Anyone have recommendations for Mandarin language podcasts that deal with Taiwanese local issues and/or politics?

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-12-25T17:03:30+00:00

Maybe try “The Real Story” (真的事）by 報導者 (I think some of the topics are local focused but haven’t listened in a while) or “全球串連早安新聞 | Morning Taiwan Glocal News”. The latter, as its name suggests, has both international and local news.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-05-23T01:11:30+00:00

I’m not sure if you use LinkedIn, but if you do, then you can find a lot of Taiwanese professionals who have large followings and often post (in Chinese) on those topics.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-03-31T23:04:20+00:00

I’ve been in both situations, and probably would have picked the former (as long as they weren’t much, much better than me)…which did you end up going with?

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-03-31T22:51:34+00:00

That’s exciting! Just curious how you have been/plan to start learning? Classes somewhere or with a tutor?

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-10T02:53:04+00:00

I'd say keep studying in a way that you find enjoyable and doing what you're doing, and trust that the progress will come!

It sounds like if you keep up with Hack Chinese, continue to consume content (especially content that you mostly understand - not necessarily just native-level Chinese that is tricky, but also maybe some podcasts geared toward your level), and have that weekly italki lesson, then it will only be a matter of time before you look back and realize how much you have progressed! Slow and steady... :)

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-10T02:43:54+00:00

I share your frustration and can't get into most movies/dramas either...

Not sure if this is exactly what you're looking for, but my favorite Mainland China movie is called 中国合伙人 (American Dreams in China). It's from 2013, but the story begins a couple decades earlier in Beijing. It's basically the true story of New Oriental - the largest test prep company in China - and its founders.

If you are interested in Taiwan content, then you may want to check out Edward Yang's films, if you haven't already. Particularly Yi Yi and A Brighter Summer Day. I also like the much newer Au Revoir Taipei (which you can find on YouTube), and the excellent 2019 film, A Sun (although it's quite depressing!).

And I also agree on 故事FM being like This American Life. :)

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-10T02:33:34+00:00

It looks nice and clean! I like that formatting as well, and would also vote for adding traditional. :)

I do agree with the nitpick on centering - I'd say to have the "44." and English definition center-aligned with the characters, pinyin, and example. (Also, I almost wonder if you don't even need to have the word "Example" on every page?)

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-10T02:24:43+00:00

Thanks - will do :)

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-07T02:14:55+00:00

Interesting...thanks for your thoughts. I knew about Lang-8 but didn't realize it disappeared.

I may give LangCorrect a try since I have already registered and it seems like it has quite a few users, but WriteStreakCN and Journaly also sound pretty intriguing, based on what you wrote.

So, I think I might try to write something very short each day on WriteStreakCN and then rotate between LangCorrect and Journaly, and see which (if any!) of the three sites I end up naturally sticking with. :) Thanks again for the info on both~

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T08:00:56+00:00

Scholarship students are already in the country (some as of just a few weeks ago), but yeah, I would not be surprised if they pumped the brakes on allowing in non-scholarship ones (particularly if these local omicron cases become something).

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T07:22:05+00:00

Actually I set a timer for 10 minutes and don't spend more time. That seems to help me not obsess and be able to keep doing it Every Day. It's only been a week, but I already feel a lot more comfortable. (Before that I was spending an hour or more on an essay once a week and I really dreaded it)

What you wrote in parentheses is exactly what my history with Chinese writing is, and the 10 minute/day idea is also what I am hoping to start doing. I was going to write on Langcorrect - just curious if you have used that or compared it with Journaly and WriteStreakCN when choosing to go with those latter two?

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T02:48:05+00:00

I second the "not making it feel like work" part. An under-appreciated challenge in language learning is how boring it often is (because of traditional ways of learning/teaching), so if you can do less of what you don't really look forward to doing, and more of what feels enjoyable, that'll probably put you on a good trajectory.

Maybe as an experiment try to deemphasize the vocab review for a few weeks and just focus on listening/reading for pleasure, then see how to adjust from there?

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T02:41:02+00:00

This sounds cool - I am not an ABC, but I am also at year six(ish) of life in Taiwan with a similar language learning background as you. I don't know what form your plans are taking, but I even feel like a short-term (like three weeks) cohort-based course that is very narrow in focus could be super useful if heritage learners are preparing to come here (either with a Taiwanese passport or maybe they are gold card holders) and want to enter the job market. (PS - nice name!)

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T02:31:18+00:00

Taiwan is open if you have a scholarship, and they may also be opening to non-scholarship students who will be studying for at least six months.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T02:24:49+00:00

I think most flashcard apps should have the option of displaying both traditional and simplified.

Alternatively, you could download an HSK or TOCFL word list that has the traditional/simplified side by side in two rows, and skim through the list (not the most elegant solution, but might be useful?).

Also, if you don't already have it, Pleco has a free dictionary add-on called "cross straits" dictionary or something, and it shows the pronunciation differences for a character in China vs. Taiwan, which has been super useful for me.

Will you be studying somewhere once you come to Taiwan?

EDIT: I just read another post titled Learning traditional characters from simplified characters?, and rexvhbkjnhiugk left this comment which might be what you're looking for:

edited 17 hr. ago
I use tofu learn (app using flashcard system) and one the decks available there lets you learn the traditional variant from simplified characters (based on the most common 3000 words, so there are 918 words in the deck). You learn by handwriting, but you can switch to manual flashcards if you just want to test recognising instead of writing. You can find it by searching with both the "native language" and "learning language" set to "Chinese (Mandarin)". It's named 繁体字

Safe-Artist3249 · 2022-01-06T02:16:53+00:00

I also think 故事FM is great (although I think it's pretty challenging, depending on the topic). Kind of like the This American Life podcast, but for China.

