Poll: shhhhhhh! "x" or "sh"

[jkhsu]

@realmayo - Thanks for the poll. Clearly lots of info and interest from users on this topic.

I have a couple of more questions and some observations to share:

1. To those of you who voted: How many of you are native Mandarin speakers (not just native Chinese but native Mandarin speakers) and also know English? How did you vote and why?

2. To those who voted that the Mandarin "x" sound is closer to the English "sh" sound, what is the reasoning for your vote? Rezaf and I are the only ones who have given our explanations.

My observation is that this poll indicates that many non-native Mandarin speakers and/or native English speakers perceive the Mandarin "sh" sound to be closer to the English "sh" sound than the Mandarin "x" sound.

I work with native Chinese in Shanghai and Beijing often. The ones I work with can speak, read and write English good enough for business. The tasks they do for me include technical project management as well as translation of content from Chinese websites into English; all of our conference calls and email communications are in English. I've asked them the same question and they all agree with me that the Mandarin "sh" is more different (to them) than the English "sh" when compared to the Mandarin "x". In an earlier post, I mentioned that the Shanghai natives actually say the Mandarin "x" even more closer to the English "sh"; they have less of the "s" sound when pronouncing the Mandarin "x". However, the native Speakers I've talked to from both Shanghai and Beijing don't agree with the majority of users in this poll.

Therefore, I'm coming to the conclusion that perhaps native Mandarin speakers perceive the Mandarin "sh" to be further from the the English "sh" than non-native Mandarin speakers and/or English native speakers. This could be the fact that most Mandarin learners and English natives were taught to pronounce the Mandarin "sh" by saying "shirt" and stopping as what John Pasden from sinosplice mentions.

You might also say that the native Chinese were taught English incorrectly; and this may be true to a certain extent. However, in my experience with Mandarin learners and from talking with native Chinese is that there are far more native Mandarin speakers who can speak good English than the other way around. I would venture to say that the native Chinese I work with speak better English than many of the forum members can speak Chinese.

I'll end it here. Just thought I'd share my observations.

[Hofmann]

One can treat me like a native Western American English speaker. I'm also a relatively nitpicky Mandarin learner. I chose ʂ because it feels and sounds more like ʃ than ɕ.

I am confident that I am not significantly mispronouncing anything. I can pronounce other languages, including reconstructed Middle Chinese, Cantonese, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Classical Latin, Taiwanese Minnan, Japanese, Hebrew, and Arabic. People have told me my pronunciation is good.

[jkhsu]

@Hofmann, first of all congrats on knowing all those languages. That's pretty cool. I'm not doubting any of your language abilities but the fact is, you're not a native Mandarin speaker right? My observation was just that the native Mandarin speakers I know all disagree with the results of this poll.

[Demonic_Duck]

Ideally you'd want to ask either a) an English person who's never learnt Mandarin (or at least not with pinyin), or b ) a Mandarin person who's never learnt English, if you really want someone who could give an objective opinion on which one is perceptually closer.

[anonymoose]

Well, this is completely random, but I just found a quote on this page:

后来通过考证，发现此音就像英语"sheep"中的"sh"一样，虽然发音的位置比较接近汉语拼音"x"音的位置，但发出来的声音却很近似汉语拼音的"sh"音。

Clearly this is one person who jkhsu doesn't work with.

[rezaf]

@anonymoose： which one do you think is closer in this recording?

Audio Recording 54.mov

[yonglin]

I still maintain that the reason rezaf's third one does not sound like English "sheep" is because of the vowel sound after the sh-, not because of the sh- itself.

[jkhsu]

@anonymoose: Thanks for the link. I had my native Chinese friend look at it. First, while it does look like it was written by a native Chinese, there is no indication it is written by a native Mandarin speaker. And second my native Chinese friend does not agree with the article.

@rezaf: I think the answer is pretty clear in your pronounciation. While using the Mandarin "x" to pronounce the "sheep" produces more of an "s" sound, it is still closer to the English "sheep" than using the Mandarin "sh" pronounciation which sounds more like a muffled sound that is totally not like an English "sheep". I really believe it has to do with the tongue retroflex and having the tip touch the roof of the palate when you pronounce the Mandarin "sh" sound. That's how I learned it. (Just like the video that I posted 3 times!) However, with the tip of your tongue touching the roof of the palate, you can't make an English "sh" sound. This is the reason why native Mandarin speakers don't think the Mandarin "sh" sound is similar to the English "sh" sound.

[anonymoose]

@rezaf

The second sounds like most authentic English. I agree with what yonglin said above.

[jkhsu]

I still maintain that the reason rezaf's third one does not sound like English "sheep" is because of the vowel sound after the sh-, not because of the sh- itself.

I tried to say the Mandarin "sh" and then "eep". The problem is with the tongue retroflex and tip touching the roof of your palate, I get the same results as rezaf. If you pronounce your Mandarin "sh" by starting with "shirt' and then ending at "r", then yes, absolutely, it does sound like "sheep" because you are basically using the English "sh" to pronounce the Mandarin "sh".

[anonymoose]

jkhsu, you've already mentioned your hoards of friends, several times, but it really doesn't help take this discussion forward without any independent verification.

[Hofmann]

It seems like what you need is people qualified to be news anchors both in the US and in the PRC.

