Hacking Chinese

A better way of learning Mandarin

Articles in the ‘Recommended resources’ category Page 6

  1. 5 websites to help answer your questions about Chinese

    It’s not always easy to know where to go when you fail to find answers to your Chinese-related questions. This article gives some advice on how to ask for help online and also introduces five websites that offer help in various forms for free.

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  2. Using Audacity to learn Chinese (speaking and listening)

    Audacity is a marvellous piece of software that allows you to record audio (yourself, other people or whatever is playing on your computer), mimic native speakers, edit and enhance the audio, as well as automatically manipulate multiple files, such as lecture or lesson recordings. In short, Audacity is a really good program for learning languages. This article introduces the software both through a video example and explaining text.

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  3. 21 essential dictionaries and corpora for learning Chinese

    There are many online resources for looking up Chinese characters and words, so many that it might be very hard for new learners to find what they need. This article introduces 21 dictionaries and corpora for Chinese learners, including what they should be used for in addition to some pros and cons.

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  4. 31 Twitter feeds to help you learn Chinese

    Twitter is an excellent source for learning Chinese. In this article, I list my favourite Twitter feeds in three categories: learning how to learn Chinese, learning how to learn languages in general and finally Chinese input on Twitter. Something missing in the article? Let me know!

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  5. Using Lang-8 to improve your Chinese

    Learning a foreign language, most people lack proper feedback from native speakers. Even if we have friends and teachers, always having to ask for help isn’t very good. In this article, I explain how Lang-8 solves this problem for you. Useful for any language, not just Chinese!

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  6. Review: The Phonology of Standard Chinese

    Duanmu San’s “The Phonology of Standard Chinese” is by far the best introduction to Mandarin phonology that I’m aware of. It’s mostly useful for people who like phonology or are already at an advanced level and want to add a theoretical edge. This book contains tons of interesting material, all well-presented and well-argued.

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  7. Learning simplified and traditional Chinese

    Learning traditional characters if you know simplified or vice versa is a lot easier than beginners tend to think. Generally, you don’t need to worry, because at an advanced level, learning both is quite easy. This article is about simplified/traditional and how to learn both.

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  8. About opening doors and the paths beyond

    Hacking Chinese is about opening doors and showing the paths beyond, but what does that mean? Why is it useful to read other people’s advice? In this article I argue that it’s essential to familiarise oneself with many different methods, not to find the correct way of doing something, but to find better ways and provide contrast to one’s own learning process.

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  9. The Chinese-Chinese dictionary survival guide

    This article is about using Chinese-Chinese dictionaries, both from a personal point of view and in a more general sense. The goal is to provide tips and tricks for using Chinese-Chinese dictionaries, traps to avoid and other things that will be helpful for learners who intend to move from English-Chinese to Chinese-Chinese.

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  10. Chinese vocabulary in your pocket

    Having vocabulary with you so that you can study anywhere isn’t merely a handy trick, it’s essential. You don’t want to waste high quality time at home in front of your computer doing something you might as well do in the super market queue or while waiting for the bus. Study the right things at the right time!

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