How do you pronounce "shi?"

[Guest shinjo17]

How do you pronounce shi as in to be?

[skylee]

shi4. It sounds like "shit" without the t, and the tone drops from "sol" to "do" very quickly.

[Guest full_of_errs]

its hard to discribe , isnt it ?

any1 who is so kind can record it ?

[confucius]

I was going to suggest something like Skylee, only using the word "shirt" without the "rt" instead. (If you are in Beijing, then just dropping the "t" would be sufficient.)

[markalexander100]

its hard to discribe ' date=' isnt it ?

any1 who is so kind can record it ?[/quote']

It's in some of the phrases at http://www.chinaadviser.com/useful_chinese_phrases.html , although that's a pretty hellish site.

[林彪]

Here is a recording:

http://66.194.40.147/~hapafor/shi.wav

When it is part of a sentence it is said more quickly than it is in the recording.

[ala]

Taiwanese and many others pronounce Shi as a lengthened "-ss" in Kiss. This is not PRC standard Mandarin though.

Also, Shi4 in standard Mainland Mandarin doesn't sound like the sh- in shit nor shirt either. The Shi4 sound is formed with the tongue curled back so that it touches (or almost touches) the bony ridge behind the upper front teeth. To practice, you should first pronounce it close to the English "sh" (say "she"), then slowly curl the upper tip of your tongue towards the the hard plate of the roof of your mouth.. you'll find yourself sucking in air.. now expire air forcefully and you get the Standard Mandarin sound Shi4.

[smithsgj]

Ala's account sounds good but there is sth missing at the end isn't there? It's what Confucius was getting at with his shirt idea. Is it called r-colour (rings some bell)? Anyone know what I'm on about? There's a definite r feeling at the end.

Then of course there *is* a vowel! Perhaps it's a vocalic r, if there is such a thing.

[cometrue]

Ala's account sounds good but there is sth missing at the end isn't there? It's what Confucius was getting at with his shirt idea. Is it called r-colour (rings some bell)? Anyone know what I'm on about? There's a definite r feeling at the end.

Then of course there *is* a vowel! Perhaps it's a vocalic r' date=' if there is such a thing.[/quote']

yep! there is a vowel, i just realize it's really a strange vowel, you can try to pronounce sh-日（ri), then you will get it. i would say the "i" is not so scientific here, perhaps we should have added one more vowel in hanyupinyin system.

[ala]

http://www.sinosplice.com/lang/pronunciation3.html

This link has pretty detailed explanations of the x,c, j, i and sh, ch, zh, r..

It is funny that most Shanghainese speakers do not pronounce the pinyin "x" or "j", and instead pronounce it much closer to the English sh and j (for both Mandarin and Shanghainese). Most are not aware of the difference (though it becomes crystal clear when listening to Old Shanghainese). Once in English class in China, I remember mentally making note that the English "she" is pronounced exactly like "xi" or "xi4".... years later was told by a Beijinger that I pronounced Mandarin xi incorrectly. .... but the difference at least to me is subtle, and will not impede at all to communication. Pronouncing z for zh, s for pinyin sh, c for ch may cause more problems for northern Mandarin speakers, but should still be understandable.

don't know that the retroflex is a vowel....

regardless, "ri"4 is one hard-to-pronounce syllable.

[smithsgj]

> don't know that the retroflex is a vowel

well, put like that...

but every Chinese syllable has a vowel doesn't it? (I take it retroflex means voicing? otherwise no tone available on shi4 - in the bopomofo paradigm I think it's supposed to be the voiceless equivalent of 'ri', as 'chi' is to 'zhi', but that's rubbish really, right?)

Cometrue, 'i' represents lots of different things in Pinyin. But you can always differentiate from adjacent letter context, there's never any ambiguity.

In fact, there's redundancy: the y in 'yi' is not necessary.

[cometrue]

>

Cometrue' date=' 'i' represents lots of different things in Pinyin. But you can always differentiate from adjacent letter context, there's never any ambiguity.

In fact, there's redundancy: the y in 'yi' is not necessary.[/quote']

yeah, sure for me, a native speaker or for you, it's quite easy, but for those beginners it's a little bit confusing i think.

how come the i matching "b d y j l m n p q t x y" and "c r z zh ch sh" has different regulations? the bopomofo is'nt a writing system, but just a tool to help people studying mandarin, so why the tool itself coudnt be improved to be less confusing?

[cometrue]

i think if we create a new symbol for the vowel after "c r z zh ch sh" and provide some special practicing or exercising, it won't be cofused again!

[smithsgj]

> think if we create a new symbol for the vowel after "c r z zh ch sh"

> you can try to pronounce sh-日（ri), then you will get it

yes, and when I did that I concluded that the vowels in shi and ri are different. ri has something of 'u' in it, so maybe it's closer than the vowel in shi or zhi. am I wrong?

if no-one knows i'll try and look it up; but what are the phonetic features of the consonants r (in ri) and sh (other than that the latter is retroflex)?

