The difference between 'q' and 'ch'

[jiasen]

Hey everyone. This is my first post in these forms, and I would like to commend you all on what a brilliant forum you have here.

I hope this hasn't already been covered (I did a quick search). I am having problems in distinguishing between the pronoucing of 'ch' and 'q'. To my ear, ch and q sound both like the english 'ch' sound. However whenever i try to pronounce words using 'ch', a chinese speaker will tell me I am saying 'q' instead of 'ch'.

I can pronouce 'c' perfectly, but I'm not sure how that would translate into pronoucing 'ch'. Any help in this area would be much appreciated.

[zeiss]

The way to pronouce 'ch' is just like 'zh', 'sh' and 'r'. Maybe pronoucing 'r' is easier for you. It soulds like 'ge' in the word 'garage'. I can't input the phonetic symbol here, which looks like [3].

The difference between 'q' and 'ch' is similar to that between and [3] in English, I think.

Maybe here is your mistake. Take two chinese words for example, say '七'(seven) and '吃'(eat), the chinise "pinyin" of which are [qi] and [chi] respectively. We pronounce the 'i' in [qi] just like the english phonetic symbol 'i', but we DO NOT pronouce the 'i' in [chi]. So, you can just pronounce the word '吃' [ch].

I hope it's helpful for you.

[heifeng]

maybe this will help a bit

[gougou]

Also check this table for audio samples.

[Lu]

Do you have a tutor? Try asking her/him, they should be able to explain it better than can be done in writing.

Pinyin q sounds like the English ch; c sounds like ts. Pinyin ch is c but as a retroflex, meaning that you have to curl your tongue backwards while saying c to produce ch. The same goes for sh, zh and r: curl tongue backwards.

I hope this helps.

[lokki]

I agree that the sinosplice site referenced above is the best place to go to find out.

These can be rather tricky to get right by just listening to how it "sounds". The secret lies in knowing some of the physical details, like where the tongue goes and in what part of the mouth the sound is actually formed. THEN practice and listen a lot to get it just right.

Once you have the general idea it can be useful to practice short sentences where you have to switch between the two tongue positions a lot, like zh, j, sh, q, ch ... in succession (back, forward, back, forward,...).

[mirgcire]

If you feel the roof of your mouth with your tongue you will notice some ridges or bumps just behind the teeth. This is the aveolar ridge.

When you make the zh, sh, ch and r sounds, your tongue should be just behind the aveolar ridge, and sound is made by constricting the air between the tip of the tongue and the roof of the mouth.

When you make the j, x, and q sounds the tongue is placed on the aveolar ridge, near the teeth. The sound is made by restricting the air between the surface of the the tongue and the aveolar ridge.

The z, c, and s sounds are made with the tonge even farther forward restricting the air between the teeth and the surface of the tongue.

Here are some good words for practicing tongue position: xian sheng (先生), jin zhang (紧张), and chu qu (出去).

[self-taught-mba]

Down and dirty rule:

1. first understand j and zh since we have very close English equivalents:

j like "jeep"

zh like "German"

2. Then apply to q/ch

q is to j as ch is to zh. the q and j sounds are "sharper"

3. Attend attend universities in Beijing through our service ---shameless plug:mrgreen:

[Lu]

zh like "German"

That's good enough an approximation if you just want to make yourself understood on a trip in China, but if you want to learn good Chinese, you need to know that zh is not actually pronounced like g in German.

[self-taught-mba]

Yep, that's why it's a "down and dirty" rule.

But it also depends on whose saying it. Some people sound remarkably on, after explaining it that way. (followed up by a few imitations of their tutor to do the trick for good)

And for all the BLCU'ers I meet that learn it only by imitation, I venture to say that both are needed (easily understood comparison and imitation).

Anyway, my point was first know the j/zh difference (since they are easier for native english speakers) then find the q/ch

[Jose]

I don't think it is essential to distinguish between the sounds "q" and "ch" (or "j" and "zh"). Even if you pronounce them the same, you will be understood if you get the vowels right. In fact, Hanyu pinyin and zhuyin fuhao (bopomofo) are among the few romanisation systems that differentiate these sounds. The old-fashioned Gwoyeu Romatzyh (國語羅馬字) and Latinxua Sin Wenz (拉丁化新文字) systems, as well as Wade-Giles and the Taiwanese 注音符號第二式 do not use separate consonants for "q" and "j" (or even "x", except for Wade-Giles).

