinese students become accustomed to the very confusing language that is modern English, JacobWorld? There are so very many words in this language (and many of them contradict) that it's no wonder it's the most difficult language to master.

Hmm... Since this is the language room, I wonder if it might not be a good idea to have a sticky thread for some of the major world languages for translation purposes from those of us who live in the country. Something like: "Chinese to Conversational English", or "South American Spanish to Portuguese/Spain Spanish"

Or maybe just a simple, "Confused about the correct conversational English phrasing? Ask it here."

Just a thought...

HeronW said:

Many who do speak English correctly will give the corrections. If the non-native speaker is honest with himself about his lack of expertise, he will ask for a native speaker for translating important documents such as medical, scientific, business and educational.

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And yet the US invented its own English dictionary, and for largely ideological and nationalistic reasons, kept the semantics and just respelled the words to suit its emerging pronunciation. (Go Noah Webster!)

If the US can do it (and insist on it being an International default in virtually all its office software), what is to stop another emerging economic superpower from doing the same?

Hebrew didn't have vowels per se until recently. While it may not matter to the Israelis, if they have foriegn/English speaking contacts, they will use translation services.[/quote]


Most modern Hebrew still does not use vowels, and for those who are no familiar with the language, this can make reading difficult. Names, especially, can be a guessing game.

My English started going downhill b/c of Japan. I started sounding like GW and it scares the hell out of me. But Engrish (or Japangrish) is really funny.

No, because English media will shape them. Besides which, they are importing teachers by in vast numbers, and once their economy gets to a certain point, they will hire a great many more people to teach English, to the point where their language will be a formalized variation of our spoken language.

Something similar happens to both my dad (Spent 10 years on New York) and my grandfather (spent a lot of his youth with France). According to my father is a common phenomenon to start to forget your own language after a while living in another country, is something cerebral

I don't think it is likely, due to the advancement in communications. As a second language, the bulk of art coming into that country in English will be foreign. I doubt that the Chinese will teach English as a first language, and therefore rely on the outside world for its linguistic influence. On another note, the language is being used to ease communications with the outside world; this would make the idea of a different dialect of English less appealing, and less likely.

Yes, but if it is unintelligible to the American, than it will essentially be useless. Out of necessity it needs to be functional as a language of communication between nations.

ColoradoGuy said:

I don't have any statistics, but it's my impression there are more English speakers who learned it as a second language than there are native speakers.

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Here is an interesting stat:

http://www2.ignatius.edu/faculty/turner/languages.htm

ETA: Someone once told me that the Philippines is the 2nd largest English speaking country!

I tend to get my laughs by reading signs and menus here in China. I do get depressed when I talk to some of my students and realize I can't understand anything they say unless it's in Chinese.

Some of my favorites: Please stay swim the shark nets.
Swims has the hiring
Watch out run into me! (since removed from the Jusco store)
Look out knock head
randomly cooks (on a menu in Yangshuo)

As a freelancer I get a pretty unique view of Chinese English, and that is of a person trying to rewrite articles that were originally outsourced to China. I only made that mistake once, as the articles were so unintelligible that I had to do a total rewrite.

mjlpsu said:

randomly cooks (on a menu in Yangshuo)

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Hey, I think I might have eaten that when I was in Yangshuo.

JacobWorld said:

Chinese and they have a great influence on the world economy will this be a thread to English language itself .

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No! Not that! Please don't let it be a thread to the English language! Help us all!