Lip reading - is it possible in Chinese?

[lokki]

It just occured to me that lip reading must be more difficult in Chinese than for non-tonal languages. It wouldn't seem likely that you can pick up too many visual cues to help determine what tone is being used.

Is lip reading possible at all in Chinese? Is it a skill regularly acquired by deaf people as it is in the west? Is it noticeably harder than for non-tonal languages?

[Meng Lelan]

Yes, I'm a deaf learner of Chinese as a foreign language. I grew up speechreading in English then went to China to study Chinese and work. It is harder to speechread in Chinese because it is a tonal language but it is indeed possible because the deaf person uses context a lot more than a hearing person to understand the spoken message. I have quite a few Chinese deaf friends in China and they can and do speechread in Chinese. Even better than I can.

But their hearing impairment "flattened" out their tones so that hearing Chinese could not understand what my deaf Chinese friends said in spoken Chinese. Sometimes I or one of their relatives had to repeat in Chinese what the deaf Chinese person said in order to put the tones back on the words.

I think there may be a few other deaf/hearing impaired people in this forums who can answer this question also.

[trevelyan]

That's really impressing Meng. I know this may seem like a stupid question, but how do you do it? Are you focusing mostly on texts or videos?

[simonlaing]

Yeah my wife's grandfather can lip read. I think for people who speak fairly fluent Putonghua it is easier than if it is a dialect.

Nanjing's dialect is fairly closer to Beijing's (I think because of WW2 and the universities here).

But also like other things it is easier for them to read lips if you're facing them and they can see you mouth and tongue.

I second the context issue as well, as sometimes we have to correct him if we only gave one or two word answers these might be interpreted 2 ways.

Have fun,

Simon:)

[Meng Lelan]

I know this may seem like a stupid question, but how do you do it? Are you focusing mostly on texts or videos?

Not a stupid question :-)

Texts and videos can't teach speechreading. When I was 3 years old I started at a school for the deaf where they had me practice speechreading and taught me how sounds look different on the lips, teeth, tongue, etc. A lot of practice, drilling, etc everyday until I was 7. A lot of this transfered over to Chinese speechreading, but there are more consonants in Chinese that can't be differentiated. Plus the tones of course. So I have to force myself to pay more attention to content and context, which I don't even bother to do in English.

[HashiriKata]

That is amazing info, Meng Lelan. From some of your posts, I gather that you teach Chinese. This must be a real challenge for someone with hearing impair. Would you care to share with us how you do it and what would be the most difficult aspect for you in the teaching?

Thanks,

[Meng Lelan]

.

Would you care to share with us how you do it and what would be the most difficult aspect for you in the teaching?

You have an excellent memory, yes, I do teach Chinese to adult learners at the weekend Chinese School, my third year now

How I do it, well, it's my passion in my life since I was six years old. Even though people kind of looked at me in a strange way when I said I wanted to grow up and teach Chinese. Learning to speak was a problem because I had to go over to the Beijing School for the Deaf and have staff there show me how to do the tones and some of the sounds. But I did fine. Listening is a real big problem out in the real world, but then again, I do really badly in English in the real world, in fact I can't use a telephone without a hearing person helping me.

The hardest part of teaching was trying to get certified to teach Chinese in Texas. They told me I had to pass the written test (no problem, got score of Advanced High, just below the highest of Superior) and the oral test. Turned out the oral test is done by phone. I spent about six months trying to get an alternate test that would allow me to speechread the examiner instead of by phone. Pretty soon even the commissioner of education in the state of Texas got involved, and the office of disabilities in Texas got involved, the director of the test services got involved, the director of teacher credentials of Texas got involved, etc etc everything short of the president of the United States and Jiang Zemin....

finally they made arrangements where I could speechread the examiner, read the printed questions aloud into a tape recorder, and speak my answers into a tape recorder, and got rating of Advanced High for the oral test.

So now I have the certificate, but trying to get a real job as a high school teacher of Chinese for the other 40 hours of the work week is a real challenge.

