看看对不对。。
Chinese
Intonation
There are several immediately evident characteristics of a Chinese accent. The most notable is the lack of speech music, or the musical intonation of English. This is a problem because, in the English language, intonation indicates meaning, new information, contrast, or emotion. Another aspect of speech music is phrasing, which tells if it is a statement, a question, a yes/no option, a list of items, or where the speaker is in the sentence (introductory phrase, end of the sentence, etc.). In Chinese, however, a change in tone indicates a different vocabulary word.
In English, Chinese speakers have a tendency to increase the volume on stressed words, but otherwise give equal value to each word. This atonal volume-increase will sound aggressive, angry, or abrupt to a native speaker. When this is added to the tendency to lop off the end of each word, and almost no word connections at all, the result ranges from choppy to unintelligible.
In spite of this unpromising beginning, Chinese students have a tremendous advantage. Here is an amazingly effective technique that radically changes how you sound. Given the highly developed tonal qualities of the Chinese language, you are truly a "pitch master." In order for you to appreciate your strength in this area, try the four ma tones of Mandarin Chinese. (Cantonese is a little more difficult since it has eight to twelve tones and people aren't as familiar with the differentiation.) These four tones sound identical to Americans — ma, ma, ma, ma.
Take the first sentence in Exercise 1 -5 It sounds like rain and replace rain with ma1. Say It sounds like ma 1. This will sound strangely flat, so then try It sounds like ma2. This isn't it either, so go on to It sounds like ma3 and It sounds like ma4. One of the last two will sound pretty good, usually ma3. You may need to come up with a combination of ma3 and ma4, but once you have the idea of what to listen for, it's really easy. When you have that part clear, put rain back in the sentence, keeping the tone:
It sounds like ma3. It sounds like rain3. If it sounds a little short (It sounds like ren), double the sound:
When this exercise is successful, go to the second sentence, It sounds like rain and do the same thing: It ma3 like rain. It sounds3 like rain. Then, contrast the two:
It sounds like rain3. It sounds3 like rain. From this point on, you only need to periodically listen for the appropriate ma, substituting it in for words or syllables. You don't even need to use the rubber band since your tonal sophistication is so high. 173 The main point of this exercise is to get you listening for the tone shifts in English, which are very similar to the tone shifts in Chinese. The main difference is that Americans use them to indicate stress, whereas in Chinese, they are fully different words when the tone changes. A simple way to practice intonation is with the sound that American children use when they make a mistake—uh-oh. This quick note shift is completely typical of the pattern, and once you have mastered this double note, you can go on to more complex patterns. Because Chinese grammar is fairly similar to English grammar, you don't have to worry too much about word order.
Liaisons All of the advantages that you have from intonation are more than counterbalanced by your lack of word connections. The reason for this is that Chinese characters (words or parts of words) start with consonants and end with either a vowel or a nasalized consonant, n or ng. There is no such thing as a final t, l, or b in Chinese. To use an example we've all heard of, Mao Tse Tung. This leads to several difficulties:
● ● ●
No word endings
No word connections No distinction between final voiced or unvoiced consonants.
It takes time and a great deal of concentration, but the lack of word endings and word connections can be remedied. Rather than force the issue of adding on sounds that will be uncomfortable for you, which will result in overpronunciation, go with your strengths — notice how in speech, but not spelling, Americans end their words with vowel sounds and start them with consonants, just as in Chinese! It's really a question of rewriting the English script in
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your head that you read from when you speak. Liaisons or word connections will force the final syllable to be pronounced by pushing it over to the beginning of the next word, where Chinese speakers have no trouble — not even with l.
Written Chinese American (with English Accent Liaisons)
Because you are now using a natural and comfortable technique, you will sound smooth and fluid when you speak, instead of that forced, exaggerated speech of people who are doing what they consider unnatural. It takes a lot of correction to get this process to sink in, but it's well worth the effort. Periodically, when you speak, write down the exact sounds that you made, then write it in regular spelling, so you can see the Chinese accent and the effect it has on meaning (puw ih aw has no meaning in English). Then convert the written English to spoken American (pull it out changes to pü li dout) to help yourself rewrite your English script.
When you don't use liaisons, you also lose the underlying hum that connects sentences together. This coassonance is like the highway and the words are the cars that carry the listener along. The last point of intonation is that Chinese speakers don't differentiate between voiced and unvoiced final consonants — cap and cab sound exactly the
Goal
To get you to use your excellent tone control in English. Chinese characters start with consonants and end with either a vowel or a nasalized consonant (n or ng). Goal To get you to rewrite your English script and to speak with sound units rather than word units. 174 same. For this, you will need to go back to the staircase. When a final consonant is voiced, the vowel is lengthened or doubled. When a final consonant is unvoiced, the vowel is short or single. Additionally, the long a before an m is generally shortened to a short ε. This is why the words same and name are particularly difficult, usually being pronounced sem and nem. You have to add in the second half of the sound. You need nay + eem to get name. Doubled vowels are explained on page 3.
