Jing Chen
Lecturer for Chinese Language and Culture, Managing Director Audi Confucius Institute Ingolstadt
With an estimated 900 million speakers, Mandarin is the most spoken language in the world and the most widely spoken variety of Chinese. Cantonese lags far behind with an estimated 70 million speakers and is the official language of Hong Kong and Macau and is spoken in the Chinese province of Guangdong.
Regardless of its usefulness for work and everyday life, learning the language has significant advantages for memory performance. Studies show that by learning the Chinese characters, you train your brain while training your sense of creativity and dexterity.
The introduction to the language begins with the Chinese Pinyin alphabet to familiarize yourself with the sounds of the Chinese language. After that, you can start saying short sentences and introducing yourself in Chinese. You will learn to write Chinese calligraphy and the first Chinese characters. To understand everyday Chinese, it is enough to know about 3,000 characters.
Good news for learners: there is no conjugation, no gender or plural. Forming sentences in a Chinese course is therefore very simple. On the other hand, Chinese is a tonal language. The pronunciation and tone used influence the meaning of the words.
Knowledge of Chinese is not only a significant advantage, it is almost a must for anyone who wants to travel to rural China. The true beauty of China lies in the secluded corners that are hardly visited by international tourists. Here the residents only very rarely speak English. Also, as soon as you leave the metropolises, street signs are only in Chinese.
Learning the language is a way to discover the fascinating Chinese culture. This includes, in addition to Chinese tradition and philosophy, China’s many religions, Asian cuisine, martial arts and medicine.
The range of courses for Chinese includes:
1. Compulsory and elective courses with ECTS credits
2. Free electives that can be taken by all THI students (with a university certificate)
Course overviews can be found in the pdf.
For information on the course objectives and contents, please refer to the Module Handbook of the Language Center.
The THI Language Center offers a number of certificate courses for THI students of all degree programs. Upon passing the exam, students receive a THI university certificate for the THI course. THI students can find the THI certificate courses in the module handbook of the Language Center on Moodle.
Certificates from public language institutes
The Chinese Proficiency Test HSK (Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi, literally ‘Chinese Language Proficiency Test’) is a standardised Chinese language test for Chinese as a foreign language.
It is used to assess and certify Chinese language proficiency.
Upon successful completion, each participant receives an HSK certificate, which is recognised by the state both in China and worldwide.
Further information can be found on the website of the Confucius Institute in Munich.
Students enrolled at THI Business School in the bachelor's degree programmes ‘International Management’ and ‘Global Economics and Business Management’ can take a placement test to assess their current language level.
The placement test can be completed independently in Moodle. The tasks take approximately 15 to 30 minutes to complete. The results are displayed at the end of the test.
Participation in the test is non-binding and free of charge.
Go directly to the placement test on Moodle.
YouTube
Chinese Grammar Wiki: Viele Satzbeispiele und verständliche Erklärungen auf Englisch geben eine guten in die chinesische Grammatik. Für Selbstlerner eine gute Ressource um zu erfahren, welche Inhalte bei welchem Sprachlevel relevant sind. Die A1 – B2 Level sind gut abgedeckt.
Information about our courses
Lecturer for Chinese Language and Culture, Managing Director Audi Confucius Institute Ingolstadt
THI students who want to get an appointment please visit Moodle.