Dreaming in Chinese: ... and Discovering What Makes a Billion People Tick

by Deborah Fallows

Why can't the Chinese say "I love you"? Can you wear pyjamas on the streets of Shanghai? Why is it so difficult to hear Chinese tones? In this charming, original book, Harvard linguist Deborah Fallows draws on her experiences of three years of living and travelling in China to provide the answers to these puzzles and many more. Using her own struggles and triumphs with the study of Mandarin as a guide, Fallows manages to describe the workings of the language in a way that is both intelligible and entertaining. Her anecdotes and stories illustrate how Westerners have to think in a fundamentally different way to survive in China.

• ISBN13: 9781906021559
• Publish Date: 1 April 2010
• Publish Status: Transferred
• Publish Country: GB
• Imprint: Short Books Ltd
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 205
• Language: English

Reviews

[inlibrisveritas]

Dreaming in Chinese: Mandarin Lessons in Life, Love and Language is a nonfiction work that gives a brief yet comprehensive look at Deborah Fallows life while in China and the way that the language of tongue, body and soul influenced her and others.

The way the the book flows reminds me somewhat of a book that one might read in a college course on Chinese(Mandarin) or the Chinese Lifestyle. It's very informational but at the same time it's simple, smooth flowing, and easy to understand. Fallows incorporated in pictures, charts, maps, footnotes,a nifty little Mandarin pronunciation guide and helpful internet links which help the reader to understand the way things work and how they might connect to lifestyles. I enjoyed reading about someone else's look into a language that isn't originally their own as well as the helpful and enjoyable stories she included as well. I really liked the characters at the beginning of each chapter that kind of summed it all up, to me that kind of made it easier to jump into the next chapter. To me this was a fun and short read.