Chinese attitudes towards foreigners speaking Mandarin.

[QiHaoMing]

If you've ever studied Chinese in China you'll know of the sort of reactions one can expect to find from the locals when they discover a foreigner that can speak their language.

Most of the time it's a friendly combination of complete surprise and amusement. After all, they can be surprised to even see a foreigner let alone one that's able to speak Chinese.

But I'd like to discuss the affect these reactions can have on ones study of the language. Have you found it to be a positive or a negative thing? Or to you personally think it has no overall influence to your studies at all?

In my opinion it can work in both a positive and negative way.

For instance a lot of Chinese, upon discovering a foreigner that can speak/studies Chinese will be very helpful and sometimes even offer to assist you in your studies and this can be a great way to meet new people and generally interact with the locals.

On the other hand though I feel that a foreigner studying Chinese in China can at times find it hard to fully immerse themselves in the culture and practice speaking to the extent they might like. At least compared to the extent a Chinese person coming to Australia to study English for instance would be able to immerse themselves.

You see in China it's always assumed that a foreigner (well in this instance I should say "white" person) can't speak Chinese. Yet it will be assumed that a Chinese person in Australia can not only speak English, but speak it fluently since we have many Australian born Chinese.

This is one advantage I think Chinese people going abroad to study English might have over English speakers coming to China to study Chinese. Due to the multicultural societies of many English speaking nations they will become "accepted" more easily whereas foreigners in China are always sort of considered as "outsiders".

Let me give an example. While I was still in China I went out for dinner one night with a few friends. All of us were native English speakers and everyone there except one Vietnamese American was white. The Vietnamese American had come over to China to visit a friend she knew. She was the only one in the group who spoke virtually no Chinese at all. Yet when it came time to order the waiter would pretty much ignore what one of our Chinese speaking friends had said and looked towards the asian in the group for our order.

The problem here wasn't that my friend spoke poor Chinese, it was that the waiter was so not expecting this white guy to speak Chinese that it didn't even really register to her at first that the words coming out of his mouth were in fact Chinese.

It's interesting and I seriously believe that in this instance had my friend had more of an asian looking face the waiter would have been writing down his order word for word as he spoke it.

So has anyone here experienced simular things happen to them during their time in China?

In your opinion, how do the attitudes and responses by Chinese people to foreigners studying Chinese affect your studies?

[wushijiao]

The problem here wasn't that my friend spoke poor Chinese, it was that the waiter was so not expecting this white guy to speak Chinese that it didn't even really register to her at first that the words coming out of his mouth were in fact Chinese.

I think this is a fairly common reaction. I had a linguistics professor who once recommended that if you are going to give a speech in a foreign language, it’s always a good idea to start off the speech by saying something to the effect of, “I know I have a foreign (laowai/ gringo..etc) accent. If you have any problems understanding me, please raise your hand.” The statement isn’t very important itself. But it does give the audience time to psychologically adjust to both your accent, and the fact that a person who face a foreign face is speaking their language.

So, with that in mind, it’s not a bad idea to make a sentence or two of blah filler before conveying actual information (like a restaurant order).

[Pravit]

Maybe it depends on where you are? My gf is white but people did regularly speak to her in Chinese and she was able to make conversation with people on the train, hairdressers, manicurists, shopkeepers, etc. Waiters in restaurants always payed attention when she said something. However, we were mainly in Beijing and Shanghai, so I imagine there are many foreigners there who can speak Chinese.

I don't think being Asian-looking would necessarily help, though. As an overseas Chinese who can't speak Chinese fluently, I sometimes had a hard time in China. Locals might be surprised at obvious foreigners who can speak Chinese, but from what I've seen, the reactions are usually positive: "aww, how cute!", "oh wow, so clever". However, the reactions to a Chinese-looking person who can speak some Chinese, but not perfectly, are sometimes along the lines of "ugh...this slow-headed country bumpkin" or "ugh...another Korean who can't understand Chinese...".

You mentioned that many Chinese would be interested in helping you study or practicing their English with a foreigner. I don't know if it's given that random Chinese people will approach you or strike up conversations if you are foreign-looking, but whatever the case, nobody ever introduced themselves to me, maybe because I look like everyone else on the street.

Also, when you're in a foreign country and are learning a foreign language, it's natural to unintentionally do stupid things or not know what you're doing, or not understand clearly spoken speech. So I had several awkward moments where it seemed people thought I was really stupid, as opposed to just a silly foreigner. On the other hand, I remember this one time when I was speaking in English with my gf and some people behind me were like "Whoa! His English is really good!"