Tell him
teo him
tellim
Pull it out
puw ih aw
pü li dout
Goal
Pronunciation
The most noticeable nonstandard pronunciation is the lack of final /. This can be corrected by either liaisons, or by adding a tiny schwa after it (luh or lə) in order to
position your tongue correctly. This is the same solution for n and ng. Like most other
nationalities, Chinese students need to work on th and r, but fortunately, there are no hear the special problems here. The remaining major area is [ā], [ε], and [æ], which sound the
and same. Mate, met, mat sound like met, met, met. The [ε] is the natural sound for the
For you to actual vowel consonant sounds English, rather than a Chinese perception of them.
of
Chinese, so working from there, you need to concentrate on Chapters 3 and 11. In the word mate, you are hearing only the first half of the [εi] combination, so double the vowel with a clear eet sound at the end (even before an unvoiced final consonant). Otherwise, you will keep saying meh-eht or may-eht.
a
It frequently helps to know exactly how something would look in your own language — and in Chinese, this entails characters. The characters on the left are the sounds needed for a Chinese person to say both the long i as in China and the long a as in made or same. Read the character, and then put letters in front and in back of it so you are reading half alphabet, half character. An m in front and a d in back of the first character will let you read made. A ch in front and na in back of the second character will produce China. It's odd, but it works.
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fay
175
æ ä
o ə
ü i
r th
n sh
L A word that ends in ~ail is particularly difficult for Chinese speakers since it contains both the hard [εi] combination and a final / (Chapter 5). It usually sounds something like feh-o. You need to say fail as if it had three full syllables — fay-yə-lə.
u, v, Another difficulty may be u, v, f, and w. The point to remember here is
f, w that u and w can both be considered vowels (i.e., they don't touch anywhere in the mouth), whereas v and/are consonants (your upper teeth touch your lower lip). M, as in too or use should be no problem. Similar to M, but with a little push of slightly rounded lips is w, as in what or white. The letters / and v have basically the same sound, but / is unvoiced and v is voiced. Your lower lip should come up a little to meet your top teeth. You are not biting down on the outside of your lip here; the sound is created using the inside of your lower lip. Leave your mouth in the same position and make the two sounds, both voiced and unvoiced. Practice words such as fairy, very, and wary.
There is another small point that may affect people from southern mainland China who use / and n interchangeably. This can be corrected by working with l words and pinching the nose shut. If you are trying to say late and it comes out Nate, hold your nose closed and the air will be forced out through your mouth.
The æ sound doesn't exist in Chinese, so it usually comes out as ä or ε, so last sounds like lost or name sounds like nem. You need to work on Chapter 3, which drills this distinctively American vowel. Because of spelling, the ä sound can easily be misplaced. The ä sound exists in Chinese, but when you see an o, you might want to say [o], so hot sounds like hoht instead of haht. Remember, most of the time, the letter o is pronounced ah. This will give you a good reference point for whenever you want to say ä instead of [o]; astronomy, cäll, läng, prägress, etc.
Conversely, you may pronounce the letter o as ä or ə when it should be an o, as in only, most, both. Make sure that the American o sounds like ou: ounly, moust, bouth.
The schwa is typically overpronounced based on spelling. Work on Chapter 1, Intonation, and Chapter 3, Pronunciation. If your intonation peaks are strong and clear enough, then your valleys will be sufficiently reduced as well. Concentrate on smoothing out and reducing the valleys and ignore spelling!
The [ü] sound is generally overpronounced to ooh. Again, spelling is the culprit. Words such as smooth, choose, and too are spelled with 2 o's and are pronounced with a long u sound, but other words such as took and good are spelled with 2 o's but are pronounced halfway between ih and uh; [tük] and [güd].
In most Chinese dictionaries, the distinction between i and ē is not made. The ē is generally indicated by [i:], which causes problems with final consonants, and the i sound is overpronounced to eee. Practice these four sounds, remembering that tense vowels indicate that you tense your lips or tongue, while lax vowels mean that your lips and tongue are relaxed and the sound is produced in your throat. Unvoiced final consonants (t, s, k, p, ch, f) mean that the vowel is short and sharp; voiced final consonants (d, z, g, b, j, v) mean that the vowel is doubled. Work on Bit or Beat? Bid or Bead? in Chapter 8.
Chinese speakers usually pronounce American r as ä at the end of a word (car sounds like kaaah) or almost a w in the beginning or middle (grow sounds like gwow). The tongue should be curled back more, and the r produced deep in the throat.
If you pronounce th as t or d (depending if it's voiced or unvoiced), then you should allow your tongue tip to move about a quarter of an inch forward, so the very tip is just barely between your teeth. Then, from this position you make a sound similar to t or d.
Chinese will frequently interchange final n and ng. The solution is to add a little schwa at the end, just like you do with the el. This will make the tongue position more apparent, as you can see on page 89. Some people pronounce the sh in a particularly Chinese-sounding way. It seems that the tongue is
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too curled back, which changes the sound. Make sure that the tongue is flat, the tongue tip is just at
the ridge behind the top teeth, and that only a thin stream of air is allowed to escape. Final Consonants One of the defining characteristics of Chinese speech is that the final consonants are left off (hold sounds like ho). Whenever possible, make a liaison with the following word. For example, hold is difficult to say, so try hold on = hol dän. Pay particular attention to Chapter 2.
t
176
American English has a peculiar characteristic in that the t sound is, in many cases, pronounced as a d. Work on Chapter 4.
Location of the Language
Chinese, like American English, is located in the back of the throat. The major difference between the two languages is that English requires that the speaker use the tongue tip a great deal: l, th; and final t, d, n, l.
