Brendan O’Kane has gone from translating to becoming a podcast professor, teaching Mandarin for Popup Chinese. Why learn Chinese from a laowai? Read below to find out.

What makes Popup Chinese different from other Mandarin learning podcasts?
Our focus is on having fun with the language and producing content that people will enjoy rather than have to force themselves to listen to. We assume our listeners will be able to get the standard “the-pen-of-my-aunt-is-on-the-dresser-of-my-uncle” elsewhere if they really want it. We are focused on real-world usage.

There seem to be a lot of in-jokes in the podcasts.
We’ve got a rotating cast of zombies, pirates, sometimes a mob boss and his dimwitted assistant ... Our dialogues tend to be improvised rather than scripted. The end product is more challenging for students, but it’s also a lot more realistic.

Popup uses a freemium model. The podcasts are free, but which of the paid services are most useful?
The annotated transcripts are especially popular among premium subscribers. Popup also produces one of our favorite China podcasts: Sinica.

Do you have a favorite episode?
Usually it’s whatever the latest one is, but I’ve got a soft spot for “Death of the China Blog.” It’s a trip down memory lane. When I got here, there was Richard from Peking Duck, John from Sinosplice and Adam Morris ... Now everybody and their granny has a China blog. At that time, it was a small, friendly community.

So what part of your Chinese are you going to work on in 2011?
Knowing where things are coming from, rather than just knowing what they literally mean, what E.D. Hirsch calls “cultural literacy.” I want to know what ‘80s TV show a certain catch phrase is referencing. Just think about how many Simpsons references you use in a given week.

Master Mandarin with Popup Chinese at 
www.PopupChinese.com. Find out more about 
Brendan O’Kane at www.bokane.org and 
www.paper-republic.org.