#84 Dr. Gu on Co-Writing ‘Language Hacking Mandarin’

Northwestern University Professor and author, Dr. LiCheng Gu, has a conversation with Benny Lewis and Shannon Kennedy about co-authoring Language Hacking Mandarin, how language education has changed over the last 30 years, and why Chinese is easier than you think.

Language Hacking Mandarin is available now. You can order it from your preferred retailer, online or in stores.

Featured Resources

• Language Hacking Mandarin

Mentioned in this Episode

• Language Hacking Mandarin
• Chinese for Heritage Learners
• Picture Characters
• Chinese with Lulu and Maomao
• Integrated Chinese

Episode Overview

Some of the topics brought up during the interview are:

• Teaching foreign languages at the university level
• How language education has changed over the last 30 years
• Learning Chinese characters
• Why Chinese is easier than you think
• Common challenges Chinese learners face and how to overcome them
• Creating language courses and books
• Working on the Language Hacking Mandarin book, and how its approach to language teaching is vastly different from traditional language learning
• The conversational approach to language learning and how it “sits” in academia
• Advice for getting started with Chinese
• Using pinyin when learning Chinese
• How languages are taught and learned in China versus the US

Podcast theme: “A New Beginning” by Shannon Kennedy

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