Learn what the hardest sounds are to pronounce
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Matt: This is our fifth and final pronunciation lesson. |
| Nicole: I'm so glad it's finally over. |
| Matt: Stop lying! You wanted to do twenty of these. |
| Nicole: ha ha... ok. Well i think pronunciation is fun. |
| Matt: Maybe we can do part II another time. |
| Nicole: Advanced Pronunciation!!!! |
| Matt: Maybe not. Anyway, the focus of this lesson is helping you master the challenging sounds of Jyutping. |
| Nicole: Right. |
| Matt: So we're going to focus on a few things we haven't had time to look at yet. |
| Nicole: The first is a few "Tricky Consonant Sounds". |
| Matt: What do you think is the most difficult? |
| Nicole: I think for most English speakers it's "z" - the difference between the Jyutping ‘z’ with the English ‘z’. |
| