When talk about my language, I talk about...

Question

China was once a lexical-oriented country, after a few decades in the mid-twentieth centuary, we turn to the other pole, somehow disregard our traditional culture. For instance, as Chinese has no alphabet, we use homonyms in lieu of abbreviations in English, such as "3" stands for "retreat" and "8" represent "Goodbye". At first, it is really cool, but after years' use, I found the peril of literary regression of Chinese.

We forget our ancestors have writen the brightest poetries in the world, (may be controversial, the main reason is contemporary Chinese poeteries is so suck.) forget the classics we have adored for over three thousand years. It is so pathetic to talk about old-fashioned literature in China, no repercussions, most people just want to make money.

Wow, I had better stop here ^_^ I really want to communicate with you, of course moderately, on the topic of present language in different countries, that must be funny.

Moonking · Accepted Answer

Hi, HairpinShare

You seem to be quite nostalgic. what you have written is a matter of mordernization.

In my Vietnam, there is also a similar problem. to our eastern countries, the western culture has been importing more and more quickly. Although we have tried to preserve but frankly, many traditional values of my country have been lost. Do you know "Kieu story" of Nguyen Du? It's a masterpiece of Vietnamese poetry, of Vietnamese language. Many old ppl knew it by heart and was able to recite all 3254 sentences of it. But the young today know very little about it, except when they are forced to learn at school. On the contrary, they are interested in a scandal of a moviestar or sth like that.

Vietnamese language is also mixed with others. a person who don't know English can't understand what a student says because they say a 10-word sentence in Vietnamese having 5 English words. When they chat with each other in the Internet, they use so many symbols such as: @#!$%^&*... Our language has alphabet but they appear to clumsily turn it into pictograph.

I feel very proud of my beautiful and rich language. That's a reason why I am majoring in Literature at a highschool for gifted students in Hanoi. I have learnt much about Chinese poets and poems. They are awesome though little difficult for us to understand through translating.

Wish you health and happiness.

Yours,

moonking.

HairpinShare · Answer

Frankly speaking, it is my first time hear the name "Kieu Story", I think it must be an appealing great love story. Could you tell me more about that?

Maybe we can discuss some famous traditional asian stories here, also I am willing to read Ramayana and Rig Veda.

More precisely, I think the most obscure part of Chinese literature or thoughts is the discrepancy of aesthetic pursuit for purity and sophisticatedly practical deed. If you get this point, the marvelous descriptions of natural or imaginative beauties are just the unfilfillments or unsatisfactories in the political lives of the poets. Also, the emotion involved in the beautifully arranged characters was gradually becoming the second mainstream, the inner sympathetic to all the unjust reality. As for the poverty, bureaucracy and disasters, however, during thousands of years, I think nothing had essentially changed, the latter day is just another strengthened former days. The main reason is that Chinese literature could just be a spiritual placebo to suffer the reality, but not to change it. This might be the cause of tragedy of modern China.

By the way, from your reply I get the image that most Vietnamese youngsters use English like Vietnamese, is that your point?

Hairpin.

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