啞巴中文 - Mute Chinese

[calibre2001]

I apologise in advance if the term sounds somewhat offensive to certain people.

Having came across the term "mute english" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mute_English ), I thought it would be interesting to know if there are people from the opposite end of the spectrum i.e. "mute chinese" - people who are limited in listening and speaking chinese but are alright in terms of chinese literacy. I would define "chinese" here as Mandarin and all other chinese dialects.

Do you people know of any?

[renzhe]

A friend of mine has a degree in sinology, but works in a different field nowadays.

By her own admission, she has trouble speaking the language, but can still read it without trouble. She can also follow conversations.

I had a chat with a Chinese acquaintance with her present, and got the same impression. She understood, but had trouble taking part.

This is a case of having forgotten/lost the ability to speak (though she was never really fluent to begin with), so I don't know if it qualifies.

I would imagine that foreigners who study old Chinese manuscripts may sometimes fall into this category.

[calibre2001]

I assume that the folks you pointed out here are living in a non-chinese speaking environment?

The reason I raised this is to perhaps identify ways that learners in such situations can get out of their rut, other than thru sheer self determination.

[renzhe]

Yes, my friend is German, and living in Germany.

I'm in a similar boat, though having a Chinese girlfriend helps. My spoken Chinese is lagging behind my listening and reading, obviously.

I honestly don't think that anything can help you become more proficient at talking other than talking. Surrounding yourself with the speakers of that language and practicing is the only way to go, IMHO.

With China, it's obviously a larger structural problem, in terms of how language teaching is approached, what it is used for, etc. But a large problem still stems from not being forced to speak the language a lot.

Interestingly, I know several people who grew up around Shanghai (or have parents from the region) who can understand the local dialect perfectly, but can only speak Mandarin. So their parents talk to them in Shanghainese and they answer in Mandarin. I would imagine that there is a lot of that in China.

[rob07]

My speaking and listening abilities are close to zero, but I can read Chinese language novels reasonably comfortably. My normal reading speed is very slow, but I can read fast enough to just keep up with Chinese character subtitles on TV shows if I push myself.

However, I'm probably not the sort of person you had in mind, because I live in a non-chinese speaking environment and I've never made any effort to learn to speak Chinese.