i am a chinese who want to learn excellent english(most want american english).
but problem very difficult,because i am living in a no english world,no people talk to you with english ,no any blue eyes.
but dopers in this forum all use english ,and lucky thing is you are american english
now i proved one thing that is someone can learn english with no talk.
even no teacher.only need a internet,and straight dope.com
i learn english by observe you dopers ‘s discussion, yeah ,it involve too many
realm, most of them are technicality case.
now,i can do many things like read news or article.i can learn more things now,because i can read ,but i have no english book ,i am sure i can read book
i can understand the one section with many comma,but still need dictionary
i proved that self-learning is a powerful thing!
thankyou dopers , i will keep you in mind
a lonely thinker in china
Congratulations!! You have obviously learned a lot; that message wasn’t perfect, but it was better than some I’ve seen from native speakers. I am so glad you’ve learned on here, and I wish you the best of luck in continuing to learn.
I’m sure I represent many others when I encourage you to join in the discussions. It might be a good idea to explain your unique situation in your profile, or sig line, that way there is no confusion if you use the wrong word in places.
Welcome to the board!
Congratulations! I had no difficulty understanding your post. Your determination shines through.
Of course, there is always room for improvement, but that is true of almost all speakers. For example, if you can find all the errors in this sign, you are doing better than the people who put it there!
Your English is pretty good, for self-taught. I can understand it perfectly. As for American versus other English I think you’ll find very little difference in the written text of people here. Subtle spelling differences are the only things you should notice, e.g. flavor versus flavour, or standardize versus standardise, etc.
My God that’s hilarious! And embarrassing.
English and Chinese are–I am told–the two hardest languages to learn. Many grammar and spelling rules in English make no sense whatsoever. So you are doing *excellently *at a very hard task.
I posted it to Fail Blog. 
The only way to get better is with practice! Here is how I would have written your post:
"I am a Chinese man who wants to learn excellent English (preferably American English), but it is very difficult because I am living in a no-English world. Nobody speaks English, and no one has blue eyes. But dopers in this forum all use English, and the lucky thing is that you use American English. One thing that I have proved is that someone can learn English without speaking, even without a teacher. You only need the internet and straightdope.com. I learned English by observing you dopers’ discussions. Yeah, it involved too many topics, and most of them were very technical. But now I can do many things like read the news or articles. I can learn more things now because I can read, but I have no English books. I am sure I would be able to read books.
I can understand the one section with many commas, but I still need a dictionary.
I proved that self-learning is a powerful thing!
Thank you dopers, I will keep you in mind.
a lonely thinker in China"
I hope you find this helpful!
This is why we are such spelling and grammar Nazis.
I am not a spelling and grammar Nazi! At most, I am a spelling and grammar Mussolini.
You’re welcome. I’m glad I can contribute to your education in my own small way.
If an all-English dictionary will do, this ought to help you out. Type the word you want to look up into the box and click the magnifying glass icon and it should pull up a fairly simple definition for you. There’s also a fairly simple Chinese-to-English dictionaryhere.
Good luck! As Eve says, English is a very complicated language full of rules that don’t make much sense even to native speakers, so you’ve accomplished a lot getting as far as you have.
Congratulations. Your English is very good already. How long have you been teaching yourself English?
The OP has done something that sounds like one of the more optimistic predictions given years ago at the dawn of the internet:
“Years from now, a person in a remote part of China without direct access to textbooks or English-speaking people will be able to teach himself English through the internet.”
A lot of people are using the internet to create or view frivolous pastimes like Stuff On My Cat; the fact that the OP has used the internet to teach himself English is a profoundly cool counterpoint.
y7xzh1, thanks for sharing your story, and congratulations on your accomplishment. 
if we want to teach ourselves Chinese, can you recommend a site?
Yes! Now I can add “ESL Instructor” to my resume!
Yes, this is true. The difference between American English and British English in terms of the written language are minor. There are a few words that could cause confusion, but by and large, English speakers get along fine. I’m a native speaker of American English and standard written British English gives me no trouble.
There are, of course, multiple accents in the English speaking world, and generally, as long as you speak a prestigious or well-known accent, you can be understood widely with little difficulty. A Mid-Atlantic US accent, a Southern US accent, RP British Accent (what you hear on the BBC), Standard Australian Accent, and others like it are “good enough” in most cases. Your average person from London is going to be able to get along fine in English when traveling in South Carolina.
Congratulations on your accomplishments.
You’re welcome.
I hope you’re not too lonely. Come back and chat with us any time you like. 
While I have been wasting years on LOLCATS, SomeEcards, Fark and FML, there are people out there that are learning to speaking better english than me, a native born, via this internet thing.
We need to truly Americanize y7xzh1 very, very quickly and bring him or her down to our level of drooling stupidity.
(It’s ok, everyone is doing it! It’s the American way!)
Your english is very, very good. If you would like to learn some obscene hand gestures…come and drive in our traffic!
You should be proud! Congratulations!
I am a future music teacher and I love teaching younger students music literacy (higher versus lower notes, louder and softer, up and down on the piano, pitch, rhythm, basic music terminology, etc.). Watching students finally understand a new idea or concept, however small, is very rewarding. I expect that teaching a written language would be similarly exciting. You don’t have one specific teacher to be writing lesson plans for you, to be proud of your accomplishments, or to be thrilled by your progress - but I expect you’ll find a large number of people here who are happy to hear about your successes, and who are glad to think they made even the smallest contribution to your learning.