[yonglin]

Meng Lelan, you must be the coolest person I've ever met (if reading your posts on a forum qualifies as "meet") and I now have a new role model in life. I think you can do anything.

[renzhe]

That is crazy impressive. All my Chinese-related struggles seem tiny in comparison.

Mad respect.

[Meng Lelan]

Don't be impressed with me - in my crazy quest for a deaf-friendly oral exam, the disability center of Texas stepped in with their director - an American born Taiwanese, for heavens sakes - and it turned out HER mother was born deaf in Taiwan, got married, had two hearing and two deaf children (one of them became director of the disability center in Texas), moved them all to the US, got a divorce, and raised four children on her own after that while trying to learn English and trying to get the kids to learn/maintain Chinese. THAT'S impressive. I almost passed out just trying to think/imagine that.

[HashiriKata]

Thank you, Meng Lelan, for sharing your story with us. There may be other impressive stories, too, but yours is personal to us because we somehow know you. Just to learn is already difficult and to teach is just so incredible. From now on, if anyone complains Chinese being difficult, I'll ask them to read this thread again .

Anyway, I hope that you'll soon find the job you want but do remember, a 40 hours a week teaching Chinese will kill you within weeks, even for someone with your will & stamina.

[Meng Lelan]

Anyway, I hope that you'll soon find the job you want but do remember, a 40 hours a week teaching Chinese will kill you within weeks, even for someone with your will & stamina.

Oh, no, it won't, because it's all I care about

[trevelyan]

Wow. What an inspiring story. All I can say is that I hope you find a great and satisfying job.

[Meng Lelan]

What an inspiring story. All I can say is that I hope you find a great and satisfying job.

Thanks travelyan...that's my goal for the upcoming school year.

I'm surprised there aren't any other deaf/hearing impaired forum members coming forward with comments on speechreading in Chinese??

[Lu]

How I do it, well, it's my passion in my life since I was six years old. Even though people kind of looked at me in a strange way when I said I wanted to grow up and teach Chinese.

Awesome. If a deaf person can become a Chinese teacher, then anything is possible. I'm sure you'll find a job, too. Jiayou!

[耳耳语语]

I just watch "Detective Dee 2". In the movie one of Judge Ti's abilities is than he can read on lips, as one other character says "他会读唇语".

So I also wondered if it was possible, and how he could decipher some inner movement of the mouth like zi ci si ri ^^.

[Meng Lelan]

Under good lighting yes you can see the tongue relative to teeth. Shape of mouth can clue in on some vowels (like "oh!" is more rounded than "eek!"). By the way I always say 我會看口形  not 我會讀唇語.   

 

Wow this is an old thread and my career has shifted away from Chinese teaching and towards teaching cane travel to the deafblind..........

[seraphim022]

Wow, this is indeed an old thread!! But I stumbled across this thread when I was googling if for deaf people learning to speak Chinese since there's a possibility I may move to Shanghai for work for about a year. 

 

I was born profoundly deaf in both ears and had a Cochlear Implant since I was 3. I'm fluent in both American Sign Language and English.

 

I grew up in the United States to Chinese immigrant parents. Mandarin were spoken at home but they tend to always speak English to me. I used to go to a Chinese language school every Sunday, but I didn't have any accommodations back then (such as captioning or sign language interpreters). But I managed to pick up some Mandarin. When I went to China about 5-6 years ago, I was placed in an environment where I had to learn to speak Chinese and memorize the tones. I can't hear the tones, but I would put in the effort to speak with tones, if I could. Sometimes people understood me...sometimes they don't. 

 

I noticed that I was able to lip-read some Chinese....well...for the Chinese words and phrases I hear again and again and with the right context clues. It's definitely a lot harder to lipread Chinese than English, but maybe that's because I grew up speaking English. I'm just wondering if someone deaf like myself could learn to comprehend and speak Mandarin very well in a certain length of time. 

[imron]

Hi seraphim022, welcome to the forums.  You might also be interested in this post by rmpalpha.

[seraphim022]

Thanks so much for the link!!