Pronunciation of "w" and "r"

[Hofmann]

Well now that you've resurrected this, here's an article on the 微 initial.

[陳德聰]

Lol wow this is old. Yeah I don't think I would consider this a regional dialectical thing so much as a tomato tomato potato potato (I think this might only make sense to North Americans?) thing. I occasionally accidentally pronounce a more v-like w, and 为什么 is one of the most common words I can think of that I do it with. My friend from Shanxi who does this alllllll the time sometimes even tries to make fun of others who do it as if she isn't aware she does it. It reminds me of either vs either. To me it does not register as non-standard. Also I feel like there is phonetic motivation for shift back and forth between w and v.

[889]

I seem to recall being told it was something of a feminine pronunciation, and best avoided by men, though perhaps that's different in different regions.

[BanZhiYun]

This is called a 音位变体 in Mandarin's Phonetics (w, v is exactly a very good example of that.) In 普通话, they do not differentiate the meaning in putonghua. E.g. (what our teacher gave us), in putonghua, if you said xinwen or xinven, everyone would understand and think it's the same. In English (as in many other languages) v, f, and w are all very different sounds, so it's understandable why we'd point out the difference. But for people speaking putonghua, it doesn't differentiate the meaning and it's not dialectical either.

[陳德聰]

This is called a 音位变体 in Mandarin's Phonetics (w, v is exactly a very good example of that.) In 普通话, they do not differentiate the meaning in putonghua... But for people speaking putonghua, it doesn't differentiate the meaning and it's not dialectical either.

It is allophonic variation, but this is not an alternation that occurs in everyone's speech and in every word with a /w/. You're right there is no /v/ phoneme, but we're going a little deeper than that.

[BanZhiYun]

I never said that it occurs in everyone's speech and in every word with a "w". To begin with, there is no /w/ phoneme in 普通话, neither a /v/ one. I'll write out exactly what's written in my textbook about it:

在一个语言中，如果两个音素的音质不同 ，但是它们的差别并不能用来区分语言单位的意义，那么这两个音素就是同一个音素的音位变体。例如北京话中，有人将“新闻”中的“闻”说成 ［uɘn］，有人则说成［ʋɘn］；［u］是一个元音，发音时双唇拢圆；［ʋ］是一个辅音，发音时上唇接触下齿。

［u］和［ʋ］尽管音质不同，但并不区别意义，因此不属于两个音位，而是同一个音位/u/的不同社会变体，或者也可以说是自由变体。

《现代汉语》沈阳，郭锐主编，高等教育出版社，2014.

I hope if you don't believe me, at least you'd believe the academic explanation of Chinese scholars on it.
In short, for example, the same person unintentionally could say 新闻［uɘn］or 新闻［ʋɘn］without affecting the listener's understanding. In 普通话, it doesn't affect the meaning. At the same time, "w" could be pronounced as ［u］and［ʋ］by anyone speaking 普通话, at any time. That's pretty much  the case with "w" and it's different "sounds".

[陳德聰]

Bizarre, 音位變體 apparently can refer to allophones or phonemic variants =_=" so I understood your first post completely wrong.

Your textbook's explanation is literally just a direct explanation of what a phonemic variant is, despite the awkwardness of using 音素 to mean both a sound and a phoneme in the same sentence. I am not disbelieving anything, also as an aside, I completed an entire degree in linguistics so we can maybe cut the redundant paraphrase of your textbook. What I am pointing out is that simply the explanation of it being a 音位變體 does not speak to it being as you said "not dialectical either". The relevant point that is directly referenced in your textbook is that it is either a social or free variant, though I am inclined towards social.

