3rd tone -- the throat grinder

[Glenn]

I'm not sure if it's just me and the way I produce sounds in general, but I have this terrible problem where when I read Mandarin out loud I end up killing my throat. To be sure, it happens in English too if I talk for a fairly long time (like almost continuously for over an hour), but with Mandarin it takes much less time (like 5 minutes). My throat starts to hurt a bit and my voice gets weak and starts to crack.

The thing is, I'm 99% certain it's caused by trying to pronounce 3rd tones correctly, or at least distinguishably from the others, and I end up lower than my throat can handle. The thing is, though, if I don't dip down that far, I feel like 3rd tones get lost with the rest and won't be distinguishable from the others, and may even sound like a 1st tone. I don't have anyone to give me feedback on my pronunciation, and I don't have any recording equipment handy to record it and listen to it (and certainly not to post it here, although it'd be sweet if I could), so it looks like unless that changes (which is highly doubtful) I'll just have to find a solution for myself, which I assume will be somewhere low but not as low as I go now.

But here's the thing that confuses me: I seem to regularly hear Chinese people doing this, and they don't seem to have this problem. I hear people going down where their throats can't handle the frequency with what seems like the same regularity I do it, and I have yet to hear any cracking in their voices. I don't get what's different about what I'm doing. Has anyone else had this problem?

[doraemon]

I do agree with you, the third tone is probably the hardest out of all four although I've never really had a problem with it (but sometimes when I say it really quickly it sounds a bit like the second tone). It's the most 'time consuming' one.

[rivercao]

Tyr to pronouce it softly, don't do it too hard, forget about your throat.

I tried several times, and found this tone is different from the English tones, I can't tell exactly, but I think you can watch videos and practice like that...

For example, when you native English speakers say "Wow" softly, do you feel your throat is exhausted? In Chinese, the pronouciation of "wo(3)" is just like that.

None of 3rd tone can be pronouced in the way lasting for a long time, because in that case, the word may sound weird.

[renzhe]

Check this thread out:

http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/21468-sore-throat-after-reading-out-loud&highlight=throat

[edelweis]

I am wondering if the throat issue could be due to using a too low pitch overall (don't know your nationality, only I notice Americans speak English with a very low pitch, lower than most Europeans and much lower than middle-eastern speakers, and, of course, it also varies according to the individual).

My choir leader advised us that the natural pitch of French speakers voice tends to drop at the end of long sentences, so when starting another sentence we should make an effort to raise the pitch back so as to avoid speaking in a too-low pitch which is tiring for vocal cords (this in relation to speaking for a long time such as a speech or when lecturing). Also women speaking in a mostly-male environment need to be careful not to let their pitch drop (unconsciously influenced by the pitch of male voices) since it will tire their voice quickly, and when out of one's ideal range, it is difficult to speak with a loud/sonorous/assertive voice.

Perhaps you could attempt to raise your overall pitch so that the 3rd tone does not require you to make special effort in a too-low pitch. In other words, "sing" Chinese tones a little higher.

I think I remember I did that when I first started to study Chinese and had to find my own range for tones (which is different from textbook CDs people's range, so I could not just mimic their voice as if singing in unison). The FSI pronunciation explanation also talks about how the pitch range of Chinese tones varies according to who is speaking.

Anyway, just my 2cts.

[Glenn]

That's pretty much along the lines of what I'm talking about. I'm American, but I don't feel that has too much to do with my problem. I know that I tend to talk from my throat (and fairly low in pitch), instead of my abdomen, which leads to less than desirable tone when singing. It's part of the reason I don't have a good singing voice. I guess that may have something to do with it, but I hear Chinese speakers hitting frequencies that their throats can't handle (you can tell because there's a sort of tremolo effect in the sound that's produced -- it's not a continuous sound, but more of a flapping). Do Chinese people never have problems with throat fatigue due to third tones?

I've considered raising the baseline pitch that I use when speaking, but it just feels so unnatural that it's embarrassing, even when there's no one around. That may be something I just have to get over, though. I do remember one of my friends who spoke Chinese (also American) having a different tone when speaking Chinese than English. He seemed to speak more nasally in Chinese, but it's been a while since I've heard it, so I don't remember clearly.

