Dallas Hai-Hwa Overseas Chinese School offers language instruction

by PegNews wire

Considering how much money we owe the country of China and the increasing participation of that government in domestic affairs and popular culture, it should come as no surprise that interest in Chinese language classes is on the increase.

Ted Chuang, a volunteer working at the Overseas Chinese School of Dallas, reports that he receives one particular question more than any other from parents of children interested in learning the Chinese language, and that questions is: which Chinese language would be most useful for their children to learn?

Here's what Ted advises:

In a nutshell, the Simplified Chinese language is quickly becoming the de facto and modern Mandarin language. When you do a search on the Internet, you’ll notice that the Simplified (Han) language websites far outnumber the Traditional (Hwa) language websites. In today’s business arena, the ability to read and communicate with the Simplified character set opens up a world of opportunities to you.

The Traditional Chinese language is not obsolete, however. The vast majority of writings which encompass the wealth of Chinese wisdom and culture is still inscribed in the Traditional character set. If you aspire to excel in the fields of medicine, literature, archeology, or other academic pursuits, the Traditional Chinese language is what you need to learn.

There is an added bonus. People who know the Traditional language can more or less pick up the Simplified character set quickly, whereas the reverse it not true.

In either case, the spoken portion of the Simplified and Traditional Chinese languages are very similar, much like the distinctions between an Yankee accent and a Southern drawl. Learning either flavor the Chinese language enables you to communicate, partnership, and interact with far broader reach of associates than ever possible.

Those with an interest in studying Chinese are invited to have a look here.

posted by JM