[cometrue]

> think if we create a new symbol for the vowel after "c r z zh ch sh"

> you can try to pronounce sh-日（ri)' date=' then you will get it

yes, and when I did that I concluded that the vowels in shi and ri are different. ri has something of 'u' in it, so maybe it's closer than the vowel in shi or zhi. am I wrong?[/quote']

i m not really good at this, but i m sure they are same vowels, just forget about somethin of "u", and then i believe that you will get a normal pronunciation of the vowel. it's a pity that i havent got an exercise online.

if no-one knows i'll try and look it up; but what are the phonetic features of the consonants r (in ri) and sh (other than that the latter is retroflex)?

i m not sure what did you exactly mean, sorry for my poor english...

[smithsgj]

Your English is fine, it's a technical question. Like 'p' is bilabial (the place of articulation is your two lips); plosive (the manner of articulation involves a puff of air); voiceless (the vocal cords don't vibrate when you make the sound, so it doesn't have any pitch). I don't know the Chinese words for these features. I thought maybe someone like Ala might know what the features are for 'r' and 'shi'.

[cometrue]

Your English is fine, it's a technical question. Like 'p' is bilabial (the place of articulation is your two lips); plosive (the manner of articulation involves a puff of air); voiceless (the vocal cords don't vibrate when you make the sound, so it doesn't have any pitch). I don't know the Chinese words for these features. I thought maybe someone like Ala might know what the features are for 'r' and 'shi'.

thank you smithsgj, but i m afraid i still couldnt understand it, lets see if anybody else would give us a response!

[ala]

how come the i matching "b d y j l m n p q t x y" and "c r z zh ch sh" has different regulations? the bopomofo is'nt a writing system, but just a tool to help people studying mandarin, so why the tool itself coudnt be improved to be less confusing?

Bopomofo (I presume you mean Zhuyin Fuhao) is not confusing at all and was well designed for Mandarin. pinyin zi, si, ci, zhi, shi, chi, ri are different from bi, pi, mi, ni, di, ti, etc.., and also different from xi, ji. In pinyin, we use "i" for all three purposes (mainly for lack of a better romanization), but in reality, the sounds are quite different. Hence, pinyin is the one that jumbles everything together, not bopomofo. Bopomofo does not add a vowel after the consonants z, s, c, zh, sh, ch, r. This is more logical and accurate.

but every Chinese syllable has a vowel doesn't it? (I take it retroflex means voicing? otherwise no tone available on shi4 - in the bopomofo paradigm I think it's supposed to be the voiceless equivalent of 'ri', as 'chi' is to 'zhi', but that's rubbish really, right?)

No, I believe syllables si, ci, zi, shi, chi, zhi, ri have no vowels. In Chinese they are referred as the 空韻. In reality though, even the pinyin "-i" after s, c, z, sh, ch, zh, r is allophonic. After dental (s,c,z), the "-i" is silent (vocalization of the preceding consonant instead); after retroflex (sh, ch, zh, r), the "-i" is a vocalization of the preceding consonant followed usually with an "-r" final. Hence, shi could perhaps be better romanized as shr.

shi = voiceless fricative retroflex

ri = VOICED fricative retroflex

chi = voiceless aspirated affricate retroflex

zhi = voiceless unaspirated affricate retroflex

si = voiceless fricative dental

ci = voiceless aspirated affricate dental

zi = voiceless unaspirated affricate dental

So yeah, shi and ri are different (in voiced/voiceless), but both are fricative retroflexes.

[cometrue]

Bopomofo (I presume you mean Zhuyin Fuhao)

i mean the han yu pin yin sysetem

No' date=' I believe syllables si, ci, zi, shi, chi, zhi, ri have no vowels. In Chinese they are referred as the 空韻. In reality though, even the pinyin "-i" after s, c, z, sh, ch, zh, r is allophonic. After dental (s,c,z), the "-i" is silent (vocalization of the preceding consonant instead); after retroflex (sh, ch, zh, r), the "-i" is a vocalization of the preceding consonant followed usually with an "-r" final. Hence, shi could perhaps be better romanized as shr. [/quote']

yeah, so that's why the han yu pin yin is not scientific, i realize that the s c z zh ch sh had vowels trend themself, dont you think thats confusing?

[smithsgj]

ALa, cometrue

By bopomofo I meant the learning system/strategy employed in both China and Taiwan (b p m f, d t n l etc). Irrespective of the actual symbols used (though I realize bopomofo is often taken to be synonymous with zhuyin fuhao outside China).

I didn't realize zi and zhi were voiceless! Is this the standard view, or your own?

I should have thought there was a vowel, 'i', which was neutral, like the schwa in "the". But even if it does represent the "vocalization of the preceding consonant" it still has its role, doesn't it? If you took the 'i' away, the vocalization would have to be represented by nothing.

I don't know what vocalization means, actually. Is it that the consonant becomes voiced? Or that it becomes vowel-like?