Some Mandarin Language Resources for kiaforrest (updated 11 October)
Links to Mandarin resources ... besides the Firefly-Serenity Chinese Pinyinary ;)
forg has told me that she would like me to watch Firefly with her to explain the Mandarin. I love Firefly and have watched the whole series (haven't seen Serenity yet) but the actors themselves are the first to admit that their 'Mandarin' bears almost no resemblance to Mandarin - so mangled and awful is their pronuncation. :) I love the concept of it though and think Joss Whedon is wonderful for coming up with the concept of a melded language in the future.
The following links are all for Mandarin (the language notionally used in Firefly).
Wikipedia article on Mandarin is excellent with some helpful links.
Conversational Chinese Online
Free Chinese Lessons
Mandarin Tools is an amazing page with lots of links.
Learning Chinese Online page
In terms of other materials. I'd avoid "Pimsleurs" and "Colloquial Mandarin". They're a bit out of touch with 'real language'. If you can buy any textbooks and materials from the Beijing Language and Culture University Press these are really good. If I come across any other good links, I'll let you know and if you have any questions feel free to ask as I love Mandarin :) I'm sorry I couldn't come up with more, but there aren't a lot of 'free' resources out there, and to be honest as I'm at intermediate level now most of the materials I use are slightly different from the beginning Mandarin.
I also use song lyrics as a method of learning to recognise characters. Once you start studying, I'm happy to recommend Chinese songs with lyrics and translations. The Top 500 Songs list over at baidu.com is very good and you can download all the songs there by just clicking on links. Lyrics are also provided.
Further resources (updated 11 October 2005)
Details about stroke order
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/chinese.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroke_order
http://www.chinese-outpost.com/language/characters/char0005.asp
Information on radicals
Wikipedia article
List of 214 radicals
forg has told me that she would like me to watch Firefly with her to explain the Mandarin. I love Firefly and have watched the whole series (haven't seen Serenity yet) but the actors themselves are the first to admit that their 'Mandarin' bears almost no resemblance to Mandarin - so mangled and awful is their pronuncation. :) I love the concept of it though and think Joss Whedon is wonderful for coming up with the concept of a melded language in the future.
The following links are all for Mandarin (the language notionally used in Firefly).
Wikipedia article on Mandarin is excellent with some helpful links.
Conversational Chinese Online
Free Chinese Lessons
Mandarin Tools is an amazing page with lots of links.
Learning Chinese Online page
In terms of other materials. I'd avoid "Pimsleurs" and "Colloquial Mandarin". They're a bit out of touch with 'real language'. If you can buy any textbooks and materials from the Beijing Language and Culture University Press these are really good. If I come across any other good links, I'll let you know and if you have any questions feel free to ask as I love Mandarin :) I'm sorry I couldn't come up with more, but there aren't a lot of 'free' resources out there, and to be honest as I'm at intermediate level now most of the materials I use are slightly different from the beginning Mandarin.
I also use song lyrics as a method of learning to recognise characters. Once you start studying, I'm happy to recommend Chinese songs with lyrics and translations. The Top 500 Songs list over at baidu.com is very good and you can download all the songs there by just clicking on links. Lyrics are also provided.
Further resources (updated 11 October 2005)
Details about stroke order
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/chinese.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroke_order
http://www.chinese-outpost.com/language/characters/char0005.asp
Information on radicals
Wikipedia article
List of 214 radicals