Gray
Cantonese pronunciation: 仔, 走, 正, 再, 像, 雀
I've been studying Cantonese for a while, but despite my best efforts, there's still one sound (or two sounds?) that I just can't seem to figure out. I'll explain what I mean below, but in brief, my main question is this:
1) Do these characters (只 制 走 正) begin with the same consonant sound as these characters (再 鍾 將 狀 雀)? Or are they different? Or does the pronunciation depend on the speaker?
According to both the Jyutping and Yale romanization systems, all of these characters (只 制 走 正 再 鍾 將 狀 雀) begin with the same consonant sound. Jyutping seems to identify the sound as resembling /ts/, as in the English "cats," and uses the letter Z to write all of these words. (Z is pronounced as /ts/ in some languages, such as German.) Yale seems to identify the sound as resembling /dʒ/, the sound at the beginning of the English "jump." It uses the letter J to write all of these words. So 走 is written as <em>zau</em> in Jyutping, and as <em>jau</em> in Yale.
However, my question is not about romanization, but about the actual pronunciation of the words.
In general, I seem to find that most speakers use a sound like "ts" in front of certain vowel sounds such as <em>i, e, ai, au</em>. For example, 只, 正, 制, and 就 seem to usually be pronounced with a sound like "ts" at the beginning.
I also find that most speakers seem to use a sound that is more like "j" (/dʒ/) in front of vowels such as <em>u, o, oi, oe</em>. For example, 鍾, 狀, 再, 將, and 雀 seem to usually be pronounced with a /dʒ/ or "j"-like sound.
But this doesn't seem to be an actual, consistent rule. I've heard some native speakers who seem to pronounce almost <em>all</em> of these words (仔, 走, 再, 雀, etc.) with a "ts" sound. I've also heard some speakers who use a "j" sound in places where I would expect "ts," such as the word 仔.
Here's a video with some examples of what I'm talking about:
At 0:42, the blonde girl says 華仔. She pronounces 仔 with a consonant that sounds like "j" (or even "ch") to me.
劉德華 then repeats the same word immediately after her, but he pronounces 仔 with a "ts" sound.
Most of the people in the video seem to usually use a "ts" sound for 仔... but not always. For instance, at 8:29, the host pronounces 仔 with a "j" sound, and so does another girl at 11:04.
So, two more questions:
2) Is it equally correct to pronounce 仔 (as in 乖仔) with both a "ts" sound (tsai) and a "j" sound (jai), or is the pronunciation with "j" incorrect?
3) Is it equally correct to pronounce 再 (as in 再見) with both a "ts" sound (tsoi) and a "j" sound (joi), or is the pronunciation with "ts" incorrect?
One reason why I find this topic confusing is because I sometimes <em>also </em>find it hard to distinguish between words like 再 and 賽 (/dʒoi/ and /tʃoi/). Most of the time, I can hear the difference. I know that the sound in 再/最/中 is unaspirated, and the sound in 賽/趣/沖 is aspirated. I can <em>usually</em> hear it.
But, for example, at 4:42 in the video, the host says 中文. The way she says it, the word 中 sounds exactly like 沖 (<em>chung</em>) to me.
At 4:44, the 最 in 最好 sounds like 趣 (<em>cheoi</em>) to me. At 5:03, the 咗 in 寫咗 sounds like 楚 (<em>cho</em>) to me.
Teachers have told me that words like 最/中/再/像 should be pronounced with an English "j" sound. But to me, the Cantonese sound usually seems sharper than a "j." I don't know if this is correct or not.
For example, to me, the blonde girl's pronunciation of 仔 at 0:42 sounds exactly like the "ch" sound in 妻. The way 劉德華 says the same word, with a "ts" sound, sounds completely different to me. And <em>neither of them</em> sound like an English "j."
I'd be curious to know whether the speakers in the video are pronouncing these words clearly (as 中/最/ 咗), or if they could be mistaken for 沖/趣/楚 out of context. Am I hearing the sounds wrong? Or is context the key here?
Thank you to anyone who read all of this! Any thoughts on the topic would be much appreciated. :)
2019年8月31日 01:56
评论 · 8
2
@Gray
While waiting for a knowledgeable person to contribute, here is an interpretation of the sound change that you refer to.
/t͡sʰ/ and /t͡s/ are described as alveolar, but palatalized before certain vowels. Thus, /t͡sʰ/ has allophones [t͡sʰ] and [t͡ʃʰ]. The [t͡sʰ] is the German < z > in < zehn > (ten) and the [t͡ʃʰ] is the English < ch > in < cheese >.
