Cantonese Textbooks/Online Ressources

[skillphiliac]

Hello!

I've been studying Mandarin for quite a while now (university), but got increasingly interested in Cantonese. A girl in my class speaks Cantonese natively, which at last made my decision to learn this language.

Now, I know it is not the most simple task to do this while still learning Putonghua, but I don't want to do it at the same level anyways. It is supposed to be somewhat recreational, still, I need proper material. I won't (and can't) rely on her to teach me all there is to this language, for various reasons.

What I am looking for is a decent book (or, as stated in the title, online course) teaching pronounciation from scratch, using a standardized transcription, much like known courses for common Chinese (I am using Hanyu Jiaocheng to learn Mandarin, so, somehting resembling it would be more than I expected). It shouldn't patronize my language skills, I feel capable enough to go with decently informative while not too easy explanations, texts and vocabulary/grammar/whatever.

To conclude this wall of text, I speak German fluently (I am from Germany as a matter of fact), so it may as well be written in it. English is just as fine, I am just desperately searching for decent lecture. Also, I know books covering Cantonese are hard to come by, either way, I would be really glad to get some help from you guys.

Looking forward to you providing me useful information and thanks in advance!

[sebhk]

As you said, good Cantonese materials are hard to come by. If you don't mind using materials from the 1970s written with a typewriter, you could have a look at the free FSI Cantonese textbooks at http://www.fsi-language-courses.com/Cantonese.aspx

A much more modern and nicer option is a text book by Bun-Ching Chow called "Cantonese for Everyone 大家嘅廣東話" published by the Commercial Press HK, but I doubt that this book is available outside Hong Kong.

Apart from that. most of the books with CD/tape from Greenwood Press are pretty good. Not very academic, but contain useful contemporary language with basic grammar explanations:

http://www.green-woodpress.com/products_list.php?iscantonese=1

Especially the Greenwood Press books by Yin-Ping Cream Lee (who is a Cantonese teacher at the Chinese University of Hong Kong) and Bun-Ching Chow are nice.

The best Cantonese grammar book is "Cantonese: A Comprehensive Grammar" by Matthews and Yip:

http://www.amazon.com/Cantonese-Comprehensive-Grammar-Routledge-Grammars/dp/041508945X

The most interesting online resources are:

The e-books of the Cantonese Learning Centre ( http://www.clc.scicube.info/book/book.html )

CantoDict ( http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/scripts/wordlist.htm )

CantoDict Forums ( http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/phorum/ )

Naked Cantonese Podcast (http://podcast.rthk.org.hk/podcast/item.php?pid=45)

Cantonese.ca ( http://www.cantonese.ca/ )

[skylee]

A much more modern and nicer option is a text book by Bun-Ching Chow called "Cantonese for Everyone 大家嘅廣東話" published by the Commercial Press HK, but I doubt that this book is available outside Hong Kong.

I guess you can order it from the Commercial Press -> http://www.cp1897.com.hk/product_info.php?BookId=9789620718243

It will cost about HKD 300 (including delivery) and will take about 2 weeks to deliver.

[skillphiliac]

Wow sebhk, I hardly expected this much information, thank you a great lot. I will have a look seperately at those, getting books from Hongkong should be one of the lesser problems.

I will replay as soon as I know more about this!

[Hofmann]

Maybe a bit more help is

Wikipedia on Standard Cantonese

Cantonese reading material on Wikipedia

CantoFish, a Firefox Cantonese popup dictionary plugin

CPIME, a Cantonese phonetic IME

[skillphiliac]

Thank you as well, still, all those online ressource have one thing in common... they can hardly be considered a guide to the language. I don't quite see it... I mean, I can't just apply what I've learned in Mandarin to a new Chinese dialect? All I find is:

- Information regarding the various romanizations

- Precomposed sentences

- Vocabulary

Not too bad on second thought, but still, I would like to have a comprehensible, useful book teaching me everything at a time. Making sure I use it in the right context etc.

Well. I am going to check out whether there is some way to get either of those books, seems to be my last resort.

I swear to god, if I should make it somehow to be a proficient speaker of the Cantonese language, I will write my own book. It will overflow from sheer awesomeness and people will send their prayers to me at night.

Or not. But I am going to write it.

[Hofmann]

You can just apply your Mandarin knowledge to Cantonese, if you do it carefully.

