Why Learn Chinese Mandarin?
74Why Learn Chinese
You might wonder why you must learn Chinese (Mandarin) as recommended by so many people. I’m not going to try convince you that you must learn Chinese, however I will give you some facts why it might be a good reason to consider learning Chinese (Mandarin) if you ever want to live, visit or do business in China in the near future.
I’m not quite sure if you are aware that English are not the largest language on Earth. Only 514 million people spoke English as their first language according to the 2007 world statistics and just over 1.075 billion people spoke Chinese (Mandarin) as their first language. So in short 209% more people speak Chinese (Mandarin) as a first language compared to the world’s second largest language, English.
Mandarin Chinese is also the largest second language spoken by people at a whopping 178 million followed shortly on their heels by English at 170 million people world-wide.
Chinese is also the third largest language spoken in the USA with Spanish and English filling the number two and one spot.
These statistics got me thinking, maybe I must start learning Chinese, since out of an economic point of view it make sense to me…
Did you know that there are 6,912 languages in the world today; however interconnected communication is killing them off. It’s estimated that by 2020 there could be only 700 languages left and I’m quite sure that Mandarin Chinese will still be the largest language on the planet. In fact they predict that 14.7% of world’s population will speak Chinese by 2050.
You need to remember that there are 241 languages spoken in China with Mandarin considered as the main language. Most people outside China make the mistake to say they want to learn Chinese, since Chinese is not actually a language. To be more correct you must say you want to learn Mandarin and not Chinese.
I know how the Chinese feels about this small mistake since I’m in the same position as they are. I’m a South African and my home language is Afrikaans. But you still get a lot of foreigners asking me if I speak South African? There is no language called South African, however we do have eleven official languages. (The most in the world and Chinese is not one of them.) But this gives you an idea how the Chinese must feel every time we say “I want to learn Chinese”. We actually look quite stupid in their eyes…
But let's get back to the point of learning Mandarin (Chinese) and how you can do so in your own free time. There is a couple of good language course online that you can use to learn basic Mandarin in as little as 8 weeks or so. But just remember that these courses will never teach you how to speak Mandarin or any other language fluently. Consider them more as a language learning starter guide or an extra language learning resource that you can easily use in your own time.
My number one recommendation is Rocket Chinese, created by Rocket Languages. This interactive language learning program consists out of authentic Mandarin audio lessons, language and culture lessons, progress tracking, forum support and software games that you can play on your PC or Mac.
Have a look at the program and if you do have the money to invest in your Mandarin learning then I think you must give it a try. You never know you might just master enough Mandarin to visit China on your next holiday or even start your own global business with a huge share in China. Anything is possible if you believe in yourself, even when it gets to learning a language like Chinese, oops I mean Mandarin…
Hopefully this information will help you decide why learning Chinese online (Mandarin) could be a good decision.
More language info:
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I quite like PopupChinese.com and ChinesePod. Both are good products. Never tried Rocket Chinese but am skeptical of the inability to try before purchasing.
I've used Rocket Chinese before and find it quite good. They do offer a free 6 day course that you can first try out and if you like it then you can buy the complete course. However you actually get more than 6 days worth of free Mandarin (Chinese) lessons if you don't unsubscribe. The only setback of the free lessons is that you can’t test the software learning games; however it does make sense to me why not...
For me these are reeealy foreign languages. I guess I couldn't learn Mandarin or any asian language even if it was my strongest desire. :D
just a thought, yeah mandarin does have the single-most largest group of people out there as a first language and your figures seem to be fairly accurate, but I don't know how you've reached your number for the largest 2nd language, come on think about it, a considerable portion (20%) of indians speak english as a 2nd language that's 232million alone, furthermore, over 50% of nigerians speak english (75million), about 50% of Philippinoes (more than 40million) 56% of germans (45million), 36% of french (23million), 10% of pakistanis and 29% of italians (17million each (i.e. 34million)), 11.75 japanese (15million), 87% of the netherlands (14million), at least 28% of s.africans, (10million), spanish, polish & turkish around 27%, 29%, 17% respectively at around each 12million each (another 36million) and with at least another 40 other countries each averaging around 40-50% of their populations having english as a 2nd language, these make up another 150million 2nd-language-english speakers. All-in-all it seems that there's at least 674million speakers of english as a second (or 3rd) language. And in fact, the British council put the figure at more than 750million, which isn't entirely unreasonable an estimate considering the rough calculations above. Soooo, that'd make the total amount of english speakers something like 1.25billion.
I HAVE BEEN INTERESTED SINCE FROM YOUNG TO LEARN A MANDERIN LANGUAGE BECAUSE I DREAM OF VISITING CHINA.I FIND IT LIKE A HOBEY TO ME AS IM EVEN INTERESTED IN THEIR CULTURE,I CAN BE GLAD ONEDAY TO SEE MYSELF WITH THE CHINEESE PEOLPE AT THE SAME PLACE ON THE SAME TABLE
Hi there,
I need to learn Mandarin in Shenzhen.
Any suggestions who to contact there?
Regards
I recommend you join Rocket Chinese. It's an interactive online course that you can use anywhere in the world.
You won't learn to speak fluent Mandarin, but you will learn enough spoken Mandarin to start a conversation and it will provide you with a proper foundation to build on.
They do have a level two course if you want to progress to the next level. The course cost at this moment only $99 and easy really good. I'm a member of their French and German courses and I can really recommend it to you.
For more info about Rocket Chinese, visit my review site here http://www.listenhear.info/rocket-chinese/
Good luck and I hope it helps.
P.S. They do offer a free course that you can try out first...
Maybe there are a lot reasons. But if you want to learn Chinese, maybe you can learn online.
How to learn Mandarin 3 years ago
Thanks for sharing all these info regarding the Chinese (Mandarin) language. I did not know that more people speak Mandarin than English...