pronounciation question

[Harpoon]

Yi5 ge4 nan2 hai2 er2

supposed to mean "a boy"... but the last part seems to be pronounced "nan2 har2"... is this the "hai" and "er" slurred together from the dialect or is it a grammer rule... I also don't understand the purpose of the "er2" (兒 - son), seems redundant (boy son?)

thanks

[roddy]

儿 has two functions. In one it means 'boy / child' and gets it's full value. Eg

儿子

女儿

In others it acts as a suffix to the syllable before, and merges. For example, 玩儿 will lose the 'n' and become something like wa-r.

This has come up a few times before.

Here

and under 2) in the first post here and this will also help. And this one also.

Roddy

[Harpoon]

ah i see.. thanks wasn't sure what criteria to search it with :o

[roddy]

It can be tricky - you've got to search a combination of characters, pinyin and English to find stuff on here.

[Harpoon]

hmm.. i can't really ascertain from those posts whether or not this "r-coloring" is popular in Taiwan or not..

[mlomker]

I'm quite certain that it is standard Mandarin. I have Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur (Beijing-based) and they pronounce 'boy' that way.

Another example is yi dian er. In this case it's actually written in pinyin as yi1 dianr3. My Chinese teacher insists on spelling it out in the former way, though.

[geraldc]

hmm.. i can't really ascertain from those posts whether or not this "r-coloring" is popular in Taiwan or not..

r-colouring is really just a Beijing thing, but you get lots of different regional variations all over the place. In the south rather than say 一点儿, they'll double the 点 to get 一点点 etc.

Taiwan has different pronunciations too e.g. "是"s sound more like "si" than "shi" or at least they do to me.

[beirne]

hmm.. i can't really ascertain from those posts whether or not this "r-coloring" is popular in Taiwan or not..

I don't know about Taiwan, but my teacher whose background is southern Chinese will comment on how the rs sound funny to her. Sometimes when I leave an r out, though, she will explain that the r really belongs there. So sometimes it is the language and sometimes it is accent. Just one of those things you learn as you go.

[mlomker]

My Oxford Starter dictionary spells it as nan2hair2 in pinyin. It seems like they take the 'er' and drop the 'e' when forming a word.

[Harpoon]

so for which words is it? it can't be every noun, can it?

okay i was listening to a local taiwanese mandarin radio station and I honestly did not hear "r" at the end of any syllable except for "er" itself.

[mlomker]

so for which words is it? it can't be every noun, can it?

okay i was listening to a local taiwanese mandarin radio station and I honestly did not hear "r" at the end of any syllable except for "er" itself.

'r-coloring' is adding an 'r' sound to a word that wouldn't have it in standard Mandarin. I was confused with your example because yidianr and nanhair are the correct pinyin spellings--the ending 'er' isn't extra in those words.

The addition of the 'r' sound is unique to Beijing as far as I know. There are some web pages that discuss it:

http://www.answers.com/topic/beijing-dialect-1

My classroom teacher and my tutor are both Taiwenese. The only thing that I've noticed so far about their Mandarin is that they fail to differentiate some sounds, for example, they pronounce shen1 or sheng1 the same. Shi4 and si4 are also the same. I asked my tutor and he said that they're 'suppose to' sound the same. My audio programs do differentiate them, though, so I'm starting to assume that is a Taiwan-thing.

[Harpoon]

hmm confusing... so in which nouns do you "r color"? obviously it's not all of them...

[wai ming]

As far as I know, 儿化 seems to be a Beijing/Beijing-standard Putonghua thing. Most people I know from Southern China and Chinese-speakers from South-East Asia don't really pronounce the 儿 ending, although I do remember it written in smaller typeface in some Singaporean Chinese textbooks.

Just a few words I can remember it being used with (off the top of my head):

男孩儿/女孩儿 nan2 hair2/ nv3 hair2

好玩儿 hao3 wanr2 (sounds like warr)

公园儿 gong1 yuar2 (I remember hearing this in a year 12 aural comprehension exam, it took me ages to work out what was meant!)

饭馆儿 fan4 guar3 (my friend once tried to say 饭馆 to a teacher from Beijing, and he didn't understand her until she decided to try adding the -r to it )

伙伴儿 huo3 banr4

一盘儿 (yi4 panr2)

[Lu]

And bing1kuar4, tang2kuar4.

