Comments on: Dedicated follower of Chinglish

By: Cegah Satwa Punah

Cegah Satwa Punah — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 06:30:52 +0000

Niche article, thanks you for write this article

By: Liz

Liz — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:15:39 +0000

I hope you managed to control the urge to rebel

Sounds like Chinglish is quite infectious so I’m sure you won’t have any problems getting it back once you’re there!

By: Zhu

Zhu — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 02:44:00 +0000

My personal favorite I saw in Nanjing was in a bank. A sign at the front was proudly encouraging customers to “question authority” (for “ask the teller” I guess!). Loved the anarchist innuendo!

I’m going to Beijing in Aug. and I hope I can get my Chinglish back!

By: Liz

Liz — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 10:45:35 +0000

Apologies to anyone who had trouble accessing PocketCultures over the last few days.

Our hosting company switched off the site at short notice to transfer it to another server. It was meant to be back online on Saturday, but only just came back on this morning.

Thanks for returning!

By: Alex Case

Alex Case — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 06:38:10 +0000

I also have more experience with Japlish/ Engrish/ Japanese English than the Chinese version, but the similarity is that it is not and will never be a real variety of English like Singlish or Indian English, or at least not until Chinglish or Engrish is the only language spoken in someone’s home when they are growing up. For another example, look at the difference between Spanglish meaning the real Creole language that Puerto Ricans in New York speak (spoke?) and Spanglish as a mangling on English by teenagers in Spain/ adoption of false English expressions into Spanish (puenting etc).

Chinglish as it exists could have an influence on the shape of any future ELF/ EIL pidgin though, just as it did on the original pidgin English.

By: Ivy

Ivy — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 23:30:36 +0000

This phenomena is prevalent throughout Asia, and even Chinatowns in North America!

Personally, I think there are multiple reasons why Chinglish and its cousin Engrish (Japanese English) exists.

#1 is as Oliver has pointed out. China and other many East Asian countries view English as a language of superiority of some sort. It’s one of the residues of colonial mentality. As such, many Asian firms use English words as a sort of decoration on their products. The most obvious would be stationery. Something like “Sweet pretty cool!” will always be written on erasers and pencil cases. It’s kinda interesting, actually.

#2: Chinglish arose probably as a result of the failure of the Google Translator. If I owned a small company, which does not have the budget to hire a bilingual Chinese/English speaker, I would naturally rely on free and accessible translators like Google. And of course, Google translations are horrible.

#3: Translations is one of the most difficult aspect of language mastering. It’s not an easy task since a good translator needs to have mastered both languages or at least be quite proficient. At times, a thorough understanding of the culture is needed to give an accurate translation.

For example, have a look at the picture you’ve posted on your other Chinglish post. Those Chinese words, if translated directly say, “Let us become friends with the birds.” Although I have translated the meaning exactly with no grammatical errors, it still sounds strange to a native Anglophone. The problem here is with the culture. Chinese people never speak directly because it considered rude and uncultured. Instead, they prefer to use an ‘indirect’ way of speech through idioms and other implicit tactics. The Western world, particularly the Americans, honor straightforwardness and effectiveness. So, this sign would’ve been written as “Please respect the birds” or something close to that.

By: Notes about the world » Obama es esperanza: Obama is hope

Notes about the world » Obama es esperanza: Obama is hope — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 16:28:37 +0000

[…] our heads away in embarrassment from George W. Bush, the rest of the world at some point found other things to catch our interest. The cultural grasp of the world is long gone - indeed the U.S. is […]

By: dj earball

dj earball — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 13:49:35 +0000

Don’t have as much experience with Chinese, but the same thing is true with Japanese. I did buy a t-shirt while in Japan, but made sure that I knew exactly what it said!

By the way, the science-fiction-western movie/TV show Firefly saw this coming. In that version of the future, Chinglish was the primary language (though for the benefit of English speaking viewers, it was mostly English with some Chinese exclamations thrown in where the meaning was already quite clear).

By: Mats - Notes about the World

Mats - Notes about the World — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 12:25:21 +0000

It’s going to be interesting to see what happens when the tendency goes in the other direction as well, and more people starts to learn to speak Chinese. English is comparatively easy - I think the possible ways to come off as weird are far more plentiful in Chinese.

I remember trying to learn Chinese a year ago and having a native speaker help me with my pronunciaton. After lots and lots and lots of struggling she looked at me and said - “my God - it’s like listening to mud flowing out of a water pipe”. The Chinese’ way with metaphors is just so ingrained in their language

Interesting post!