Since we were at the topic of learning English, I might as well recall some issues faced when I was in middle school. One issue that I had thought a lot about was the accent. Let me explain. It was in the mid-late 80s and back then, the British accent was the only accent taught in middle schools. Since I already started listening to VOA, I was deeply fascinated by the American accent. Growing up in Beijing, I like the American accent better than the British one as it is closer to the Beijing dialect of mandarin. To be clear, I’m not a big fan of 京片子, especially the “blurry” nature of its pronunciation. But I like the northern dialect of Chinese (I guess I should call it 北京普通话 to avoid confusion), which features a "clearer" pronunciation than its southern counterpart. I found two things American English is similar to the Beijing dialect: 1) The “er”s at the end of a word are pronounced like 儿话音; 2) Both pronounce every bit of a word clearly, no matter how fast spoken. (Again, don’t confuse北京普通话 with 京片子); 3) Both use the stomach more to generate the sound, as opposed to speaking shallowly from the upper throat. So I began following VOA and learned to speak the American way. I was one of only two people speaking with an American accent. (The other student was, interestingly, a rock band guitarist, whose interest was probably sparked by his exposure to the popular American culture.) It was a little rebellious for a kid like me that usually went with the norm, but nonetheless cool and satisfying.
For a long time, I mimicked the VOA anchor of Special English down to every detail of their pronunciation. I can bet if you listen to both the real broadcaster and me, you will not be able to tell which is which.
Posted by Shamu at October 11, 2004 04:17 PMThat's great to hear! Maybe we should talk over the phone sometime. See who can fool whom. LOL
P.S. Sorry for being picky, but you don't speak an accent, you speak with an accent.
Posted by: Yan at October 11, 2004 05:23 PMYan, thanks for pointing out the error. I've corrected it.
As to the accent, to be frank, I no longer take it as an important issue as long as I'm speaking fluently. Sometimes I feel NOT sounding like a Caucasion American is the right thing to do. :)
That was a pleasant read. I also like the Northern accent and find it very plesant to listen to. There are so many accents in China that it can prove to be a problem to learn Chinese. One time I was with a group of people, and someone was talking and I hadn't the slightest idea what he was talking about. Later on I told a friend about my difficulty and he told me not to worry as he didn't understand him either. One time I was on a bus, sitting on the back row, going into Shanghai. The fellow next to me was speaking to his friend, his voice was deep (my voice is also deep, so that perked my interest) and he spoke in a relatively slow cadence with clear and crisp words. I silently mimmicked each of his words, wantingly to pattern my own speach after his, it was so impressive to me.
Posted by: JFS at October 12, 2004 04:33 AMone of my friend has ever said: "why not speak with an accent, you feel like real you, not imitating a native English-speaker" :)
Posted by: juju at October 12, 2004 08:27 AM