Gongyuan, without erhua, is 公元, meaning A.D. (according to my previous Dongbei language partner).

Taiwanese Mandarin is a bit different from mainland, especially Beijing, Mandarin.

Firstly, Taiwan has no erhua at all. Some textbooks here say it's nanhair, yidianr and zhaopianr, but you'll never hear anyone actually say it that way here, it's always nanhaizi, yidian, zhaopian.

Secondly, Taiwanese often don't pronounce retroflexes. Zhi chi shi sounds like zi ci si here, and even rou and rong sometimes turn into lou and long. This pronounciation is widely used and understood in Taiwan, but it is not correct standard Mandarin. Mlomker, if your tutor says sheng is supposed to sound like seng he's incorrect.

Another difference is that some Taiwanese speakers don't see the difference between -ng and -n.

All in all, the sentence 'Wo shi ShiDa de xuesheng' may well turn into 'Wo si SiDa de xuesen', and still be understood in Taiwan.

[bhchao]

Secondly, Taiwanese often don't pronounce retroflexes. Zhi chi shi sounds like zi ci si here, and even rou and rong sometimes turn into lou and long. This pronounciation is widely used and understood in Taiwan, but it is not correct standard Mandarin.

Yeah, 你是不是 is pronounced 你四不四 in Taiwanese Mandarin. I grew up speaking Taiwanese Mandarin and pronounced it 你四不四, and got used to hearing people pronounce it the same way. Therefore the mainland pronunciation of 你是不是 sounds odd to my ears and may also sound odd to other Taiwanese Mandarin speakers even though it is the correct pronunciation.

[gougou]

hmm confusing... so in which nouns do you "r color"? obviously it's not all of them...

In a Beijing bookstore, I once saw a book called "No problem with 儿化", or something along these lines. I can't find the exact reference just now, but it seems to be part of a series (i.e. "No problem with..." + Chinese verbs, + Chinese Grammar...)

[BeijingSlacker]

Yeah, 你是不是 is pronounced 你四不四 in Taiwanese Mandarin. I grew up speaking Taiwanese Mandarin and pronounced it 你四不四, and got used to hearing people pronounce it the same way. Therefore the mainland pronunciation of 你是不是 sounds odd to my ears and may also sound odd to other Taiwanese Mandarin speakers even though it is the correct pronunciation.

What confuses me is this. Does standard Taiwanese Mandarin not distinguish si/shi, ci/chi, zi/zhi or do most people just prefer not to pronouce the differences? The reason I am asking is that all the Taiwanese TV news announcers I've heard definitely pronounce the differences clearly (They seem to speak perfect Beijing-standarded Mandarin) but most of the actually Taiwanese people I've met do not distinguish.

[shibo77]

Good explanation with IPA:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinyin#Pronunciation_of_finals

-Shibo

[bhchao]

Does standard Taiwanese Mandarin not distinguish si/shi, ci/chi, zi/zhi or do most people just prefer not to pronouce the differences?

Good question, one that I really do not have a definite answer for. I think Taiwanese Mandarin speakers are aware of the differences between the mainland pronunciation and the pronunciation used in Taiwan. But the way they are brought up in the family to speak Mandarin has an influence on whether they say si or shi. Also social norms such as daily interaction with other Taiwanese Mandarin speakers are another factor in whether one pronounces 是 as si or shi.

When I went to elementary school in Taiwan, none of my friends or fellow students pronounced 是 as shi. They all pronounced it as si. My parents also pronounced it as si.

Personally I know shi is the correct pronunciation of 是. But even if I try to correct myself into saying shi instead of si, I would feel very awkward and out of place from the mainstream that I grew up in.

The same can be said of other Taiwanese Mandarin speakers.

[mlomker]

When I went to elementary school in Taiwan, none of my friends or fellow students pronounced 是 as shi. They all pronounced it as si. My parents also pronounced it as si.

I really appreciate this conversation. I am only in my first six months of studying Chinese and I'm glad that my ears were not deceiving me. My tutor and instructor are both Taiwanese, but I have Rosetta/Pimsleur to contrast them with.

I have been Skype-ing with a couple people on the mainland as well. The fellow from Shenzhen speaks standard putonghua, but there are obvious differences in dongbeihua. I ran across gong1 yuar2 vs. gong1 yuan2 and shui2 vs shei2 in my first conversation.