Learning Cantonese

I received the following email on how I learned Cantonese and below it is my answer.

Here is a short podcast of the answer in English, Cantonese and Mandarin.

Hello Steve,

I was wondering if you could please make a blog post outlining how you learnt Cantonese.  I've heard that you didn't take formal lessons but just simply listened to a lot of Cantonese.

However, after being in Hong Kong and watching TVB/ATV all day for 15 hours per day, I can't see how simply listening to TV has improved my cantonese. I get my wife to make MP3 recordings and listen to them over-and-over. However, watching TV hasn't done much for me.

I know you've lived in Hong Kong for 5 years, but you studied Mandarin.  Could you please document on your blog (if you can remember) how you learnt your languages.

Did you follow the same method for each language, or different methods depending on the language?

Thanks

Milan.

Here is my answer to Milan, who has a very interesting blogsite of his own.

I lived in Hong Kong from 1968 to 1970. I spent the first year studying Mandarin and the second year working as a Canadian Government Trade Commissioner dealing with China trade. This meant regular trips to China. My focus was on Mandarin. I knew a few words of Cantonese, my wife whom I met in Hong Kong spoke Cantonese, but not with me.

Up until the year 2000 or so I made no effort to learn Cantonese. I was held back by a lack of interest and the fear of the legendary "nine tones" of Cantonese. Then I decided I would learn it. I went looking for books and CDs in the stores here in Vancouver. As I usually do, I bought several different "methods" from Teach Yourself Cantonese, Colloquial Cantonese and another one which I do not remember the name of. This last one was not very good for learning because it just consisted of unrelated phrases, which is usually less useful than learning from dialogues or fuller contexts. However, this book made it clear that Cantonese really had only 6 tones. This was a psychological breakthrough for me. I felt that nine tones was impossible, but six tones was possible. In fact when I studied Cantonese I just ignored the tones. It is not posible to remember the tones of each individual word. I relied on repetitive listening and imitating. I realized that I would get many tones wrong, but I did not let it bother me. In time I would get better.

At first I paid a friend of mine who was a commentator on local Cantonese radio to read the newspaper with me. I though if I just was able to read the newspaper in Cantonese I would soon learn how to speak. This did not work and I gave it up. I find it stressful to have a teacher. I prefer to learn on my own and then speak to people when I am ready.

Thereafter I just listened to these CDs over and over, referring to the books from time to time. I had a big advantage in that I could read Chinese characters. I knew the meaning of what I was reading even though I was not sure how to pronounce the characters in Cantonese. All I had to do was to get used to how certain Mandarin sounds changed in Cantonese. One other important thing was that I started to like the sounds of Cantonese, whereas before I had considered Cantonese an ugly language. "L'appetit vient en mangeant" as they say in French. Often you have to give yourself the chance to get into something in order to like it. It is very important to like the language you are studying.

Soon I could start listening to radio. There was one commentator on local Cantonese radio whose voice and opinions (as far as I could tell) I really liked. I listened to him. I recorded his programs and listened over and over. Unfortunately I did not have a transcript so this slowed me down. However, I continued to listen to my easier content at the same time as I was trying to understand the radio. I probably listened and read Cantonese 1-2 hours a day, in the car, while running etc.

The whole process took about 6 months until I could phone in to Cantonese radio talk shows and give my opinions on different subjects, which I still do from time to time.

Learning Cantonese was different than learning other languages since I already had most of the vocabulary from Mandarin but just did not know how to pronounce the words in Cantonese. The Cantonese colloquialisms also need to be learned. However, I do not need to know all the slang, and did not really bother. I still use Cantonese mostly to listen to radio talk shows, and occasionally when I meet Cantonese people casually.

Comments

[馬米蘭]

Thank you so much. I am extremely happy that you took the time to answer my email. I wish one day I can speak as well as you can.

Best regards,
Milan

[Edwin]

As a native Cantonese speaker, I totally agree with Steve that consciously memorizing the tones are not really important. In fact, I bet 9 out of 10 Cantonese speakers cannot spell out all the tones. They just speak the words without being aware of them.

