Difference between Mandarin in China and Taiwan

[WallOfStuff]

Maybe you guys can help me with some differences here. These are just things I've noticed hearing people from China and Taiwan speak. Also you can say differences from different areas of China, or other countries, etc.

~3rd tone (ǎ, ě, etc.) is not pronounced the same as in China. In China, it was pronounced as dipping and then rising back up (commonly described as 214, using the 5 levels of pitch). People in Taiwan seem to pronounce it as just a mid-level tone with little emphases, almost like the 5th tone (or no tone at all). It's more like 33 almost. People from China pronunciate their tones a lot, while people in Taiwan don't emphasize them as much. Though this isn't always the case.

~Certain words. In China, 橡皮搽 is used to mean "eraser". In Taiwan, it seems to be 搽子. I think there were more words also, but I can't think of them. Oh, except for the "orange" fiasco.
The Chinese word for orange (the fruit) is apparently 橘子. Not in Taiwan. They use 柳丁 apparently, which isn't even in most dictionaries. Confusing. Finally, I found a girl from Taiwan who gave me an explanation that they were different types of oranges. There was also another word thrown into the mix, but I'm pretty sure that was for "tangerine".

~People from China said I pronounced the pinyin letter "c" wrong; people from Taiwan said I said it correctly. =\

[hlysnan]

"c" is pronounced /ts/ as in "cats" /kæts/. It should be pronounced the same in both the mainland and in 台湾省.

[linguoboy]

"c" is pronounced /ts/ as in "cats" /kæts/. It should be pronounced the same in both the mainland and in 台湾省.

Taiwanese Mandarin speakers sometimes hypercorrect. My Chinese teacher used to throw the class into consternation by, e.g. saying chóng for 從. Southerners will do this, too, but you never hear it from Beijingers.

計程車 was the word I learned for "taxi". Although I made sure to memorise 出租車 before visiting Beijing, the word I actually ended up using almost exclusively was 的士.

[hlysnan]

Taiwanese Mandarin speakers sometimes hypercorrect. My Chinese teacher used to throw the class into consternation by, e.g. saying chóng for 從. Southerners will do this, too, but you never hear it from Beijingers.

Now that you mention it, that does sound familiar.

[Pangu]

This wikipedia page is a good resource for differences between Mandarin in China and Taiwan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwanese_Mandarin

[azhong]

Taiwanese Mandarin speakers sometimes hypercorrect. My Chinese teacher used to throw the class into consternation by, e.g. saying chóng for 從. Southerners will do this, too, but you never hear it from Beijingers.

Now that you mention it, that does sound familiar.

Hi Linguo, my German teacher, and the other friends:

I don't know why your teacher is so "hypercorrect", but the more general case is that most Taiwannese, me included, pay not so attention to pronounce well "zh, ch, sh, r" in, for example respaetively, "豬，出，師，日", and instead our pronunciation sounds more like "z, c, s", thus become "租，粗，私"。That's because these four tones need the tongue to rolled inner, while in Taiwanese dialect there are no such way of pronunciation.

Interesting to say, for me I always enjoy listening to the Beijingers speaking Mandarin, and I supposed it true for everyone that it sounds more beautiful comparing to the way I pronounce Mandarin. However once I met a girl from Southern China, 上海 or somewhere nearby, on her first visit to Taiwan and told me she enjoyed more listening the the Taiwanese speaking Mandarin...

[linguoboy]

I don't know why your teacher is so "hypercorrect", but the more general case is that most Taiwannese, me included, pay not so attention to pronounce well "zh, ch, sh, r" in, for example respaetively, "豬，出，師，日", and instead our pronunciation sounds more like "z, c, s", thus become "租，粗，私"。That's because these four tones need the tongue to rolled inner, while in Taiwanese dialect there are no such way of pronunciation.

"Hypercorrection" is when you know you're prone to making one kind of mistake, so you try so hard not to do this that you end up making a different mistake. For instance, German doesn't have /w/, only /v/. German-speakers have had it drilled into them so much not to use /v/ for English w that sometime they go too far and use /w/ even when they shouldn't. In fact, I more often hear this mistake from Germans than the opposite.

My teacher knows that, like most Southerners, she's prone to merge the retroflex series with the alveolars. She tries so hard not to say cóng when she means chóng that she goes too far and says chóng when she really means cóng. I think it has a lot to do with the knowledge that she's teaching foreigners and therefore has to use her "best" pronunciation. It's hard for her to even hear the difference, but it sounds really obvious to us, since we would never confuse /ʦ/ with /ʧ/ in English.

[MillMaths]

計程車 was the word I learned for "taxi". Although I made sure to memorise 出租車 before visiting Beijing, the word I actually ended up using almost exclusively was 的士.

In Singapore they're called 徳士.

By the way, I keep hearing the particle 的 (as in 我的, "my") being pronounced dì in Mandarin songs sung by Taiwanese singers. I wonder if that's the way it's pronounced in Taiwanese Mandarin.

[Bubulus]

I know it's common in southern lands to use [ti] for 的 (的 as in 我的 comes etymologically from 之 after all), so I guess the Taiwanese you've heard belong to those people.

[hlysnan]

By the way, I keep hearing the particle 的 (as in 我的, "my") being pronounced dì in Mandarin songs sung by Taiwanese singers. I wonder if that's the way it's pronounced in Taiwanese Mandarin.

邓丽君 does this a lot, but I think it was a neutral tone. I've always wondered about that though.

[azhong]

Now Azhong from Taiwan is giving his local comments:
(feeling somewhat strange for me now, cause I've used to be a student in Unilang.)

