在英文，在中文

[woliveri]

Hi all,

I have a friend who insists on using this sentence structure to explain what might be said in English or in Chinese to Chinese friends. His thinking is it is equivalent to "in English" or "in Chinese"

Then the other day I was chatting on line with a Beijing native and she used "在英文".

=>"侄女在英文是什么"

Is this not a poor sentence structure, using "zai" in this way?

Thanks,

Bill

[Quest]

That's definitely not right in Chinese.

[skylee]

I would not use 在英文. I would use 用英文講/說 or 的英文. Like "侄女用英文怎麼說?" or "侄女的英文是甚麼?"

[Devin]

Hi..I am Taiwanese..

My mother language is Mandarin.

It's usually referred to as 國語 in Taiwan and as 普通話 on the mainland.

I have sentence for you in bellow(在下面).

"在英文在中文表達的方式不同.."

在天上..in Heaven

在台灣..in Taiwan

在某個地方..in somewhere

in English or in Chinese.I feel no wrong..just the words is too short.

But I deem that.在英文裡 is better then 在英文.

[woliveri]

Yes, I've tried to give him better ways to say that but he still continues to do it. I was sure he was incorrect, so much so it was grating on my soul everytime he said it, but then I saw a native from Beijing who graduated from BNU say it the same way and it cast doubt in my mind.

Thanks for the responses

[miss_China_so_much]

It's not proper Chinese but some people do say like that. It's just a kind of casual way of saying things. You can take it as : 侄女在英文里是什么