So now I'm wondering if whether supporting the breath when speaking more with the abdomen than with the throat leads to less damage and fatigue when speaking Chinese for all people. If a Chinese person where to speak more throatily, like I do, would they have the same issues that I'm having with fatigue or some lost distinction between tones (mostly 3rd and 1st, maybe 3rd and 2nd)? That's not counting people who don't go below their range. I guess a large part of the problem is that I've associated bottoming out with what a 3rd tone should sound like. Maybe I should pay more attention to examples that don't do that, but they're just so much more noticeable when they do. I'm sure that's where the association came from in the first place.

[LiScing]

Do Chinese people never have problems with throat fatigue due to third tones?

I've never heard of the 3rd tone fatigue problem except in this forum. I've been around plenty of 4 to 8 year old Chinese children yapping all day until bedtime and they never have complained about it.

But perhaps if I tried to imitate some accent that I wasn't accustomed to, I would have a similar problem.

[Shi Tong]

Do you think it might be an over effort on your part to emphasise the first part of your third tone, so that when you come to the slight rise at the end, it doesn't sound like second tone?

I've argued a lot of times that people really dont use this rise when they're speaking in normal everyday conversation, and often the pace is so quick that you really dont need to raise at the end of a third tone, especially between other words (like 不好了), mainly I find a raise of the end of the third tone only occurs when a sentence ends in a third (你好) or when it's a commonly used phrase where people are used to raising it again like- (你好) If you apply a rule like this (not raising the third tone in the middle of a sentence) you dont have to dip as far when you're reaching for the bottom of your third tone.

This may help. Does anyone agree?

[Hofmann]

I do. So does the standard.

I had the impression that third tone behavior was covered in almost all Mandarin instructional materials, but apparently not.

[Shi Tong]

I do. So does the standard.

I had the impression that third tone behavior was covered in almost all Mandarin instructional materials, but apparently not.

Hmm.. interesting!

The only kind of official instruction I got (and promptly ignored) about 3rd tone was that it raises at the end. I noticed it was missing in most conversational Chinese and almost dropped it completely, except for certain phrases where people use that raise a lot (你好), and this happened to coincide with most phrases which ended in 3rd tone.

The only *special* tonal instruction I got was for tone sandhi. (3-3= 2-3), and TBH, in most conversation I've heard amoung natives, the third tone is nearly always consistantly low, EVEN at the ends of sentences/ phrases.

But if the OP is really making an effort to dip and raise every time he's pronouncing a third tone, this could really annoy the throat, IMO!!

[Glenn]

As far as I'm aware I'm shooting for the low pitch without a rise. But it's the low pitch that's the problem. If I don't go too low I worry it's sounds like a 1st tone. If I do my throat wears out (and like I said, I hear Chinese people doing what I'm talking about without the rise -- that's where I got it from). I don't know if I can describe this any more accurately. I'll probably just have to give up until I guess my hands on some recording equipment. Agh, if I could just record this woman I'm hearing right now...

[Guest realmayo]

I agree about the throat. I've been struggling to speak less "throatily" and "earnest-sounding" in Chinese. Thanks to my classmates, I can easily pick out Vietnamese accented Chinese, Korean accented Chinese, and now to my ears the typical accent of native English speakers is this throaty, earnest sound. I agree it would sound more Chinese if it was more nasal, this is what I wrote in another thread (www.chinese-forums.com...sounds-from-the-mouth-or-throat):

All I've been able to talk about is trying to decrease the amount of vibration that my throat makes when I speak certain Chinese sounds: -- to my ear, and the ears of a couple of Chinese friends I've asked, this is particularly "non-Chinese" (used when I do it) and the alternative sounds, to them, more Chinese.

[Glenn]

Yeah, I read that thread, but I didn't completely understand what you were talking about. I still don't think I get it. Can you tell me specifically what changes you made? I'd appreciate it.

[Shi Tong]

As far as I'm aware I'm shooting for the low pitch without a rise.

.. but are you making an effort to make your 3rd tone words quite short? I always feel like they're pronounced shorter than a lot of the other tonal sounded words.. making them just as "long" as a 1st tone might indeed result in a ground throat.

I do know what you mean, but I dont know if I can help.. sounds like you're just aiming TOO low.. and maybe you're overcompensating for worrying about sounding 1sttoney?

Either way, I look forward to a sample, and good luck!

[Glenn]

Yeah, it's seeming like the way to go will be to listen really closely for third tones in actual speech and see how high I can go with them and get away with it. haha

The 3rd tone always seemed to me to be the long one, though, where the word slows down, and where the accent is. But maybe I've overgeneralized based on the most obvious instances of this phenomenon. Like I said, it looks like I'll just have to do more observation and more listening to see where it should be.