The reason why the use of a separate graph for the "q" consonant is not strictly necessary to represent the sounds of Mandarin Chinese is that it occurs with different vowels than "ch" (and "c"), and no minimal pairs exist that differ only because of the consonant being "q" or "ch". Apparent minimal pairs like "qi", "qu", "quan" vs. "chi", "chu", "chuan" do actually have different vowels, a fact obscured by the double value of the "i" and "u" letters in hanyu pinyin. In fact, "q", like "j" and "x", only occurs in front of "i" and "ü" (the latter losing the two dots as a written convention).

One can think of the "q" sound is as a particular case of the c/ch pair with the front vowels "i" and "ü"; whereas most vowels like "a" or "e" accept combinations with both "c" and "ch", "i" (as in "bi", not as in "si") and "ü" only accept "q" instead. If you pronounce "ca" and "cha" and then try to pronounce the same consonants with "i" and "ü" you will find it harder to make the difference because the front quality of these two vowels somehow pulls the articulation of the consonant to the front too. Something similar happens with the pairs "za / zha" and "sa / sha" as opposed to "ji" and "xi". At the point where the c/ch, j/zh and s/sh distinctions become difficult to make, the sibilant and retroflex consonants merge together and become palatal, following the vowels to the front of the mouth. This is indeed similar to the English example of "jeep" v. "German" mentioned by self-taught-mba, where the vowel may also influence the point of articulation of the consonant.

In phonetic terms, becase of the absence of minimal contrasting pairs with other consonants, "q", "j" and "x" can be regarded as allophones, just like the difference in English between the "p" sounds in "pin" and "spin". Important if you want to sound like a native speaker, but not essential if you want to be understood.

[Quest]

I don't think it is essential to distinguish between the sounds "q" and "ch" (or "j" and "zh").

I think it is essential. You cannot be understood pronoucing all zh ch sh words as j q x, or vice versa. Also, it seems impossible to combine zh ch sh with ü. If you can pronounce zhü, chü, or shü, and it comes out sounding like ju, qu, xu, I'd like to hear it.

PS: I must admit though, when I saw "minimal contrasting pair", I ceased attempting to understand your post.

[self-taught-mba]

Agree with Quest. You need to distinguish.

What he might be saying in essence is that the q/ch combination has vowels and finals combinations that are mutually independent, therefore they are naturally different. I use a program to help students see the pattern.

Ch will never be followed by an “i” (unless in isolation where it is like a “placeholder” so to speak "chi") and never a ü whereas q will always have a “i” or a ü (ü sound because of the change rule: u to ü after j,q, and x)

(Most students never realize this until after we use a program that blacks out invalid finals after an initial is selected and the pattern is easy to see.)

So in that way the pinyin system reinforces the difference naturally by the letters after the first letter (the initial).

That’s why you have to internalize the ü change rules right away.

Probably won’t respond further – rather busy.

[self-taught-mba]

@Jose

PS There might be a reason those systems aren't used here anymore btw.

My advisor has even written before about being able to tell someone's pinyin system from their accent. Read the footnotes in this article"Why Chinese Is So Damn Hard"

Whereas newscasters will now use the official pinyin system.

[Rrina]

Besides the sinosplice site, which indeed is very helpful, you may want to check out the free FSI course which is at: http://fsi-language-courses.com/Chinese.aspx

The tapes and text on ''Pronunciation and romanization'' under ''Resource Module'' are very detailed, with a lot of practice for pronunciation of q, zh, and all the other letters...

[atitarev]

To self-taught-mba:

In my opinion, in English there are no exact equivalents to describe the difference, so they can only be described, no (English) examples can help.

Surprisingly, Polish has good equivalents of qi-chi, ji-zhi, xi-shi pairs:

ci-czy, dzi-dży, si-szy. They are not 100% accurate either, since Polish voiced/unvoiced and no aspiration but palatalised/unpalatalised pairs sounds are the same. The vowel followed is also different.

Japanese has the equivalents for the palatalised only (no palatalisation, though):

qi ち (roughly) [t̠͡ɕi] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_alveolo-palatal_affricate

ji じ can be described as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_alveolo-palatal_affricate (Mandarin is not voiced, though?) [d̠͡ʑ]

xi し [ɕi] for more examples of voiceless alveolo-palatal fricative in other languages: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_alveolo-palatal_fricative

Note in Japanese Romaji, these sounds are rendered as chi, ji and shi, which is confusing, if you know Pinyin. Romaji chi and shi are not the same as Pinyin chi and shi, they are more like qi and xi.

