论学习外语的重要 On the importance of learning foreign languages

TRANSLATION
Hello,everybody! My name is Marco Cerini. I live in Italy, not far from Rome. I studied Chinese at the Oriental Studies Department of Rome University. Besides its language, I am very interested in China and its culture, its history and customs.

Since graduating in 2007, I have deepened my knowledge about phonetics and teaching foreign languages, not only for mere academic reasons, that is, hoping my English and my Chinese would improve. Rather, I firmly believe that we, nowadays people of the 21st century, coming from any country, belonging to any nationality and speaking whatever mother tongue, do need to communicate with each other more than ever before.

Many people say English has already become the lingua franca of the world, and it is therefore useless to bother learning languages other than one's own mother tongue and English. In the past, I used to think this opinion was basically correct: in the end, I live(d) in Italy, my future family's and my job's roots etc. will stay in my own country; why should I be willing to get in touch with foreigners?

Only after I started comprehending the Far Eastern Universe while attending university, I realized that, along with the unceasing advance of globalization and the explosion of new technological and scientific discoveries, even such basic concepts like "boundaries" and "distance", "here on my side" and "there on your side" have lost practical meaning. I am currently talking to you from my little house in Italy, but lets suppose I move to China tomorrow, or to Botswana, wouldnt I be myself anymore? Of course I would!

Nevertheless, though globalization and hi-tech progress made it possible for us to overcome many obstacles, communication is still problematic between people. For me, to make an effort in understanding the characteristics of different cultures is the first step to solve that communication problem of our times, provided we start from comprehending the languages representative of those different cultures.

For example, when a foreigner tries to enter the cultural world of the Chinese, if he/she only speaks English, he/she will have a hard time in having a conversation, without an interpreter, with those Chinese unable to understand that language. In other words, he/she will have to express his/her ideas and opinions to other people through the filter of a lingua franca coming from England.

On the contrary, speaking a little Chinese, I might chat with Mr Zhang and Mrs Zhou, or even talk directly to the elders who go to the park in the morning to practice qigong or take their bird on a stroll! Every people is not merely its population rate, its economy figures and its customs; moreover, a people is a point of view, a way to deal with life's complexity. Every people, moreover, corresponds to its approach to the future, its fears, its dreams and hopes. This, I think, is the sparkling clear difference between merely understanding each other and truly communicating with each other.

A language mirrors the cultural background which it belongs to, therefore embodying the kernel of a population's psyche. Only with a deep understanding of this all, we wil be able to understand this simple truth: human needs and aspirations are basically the same for everyone, to say, to live comfortably and safely, and to pursue happiness; the point is that different cultures employ different systems of thought to give difficult answers to "How could I live comfortably and safely?" and "How may I reach happiness?".

The uniqueness of each language, spoken or written, too, originates from diversity in each system of thought; from this perspective, learning a foreign anguage other than English is not a waste of time and energy, but rather it is a privilege.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• 学习
• 外语
• importance
• learning
• foreign
• language
• lingua
• staniera

[MartialArts4Ever]

Hao! *claps*

[marcoxyzxyz]

Xièxie, xièxie! ^.^

[4evertruel0v3]

omg, how could you do that, how long have you studying it? i dont think there is alot chinese in Italy...

[marcoxyzxyz]

Years... ah ah. Regarding Chinese immigrants in Italy, there are more than 200'000! But their Mandarin is generally very BAD.

[yumingi]

人间应当改作人与人之间，人间这个词语没有人与人之间的意思。

译员一词在口语中也不常用，其实用翻译或翻译人员更恰当，一听就­能明白。

[marcoxyzxyz]

我这次所用"译员"而不用"翻译"的，就是因为后者既是tran­slation/translate又是translator的­意思，而我却想说translator。我本来也考虑选择"翻译­员、翻译人、翻译人员"类似的词语，不过有一个中国朋友说"那，­太啰嗦啦！"因此我想，既然这视频文件要带字幕，那就用"译员"­也行。我一般说"翻译"，yìyuán对我来说只是"议员"的意­思。

[673346509]

儿话音不错...

[Joey818Lin]

他是羅馬時代的義大利人嗎？怎麼說話這麼古風

代我和凱撒大帝問聲好

[lkj17]

your Chinese is good. but why you look like from middle-east?

[TVrawks301]

Wow, you sound like you are a Chinese native! I'm currently learning Spanish, but I want to learn Chinese too someday! Well done! :D

[ff90kk380]

你說得中文真的很好！！！！！！！

沒有那種腔調！

[Coughranbranden]

或者你可以使用谷歌翻译



[vicabroad]

Hello,my friends.I'm live in China, I love to learn English. So send me an email to be my friend.u know I can teach you how to learn Chinese more quickly than you can image, and u can teach me English too...right? It's a good thing.That's it~!

看这个视频的人应该都是对中文比较感兴趣吧？我是个土生土长的中­国人，能说一口标准的普通话，我希望这能成为交外国朋友的资本。­在中国是上不了Youtube的，我是翻墙出来climb over the Chinet and run over here。我们国家最喜欢用QQ聊天工具，你们如果也用的话可以­认识到许许多多的中国人。当然你们可以加我的号码：578001­722或者给我发邮件valentinevic@yahoo.c­om waiting you~~！

[edwardtang1977]

damn you're good! I can't believe you never lived in China!

[abusedbynycpolice]

Please highlight the title in quotes. Thank you

[abusedbynycpolice]

Can you tell in a nut shell what this chinese conversation is about. Just the beginnings. I will arrange payment in a few days with you to do the rest: YT: "FREE MONSTER TOURS BEATS!! CHINESE TRANSLATION NEEDED!! CHINA!!"