I was often mistaken for Korean; in one incident, the Korean clerk at Green Tree even thought I was Korean! (I suppose buying a grape sac sac drink at Green Tree in Wudaokou after getting your hair done at 韩国美发厅 and wearing a shirt that says 서울 바라다스 on it might fool even the best of them...)

I would say to not think too much about your foreign-ness and speak Chinese as much as you can. From seeing my foreign friends interacting with locals I honestlly think being foreign-looking is not any worse than being Asian-looking.

[dan ni er]

I'm not sure how easy it is to practice Chinese with locals anymore, especially the university students. I think many of the students are so obsessed with learning English that they would feel it to be a loss of face if they spoke to you in Chinese in public, as I would sometimes hear 他是外国人你干吗跟他讲中文， 你应该跟他练习英文。

I don't know maybe I'm only talking about a small minority as I found many Chinese who were more than happy to speak to me only in Chinese.

[Pravit]

Don't think it's a losing face issue although they might want to seize on the practicing English opportunity. In one cute incident a shopkeeper, upon hearing I was American Chinese, called her university-age son to come downstairs and practice his English with me, which he evidently didn't feel like doing.

[QiHaoMing]

Wushijiao,

Making it clear before you go to speak which language you're planning on using is probably very wise, and could counter the whole element of surprise some Chinese people have when it comes to listening to foreigners speak. Good suggestion.

Pravit,

It's interesting to hear things from an overseas Chinese perspective. I was always a little jealous about how asian classmates of mine could be assumed to be Chinese. It always seemed like that made things easier for them when it came to studying and especially getting out and practicing speaking. Thanks for showing me the other side of the coin. Everything has to work both ways I guess.

As for practicing speaking with Chinese uni students, sure there are always going to be a few that insist on using English when speaking with you but for every one that is majoring in English there are heaps more that couldn't care less about studying it and are thrilled to be able to interact with a foreigner than can speak their own language.

[koreth]

Pravit's story reminds me of an experience I had when I visited Beijing: I went to the corner store to get a bottle of water for my girlfriend. The shopkeeper tried to sell me beer, soda, cigarettes, and snack foods. During the whole conversation I didn't speak one word of English and he didn't speak one word of Chinese.

Still not quite sure if one of us was being rude to the other, but I hope he found it as amusing as I did afterwards.

I also wondered afterwards what visiting China must be like for, say, a French or Italian tourist who speaks little or no English. That must be frustrating: carefully memorize your Mandarin phrasebook before you leave, only to find everyone wants to answer your questions in English.

[yonitabonita]

Yet it will be assumed that a Chinese person in Australia can not only speak English, but speak it fluently since we have many Australian born Chinese.

I think that depends on the context. I'm a Chinese-Australian. In work, university, and social contexts (ie, where I'm hanging out with my friends) people expect me to speak English. Though outside these circles, I'd say that it wouldn't be unusual for people to assume differently.

There have been loads of occasions where the woman at the bakery or the shop assistant would speeeaaak niiiiiiiiice and sloooooowwwwwly or REALLLLLY LOUUUUDLY to me. There may be lots of Australian born Chinese in Australia but a vast sector of the Australian population seem to be unaware that some of us can manage beyond "spee in bloken engrish". Indeed, some have generously complimented me on how my English is good enough to be Australian...

Sorry to get off topic.

I hear what you mean about people here in China turning to the nearest Asian and ignoring the white folks. There's not a day when someone doesn't look straight at me after my (white) husband has spoken (Mandarin) with that desperate look in their eyes that says "please tell me what he said". It's great for my practice. It's demoralising for him. After a while, I know that he can get a bit 'ahh what's the point of learning this when no one EVER understands me anyway'.

But after the princess has dried his eyes, he presses on, goes out without me and finds people in our neighbourhood to talk to him. From what I can gather, there is never any shortage of curious Chinese who can overcome their shyness to satisfy their curiosity about the laowai. For every person that laughs etc, there's another that tries.

Yonita

[heifeng]

[Chinese uni students] thrilled to be able to interact with a foreigner than can speak their own language.

hmmm, I originally thought this too, but it turned out not to be the case, even though I took classes together with Chinese students as a 'general student'. I had better luck chatting up the minority students from Tibet an Xinjiang, maybe because we had more in common since Chinese wasn't our native language. Most Chinese students all live together in the exact same dorm room, according to their major, they go to class together, save eachother seats, etc....It's much harder to break into their inner circle, even find a freaking seat that's not held for some one else!! ) at least much harder than I thought. Even my former roommate who is huaqiao and has lived in Beijing for almost 10 years and is currently in undergrad is locked out of this inner realm the Chinese students. The most interaction I had with students was one sweet girl who wasn't really the average bookwormish student, and was able to keep in touch with her for a bit. I have just come to the conclusion that most uni students are not exactly masters of communication (but in fairness are master's of the universe in the realm of exams thus are attending college) so they are not always willing to suddenly chat you up, or at least not beyond the usual ketao stuff....It's much easier to chat up the random people buying/selling cell phones on the tianqiao, and they usually have more interesting life experiences to chat about, or at least can chui niu....

