Reading, or Something Like It: Guest Essay from Catherine Chou

How to learn Taiwanese and read Mandarin in a year, plus two useful tools for learning these languages. And The Brothers Karamazov book club details.

Happy almost Lunar Year! (It’s Year of the Tiger!)

We’ve been so grateful to see so many new sign-ups lately! Thank you. We publish Chinese newsletters on Thursdays and English on Sundays; you can change the settings at “My Account.”

Today we are honored to share a guest essay from historian Catherine Chou. We’ve been delighted to spend time with her, and have been struck by her generosity, openness, and warmth. For the past year and half, Catherine has been deeply immersed in learning Mandarin and Taiwanese in Taiwan. This essay will inspire anybody who dares to embark on language study, but especially those seeking literacy in their parents’ native tongue. It is also an impassioned plea to revive the Taiwanese language. As Catherine puts it, Taiwanese is a “playful, complex, experimental” language that has adapted “in the face of decades of neglect and hostility from state and society.”

Other news: This week Michelle co-authored an essay with Father Peter Hung Ngueyn in The News Len…