So you probably hear variation between "ts" and "ch" which is not noticed by native speakers because this is not a phonemic difference.
2019年9月1日
2
@Gray
Some languages, such as English, distinguish between voiced and unvoiced phonemes. I have taught students whose first language does not make the distinction.
I have no direct knowledge, but according to wikipedia, Chinese makes a distinction between aspirated and unaspirated but not voiced and unvoiced.
[excerpt]
Between pairs of stops or affricates, having the same place and manner of articulation, the primary distinction is not <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_(phonetics)" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">voiced</a> vs. voiceless (as in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_language" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">French</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_language" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">Japanese</a>), but unaspirated vs. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspirated_consonant" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">aspirated</a> (as in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic_language" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">Icelandic</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Gaelic" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">Scottish Gaelic</a>). The unaspirated stops and affricates may however become voiced in weak syllables (see <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Chinese_phonology#Syllable_reduction" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">§ Syllable reduction</a> below). Such pairs are represented in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinyin" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">pinyin</a> system mostly using letters which in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romance_languages" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">Romance languages</a> generally denote voiceless/voiced pairs (for example [p] and [b]), or in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanic_languages" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">Germanic languages</a> often denotes <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fortis_and_lenis" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(11, 0, 128);">fortis/lenis</a> pairs (for example initial aspirated voiceless/unaspirated voiced pairs such as [pʰ] and [b]). However, in pinyin they denote aspirated/unaspirated pairs, for example /pʰ/ and /p/ are represented with <em style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34);">p</em> and <em style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34);">b </em>respectively.
Hopefully someboey with a suitable background in Cantonese phonology can add to this discussion.
2019年9月1日
2
Hello! This is an interesting question. I am a native Cantonese speaker. Let me try to answer this:
Do these characters (只 制 走 正) begin with the same consonant sound as these characters (再 鍾 將 狀 雀)? Or are they different? Or does the pronunciation depend on the speaker?
Answer: According to a lot of dictionaries, you are right that these characters begin with the same consonant. But practically, we pronounce 只 制 走 正 with 'ts' and 再 鍾 將 狀 雀 with 'j' sound.
仔 is pronounced with 'ts' sound. In the video, the blonde girl was only trying to make it cute to say it with 'j' sound. Nothing more!
One thing to note is, people speak fast and try to say things in a 'fun' way in these kind of TV programs, so they don't mean to pronounce every character precisely as you hear in class.
2019年8月31日
2
Hi Gray :
Most of time the pronounce is depend on the speaker. It's hard to say which is correct.
Question: 1)
Answer:
Most of time is depend on the speaker.
Question: For the video Question:
Answer:
The video At 0:42, that girl say 仔 ("ch") is not we say, we usually say 仔 ("j")
Question 2:
("j") is corrected
Question 3:
most of time "ts" incorrect
2019年8月31日
1
Thanks very much for your comment, Chris. You're right -- I didn't think about the importance of voiced/unvoiced versus aspirated/unaspirated when I was writing this post, but I've read about it before. Your comment corroborates a video about Cantonese consonant pronunciation that someone linked me to after I made this post: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vy_KV0FXPTY" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vy_KV0FXPTY</a>;
According to the video, the sounds that Jyutping transcribes as "c" and "z" are actually both the same sound, /ts/, in aspirated and unaspirated forms. This is kind of a revelation to me, because teachers always say that "c" is always pronounced like the English "ch." I mean, it's true that if you pronounce it as "ch," Cantonese speakers will understand you, but I've always thought this description was slightly off. Aspirated "ts" sounds right.
But most importantly for me, the video also includes this:
"And I'll throw in a quick note about these two consonants [c and z] that I haven't seen discussed anywhere else. When these consonants show up before back rounded vowels like <em>u</em>, <em>oe</em>, and <em>o</em>, then some speakers will pull their tongues back a bit, and those two consonants, at least to my ear, will start sounding more like aspirated and unaspirated versions of /ch/ rather than /ts/."
I feel like this fully explains my confusion, because although English does use aspiration to distinguish pairs like p/b and t/d, I feel like the difference between ch/j is more about voicing than aspiration. At least, to me, a voiceless but unaspirated "ch" sounds about as similar to aspirated "ch" as it does to "j."
I'm thinking it might be best if I just forget about the English letter "j," and focus on the idea of aspirated "ch" versus unaspirated "ch" (and "ts") if I want to consistently tell these sounds apart!
2019年9月1日
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