[BanZhiYun]

Our textbook uses 音素 = 音段, aka segment in English as noted in the textbook. Then, 自由变体指的是音位变体的一种(there is also a 条件变体). Then all sounds （语音）has 物理属性，生理属性 and 社会属性. Glad to hear you did a whole course on Linguistics, but that doesn't mean you did a whole course on Chinese phonetics. It's like me going and talking about English phonetics based on what I've learned about Chinese Phonetics. About the terminology, yeah, I guess I am more used to the Chinese one right now as opposed to the English one. And finally, as I said, no it is not dialectical, it is a 音位变体 －> 自由变体. I guess I'd need to quote more of our textbook so you'd get used to the terminology it uses (as I said, it alternated 音素 = 音段, segment 音素 being the old term, 音段 being the new one) and all of 语音的属性, which is a different chapter.

[陳德聰]

Can't downvote you on my phone unfortunately. Edit: Can if I use the full site instead of the mobile one!

No need to give more quotes, the nice thing about understanding English and Chinese and having a background in linguistics (presumably you mean "course" in the European sense and not the North American sense) is that it's pretty easy to tease out what the terms refer to. 條件變體 being allophonic variation and 自由變體 being free variation... You don't need to have dedicated four years of study to Chinese phonetics to get that far, and aren't you just a freshman? These are basic concepts that aren't unique to Chinese.

Interestingly enough, a couple of studies* seem to suggest quite the opposite of what you are suggesting re: not being dialectical. If the variation is more robust in specific regions like Beijing and Tianjin, and even seems to index to female, I would say there's a lot more social conditioning and regional influence involved than you think.

*

沈炯, 1987. 北京話合口呼零聲母的語音分歧

Wiener & Shih (2011)

[BanZhiYun]

I am a freshman, but you seem unfamiliar with Chinese and putonghua, and it's 定义. You have done a course on Linguistics, so what? I am doing Chinese Linguistics, not Introductory or Comparative Linguistics. Downvote me as much as you want, being uneducated on Chinese linguistics (I wouldn't be so arrogant going left and right saying what's what when I have done a course on "Linguistics"; there's a difference between Chinese Linguistics and General Linguistics, whether  they use the same terminology or not) is a different story, that's the bottom line.

Once again, if you are unfamiliar that 普通话以北京音为标准音，以北方方言为基础方言，以典范的现代白话文著作为语法规范, well, that's not my problem. If you know the definition but can't understand what it's actually saying ("more robust in [specific] regions like Beijing and Tianjin" let's look at the definition again: "普通话以北京音为标准音") and you saying whether it's regional or conditional, well, to me makes no difference. You need to prove it with examples, or, if you feel so confident, write an academic work on it. Whether it's a more "robust" phenomenon in Beijing or Tianjin, we can not say that for sure. Example? There's a person in this exact thread (on the first page) who said a girl from Gansu while talking to him (in 普通话, not in 天津话 or 甘肃话, remember?) said [ʋɘi] 为什么 (veishenme). Gansu is quite far from Beijing. 可见, we can say that this phenomenon is seen on people speaking putonghua. Downvote me as much as  you can, it's time to get your basics on Chinese Linguistics (Phonetics, Syntax and Lexicology) on par, thank you. Otherwise, 知其然，不知所以然.

Oh yeah, on a last note, downvote me as much as you want, way to prove your attitude towards academic questions. But yeah, this is the Internet, so I can't expect people like you to have any kind 道德, after all, "we're fighting for a place under the sun" (read: being popular and dominant on the Internet). As I said, if you want to prove yourself somehow, go write academic papers and publish more academic work. I don't care what courses and stuff you've done. I am a freshman, so I am going to do plenty of academic papers and stuff in the future. Then the "awkwardness" you seem to be talking about, combined with "understanding Chinese and English and having background in linguistics" is hilarious. It's obvious you didn't grasp what the text in an academic textbook was talking about, so we can conclude that either you don't have a thorough understanding in Chinese (in this case), or your background in linguistics is questionable, or that you don't have enough experience reading in Chinese on linguistics topics. For me, I would not left and right saying I am really good @ using and writing academic papers on Phonetics in English, since I haven't read enough books on that in English, neither have taken a course on it in English. So you should go down a notch in your arrogance, no? Thanks.

