How to speak with a Fujian accent? + Fujianese slang?

[SXM]

Hi everyone, this is my first post at the forums here,

I'm currently studying Chinese in Xiamen, FJ on a intermediate level. My teacher is a Xiamen local and has an distinguishable accent; Zh/Ch/Sh becomes Z/C/S, N becomes L, and R become L. I have kind of adopted this accent me too, as I'm living in Xiamen and not really planning to go to the north.

Anyway, I would like to know if there are any other pronunciation changes people from this area usually do? I'm quite knew to town and those above are the only really noticable changes I've heard.

Also, I would also like to learn some Xiamen/Fujian slang or expressions, to complement all those standard text book words I've heard. It can just be any kind of word.

Please note I'm not talking about 闽南话, or anything like that, but standard Mandarin.

/SXM

[Michaelyus]

How basilectal do you want to go? My natural accent is a weird hybrid (because of my parentage) - I usually say I have 闽腔粤调 (which is 很难接受 for most native Chinese)! Although having said that, my perceptions are within the overseas community of Fujianese rather than in Fujian, and also from a bit further north, nearer 福州, up the coast from 厦门.

The other major change in the consonants that would be considered normal (i.e. acceptable within the area for most arenas of life, including dealing with the public) is the f/h merger. Usually to /h/, but it can be realised as anything from [h~ɸ~f]. Some people may use [h] informally and [f] formally (just like they use informally in all places and [ʃ~ʂ] formally in all places). The usual Beijing and Northeastern [x] realisation for h- is distinctly absent from the accent.

Merging final -n and -ng is also notorious; as to its acceptability, it's hard to judge. It's well known that -n and -ng undergo all kinds of changes in standard Mandarin anyway (otherwise it sounds really over-enunciated </personal judgment>). Technically a merger of all the nasals of Middle Chinese into one is found in more northerly areas of Fujian anyway; in 闽南 it's also considered sub-standard by some, but it is very common.

What can be quite distinctive is the glottal stops. Certain words may preserve the glottal stops in the final that correspond to 入声 in Middle Chinese (these of course are present in 闽南 too, but also in 'native' southern Mandarin of e.g. 南京). This might be a little idiosyncratic though, but it can be extremely high frequency in some speakers' speech (because some really common words do have this feature, e.g. 一、吃 [even when considered as a Mandarin version of 食]、作、越). I think it is more common to transfer a glottal stop onto the end with syllables in Mandarin first tone and fourth tone, probably because they are the shortest in duration (I've never heard 学习 with a glottal stop in the middle).

Glottal stops to break up vowel sequences in words are much more common.

Non-pronunciation of the w- of wu and the y- of yi, yin, ying, is actually included in the standard, so this is one Fujian feature that makes it more standard than its surroundings. I will warn that it will probably never be heard in front of a syllable (and will be replaced by a glottal stop) in a Fujianese accent, whereas I don't think the standard actually prescribes or proscribes either way.

Of the Pinyin w- initials that are pronounced, I would say that [ʋ] is not usually found as a variant in a Fujian accent behind /e/: strictly [w].

Lengthening of glides is common in some syllables (probably ones that only have a single vowel in the final). E.g. 学 xué may spend longer on the middle [ɥ~y] than on the end. But this is rather inconsistent. I don't know whether that corresponds to 闽语 lack of glide or to extra 入声 effects or something...I do think that it is more common with /ɥ/ glides though (Pinyin ü).

Concomitant with the glide lengthening is a pronunciation of Pinyin -üan and -üe (i.e. juan, quan, xuan, yuan, jue, que, xue, yue, lüe, nüe) which uses a different vowel, probably closer to [ɪ] than [ɛ]. I think this is probably even more common the glide lengthening.

Just remembered that -i- has a similar treatment. E.g. 写 xiě can have a longer -i- than -e, and the vowel becomes closer to [ɪ] anyway. Also applies to -ian and yan which its medial vowel closer to [ɪ] than [ɛ].

Potentially some may merge Pinyin ü in all environments to Pinyin i (i.e. /y/ realised as , /ɥ/ as [j]). This sounds more southeast Asian to me, with strong 闽南 influence, but also maybe too non-standard for public use, though I don't know how it is perceived in modern 厦门. I also believe this is a difference between north and south Fujianese accents, with the merger being more common in the south.

Correlating with the loss of distinction between -n and -ng, there is very little difference in quality between -an and -ang (in the Beijing standard the -ang is definitely a back vowel [ɑ], while -a and -an [apart from -üan and -ian] are [a], a central vowel), which is usally centralised [a]. I don't think there is much distinction between -en and -eng, although I don't recall whether it is shifted in one direction or the other. Maybe it's in free variation.