[jkhsu]

@anonymoose - Fair enough. You're in Shanghai right? It should be pretty easy to find English speaking Mandarin Chinese natives there to get their opinions. Again, if I can convince "my hoards" of friends as you say, I will let this forum know about it right away. At the same time I'm using them as a resource to help better understand the issue.

[Hofmann]

What do you make of this?

[creamyhorror]

I've asked them the same question and they all agree with me that the Mandarin "sh" is more different (to them) than the English "sh" when compared to the Mandarin "x". In an earlier post, I mentioned that the Shanghai natives actually say the Mandarin "x" even more closer to the English "sh"; they have less of the "s" sound when pronouncing the Mandarin "x". However, the native Speakers I've talked to from both Shanghai and Beijing don't agree with the majority of users in this poll.

You're in Shanghai right? It should be pretty easy to find English speaking Mandarin Chinese natives there to get their opinions.

Maybe what you should do is ask them for recordings of themselves pronouncing

1) pinyin xi, xia, xian, xiang

2) English "she", "shoot", "shave", "sure"

3) pinyin sha, shi, shu, she

That would allow us to see if in their own pronunciations x and English 'sh' are more similar.

edit: Also ask them to have a listen to any of the CCTV Simple Chinese news audio clips I linked above, and say if the xis in those recordings 1) are standard Putonghua pronunciation and 2) resemble English 'sh'. Because those xis don't sound like English 'sh' to me (do they sound even quite like it to you?)

BTW, Sally-txl is a native speaker from Shanghai - if you're reading this, Sally, do you think you could record a sample of the above for us? In standard Putonghua as well as Shanghainese accent, if there's any difference?

[creamyhorror]

@anonymoose： which one do you think is closer in this recording?

@rezaf: Your English "sheep" sounds slightly too thin to me. Check out the pronunciations (especially the UK one) from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary:

http://dictionary.ca...h/sheep?q=sheep

It's noticeably farther back in the throat.

edit: If someone pronounced xi with the 'sh' in either of the pronunciations in the "sheep" link above, it would strike me (and I suspect most native speakers) immediately as poor pronunciation. But if he pronounced it with the 's' in "see" as is pronounced in the same dictionary, I would say it wasn't so bad. What do native speakers think?

[creamyhorror]

I just don't know when to stop, do I...

Therefore, I'm coming to the conclusion that perhaps native Mandarin speakers perceive the Mandarin "sh" to be further from the the English "sh" than non-native Mandarin speakers and/or English native speakers.

That's not necessarily true. I Baidu'd a bit and it seems most people there think English 'sh' is close to pinyin sh. I assume many of these people are native Mandarin speakers.

http://zhidao.baidu....n/86639105.html

http://zhidao.baidu....dex=3&fr2=query

http://zhidao.baidu.....html?an=0&si=3

http://zhidao.baidu.....html?an=0&si=2

An example:

sh汉语拼音的读音和英语的音标发音是否相同？ 举个例子show是读成受还是秀（比较与“秀”相近，但不是把sh读成x而是像“嘘”那样吐出来的感觉）

最佳答案: sh 是“收”的音，和汉语拼音的sh发音是一样的，需要卷舌，也叫翘舌音。不是汉语拼音的X，不能读成想“秀”。

These answers don't really prove anything except that Mandarin speakers don't necessarily think pinyin x is closer to English 'sh'.

(An interesting point is that 秀 is the original transliterated loanword of English "show" (possibly from Cantonese), but the speakers above have concluded that the actual pronunciation is closer to 受.)

[jkhsu]

Maybe what you should do is ask them for recordings of themselves pronouncing

1) pinyin xi, xia, xian, xiang

2) English "she", "shoot", "shave", "sure"

3) pinyin sha, shi, shu, she

That would allow us to see if in their own pronunciations x and English 'sh' are more similar.

@creamyhorror - It doesn't make sense for the native Mandarin speakers to do this because all it's going to prove is that they are not saying the "sh" sounds like a native English speaker. I can tell you now that this is the case so no need to do this. People here are learning Mandarin Chinese right? I think it makes sense for people in this forum to do these recordings and I'll be happy to get the native Mandarin speakers' input. They can tell us:

1. Whether the Mandarin "sh" and "x" sounds are pronounced correctly

2. Whether the Mandarin "sh" sound is more similar to the English "sh" sound or the Mandarin "x" sound.

At the end of the day, what we all want to make sure is #1. If you have your Mandarin "sh" sound close to your English "sh" but your Mandarin "sh" and/or "x" sound is totally off, what's the point?

[jkhsu]

@creamyhorror, I'm looking forward to posting more in the Stephanie Sun thread where we agree on something!

[rezaf]

@rezaf: Your English "sheep" sounds slightly too thin to me. Check out the pronunciations (especially the UK one) from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary:

http://dictionary.ca...h/sheep?q=sheep

It's noticeably farther back in the throat.

Listen to this one: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/sheep

Here the UK pronunciation is noticeably closer to "x" and in your link the US one is thiner than the UK one. Again the UK pronunciation of "she" in http://www.thefreedictionary.com/she is much thiner than the US one, the same goes for "show". The interesting thing is that the UK pronunciation on the Cambridge dictionary is thicker than the US one but on the free dictionary it's completely the opposite. So I don't really think there is one fixed "Sh" pronunciation in English. However no matter how similar ʂ and ʃ might sometimes sound, the position of the tongue for ʂ is so different from ʃ that you can't even meaningfully connect ʂ to some vowels like iː.