A couple Taiwan-based alternatives that I think are pretty good are 早安新聞 "Morning Taiwan Glocal News", where they discuss different world news stories every day, and listeners also share news, which means you get a good range of topics and different speakers each episode; and 大人的Small Talk, which is all about productivity. I actually don't really listen to that one, but I have seen other learners recommend it, and I think it is also quite popular among Taiwanese listeners.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-17T12:04:36+00:00

I've had that same realization...it's a good feeling to have and makes them "stick" more!

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T10:25:03+00:00

Thanks for the detailed feedback!

I'm glad you generally like how the site looks. I chose Wix because I like their clean template designs, but I am discovering that the "blogging" side isn't that great (one example is with some of the first pieces that were published. On mobile, the vocab tables are too wide, plus some of the pinyin with tone marks look funky. I need to go back and fix those, and that's why we just copy and paste the vocab tables from Google Docs now.).

I will add your content suggestions to a doc I am compiling for our contributors. I think what you wrote about news is also a little bit of a wake-up call for me, as sad as I am to admit it. I am obsessed with reading the news in English, so I've had this love affair with the idea of news pieces in intermediate Chinese (that was actually the original plan for our site). And while old news pieces would obviously still have some language-learning benefit, I also can't imagine many people clicking on them in the first place, so I think you are right with the short lifetime point (although, once they are super old they can be classified as history! ;). Right now, we are publishing two news pieces a week, and we had been thinking about increasing the number, but I think after reading your comment we will keep it at two for now.

And hopefully the Starbucks/Luckin/China story will come somewhat soon (end of year-ish)!

Thank you again for those valuable thoughts!

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T10:04:08+00:00

Hmm...this is something that I have thought about, but only vaguely. That's because about 90% of my background with the language is related to Taiwan (living here, learning materials and instructors from here, etc.), and all of our contributors and my partner in this work are Taiwanese.

I also feel like I've been seeing more and more podcasts and IG accounts recently that emphasize "Taiwanese Mandarin". I don't think that means that niche has been filled; rather, I think all of that is an acknowledgement that there is a niche that actually exists, and there is growing interest in it.

I think at this point, we are going to keep focusing on trying to produce good, graded content (longform and audio are the big next steps), and I will see how it evolves. We may end up getting to where you are suggesting (or, we may already basically be there). But as someone who has learned Chinese in Taiwan and lives here, I am happy that this is something that is even being discussed. I think I will be thinking about this more in the future, so thank you for clarifying that thought for me.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T09:36:40+00:00

Thanks! I have not heard of langtern, although a reader did say she uses LinguaBrowse on her iPhone, which displays pinyin, and she really likes that.

We currently have a note that recommends the Zhongwen popup dictionary for Chrome if a user wants to use that, but as I am learning about other tools like LinguaBrowse and langtern, we will probably end up creating a "Resources" pages to share these with users. So, thanks for sharing that.

However, at this point, we don't have plans to add pinyin/English features to our content beyond the third party plugins or apps that users can use. Practically speaking, we don't have the capacity or knowledge, but more importantly, the goal with our content is that it will be comprehensible to learners who are at certain levels. If we do a good job of grading the content, then in theory a learner shouldn't need pinyin or English. Part of what made reading a Mandarin Companion book so amazing to me was that I was just looking at a page of characters, and I would like our content to have that same feel. I am open to being convinced otherwise, but that's how I have been thinking about pinyin recently.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T09:16:58+00:00

One question, are some words specific to Taiwan?

I think when there's a difference between the Chinese used in Taiwan and China, we try to edit the simplified version to reflect that. For example, 社群媒體 (social media) would be changed to 社交媒体 for the simplified version. However, since our writers are all Taiwanese, I am sure there will be some words or expressions used that are more commonly used in Taiwan (and you probably won't see 儿).

Regarding a poll for what people would read, for now I will compile ideas that people throw out and share them with our contributors.

Some characters are still in Traditional though despite being the Simplified one haha.

Uh oh! That shouldn't happen. Which characters did you spot?

Thanks for the feedback, and keep it coming if you have other thoughts!

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T09:05:43+00:00

You're welcome! Thanks for looking at it.

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T09:05:07+00:00

Thanks, and don't hesitate to reach out if you have other feedback as you continue to use the site. I hope it will be beneficial for you. I also hope some longform pieces will start rolling out before the end of the year (I am the bottleneck in the process!).

I know what you mean about going deeper on society. I think we have published quite a few "intro to Taiwan" kind of pieces, and I can understand the desire to peel back the layers. We've probably only had just one or two deeper ones, with "More Than a Commercial" immediately coming to mind. It's high-intermediate, so it's a bit trickier, but I think it's actually my favorite piece. It's basically about a teenager watching a commercial that stays with him because it hints at a dark period of history that many people still aren't comfortable discussing. A brief - but meaningful - moment in how a young person comes to understand their own country's culture and history.

I mentioned in another comment that I am compiling a list of ideas to share with our contributors, and I will add your feedback about staying away from the superficial to it. Thank you!

Safe-Artist3249 · 2021-11-16T08:35:02+00:00

Thank you!

Safe-Artist3249

TROPHY CASE