Russian has doubled voiceless alveolo-palatal fricative rendered with letter "щ" [ɕɕ]. ("Щи" would be spelled "xxi", if it were written using Pinyin letters).

[Lu]

Wade-Giles and the Taiwanese 注音符號第二式 [MPS2'] do not use separate consonants for "q" and "j"

Yes, and Hanyu Pinyin doesn't distinguish between u as in yu and u as in lu, or between i as in xi and i as in shi. That doesn't mean they are to be pronounced the same way (yoo? shee?). Romanization is only a system, it is not the actual pronounciation, and it would be a big mistake to treat it as such. Wade-Giles, like any other decent system, expects its users to learn and understand this, so they distinguish between chu (zhu) and chu-dots (ju).

[Jose]

Romanization is only a system, it is not the actual pronounciation, and it would be a big mistake to treat it as such.

I completely agree. That is exactly what I think. Sorry that I wasn't able to express myself clearly. My point is that comparing different transcription systems helps one understand more clearly the grey areas in the description of the sounds of standard Chinese.

Quest, I apologise for using obscure language. By "minimal contrasting pairs" I was thinking of pairs like "bat" vs. "pat" in English, which show that "b" and "p" are universally understood as separate sounds in an unambiguous way. On the other hand, while a phonetician could argue that the "p" in "pin" and the "p" in "spin" are very different sounds, the occurrence of both p sounds follows a regular pattern based on the sounds that surround the "p". That is simply the difference between a phoneme and an allophone.

My point was basically that it is arguable that "q", "j" and "x" are phonemes; they can be regarded as allophones. I have to admit, though, that Chinese people regard "q" and "ch" as completely different sounds, unlike English speakers in the case of the "pin" vs. "spin" example. It is hard to know to what extent this is solely based on native-speaker intuition, or whether the education based on hanyu pinyin (or zhuyin fuhao) plays a role.

And I don't think hanyu pinyin is necessarily a better system than say MPS II, the Yale system, or even Wade-Giles, to understand the phonetics of the language.

[Lu]

Chinese people regard "q" and "ch" as completely different sounds

This is because they are two completely different sounds, made in different places in the mouth. I can't imagine anyone with good Chinese, be they native or not, pronouncing these two the same way. They might be related, but so are, for example, p, k and t, yet no one with decent English (Dutch, Spanish, etc) would mix them up.

I don't think hanyu pinyin is necessarily a better system than say MPS II, the Yale system, or even Wade-Giles, to understand the phonetics of the language

I don't know much about MPS2, but the Taiwanese government is not exactly renown for its wise use of romanization, and from what I've seen of MPS2 it looks like a botched version of Yale.

Yale, if I'm not mistaken, was created specifically for English-speaking learners of Chinese, and not so much with an eye on linguistics or phonetics. As a system for English-speaking learners, it certainly has its merits.

Hanyu Pinyin shows some relations between sounds, like that between z-zh, s-sh and c-ch very clearly, where W-G does not. W-G also is rather messy with the difference between u as in yu and u as in bu, and in how it writes the end of sounds like si and chi (ssu, ch'ih). From my limited linguistic experience, I don't think HYPY is less good a system than W-G, and certainly better than Yale.

[lokki]

When you make the j' date=' x, and q sounds the tongue is placed on the aveolar ridge, near the teeth. The sound is made by restricting the air between the surface of the the tongue and the aveolar ridge.

The z, c, and s sounds are made with the tonge even farther forward restricting the air between the teeth and the surface of the tongue.[/quote']

Sorry mirgcire, but that is another example of confusing and inaccurate information that can lead you totally astray. Sadly, much of the advice on pronunciation offered on these forums, and of what you can dig up on the web, is simply wrong.

Again, go to the sinosplice site and find out. The explanations found in the pronunciation modules of the FSI course are also very good and can be trusted.

Also, all explanations based on "similar" sounds in English are just rough approximations. They can help you get the general idea initially but if you are serious about learning you'd better just ignore them and go straight for the accurate information at sinosplice and in the FSI course.

It might be true that you can get away with not making a difference between two sounds, and still be understood most of the time, but what kind of an excuse is that ? Sure, it can be useful to be aware of the fact, but it's the wrong attitude for somone to base their learning on.