Chinese people will also always praise an obviously foreign person's Chinese no matter how mangled (and then mention Da Shan) and turn around and directly criticize an Asian person's (or something BC's)! I've witnessed it many many a times! It's actually somewhat funny and twisted at the same time. Not that I'm condoning it, but since those who blend in don't get hollered Helloooooooooo at them and have people talk about them in earshot 24/7, well, you have to suffer somewhere! hehe j/k

[QiHaoMing]

yonitabonita, that must really suck when you have people go ahead and assume that you're not a native speaker of English and try and speak to you in a slow, condesending manner like that. But I guess there are always going to be people like that around. The same kind that think non-english speakers are going to be able to understand them if they only speak LOUDER. Ugh. I feel for you.

It's kinda like that being a foreigner in China, a lot of people will just assume that you can't speak a word of Chinese because you're white which can make getting out and about to practice a little frustrating at times.

But it's cool once you have a circle of open minded Chinese friends that understand you study/can speak Chinese to practice and converse with.

It's usually only strangers (shopkeepers and stuff) that you can have problems with.

[adrianlondon]

I'm obviously foreign (I'm British) and speak a little bit of Mandarin. I've not had any problems when interacting with the locals. OK, there is the problem that I don't speak the language very well, but the people I've spoken with (such as taxi drivers, random chinese students on campus, cleaning staff, restaurant staff etc) have always tried hard to have a conversation with me, in Mandarin.

This is helping me improve my spoken abilities as much as my hours of classes are.

[teachinator]

As a middle-aged laowai who REALLY doesn't look like she should speak Chinese, I have been quite happy with the reaction of Chinese people "on the street" when I do. It's very rare that they try to speak English to me or otherwise denigrate my Chinese. As someone said, I do sometimes get the "how cute!" or "how clever!" reaction, but nevertheless virtually all people quite willingly continue the interaction in Chinese, and many don't bat an eye.

For example, today I went shopping in Zhongguancun and then to lunch with a Korean friend. We speak more or less the same level of Chinese (both are intermediate level students). I didn't get the impression that anyone was ignoring my Chinese or me in favor of her Chinese. My problem is more that people chat away to me in voluble Chinese while I am sometimes left behind dazed in the wreckage :-)

Somewhat off-topic plaint: My biggest problem is that there are so many people around my university who speak English that when I am conversing with a Chinese student, we often conduct the whole conversation in English. I know they want to be helpful (and to practice their English) and it's easy for me to express myself clearly that way, but I know it's not good for my progress when I can fall back on English.

It's all too easy to get mired in an English-language environment here (like now, for instance :-/). When signs everywhere are in English and even my textbooks give word definitions in English, it's hard to be immersed and I always go for the English as it's vastly easier. The ubiquity of the English language is a two-edged sword!

[teachinator]

If you've ever studied Chinese in China you'll know of the sort of reactions one can expect to find from the locals when they discover a foreigner that can speak their language.

Most of the time it's a friendly combination of complete surprise and amusement. After all, they can be surprised to even see a foreigner let alone one that's able to speak Chinese.

But I'd like to discuss the affect these reactions can have on ones study of the language. Have you found it to be a positive or a negative thing? Or to you personally think it has no overall influence to your studies at all?

Encouragement in the form of successful interaction makes me feel like I'm progressiong toward my goal (to be fluent in Chinese) and as such is a very positive influence for me. It's also a great motivator to keep on trying to communicate in Chinese.

If people were hostile to my speaking Chinese, ignored it (this happened once in the "upscale" part of my hotel and I felt very dissatisfied with that encounter), or consistently didn't understand me, I am sure it would affect my attitude and my studies negatively. But they are almost always quite supportive.

