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Growing Experience of Speech | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| BobbyE Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5034 days ago 226 posts - 331 votes  Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 1 of 10 09 December 2013 at 12:04pm | IP Logged |
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On my way out the door to school in the morning my headphones start playing a one-on-
one interview with a Chinese economist. He is talking about economic and financial issues in China. I read the transcript twice beforehand, but it is still a fog when I start listening. The audio quickly becomes clearer. The more I focus on what he's saying, the more I pick up, the clearer it gets, and the easier it is for me to understand. I get about 3 hours of listening in a day. Fast forward two weeks. Native speakers on the streets of Beijing are sounding easier to understand. My speaking is faster. When I listen to an interview or an audio book, the sounds are clearer and more articulate. Also, I reach a high percentage of comprehension of that audio much faster. Although I've been listening for about an hour a day for the last several months, probably even the last two years, but I hadn't noticed such improvement until I started listening about 3 hours a day and with an intense focus on the sound. The growth in clarity seems directly correlated with the intensity of focus I place on the speech. The more I focus, the faster it becomes clear. The clearer it gets, the more I can relax and still understand it. Who else has had this type of experience? How do you describe it? Is there any research on what is happening to the brain? Edited by BobbyE on 09 December 2013 at 12:07pm 9 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Duke100782 Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Philippines https://talktagalog.Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4275 days ago 172 posts - 240 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 2 of 10 09 December 2013 at 2:58pm | IP Logged |
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I've been listening to Chinese lessons on podcasts for several months spread over a year now. It wasn't too
long ago when I started readily comprehending the native-level speed conversations. It's also just recently after living a year and a half in Chongqing do the differences between the regional Chongqinghua dialect and Standard Mandarin have become distinct to me during rapid speech. Right now, during chats with taxi drivers, shopkeepers and waitresses, I can readily understand 50-80% of everything they say (educated guesses can usually fill in the rest). I should mention though I'm of Asian descent so they usually don't slow down or simplify their speech for me until after sometime of trying to talk to me. When it's strong, their (Chongqing) accent once in a while also befuddles me, but at least now I can detect there is an accent. I feel like rate I'm learning is picking up, and I should be on my way very soon reach to a B2 level or higher within 2014. What material are you using? I'm using Popup Chinese for my podcasts. Edited by Duke100782 on 12 December 2013 at 5:07pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| BobbyE Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5034 days ago 226 posts - 331 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 3 of 10 09 December 2013 at 3:08pm | IP Logged |
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That sounds really cool. I'm in Beijing now, but I'd really prefer Chongqing. How do
you like it there? I used MandarinSpot to annotate text. I use audiobooks from shupung8 or haokan5 dot com and then just search Baidu for the texts. My favorite has been 盗墓笔记 I've finished the first two books and re-reading now. It's a great series and haokan has a really professional dramatic rendition of it, true-to-text too. An amazing resource I've found for interviews with transcripts is: http://money.163.com/special/00254BSP/economists.html There are 130 interviews on economics and social issues (each ~30 mins), and another 100 or so on business on another part of that 意见中国 page, and yet on another page their are lectures on various things. All of it has transcripts. It took me multiple- day, multiple-hour searchs to eventually find something like that (ah I waste so much time looking for resources when I already have plenty). Edited by BobbyE on 09 December 2013 at 3:10pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | |
| shk00design Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4231 days ago 747 posts - 1123 votes Speaks: Cantonese*, English, Mandarin Studies: French | Message 4 of 10 09 December 2013 at 8:26pm | IP Logged |
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In recent months I watched a few TV series & movies from Singapore including the latest feature "ILO ILO - 爸妈不
在家" with directory Anthony Chen who won a Gold award at the French Cannes Film Festival. The Chinese community in Singapore & Malaysia use Simplified Chinese characters and they like to insert English words into sentences in their Mandarin speech such as: O不OK, 你的朋友夠friend啦, 我去cantine吃饭, 你出门时忘记帶ID, etc. Hong Kong being another former British colony you don't notice the use English words & phrases in a conversation as much. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Duke100782 Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Philippines https://talktagalog.Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4275 days ago 172 posts - 240 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 5 of 10 12 December 2013 at 5:28pm | IP Logged |
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I really am having great time in Chongqing, partly because I live a very comfortable life here and also
because I get to teach a grappling class once a week, another one of my endeavors which gives me much happiness. But the ability to speak Mandarin is something I'd like to nurture for the rest of life, so I wouldn't mind living in Beijing, just so I could pick up a standard accent from the very start. I have a wife and a baby on the way and my wife is mostly just at home so I spend lots of time with her, so a lot of my exposure is through podcasts, despite living in China. I'd like to walk the streets and absorb standard Mandarin, rather than having to keep trying to discern the Chongqinghua from the Putonghua. Maybe you'd have some insights on this. Thanks or the link, I'm going to check it out as soon as I send this message. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| BobbyE Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5034 days ago 226 posts - 331 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 6 of 10 13 December 2013 at 1:11am | IP Logged |
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That's pretty awesome that you have those things that are making you happier here. I
don't have a wife or a baby, but it would be great to have some family here. I've found that the accent I'm picking up is based on what I listen to at home and almost not at all based on what I hear on the street. I think this is because when I'm working by myself I can deliberately try and copy the sound on the audio and repeat it, while on the street I'm mostly concerned with understanding what people are saying. Also, I struggle a lot with southern accented putonghua. I'm trying to listen to more of it lately, but I imagine living in the south would help me get used to the lack of difference in "zhi" and "zi" or "shi" and "si" that occurs in some southern areas. Have you found this to be the case? 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Duke100782 Bilingual Diglot Senior Member Philippines https://talktagalog.Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4275 days ago 172 posts - 240 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin | Message 7 of 10 14 December 2013 at 1:50am | IP Logged |
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Good point on picking up the accent that you practice over what you hear on the street. Well, I'd say the
accent here in the far inland Southwest (Chongqing and Sichuan) might be different from what one might hear at the coastal south like Fujian and Guangzhou but they also do have much less of the rolled-tongue sound which helps distinguish the "shi" and "si" and the "zhi" and "zi" to my beginner-level Chinese ears than what I hear in my podcasts and lessons. I usually come across this problem when buying things and the speech is very heavily accented - I have a hard time distinguishing between 十 and 四, which is at times a blow to my confidence ("after a year and a half in China I get confused with numbers!"). But the biggest surprise to me is the confusion between the "N" and "L" sound in the accents of the local dialects. For example 我和你 "wo he ni" sounds like "wo he li". I don't detect this often, but when I do I find it quite interesting. I'm not sure if it's present in all accents in southwestern Mandarin or just limited to the speakers of some sub-regional dialects here, but it's definitely there. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| BobbyE Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5034 days ago 226 posts - 331 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin | Message 8 of 10 14 December 2013 at 3:37am | IP Logged |
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That's interesting "N" and "L". I hear that up here almost none even though there are a
lot of migrants from the south. It's funny you mention 十 and 四 because there is this Sichuan restaurant, the first time I went there I ordered a dish that was supposed to be 18, I heard her say "si-ba", "四八", I assumed I just missed though “十” in the middle and thought "no way, this is not 48 kuai", so I looked confused and just grabbed a 50 and waited to see what she gave me in change. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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