[BanZhiYun]

Oh, yeah, when you refer to a Chinese book, you need to use a 书名号《》, so, in this case, it should be: 沈炯, 1987. 《北京話合口呼零聲母的語音分歧》。So instead of trying to look cool and what not using Traditional Characters, downvoting people on the Internet and stuff, it's time to get more strict about your own self (Punctuation in Chinese, in this case ). Or read more 《道德经》。

[陳德聰]

LOL for the record, I think I only have two down votes per day so someone else is lurking around in here down voting you too which makes me pretty gleeful. You seem to be a bit confused about a couple of things, and perhaps attributing that to your age/level of study was wrong, as it may just be a personal trait of yours.

I think the first confusion is that there is no such thing as "具有中國特色"的語言學. Linguists study language, and while I did not study phonetics as extensively as I did phonology, syntax and pragmatics, I think it's safe to say that a linguist is capable of studying any language with a linguistics lens. Never mind the fact that despite being written in English, all of my upper level coursework was done on Chinese linguistic phenomena.

You also seem to be confusing the word dialect with the word 方言. What you're implying is that 普通話 is only spoken with "Beijing pronunciation" and "vernacular grammar", when in reality, if you want to look at it as a language and not a dialect/variety, you have to acknowledge that speakers in different regions are still speaking 普通話 even if they have non-standard accents or variant pronunciations. I don't know what your language background is, but it seems to be neither English nor Chinese, so I don't blame you for taking in the really quite useless "definition" of 普通話 you've cited above. A pronunciation can be socially indexed to gender or regional without being non-standard, and it can still be dialectical without being non-standard, so perhaps it's the English terms that are throwing you off. As for evidence, I literally just gave you the names of two academic works that say exactly what I have said. One is even written in Chinese for you. I apologize (sorry not sorry) for not using the proper Chinese citation convention, but since you were able to correct it perhaps you can actually try reading it ha.

As an aside, please refer to me only as 陳聰 from now on since I am so 缺德! Sigh, freshmen.

[eddyf]

BanZhiYun, please think twice before accusing other forum members of being unfamiliar with Chinese. There are some very knowledgeable people on here. And it's getting pretty annoying the way you mention or quote your textbook in every post like it's the Bible and you're a missionary bringing enlightenment upon us savages. It's just a textbook. Not everything it says is authoritative, especially when it comes to conventions of terminology. The terms that it uses may very well simply reflect the personal preferences of the authors. And bickering about terminology like this is pointless anyways. I think most people are more interested in how to increase their personal proficiency in Chinese or at least want to learn something about the language that they didn't know before.

[lips]

vúvèi

[BanZhiYun]

@陈聪 ROFL, you yourself said you downvoted me, it's obvious there are not other people "lurking" around here doing the same, maybe it is you again, but you are keeping it quiet this time. Aka, your logic is weak and you are trying to be personal, when that doesn't exactly work on me. After all, you yourself said you are downvoting people, rofl. You've gone to university and are still at this mindset? Thank god "I am a freshman". Oh yeah, and you trying to be personal to people on forums might be as well be your a personal trait of yours. The point is, who cares? You are not my friend, neither a person I know, so could care less what kind of person you are. So I don't see why you are trying to offend people online, rofl, as if it'd affect me in any way in real life I am glad you are not mentioning  your own mistakes, though, but being strictly personal with me. There goes that, as I said, it's time to work on yourself more than talking about other people.Yes, you've cited the book as I said, but you don't even understand what it's saying, so yeah. Secondly, I never mentioned “具有中国特色的语言学”, so not sure what you're trying to "translate" my words. My native language is neither English, nor Chinese. Chinese isn't your native language either, obviously, and obviously again, my Chinese is superior to yours as your English is superior to mine. How come? Well all my course work is done in Chinese. You say you did not study phonetics as extensively, so it's time to finish this topic. The logic behind what your saying is weak, so it's pointless talking to you; you're talking to no end as if you are authority, when in fact, neither  you nor me are. So it's time for both of us to shut up. "you have to acknowledge that speakers in different regions are still speaking 普通話 even if they have non-standard accents or variant pronunciations" Of course I do, you obviously are confused what "standartanization" meant in this case. Once again, you admitted you haven't studied phonetics as extensively as phonology, it's exactly the opposite of mine. So it'd be unppropriate of me going and arguing with you on phonology, so  yeah, I am done with this topic.