I had been troubled by this 9-tone theory since first hearing it when I was young. I noticed right away that the last 3 tones were redundant. I am not sure who started it. I guess it was from the official Cantonese Pronunciation Dictionary by S.L. Wong (http://humanum.arts.cuhk.edu.hk/Lexis/Canton/).

As a matter of fact, there are tons of jokes and stories on the misuse of Cantonese tones, which I think make learning Cantonese more fun.

I can totally relate myself with the ‘ugly language’ concept that Steve mentioned. Whenever my wife hears someone speaking Vietnamese or Hindi, she would freak out. She kind of considers those languages as 'ugly'. I always told her that this is not the right attitude, as other people might also consider our own language as 'ugly', too. (And of course, I have just found one today).

Having said that, I also have the same wrong attitude myself. My in-laws come are from the Chaozhou ethic group of Canton, whose language is considered by many people as an "ugly language". Basically, the speakers always sound as if they are quarrelling. Although my in-laws frequently speak the language, I have no desire to learn it whatsoever. Somehow, I know that this not the right attitude of a linguist. Sooner or later, I will have to fix it, and learn the language (at least some basic greetings).

By the way, Steve, your Cantonese is pretty good. I bet many foreigners living in HK for years don’t speak the language as good as you do. Just wondering, do you still speak with your wife in Cantonese nowadays? I am looking forward to hear more of you speaking the language. I am pretty sure a lot of Cantonese speakers would like to know more about the Linguist system.

[Steve Kaufmann]

Edwin,

I did not used to speak Cantonese with my wife, but now I do if we want to say something that we do not want others to understand. Now there are so many Chinese people here in Vancouver that I have to be careful to resist that impulse!!

Milan,

Good luck with your studies. I have always found movies to be an inefficient language learning tool. Treat them more are entertainment or a relief from more intensive learning actiities like listening, reading, studying words or speaking. Movies are hard to understand in any language until you are really fluent.

Steve

Steve

[petchimutrhu]

hollo sir
your information is very useful for me.thanks to you .
by
petchimuthu

[Thomas]

Hallo Steve,
ich bin wie Du mit einer Chinesin verheiratet, deren Muttersprache Kantonesisch ist. Mandarin kann ich nicht. Ich habe dein Buch "The Way of the Linguist" gelesen und möchte dich um Tipps für gute Bücher über Kantonesisch bitten. Welche hälst Du für gut geeignet,von welchen sollte ich die Finger lassen ?
Viele Grüße von Thomas

[Steve Kaufmann]

Thomas,

I will reply here in English. I have also put up a German podcast answer in a new post on my blog.

I simply bought two beginner Cantonese books with CD. One was from the Help Yourself series, and the other was from the Colloquial series. I just listened and read and tried to remember the vocabulary as much as possible, forgetting and relearning often as I went. I had the great advantage of already speaking Mandarin.

You can do the same, and put most of your effort into listening. Do not worry if you cannot remember it all. Do not worry about the tones. Just listen and read, over and over, 20 or more times to the same content. Go from chapter one to the end and start all over. Then take another beginner text and do the same. This will keep you busy for a few months. By that time we will have Cantonese on The Linguist.

I hope it works for you.

Steve

[Learn Chinese Now]

You can use a Chinese Pronunciation Dictionary on Learn Chinese site. It can help you to pronounce a Chinese word or Chinese sentence.

[Teeya Door]

There is a Chinese Practice Corner for foreigners to learn Chinese and Practice Chinese. I met and made some Chinese friends when I visited Beijing last time. The corner is in a bar and they hold Chinese Learning party every evening. The bar is located in San Li Tun of Chao Yang and very close to American Embassy and the other countries embassies. You can ask taxi driver where is San Li Tun and most of drivers and Beijing people know there. Very interesting place to learn mandarin. If you cannot visit Beijing, you also can join from their website 'Voice Connecting China'. You can join party online through phone call or skype.