The absence of 儿化 and low frequency of neutral tone is pretty well-known.

Slight differences in the tone values. Not massive differences though: no differences in contour as far as I can tell. The fourth tone probably doesn't start as high nor finish as low: 42 rather than 51. Maybe a slightly lower first tone, 44 rather than 55. But these need literature references rather than my offhand recollections!

Rhythm can be slightly different (rhythm is a feature of languages that is rarely studied anyway, so I don't have any specific back-up; only recollections). Not the obvious difference of Cantonese-accented Mandarin (which really does have an exotic rhythm: one commentator said it was "flamboyant"), mind you.

Some words may have non-standard tones or "Taiwan standard" tones. These may be viewed as errors - 亚 is famously mis-pronounced yǎ. The English equivalent would probably be "nuclear" mis-pronounced as "*nucular". With the Taiwan standard though (probably most famously in 星期), it's a little less clear cut for most people - most people with strong Fujianese accents do say xīngqí, and do not necessarily see it as Taiwan standard, just as the way they say it.

I do know of lots of vocabulary differences, most of them common to southern Chinese languages in general (including southern Mandarin and Taiwanese Mandarin). In general, vocabulary choices will probably be closer to Taiwan standard where there is a choice, but that's a trend that shouldn't really even be used as a rule of thumb.

But one big giveaway is in the sentence-final particles. That ephemeral "hòu" or "hào" particle (usually pronounced [hɔ˦˨]) is probably the easiest way. It is also shared by Taiwanese, Malaysian and Singaporean (and potentially Indonesian?) 华人 of Fujian extraction.

[SXM]

Thank you very much for taking the time to write such a detailed response! For being basilectal: I'll pay notice when people speak, and I think I may adopt some of those things you said just said if I hear most people pronounce things that way. Also another reason for me to learn this, is that it'll be easier to understand people if understand how they say words.

Anyway, there were some things I didn't really understand:

Can you say what is a glottal stop? I'm sorry, I don't know so much about linguistics, and I didn't understand anything of the Wikipedia article that I found, hehe.

For the hòu/hào, is there a written character for this or is it only used in speaking? Also, do they just use it randomly, or it is used in certain context?

Another thing I've wondered for a long time that you took up in your post is the 儿化. I've heard many people hear say thar it's not used in the South, but does this mean it's not used at all, or just much more sparesly? For example, If a person would want to say "draw a drawing," would they say 画画儿, or just say 画画, in which the last example 画 would mean both "to draw", and "drawing"? Similarly, would a person form Fujian never say 哪儿, or would they sometimes use it?

Sorry if this became confusing, and thank you again for your very long answer!

/SXM

[Michaelyus]

Oooh sorry, I think I went pretty overboard with the phonetics and linguistics stuff! (Although it now stands a testament to the accent, ready for the Internet to refer to and contest!)

The glottal stop, IPA [ʔ], is famously used in some English accents when the letter 't' is "dropped". E.g. London Cockney "water" becomes 'wa'er'. In some contexts (mainly before an "n", and when the syllable is unstressed), it is an option within standard British English (modern Received Pronunciation) or standard General American English, e.g. "button", "fountain", though I wouldn't say it was particuarly common. http://en.wikipedia....lottal_stop.ogg has a sound file with it.

That sentence-final particle I mentioned does have a very widespread usage. It's mainly used at the end of declaratives as a tag question, like the English tag question "isn't it?". Generally its function is to keep the conversation going and to keep the listener attentive. As for writing it: since it comes from 闽语, and 闽南 has the most developed dialectal orthography, I think the consensus is to employ the (extremely classical-looking) character 歟 (simplified: 欤), or perhaps 呼 or 乎. I found the first one on http://www.chinalang...d0&start=15. I confess that I don't find it completely satisfactory, because there's the other [hɔ] with rising tone, which is a "real" questioning particle... but that's a different debate.

I would say the 儿化 is pretty much completely foreign to the south. 画画儿 usually becomes 画一画, but 画画 is also used (and yes what you've written is how it's parsed): verbal 儿化 usually translates to reduplication. Sometimes the 儿 is replaced by an alternative rather than dropped: 哪儿 becomes 哪里. Of course, other factors apart from region will come into play (as well as other regional factors, e.g. people from 'the north' born in Fujian, or those who actively change their accent toward the standard). But in general, a complete lack of 儿化 is a feature of a Fujian accent (remember also that r does not exist separately at all in a Fujian accent).

Neutral tone is seen in Fujian, fairly regularly really. It's just not used to the extent as the north.