Podcast Idea: Lesson on Accents

generalzod
March 14, 2008, 06:30 PM posted in General Discussion
Just an idea for an upper intermediate (?) podcast: accents. When I say "accents" I mean the Mandarin accents of native speakers. Since probably 70% of Chinese don't really speak "standard" Mandarin, it would be helpful to showcase the regional differences in accent and pronunciation.  In the real world, most Chinese don't speak CCTV Mandarin -- just as people in Boston or Mississippi don't speak CNN English. Maybe you could have three different speakers with different accents read the same text, etc.
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Joachim
March 31, 2008, 10:11 PM

Is this accents or dialects that you are talking about? An accent would be someone from Shanghai speaking Mandarin. Anyway, when reading the title, I was thinking of foreigners trying to speak Chinese and having some kind of accent. What are the differences in pronunciation etc. between people from the US, Europe, Japan?

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buschstadium310
March 31, 2008, 10:50 PM

ya!!

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zeoblade
April 01, 2008, 01:46 PM

southern bird language is quite unorthodox and the beijing dialect does sound rough. i do think CCTV pronounciation sounds the best and we should strive for a standard like that.

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sebastian
April 01, 2008, 03:19 PM

Has already been done on advanced level. The lesson name is: Advanced - 中国的口音

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Joachim
April 01, 2008, 07:56 PM

sebastian: The lesson mentioned is on dialects?

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John
April 02, 2008, 06:23 AM

Actually, we have already recorded a lesson (Intermediate) on different Chinese accents, and it will be released soon. The accents we covered are Northern, Southern (Shanghai area), and Taiwan. Look for it later this month!