@eddyf Hello there. I never said there aren't knowledgeable people on here, right? I said that a concrete person needs to work on their knowledge, as do I.  So it'd be good if you don't twist my words. I will be very straightforward with you. Instead of going into conversation between people, it's good to keep your opinions to yourself. They are personal and unprofessional when people are "bickering about terminology" (read: something very specific). It'd be like having a professional meeting happening and having a worker come and say who he likes and who he doesn't. Now that is annoying. If you have no idea what's authorative when it comes to academic work, that says enough about your perception on academics. Not only in China, but in general. That's why there are many publishers, and not every author could be published by different publishers (商务印书馆，中华书局 being the most authorative publishers in China). If you feel yourself being a savage, that's your own problem. I never meant to do that, I can quote you a thousand other books talking about the same topic. I am quoting my textbook because it's simple. If you didn't get that, it's time for you to work on your logic. I was not the one who started bickering about terminology, so telling me that is funny.  You need to be more objective, no? "I think most people are more interested in how to increase their personal proficiency in Chinese or at least want to learn something about the language that they didn't know before." Yes, I guess you're right, I am included in it as well. Or correct a mistake I have on understanding the language. Now, if some people are stubborn on what they know is "forever" and "unbreakable", well then, that's a different story. Thanks for your input, but yeah, it was even worse than 陈聪's, it had close to no value.

[陳德聰]

I think it's pretty evident who is operating from a position of less knowledge here.

I did not cite any books, I cited two academic papers. So far you've cited your textbook, but only to the end of defining what kind of variant we are dealing with. Close to immediately after, you stopped providing any sort of analysis or argument, and have been playing the "my Chinese is superior to yours" game, one I quite enjoy personally as someone whose actual profession is the use of the language. I recall watching your speeches a couple of years ago, but presumably you've made progress since then. Crucially though, your actual proficiency in Chinese has no bearing on your understanding of linguistics, which as we have seen, is limited to the one paragraph you've cited.

Guess you didn't bother to read Hofmann's link either.

Literally the only claim you have made so far is that the w~v alternation is not dialectical, and that it is a free variation. Your own textbook goes further by suggesting it may be a social variant, which is expanded on by folk intuitions of people who believe the variant sounds feminine, that it indexes to female, which is reiterated by both academic papers I provided. They even go further and find that the variant is most common among young, educated women. But this is stepping into the realm of sociolinguistics, so I don't think you've made it that far in your studies yet. You're still at "it's a 自由變體".

I don't think I was being that rude at the beginning, but perhaps I was. It looks like you've gone all-out jerk though, even lashing out at people just for noticing you're out of line.

[BanZhiYun]

I am not sure who's "playing games" here, but since we're at "analyzing", let me "try to analyze" what I can (as of this stage of study). "Crucially though, your actual proficiency in Chinese has no bearing on your understanding of linguistics" That is true. Linguistics =/= phonetics, I guess you need to be more specific. Where did I say I have a "thorough" understanding on Linguistics? I said I am studying (Chinese) Linguistics right now. Then again, you yourself have said you don't have an extensive study on Phonetics as opposed to some other disciplines. So trying to twist words and be personal, once again, is not gonna work.

Reading links who are not on Chinese websites isn't convenient when you live in China, as you'd probably know (I assume you've come to China for at least an year, doing research or something else, after all you claim "your profession is the use of the language".)

Now, sounds have 物理属性，生理属性 and 社会属性, some sounds could mean something in a given language, and something different in another language. Here's a simple example. Nicole Sherzinger has a song called "Right There", in the chorus it sings "Eee be [....]", to native English speakers they only understand "Be [my babe]", but to people from my country, we could understand "Eeee be" as a whole word. There were many jokes about that when the song came out. So, w-v being a 社会变体 is related with 语音的社会属性. One of the sayings is related with 语音的属性（社会变体）, one of them is related with 音位变体（自由变体）, but as cited, no matter from which point of view you look at it, they are equal.

