Jump to content
Chinese-Forums
  • Sign Up

Learning to speak Cantonese, already can understand it


iwanttolearncanto

Recommended Posts

What would be the best way to learn how to speak Canto? I speak fluent Mandarin and can understand almost all Cantonese, but whenever I try to speak it... it comes out like Mandarin. I just feel like so many words are so similar. I'm wondering what method would be best to learn and how I should approach this. Thanks!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Listen and repeat. That's how I did it. Accuracy depends on how much you care about it. Cantonese can sound inelegant if not pronounced correctly.

My Mandarin pronunciation has a lot of Cantonese influence which I wish would magically fix itself.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is no best way to learn a language. However, it seems you are experiencing interference. This is good because you are taking advantage of the similarities between languages, but don't have mastery of the Mandarin-Cantonese rules and/or enough knowledge of exceptions.

 

I recommend you just study it "normally" and let your Mandarin proficiency help you when it can, instead of looking for an optimal way to go from Mandarin to Cantonese. As you do this, you will get a more nuanced grasp of the relationship between Mandarin and Cantonese.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and select your username and password later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Click here to reply. Select text to quote.

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...