The highs and lows of native speakers

[Flickserve]

I was sitting in Hong Kong International airport and ordered some food at the foocourt. Had to share the table due to the crowd.

On one side, one lady with her child talking pretty standard Mandarin. I can get the gist of the conversation.

Opposite me is a couple in their fifties speaking northern Mandarin with lots of variation in their pitch. More than anymore youtube video that I have come across. Actually, I quite like that style, but so far, I have met few tutors who actually speak and teach with that style of speech. It's probably Beijing accent but I hesitate to say definitely due to my overall lack of experience with Chinese Mandarin. I have difficulty picking up what they say.

Why doesnt anybody teach me it even if I ask? I asked a couple of 土生土長 北京人，but I get mostly standard Mandarin.

Why am I interested in it? Because the high and low pitches in the rhythm of the speech are more easily discernible. I want to try mimicking it as an experiment in the rhythm of my speech.

[歐博思]

Tones are stronger in Beijing Mandarin because they're all 胡同 gangsters jkjk. I'd guess Chinese think it's weird a foreigner'd want to learn non-standard Chinese variations.

 

edit and side note: Just remembered an interesting story from my Chinese professor in university: She told us how when she and her sister were little they would just communicate by loudly "humming" out words while all bundled up in the cold Harbin winters. After personally experiencing how Dongbei winters freeze up my mouth as well, this sorta led me to wonder if the extreme cold had some influence on the (presumably) Dongbei accent you adore. 

[LinZhenPu]

In a practical sense, think it's much more important to understand what is being said to you and to be understood than it is to understand what others are saying to each other. In my experience, Chinese people (I'm in the Northeast) won't talk about you to other people right in front of you without including you in the conversation.

But then it's really satisfying to be able to understand what people are saying to each other and it can come in handy, both of which are motivating factors and can be a great conversation starter.

 

 

On a cultural note:

In my experience, people in my home country sometimes do talk about you (right in front of you!) without including you in the conversation, which is a pet hate of mine about my home country's culture and something I really could never understand. In such a situation I feel like I have every right for my voice to be part of the conversation, but depending on who is talking, I've been told "We're talking about you, not to you". Completely disrespectful and what's worse they feel like they are in a position to intentionally disrespect you. I've never seen Chinese people do anything like that, not even towards street beggars who barge into a restaurant demanding someone give them 1快。

[Flickserve]

@LinZhenPu

I don't think they were talking about me. I want to get used to that rhythm and style of speech. Just bemoaning the fact there are very few tutors who speak that with that style of speech.

I am going to have to keep searching.

[陳德聰]

You could start by asking people to teach you 東北話

[abcdefg]

I want to get used to that rhythm and style of speech. Just bemoaning the fact there are very few tutors who speak that with that style of speech.

 

Flickserve, I had a teacher two years ago who was an opera singer and poet. She had me spend a lot of time reading poetry out loud because it required strong pronunciation and very definite emphasis. I also sometimes shadowed her reading oratory, flowery speeches.

 

She didn't want me to actually talk that way all the time, but it was an exercise in overcoming my foreigner tendency to be monotone. Took a while for me to loosen up and not feel embarrassed by that kind of delivery. Seemed to help, plus it was fun. A change of pace.

 

We found some people doing famous readings of well-known poems on line. Some were even set to music. I would use those as homework. Did lots of Mao's poems. Even learned a few by heart.

[Flickserve]

You could start by asking people to teach you 東北話

And then get this type of reply

你学好普通话就行了

[Lu]

I think a big part of it is that dialects (or strong accents) are seen as inferior. You speak it with people in your inner circle, but it's not really a language, and therefore it shouldn't be learned, or can't even be learned. If you want to learn a language, learn 普通话.

 

I've seen this attitude even about Cantonese (me: 'what's [word I just overheard] mean?' Canto speaker: 'Oh, that's how we say [meaning].' Not 'that's the Cantonese word for [meaning], but 'that's how we say [meaning]'.) Some regions have more sense of their local identity and take pride in it, and so it is possible to learn Cantonese, Taiwanese, Shanghainese, and probably some other fangyan. But not, I suspect, 东北话.

 

I think all you can do is keep asking until you find someone who understands what you want and can help you, and/or in the meantime study by yourself by listening and trying to imitate. It might also help to figure out how to explain very clearly why exactly you want to learn it, and how you're planning to balance it with leaning good 普通话. To be honest, if a foreigner with decent-but-far-from-perfect Dutch would ask my help learning to speak the dialect of my 老家, I'd also try to dissuade them from wasting their time like that.

[LinZhenPu]

Flickserve, I had a teacher two years ago who was an opera singer and poet

I'd love to have a teacher like that. Any opera singing school in Harbin?

[abcdefg]

She was raised in a small itinerant opera troupe that traveled to small towns in Shaanxi giving informal performances, a few nights here and a few nights there. Inexpensive admission. They often performed in a tent. Her mother was a singer and her father played several instruments.

 

She told me that Chinese opera required higher highs and lower lows than ordinary speech. Exaggerated patterns of emphasis. I cannot sing, but was able to learn to recite verse. We used that as a language tool. Worked out pretty well. I appreciated her different approach.

 

Too bad she has moved on; was only doing Chinese language tutoring as a temporary measure until she found something more suitable. She came to my home for lessons, which meant we could be loud without disturbing other students.