Great article on sentence mining

[Mike N]

For the uninitiated, sentence mining is the act of taking sentences out of native L2 content which contain one element which you want to learn or which you cannot understand. By using these sentences rather than definitions, you get both the meaning and the context in which it is used.

It's also a lot more fun than just looking at a bunch of dictionary definitions!

Link here: http://www.xamuel.com/sentence-mining/

[Daan]

Interesting, thanks for sharing!

[flynnfrogg]

I found a great source for sentence mining - my Singaporean better-half has been recording on a hard disk all the episodes of the 9pm TV drama - and it has both English subtitles and Chinese as well! So it is great to watch, pause the machine and write down all the sentences I want. If anyone wants the entire series on disks, just let me know.

Flynn Frogg (progressing in hops)

[creamyhorror]

I found a great source for sentence mining - my Singaporean better-half has been recording on a hard disk all the episodes of the 9pm TV drama - and it has both English subtitles and Chinese as well! So it is great to watch, pause the machine and write down all the sentences I want. If anyone wants the entire series on disks, just let me know.

Flynn Frogg (progressing in hops)

Which drama is it? I take it it isn't a local one, since those tend not to have Chinese subtitles (very annoyingly).

I recently thought I'd like to get a few subtitled episodes of the weekend 7pm Taiwanese drama (夜市人生) myself. That show would be great for picking out vocabulary from (mostly for my little brother) - whenever I watch it I always think the lines include a lot of useful, common words, and the (Mandarin) pronunciation is excellent and very clear. I don't quite get that feeling from Mainland shows, which seem to use more alien vocabulary from my POV.

[OneEye]

I watched the first few minutes of 夜市人生 episode 1 just now and it was all 台語. Is there a lot of Mandarin later? I'm trying to find a bunch of shows to watch but the more 台語 there is the less useful it is for me (for now).

[creamyhorror]

I watched the first few minutes of 夜市人生 episode 1 just now and it was all 台語. Is there a lot of Mandarin later? I'm trying to find a bunch of shows to watch but the more 台語 there is the less useful it is for me (for now).

No, it's all in 台語, but in Singapore we get the Mandarin dub, and it's great. I haven't found the Mandarin dub on Youtube though, but I assume it's out there somewhere...

[flynnfrogg]

the complete (21) episodes of 再见单人床 (which should translate as Goodbye Single Bed but is titled in English as 'Pillow Talk') were aired over Channel 8 during the timeslot 9pm-10pm Monday to Friday. These have both English subtitles as well as Chinese subtitles.

After this series ended, it was followed by "Absolutely Charming" with both English and Chinese subtitles.(and this new series is still currently airing It will be Episode 19 tonight)

[flynnfrogg]

oh and I should answer CreamyHorror question - yes these dramas are all Singaporean-made

[OneEye]

I don't know why I didn't mention this before, but sugoideas is a great resource for Taiwanese TV shows. Some of the shows have English subs, all of the shows I've seen have Chinese subs, and with some you can pick which subs you want. It's easy enough to download the videos to your iPod or whatever.