 

And I have done analyze in previous posts that you obviously didn't understand, or ignored, and decided to be personal with me. It's the same once again here, trying to tell me I am "playing games". If you are unfamiliar with definitions (isn't that your profession, "working with the language"?) then I am not sure what kind of Linguistics (maybe you're good at General Linguistics, but you are not so good with understanding Chinese as proven from your posts) you have studied. You are trying to negate 普通话的定义, well, simply put, no matter to what degree you've studied Linguistics, Chinese scholars are superior to you when it comes to Chinese, so it's funny you'd try to negate their definitions on their own language. Oh  yeah, this citation also comes from my textbook (普通话的定义), so it's not as if I only cited one paragraph. Thanks for your input, but first get your facts straight when trying to offend me, as I've already stated. Best of luck to you in your future professional development.

Overall, I answered the question on this topic, which was not asked by you. Then you tried to reply being ignorant and rude as if you're the authority here. Well, guess what, you are not the only studying Linguistics on this forum (I don't mean that everyone on here should be studying that, but it seems you think you're the authority since you're one of the few.) And I will be straightforward with you as well. Neither you, nor me, is authority on an online forum, so as I said, going down a notch on your arrogance is a good idea. Whether I am out of line or not is neither for you, nor for eddyf to decide, I could very well say the same for you two. But who I am to do that? No one. So as I said, it's good to be objective. I am sorry that being objective and critical is "going all-out jerk", lmao. You can be personal, but it doesn't get anywhere.

[eddyf]

Yeah, so I only butted in because I noticed you doing the same thing in another thread, that is, picking pointless fights with people and insinuating (or directly saying) that people's Chinese is bad just because something they said doesn't match with (your interpretation of) something you read in a book. It's just really pointless. I mean, look at this thread. It is about such a mundane topic. Yet here you are fighting with people about it. Normally such levels of passion would be reserved for an actual controversial topic like what fluency means

Can we just get to the point? What claim are you even making about v/w in Mandarin?? That there is no pattern to how one pronunciation is used over the other? Or if that's not what you're claiming, then what are you claiming is the pattern?

[BanZhiYun]

@eddyf Hello! As I said above, I answered to this topic in general, and  then 陈德聪 decided to pick up a fight with me (despite being wrong, lol). It's not like I like going left and right saying who's right and who's wrong on every topic. But I am very sure of my Phonetics understanding on 普通话's initials and finals (so far), so when I believe I have a point, I just say it. Yeah, admittedly, maybe if I had to "discuss" it with someone else who has their point of view, then I go a little off (especially if they're wrong and stubborn, lol).

Yeah, my claim is that there is no pattern to how one would pronounce it, it could be /v/ at times, it could be /u/ at times. Besides that, no matter how it's pronounced, it doesn't affect the understanding of 普通话's speakers, they would all still understand it.

A side note, thank you for your balanced and objective post, it's refreshing to finally see such a response after useless bickering.

[陳德聰]

"知其然，不知所以然" indeed. (Edit: P.S. Are you sure you know what that means? I just noticed you said the exact same thing to Angelina in a different thread and it was equally inappropriate for the context，也好像少了個其字)

Yet this claim does not account for the reality that this free variation (自由變體) is not uniformly present in the speech of every speaker of 普通話. Despite the fact that some girl from Gansu exhibits this variation, there are certainly people who never do this, and it definitely happens more in and around Beijing than it does elsewhere. Which is where the issue of what motivates the variation, if anything, arises. I count two studies, one done with a large sample size (Shen, 1987) and the other a much smaller sample but more recently (Wiener & Shih, 2011) that point to regional and gender-based analysis. If we pretend BanZhiYun has provided the "what", then I am giving a go at the "why".