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Dedicated follower of Chinglish
Author: Liz4 Jul
Hands up if you ever had a t-shirt with Chinese characters on it. Any idea what they meant? Or whether they were even real Chinese? Or you didn’t really care, because they just looked cool?
This is one of the reasons for the growth of Chinglish, according to Oliver Lutz Radtke. He believes it is often used for decorative purposes and no-one really minds what it says. Oliver majored in Chinese and is author of the book ‘Chinglish: Found in Translation’ and The Chinglish Files, a blog about everyday examples of Chinglish.
This obsession with Chinglish is not meant as a joke, however. Rather, he sees Chinglish as a great opportunity for Westerners to understand differences between Western and Chinese culture. For example as Westerners we find some examples of Chinglish shocking or funny because they talk directly about subjects our culture has taught us to avoid talking about.
Chinglish is becoming more and more common as China learns English, and some think it could be accepted in the future as a standard variation of English.
PocketCultures asked Oliver some questions about his love affair with Chinglish.
1. Oliver, Where are you based now?
I am based in Beijing now, which feels great to be back in the Chinglish cradle again. [After studying in China, Oliver has been based in Singapore for the last few years] I’ve been to Beijing for the last time in 2004 and the city has changed enormously. Many public signs are corrected. Many restaurant menus are not; despite the effort of the Beijing Tourism Bureau to issue a standard set of 2000 plus dish names last year.
2. In the introduction of your book you state that the Chinglish found on written signs in China is an endangered species. But there are reports that spoken Chinglish is starting to take on a life of its own, assimilating grammatical attributes of Chinese languages.
What do you think are the chances that it will someday be recognised as a standard variation of English?
We have to differentiate between written and spoken Chinglish. In the academic context Chinglish is rather referred to as China English and I am pretty sure it’s a trend you can’t stop.
Languages keep changing and English has proven to be one of the liveliest languages ever, just take a look at how much French you find in there! So I guess certain expressions have already started to make their rounds around the globe and more and more will.
I am not at all in favour of teaching a language without using a local context and I don’t think that AE or BE will be the standard of the future, with billions around the globe learning English as a foreign language. Besides, research has shown that native speakers aren’t necessarily the ones that are being understood the easiest, rather the opposite.
3. Out of the (1000+!) examples of Chinglish you have gathered over the last few years what is your personal favourite?
I think it is definitely a tough choice between the first one “Don’t forget to carry your thing”, because it keeps reminding you that Chinglish is mostly about laughing at yourself and not others and “Little grass has life, please watch your step”, since in a wonderfully anthropomorphized way clearly shows the Chinese love for flowers.
Photos from The Chinglish Files
Many thanks to Oliver for his help with this post.
More like this:
Is Chinglish the future of English?: most English conversations do not involve a native speaker
Top 20 languages of the World: What are the most widely spoken languages in the world?
Languages fight for global dominance: more about the prospects for English as language of international communication
9 Responses for "Dedicated follower of Chinglish"
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!
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).
[…] 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 […]
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.
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.
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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.
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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!
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!
Niche article, thanks you for write this article
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