1"的" is in principle pronounced as "de" instead of "di" everywhere in Taiwan. The pronunciation change in song is perhaps because it's a song, and the song, you know, pays more attention on its beautiful tone and melody, and can sacrifice some unimportant pronunciation when necessary. Such is also the aria in the Opera, isn't it?

2. Taxi in Taiwan is named "計程車", in Hongkong named "的士", in Beijing, " 出租車" maybe, since I've never been there. Now we can try to understand these terms respectively:

"的士" is a direct translation in pronunciation from "Taxi", into Cantonese I guess, a dialect in Guangdong and in Hongkong, which I cann't speak neither. Thus the "的" here has a more special pronunciation "di"

出租車, lit. out-rent-car, thus means the car you can rent.

計程車, lit. calculate- distance-car, thus means this car calculates the fee by the distances.
　計=計算: to calculate (Cf: 計算機：calculator, or maybe "計算器" somewhere ont Taiwan, since google translator translated so...)
　程=里程，路程，車程，行程：the distance of the way

Now can anyone of you teach me why the "taxi" in English-speaking countries is named "TAXI"? Anything rerlated to tax?

[hlysnan]

taxi
1907, shortening of taximeter cab (introduced in London in March 1907), from taximeter "automatic meter to record the distance and fare" (1898), from Fr. taximètre, from Ger. Taxameter (1890), coined from M.L. taxa "tax, charge." An earlier English form was taxameter (1894), used in horse-drawn cabs. The verb is first recorded 1911, from earlier noun use as slang for "aircraft." Taxicab is also first attested 1907.

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=taxi

[MillMaths]

邓丽君 does this a lot, but I think it was a neutral tone.

Funny enough, I was thinking particularly of her in connection with this. My ex-boyfriend's parents listened a lot to her songs when he was little; she and 尤雅 were their favourite Taiwanese singers.

1"的" is in principle pronounced as "de" instead of "di" everywhere in Taiwan. The pronunciation change in song is perhaps because it's a song, and the song, you know, pays more attention on its beautiful tone and melody, and can sacrifice some unimportant pronunciation when necessary. Such is also the aria in the Opera, isn't it?

Thanks for the explanation.

[hlysnan]

Funny enough, I was thinking particularly of her in connection with this. My ex-boyfriend's parents listened a lot to her songs when he was little; she and 尤雅 were their favourite Taiwanese singers.

Haha. I haven't heard of 尤雅 though.

[MillMaths]

I haven't heard of 尤雅 though.

I don't think she was as famous as 邓丽君 back in the 70s, when my ex-boyfriend was growing up with those songs his parents listened to.

[azhong]

Hi hlysnan:

thanks for your explanation. By the way I remembered you; you helped my Japanese once or twice, didn't you? Thanks for that too.

For me who prefer more Mosart and Beethovon and Schubert etc, I reaaly don't suggest you spend time on those ex-popular songs to learn languages there. Instead, you can easily find more classical folksongs in youtube. I can provide help if needed. However this is just my personal favor.

And what's more--this term was learned from Linguoboy-- to say something fair, 鄧麗君is still mentioned so far not only in Taiwan but also countries in Asia because the artness in her songs, but 尤雅...

[hlysnan]

Hi hlysnan:

thanks for your explanation. By the way I remembered you; you helped my Japanese once or twice, didn't you? Thanks for that too.

Uh, that's not me. I was the one who was confused about 帮忙 and 帮助.

For me who prefer more Mozart and Beethoven and Schubert etc, I reaaly don't suggest you spend time on those ex-popular songs to learn languages there. Instead, you can easily find more classical folksongs in youtube. I can provide help if needed. However this is just my personal favor.

I do like Mozart and Schubert. But as for Chinese music, I like 刀郎 and 韩红. What folksongs do you recommend?

[azhong]

刀郎 and 韓紅 , they must be Mainland Chinese, just judging from the names. Can you judge that?

Since I don't know how many Chinese (Mandarin) folksongs you've know, I just recomment some which come to my mind now: (I didn't really spen time checking if this lyrics version matches this singer's version. We can discuss it later if you mind any possible monor diffreences. Or you can try find another performence version.)

1 茉莉花
the lyrics: http://mojim.com/twy106529x1x1.htm
the song in youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-GN2t_UYss
2 教我如何不想他
http://mojim.com/twy102582x2x2.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEB5afO6jRA
3. 在那遙遠的地方
http://mojim.com/twy100098x35x3.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHSDIetvGWc
4 茶山新歌
http://www.chlyrics.net/lyric/57246
www.youtube.com/watch?v=17ul4t5oPG4

[hlysnan]

刀郎 and 韓紅 , they must be Mainland Chinese, just judging from the names. Can you judge that?

Nope, but just so you know, 刀郎 is just a stage name. His real name is 罗林. How does one tell whether someone has a typically mainlander name?

Also, here are a couple of songs I like:

天路
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQbCpF_SjGE

冲动的惩罚
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEXo2ZCqpJ0

Since I don't know how many Chinese (Mandarin) folksongs you know, I'll just recomment some which come to my mind now: (I didn't really spend time checking if this version's lyrics matches this singer's version. We can discuss it later if you find any possible minor diffreences. Or you can try find another performance version.)

Cool, thanks. I'll have a listen tomorrow.

[azhong]

To judge one's from Taiwan or from Mainland China by their names are more or less possible. But that I think it need some "culture bath" instead of just some knowledge in brief. I don't think this point really important, and I don't where your Chinese level are, thus I don't know where to start. And what's more, my English is not so fluent to have a good desciption on this topic I'm afraid.

So may we just skip this unimportant question for now? (But it's true there are obvious difference in their names between Taiwan and China, partly due to the different political thought and movements. )