[djwebb2004]

Well, let me first say that I am not one of those foreigners who refuses to speak English or objects to people coming up and trying to speak English. After all, it's my native language, and so it is no sweat to say a few words. But as someone else said in this thread, the other side of this is that it is easy to slip into more English than I had intended. I expect other people have had the same experience as me, where I made friends with university students who appeared to not be able to speak English, although they have to be able to read it for academic purposes. And as the relationship goes on, hanging around you and getting encouragement and practise from you - as I try not to be selfish and use Chinese friends for 100% Chinese practice - their English level just suddenly blossoms, and these people who apparently were monolingual, at least in terms of kouyu, are suddenly speaking fairly good English. And from then on, I have a problem. From a situation where I was occasionally tossing in English sentences in order to help them, as they apparently could not bring themselves to speak English (they could only write it), the relationship has progressed in a matter of weeks to the point where the relationship *could* be conducted solely in English - and that is not at all what I want. I even get to the point where I am embarrassed to speak Chinese, because I feel that I am not helping him enough by doing so....

[Xiaohua]

I'm not white, I'm black. And when I go into resturants, and stores. I speak chinese and they love it. I make alot of new friends that way. One time me and the girl behind the counter. Were talking, and she just busted out and said(because at that point she did not know I spoke chinese. The other girl knew. But she didn't know) She said," Do you want me to teach you chinese?" And I had to admit, that I spoke it already. And we started to talk it right there in the resturant. Whenever I go out and they find out I speak chinese they love it. It has gotten to the point that when I enter intp the stores, they greet me in chinese, and want me to contiue to speak to them in chinese. If I don't feel like speaking chinese, they get upset, and want me to speak chinese. Even though they can speak english. So no, I really don't have any problem with them being mean to me when I speak it.

[歐博思]

Yeah this'ns an oldie but I had something happen recently that just blew my mind.

me: *comments on friends 人人 status* (in English since I am not a Chinese bandit with all my college friends)

him: heyhey，你现在都能来人人网回复了。不错啊。impressive

Wow I am so talented I even know how to reply to messages on 人人 now! I am assuming this has something to do with when he was still at my university in the states before I started really learning chinese, I could hardly count to ten in chinese. When people say things like this I am beginning to either A) accept it is a cultural thing to praise the foreigner speaking the impossible chinese and reply with 过奖了 or more likely B) assume I said something really awkward and there is nothing left to say except "omgordz ur chinese is fantastic! I am so happy you can reply now!"

[skylee]

Assumption B is not that unlikely.

[Takeshi]

I have rarely had problems here in Guangzhou. But then I don't really interact with Chinese people so much to be honest. Most people aren't going to try to learn English from you, and most people won't be so surprised if you speak Mandarin, though they will be surprised if you speak Cantonese, generally it is a positive response though.

Every now and then you will run into someone studying English or something. I usually can naturally fight my way into speaking Chinese with most people (ie: my Chinese is better than their English so the conversation naturally tilts toward Chinese usage), and I don't bother trying to force the conversation out of that natural balance so much because I don't like to be too rude by forcing to only speak Chinese. Either way, these instances are extremely rare in my life because I don't have a single other native English speaking friend (most of my friends are other foreigners from non-English countries) so anytime I am hanging out with people in a group Chinese is the most natural language.

But what I really really hate though is when I speak in Chinese to someone and then they say in English "wow your Chinese is so good" or something. This happened to me the other day when I went down to reception and the 服务员 had introduced me to her 姑姐 who lives in Canada but came back to visit. She introduced me to her in Cantonese, I spoke to her in Cantonese, but the first thing she said is "wow you can speak Cantonese" (in English), and then proceeded to casual talk in English. I know she is Canadian and all and she can definitely speak English so there isn't any reason I have to "deny her" of the right to speak to her in English as a fellow Canadian, but it just felt extremely uncomfortable the way she suddenly switched to English like that. I just ran away from the situation and figured I won't have to deal with the problem again since I'll never see her again though. (It was especially awkward because I found it extremely embarrassing to talk to the 服务员 then even though I could normally talk to her fine because it felt like her 姑姐 had just denied me of speaking Chinese.)

I figure I may have much more situations like that if I try to use Chinese when I'm back in Canada. But I will probably still find some times to use Chinese anyways. Back when I was in Canada before going I knew a ton of Chinese people, and in gettogethers the old ones (who don't really speak English) especially always want me to talk in Chinese, and everyone talks to each other in Chinese. Back then my Chinese wasn't good enough to cope, but now I should be fine.

As for using Chinese in HK, it's a little different from the mainland. First of all, on the street talking to average people like store clerks/whatever, nobody ever seems to be at all surprised that I can speak Cantonese. (Perhaps because I'm brown and there are brown people in HK who speak Cantonese so they are used to it?.) It is really nice to just be able to be treated so normally when talking to average people in HK, compared to the mainland where everyone would smile, be surprised, and do whatever. However, among the people I know in uni etc, everyone seems to be able to speak English and we speak in well, English all the time and it would probably impossible for me to speak in Chinese with them at all.

