Product Description

Intermediate Cantonese is designed for learners who have achieved basic proficiency and wish to progress to more complex language. Each of the twenty-five units combines clear, concise grammar explanations with communicatively oriented exercises to help build confidence and fluency. The book includes:
Many examples from contemporary media, including films, advertising, songs and soap operas
DT Clear distinction between colloquial and more formal speech registers
DT Teaches contemporary Cantonese as spoken in Hong Kong

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #150231 in Books
• Published on: 2000-10-19
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

Review
This is an excellent practical grammar of Cantonese. It offers clear explanations on a variety of topics, and provides relevant exercises that reinforce the material covered. The writing is compact and perspicuous. The examples are natural, and there are enough of them to adequately illustrate the point under discussion. It covers intermediate and even advanced grammatical constructions, areas often under-represented in pedagogical materials. This book has a welcome place on the bookshelf of every student and teacher of Cantonese. - The Linguist List, November 2001

Customer Reviews

Every serious student should get a copy
This book is an excellent sequel to: "Basic Cantonese: A Grammar and Workbook" by the same authors. It (and its predecessor) are the best sources I've seen as far as really explaining how Cantonese works. There has been some other good material published in recent years for Cantonese learners (I give high marks to "Colloquial Cantonese" by Tong and James and "Teach Yourself Cantonese" by Baker and Ho) but this is the best treatment of Cantonese syntax I've come across- having worked through it I now feel confident that I can speak good, authentic Cantonese. It is written from a linguistic point of view but it is so well-organized and the material is so neatly presented that even someone without much linguistic background would find it a help. There are some comparisons made with Mandarin usage which are interesting and helpful to someone who learned Mandarin first (as I did) but previous knowledge of Mandarin is not assumed or required. A further plus: Lots of contemporary vocabulary. If you think you'd like to be able to say: "The boss has sexually harassed her" "My daughter is giving me an attitude again" or "very soon one will be able to get on the Internet via mobile phones" look no further!

Great textbook to upgrade your knowledge of Cantonese
Intermediate Cantonese is a great textbook to upgrade your knowledge of Cantonese, a language spoken by over 100 million people in southern China (Guangdong, Guangxi, Hong Kong and Macau) and among many overseas Chinese. It's very didactical and quite easy to understand. Cantonese is not easy to learn, but the book makes it pretty easy to learn.

Great book on Cantonese Grammar -- but dense and definitely not for beginners
This is a great book on Cantonese Grammar for learners who have graduated beyond "Basic Cantonese: a Grammar and Workbook" by Virginia Yip. Note that this is suitable only as accompanying material, not as a complete book for learning the language. Presentation is quite dense, much more demanding that the Basic Cantonese book.

This is only for the slightly advanced learner, but highly recommended if you really want to understand the structure of the language.