I don't know how you study, but you can use my links thus:

In the Cantonese forums, there's a grammar guide. Since you already know Mandarin, you should be able to breeze through it and note the minor differences. There are even links that look like ≈ to Mandarin equivalents of basic vocabulary. That should take care of your grammar for a while, until you pick up a real grammar book like Cantonese: A Comprehensive Grammar. So there's your grammar.

Your vocabulary should be taken care of by the popup dictionary and CantoDict.

Then you can proceed to reading stuff, such as Wikipedia, armed with the popup dictionary, the grammar guide, and the forums if you need help.

Someone is working on an all-in-one online textbook.

[skillphiliac]

Oh wow. You just made my evening.

This is probably what I was not quite grasping, I had no idea. I was fundamentally convinced that learning Cantonese, while showing structural similarities to Mandarin, was pretty much a different sensation altogether. Whew.

One thing that still bothers me... isn't it - all the while managable - difficult to get all the expressions and grammatical nuances right? Even more so - what about adjusting to modern evolution of this language? Then again... I guess that is where my friend comes in. I'll just have her correct me once in a while I guess...

Either way, thank you so much for those tremendously helpful advices.

Edit: I just made up my mind. Seeing as I was looking for something close to my "dear" 汉语教程 Hanyu Jiaocheng, I figured I might as well translate each lesson step by step. I started looking up each word individually in CantoDict, made sure that it is used in Cantonese and not ambiguous or anything like that, and finally wrote down the pronounciation in Jyutping. Getting the hang of the transcription will be one of the lesser problems, I have to make sure to keep up with the notes on grammar you gave me. I guess it is going to be a pain in the ass, at least for the beginning, but until then this should be the way to go. I'd rather do it properly instead of mixing things up early and losing track of my goal.

Additionally, a couple of questions.

First: Can I have your sincere opinion on whether this sounds promising enough to keep at it? I would like me a fair share of your minds concerning this relatively big scheme.

Second question at hand: I haven't found one, but - is there already a thread about exchanging Cantonese audio samples recorded by oneself and having it analyzed by more competent speakers? Or, if not, would there be someone willing to do so?

Either way, thanks again...

Edited March 25, 2009 at 01:52 AM by skillphiliac

[Hanlink]

If you are really serious, you should be able to find a beginners, intermediate and advanced (4-6 vols, I think) of Cantonese study books by Sydney Lau. They were written to teach British policemen, Cantonese.

I would guarantee that if you get someone to teach you how to read the pinyin accurately (everything has characters, too), you will be able to race through all of the books very easily, even more so if your Mandarin is strong.

The grammar sections are useful, as is the vocabulary, which is very wide-ranging. In addition, you will also end up knowing a huge number of Cantonese characters!

As a fundamental base for Cantonese study, you cannot do better.

[skillphiliac]

Sounds even better... where can I get it from?

Edit: Looks like this is not going to work. The information I was able to get is more than just sparse, buying it here in germany is practically impossible, all products I've found in the States for volume 1 cost 50$ or more and lastly... well, it just doesn't get any cheaper.

Edited March 25, 2009 at 11:16 AM by skillphiliac

[Hanlink]

You can find the whole series on the Hong Kong government's website, it is a bit messy to get in, but once there, do a simple search using 'cantonese', the first volume is HK$92 or about US$12.

http://www.gov.hk/en/residents/government/publication/bookstore.htm

Good luck!

[skillphiliac]

Thanks a bunch.

I just did it. I ordered the first four volumes for a total of 42 Euros (shipping included). Well, it is going to take up to eight weeks, enough time for me to get used to pronounciation and learning one or another word in cantonese.

Great help, this thread should be pinned if you ask me.

[Hofmann]

About your second question;

I don't think there's a thread like that here, but if you wanted to start a thread, I recommend you do it over here.

[ZLearner]

I'm surprised no one has heard of the Cantonese Learning Centre online tools and you can download 19 books for only $20 if you decide they're right for you after a free encrypted try. They are available via paypal. Only about 8 of the booklets have sound files, but you can figure out once you've learnt the basics. I love this course!

They include the Hong Kong culture which is excellent.

There is a user on YouTube who made some of them into short movies to learn easily.

[skillphiliac]

ZLearner: It was actually mentioned already. It just doesn't really qualify for various reasons:

- I'd like to hold a book in my hands (which, apparently, I am going to do in a short while)

- I have trouble loading some examples

- It doesn't look appealing to me

It just doesn't give me the impression this is what I am looking for, although it might be useful. I found what I need a few posts before.

Also, you might want to consider changing your font back to normal.