Different pronunciations of Mandarin

[Pravit]

Hi,
I am wondering about different pronunciations of Mandarin. My Chinese-Thai friend, who learned Chinese in a Bangkok Chinese school, pronounces things differently than the speech I hear on the tapes that came with my course(Modern Chinese: A Basic Course). Some of the things I noticed were that he doesn't recognize adding on the "儿" to words such as 画 or 分, and prefers saying 那里 or 这里 to 那儿 or 这儿. He also pronounces the pinyin "z" with a complete "J" as in "Jack" sound as opposed to something like "dz"(and keeps trying to get me to say "J"). He pronounces the "sh" in 是 as almost a pure "S" sound. Besides that, he doesn't seem to recognize neutral tones in words like 喜欢, 铅笔, etc. instead giving them the original tone. He gives the 3rd tone a flat low tone instead of a low-to-rising tone which I've heard on tapes. I've heard there are different pronunciations of Mandarin depending on the region, would this be an example of that? Or is this simply how Thai-accented Chinese sounds?

Pravit

[A-Hiong]

Sounds like a Southern Chinese person to me!!!

[Dylan Sung]

Mandarin in tapes is standard Chinese, and that means Mandarin Putonghua, which is based on the speech patterns of Beijing (Peking/Peiping or whatever romanisation you've seen it in).

There are plenty of dialects in China, and this include many different Mandarin dialects and pronunciation.

I guess your Chinese-Thai friend had family who left China before the China became a socialist state.


Dyl.

[Pravit]

Right! There are a lot of Chinese in Thailand who speak a dialect of Southern Min(it's called Dae Jiu or Chou Zho), which is spoken in Fujian province if I'm not mistaken. Of course, he had to go to school to learn this, but I guess he learned from other southern Chinese people too

[jinfeng1]

The standard Mandarin which you learn from textbooks is based on
the pronunciation uttered by Beijing natives. but they are not the same.
i think the standard pronunciation is found in CCTV news. Those are the professionals.

[tj]

Hi Pravit,


Majority of Chinese-Thai are Teochew (ChaoZhou). ChaoZhou is a state in Eastern GuangDong and near to southern Fujian.
ChaoZhou language is quite similar to Southern Min (Min3 Nan2) because of geographical factor.

Does young Chinese-Thai can speak Teochew well?

[%sig%]

[Zhusaipei]

Hi Pravit,
I know hundreds of Chinese people from nearby WenZhou and talk regularly with them.
Here's what in the South of China is commonly mispelled:

- 's' and 'sh' both sound as 's';
- 'z' and 'zh' both sound as 'z';
- 'c' and 'ch' both sound as 'c';
- retroflex final 'er' and retroflex endings simply don't exist;
- sometimes 'h' becomes 'f'.

It's not a matter of education, just a different 'accent'.

About the 3rd tone, sounds like those I've heard on some Chinese courses tapes are never heard on earth! I remember a 'wu3' (number 5) five seconds long! They're taped that way only for educational purposes.
In that case, trust your friend.
And trust him also when keeps trying to get you say something - be sure he doesn't want to correct your good 'sh', 'zh', 'ch' Beijing pronunciation; so focus on your tones, it might be there your mistake!

[%sig%]

[william]

I am interested in getting Mandarin language tapes. Can anyone tell me which would be more like pronunciation on CCTV?
thank you

[%sig%]

[Fluency]

You were right to mention newscasters speaking correct Mandarin. Their are no "different" pronunciations of Mandarin, because it is a government defined dialect. Beijing has created a series of Mandarin tests and levels, the highest level needs to be achieved to become an announcer on the national channels, and it is supposedly a quite brutal test. Anything that differs from what is defined as being "Mandarin" is then a "Chinese dialect" and not a form of Mandarin. Mandarin was based on the Beijing dialect but the closest spoken dialect to pure Mandarin is that from Heilongjiang (yes some will argue this)

[bjfall]

I heard a lecture a few months ago about pronouncing Chinese words and I found it quite helpful. The organizers have uploaded parts of that talk online at http://www.linese.com/cc/20408000000000000,8.html

I've been in China for over a year now and have learned to distinguish the Putonghua of Northerners from that of Southerners. The accents may be different, but they're all speaking the same language. It's just a matter of what you've been exposed to and what you've gotten acustomed to.