In the mainland it is the opposite because it is the strangers who will always be surprised and may want to speak in English, while the people I know well all already know I speak Chinese and are used to it.

The hardest place for me to use Chinese is in McDonalds in the mainland, because it's about the only place where there is a strong expectation of the foreign customer to not be able to speak Chinese, or the clerk would always want to speak in English. Odly enough, McDonalds in HK were one of the first places where I felt I was able to successfully communicate in Cantonese. (Well, not just McDonald's but any restaurant really.) It's weird.

[ansileran]

I'm glad I stumbled on this topic, even six years late.

From what friends have told me, Chinese, especially in big cities, are becoming accustomed to seeing foreigners and, since the number of foreigners who can speak Chinese is growing, reactions are more positive than what I got.

I went to Beijing in 2006 to study Chinese. I stayed about two months in Beijing, in the southern part of the city. The school was private, new (without many students at the time) and we were the only foreigners in the whole neighbourhood. I was staying with a Chinese family (from Sichuan) who had no trouble understanding what I said in Putonghua. Not that I could say much, but apparently my pronounciation was fine (or so I have been told many times). Speaking in Chinese, I met mainly with 3 different reactions, depending on where I was :

• restaurants and shops in the neighbourhood : they would actually try to understand me and apparently didn't have any problem to
  
• touristic areas : they would speak in English, though they understood what I said in Chinese as I refused to say a single word in English (I hate to be mistaken for an American so I make it clear that I am not - of course I don't mind helping someone practice their English as part of a language exchange...)
  
• people on the streets would either :
  

- ignore me, as if I hadn't spoken at all, even walk away as fast as they could sometimes (probably afraid to be associated with a foreigner)

- actually answer in Chinese that they couldn't speak English before walking away

- turn to my Chinese "aunt" or "uncle" who told them I could speak Chinese and then, what a miracle ! They would instantly start to understand

- talk to me in Chinese (on very rare occasions) once I had made clear (in English) that I am not American

At the time, I was still very young, didn't know much about China and Chinese culture and had only be outside of France a couple of time, to places where I didn't stand out (Germany, UK, US, Italy, Spain, Ireland...). This was a huge shock to me and one of the main reasons for my giving up on Chinese for almost 5 years, others being personal hygiena (I was staying in what would compare to a low income neighbourhood in Europe : richer than most Chinese living in the country side, but basically construction workers, few taxi drivers... mostly non educated people), society (the floor's guard was 16 and, since he couldn't pass the highschool entrance exam, had no choice but to work with no career prospect at all) and patriarchal family system (I was undergoing a phase of feminism at the time, being raised by a single mom didn't help ^^).

I went home that summer saying that I was going to give up on China and Chinese as a whole. I mean, what was the point ? In France people constantly gave me crap like "you're studying Chinese ? What for ? You must be crazy ?". Didn't help that most Chinese immigrants around my place were there without visa and kept together, didn't speak French, sold illegual stuff on the sidewalk... and didn't speak putonghua as they were mostly Wenzhouren ^^. If I can't speak Chinese in China (and can't speak it in France, or have no use for it here), there was absolutely no point in me learning Chinese.

I'm glad I think differently now and that things seem to have changed...

[Mr John]

Too be honest, I think it depends on a range of factors such as personality, appearance, Mandarin level and where you live. I arrived in China knowing only the most basic expressions back in 2012. Too complicate things a little, I was told that some Chinese might think I was from Xinjiang ; which turned out to have some truth in it.

 

Intially, although my co-workers were encouraging, I felt deeply embarrassed whenever I tried to communcate in Mandarin. Something which was not helped by the fact that my co-workers had been studying English for ten or more years. The other main issue was that I felt liked their trained monkey, a role which I was to proud to play.

 

Later, as my Mandarin improved, I began to understand more of what Chinese people were saying. Discussions about me, rather than with me, were a common occurence. Once, on a train, a group of workers were discussing my appearance and debating for a good ten minutes whether or not I was from Xinjiang. Rather than telling them that I wasn't, I just sat there feeling uncomfortable.

 

Reflecting on my time there, I think I should have developed a better way to deal with the level of attention I often received. In my case, it led to a strong feeling of alienation. For others, it'd simply be a great chance to practice their Chinese. Having said all that, once people knew that I could speak some Mandarin, they were just as curious as they are about any foreigner.

 

The main lesson I learnt was that the way people interact with you is based on the assumptions of both parties. Starting with strong assumptions about the other person can prevent what could be a really interesting conversation. Still, there are idiots in every country. 没办法