You might wonder why you must learn Chinese (Mandarin) as recommended by so many people. I’m not going to try convince you that you must learn Chinese, however I will give you some facts why it might be a good reason to consider learning Chinese (Mandarin) if you ever want to live, visit or do business in China in the near future.

I’m not quite sure if you are aware that English are not the largest language on Earth. Only 514 million people spoke English as their first language according to the 2007 world statistics and just over 1.075 billion people spoke Chinese (Mandarin) as their first language. So in short 209% more people speak Chinese (Mandarin) as a first language compared to the world’s second largest language, English.

Mandarin Chinese is also the largest second language spoken by people at a whopping 178 million followed shortly on their heels by English at 170 million people world-wide.

Chinese is also the third largest language spoken in the USA with Spanish and English filling the number two and one spot.

These statistics got me thinking, maybe I must start learning Chinese, since out of an economic point of view it make sense to me…

Did you know that there are 6,912 languages in the world today; however interconnected communication is killing them off. It’s estimated that by 2020 there could be only 700 languages left and I’m quite sure that Mandarin Chinese will still be the largest language on the planet. In fact they predict that 14.7% of world’s population will speak Chinese by 2050.

You need to remember that there are 241 languages spoken in China with Mandarin considered as the main language. Most people outside China make the mistake to say they want to learn Chinese, since Chinese is not actually a language. To be more correct you must say you want to learn Mandarin and not Chinese.

I know how the Chinese feels about this small mistake since I’m in the same position as they are. I’m a South African and my home language is Afrikaans. But you still get a lot of foreigners asking me if I speak South African? There is no language called South African, however we do have eleven official languages. (The most in the world and Chinese is not one of them.) But this gives you an idea how the Chinese must feel every time we say “I want to learn Chinese”. We actually look quite stupid in their eyes…

But lest get back to the point of learning Mandarin (Chinese) and how you can do so in your own free time. There is a couple of good language course online that you can use to learn basic Mandarin in as little as 8 weeks or so. But just remember that these courses will never teach you how to speak Mandarin or any other language fluently. Consider them more as a language learning starter guide or an extra language learning resource that you can easily use in your own time.

My number one recommendation is Rocket Chinese, created by Rocket Languages. The Rocket Chinese download is an interactive language learning program that consists out of authentic Mandarin audio lessons and software games that you can play on your PC or Mac.

Have a look at the program and if you do have the money to invest in your Mandarin learning then I think you must give it a try. You never know you might just master enough Mandarin to visit China on your next holiday or even start your own global business with a huge share in China. Anything is possible if you believe in yourself, even when it gets to learning a language like Chinese, oops I mean Mandarin…

Hopefully this information will help you decide why learning Chinese (Mandarin) could be a good decision.

More language info:

www.vistawide.com/languages/

www.omniglot.com/