Comments on: Tone Wars http://laowaichinese.net/tone-wars.htm Tips and Strategies for Learning to Speak Chinese Fri, 22 Aug 2008 02:09:13 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.1 By: Albert http://laowaichinese.net/tone-wars.htm#comment-3425 Albert Sat, 10 Nov 2007 22:51:34 +0000 http://laowaichinese.net/?p=12#comment-3425 Nedzer, I understand your frustration with this phenomenon, but I would like to submit that there is hope. One of my colleagues in Kunming did quite a lot of work with his students' intonation and it seemed to help many of them. Your comment inspired me to try to find some intonation resources for students of English to add to my burgeoning <a href="http://english.laowaichinese.net/" rel="nofollow">English Tools</a> website, but alas, I haven't found any good ones yet. Nedzer,

I understand your frustration with this phenomenon, but I would like to submit that there is hope. One of my colleagues in Kunming did quite a lot of work with his students’ intonation and it seemed to help many of them. Your comment inspired me to try to find some intonation resources for students of English to add to my burgeoning English Tools website, but alas, I haven’t found any good ones yet.

]]> By: Nedzer http://laowaichinese.net/tone-wars.htm#comment-3424 Nedzer Sat, 10 Nov 2007 15:53:53 +0000 http://laowaichinese.net/?p=12#comment-3424 It's also the biggest problem Chinese students of English have - Learning English tones, they tend to say every word the same speed and with a level tone (often ignoring tone and thinking vocab is more important). In a way mirroring what the stupid Laowai does. This has the effect of making the speaker sound unatached to what they are saying, worse still making the speaker seem permanently pissed off. When an Italian learns English it often sounds sexy because of the way they bring their speech patterns from Italian to English. When a Chinese person learns English it just sounds shite. Trying to explain that they will sound more fluent if they learn the tones is like trying to convince the Chinese not to slurp soup or clear their nose out with the aid of a hankerchief.... Not going to happen. Slurp, slurp, Chinese have tone, Engrish no tone, sluuuurp! It’s also the biggest problem Chinese students of English have - Learning English tones, they tend to say every word the same speed and with a level tone (often ignoring tone and thinking vocab is more important). In a way mirroring what the stupid Laowai does.

This has the effect of making the speaker sound unatached to what they are saying, worse still making the speaker seem permanently pissed off.
When an Italian learns English it often sounds sexy because of the way they bring their speech patterns from Italian to English. When a Chinese person learns English it just sounds shite.
Trying to explain that they will sound more fluent if they learn the tones is like trying to convince the Chinese not to slurp soup or clear their nose out with the aid of a hankerchief…. Not going to happen.

Slurp, slurp, Chinese have tone, Engrish no tone, sluuuurp!

]]> By: m.g. http://laowaichinese.net/tone-wars.htm#comment-29 m.g. Sun, 17 Dec 2006 07:54:16 +0000 http://laowaichinese.net/?p=12#comment-29 Of course you would go to China to teach English and end up teaching Chinese to Americans! (or whoever reads your blog) I trust a post about mnemonic devices for tones is still pending. Of course you would go to China to teach English and end up teaching Chinese to Americans! (or whoever reads your blog) I trust a post about mnemonic devices for tones is still pending.

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