As far as recording a sample... that'll be a while. I'm not sure how to do it, really, although I guess just getting a mic would do the trick? I'm not sure if I have software to record onto. I've never even looked into it before. Thanks for the encouragement!

[Shi Tong]

Hello Glenn,

I'm glad you're encouraged, that's certainly the aim!!

I think the whole "third tone is the long one" can be a red herring.. actually, in my experience, the third tone can more often than not, sound like the short one. I think if you're making it longer than necessary, then that may be part of the problem.

I was actually thinking before I saw this reply that I was thinking about telling you that the third is supposed to be a shorter tone than the rest (especially between other words), so it's really interesting that you think it's supposed to be longer.

I think this could quite possibly be the problem.

One other thing to mention is that when Chinese people are trying to teach people to speak Chinese, they can sometimes go about lengthening sounds, or over emphasising them to help with distinction between one and another. When you actually hear them chattering, it's totally different, with a very relaxed approach that can lead you into thinking that- for example- the third tone is not a tone where you have to dwell and string out.

In fact, strangely enough, I was taught to say a third tone as always a long dipping- then- rising tone, and later listening to normal people speak totally eradicated the idea (apart from in some select places), I realised it was the reserve of classrooms in some cases because this meant the teacher was making it clear how each tone was "supposed" to be pronounced.

I suppose it could be similar to teaching an English student in the UK to say "milk", with an "L", and then realising that everyone outside actually pronounces it closer to "miwk".. or drawing out sounds- "awwwwffulll" to make it clear where each letter lies.. then realising that everyone just says it fast.

Either way.. as I said, good luck, and certainly dont go out of your way to make a recording, just practice!

[mfgillia]

Its been a couple months - has the problem gone away? Had the same problem and think its a natural part of the learning process. Now its easy for me to produce low third tones although having found a talented native language tutor that teaches tones full time to westerners certainly helped tremendously as well. Now probably my favorite tone. I found the comments above to be generally accurate except the idea of making it a very short tone. I get into problems with my friends and tutors when i do that. If its part of a sentence then i aim to drop it down a pitch and go lower still. If I end the sentence with a third tone then I aim to rise it at the end - otherwise my second tutor corrects me endlessly.

Having no special talent for learning Chinese other than persistence and living in Asia, I don't see how any native English speaker can learn proper pronunciation and tones without countless hours of correction by some talented, patient teachers. If there was ever a time when hiring tutors for one on one instruction should be mandatory its at this stage. Most native speakers, e.g., the majority of my Chinese speaking friends, simply can't teach tones and will often swear they aren't making the usual tone changes when speaking naturally (e.g., two 3rd tones into 2nd and 3rd, three third tones into either 223 or 323 etc.) but they can tell what sounds good and natural and what doesn't.

[Glenn]

Hi, mfgillia. Sorry, I just saw this post. For some reason it didn't show as new for me. Anyway, the problem has gotten better, and I think it's mostly due to being cognizant of the problem and listening to/hearing lots of Chinese people speaking and repeating what they're saying (when I can) the way they said it. I think the issue with reading and having problems with my throat is that my reading just isn't fluent enough, tends to be character-by-character as opposed to word-by-word or phrase-by-phrase, and since I'm not seeing ahead if there are a few 3s in a row I just end up going lower with each one. On the other hand, there are times when I'm reading when it isn't a problem, because I do recognize units as opposed to going character by character, and I can make the adjustments for tone sandhi. I don't have anyone correcting me, though, so I could still be off with my pitches and contours, but from what I can tell I'm at least fairly close to what I'm hearing when I repeat it. Thanks for asking.

[Leigh Abbott]

Hi everyone,

I am a newbie student in Chinese; I have started some lessons with an online tutor but I'm still a bit unsure about their teaching methods so I don't know how well the lessons will go in the future.

I was wondering how often is vocal fry (the crackling sound when you go kind of below your natural range) is present in Chinese. I find that quite a few third tone examples tend to have this sound. As a result I think I tense up my vocal chords when trying to imitate sounds in Chinese to try and get the correct pronunciation but it's the kind of feeling I have when I am putting on a voice and it feels extremely unnatural and my throat just tends to get quite tired. If I try and pronounce words as relaxed as possible...I find that I really just sound like I am saying Chinese words in a full on British accent. I find I cannot shift tone in my voice without tensing up my voice and it starts to hurt after a little while.

Any tips at all?

[roddy]

Merged the above with a relevant topic.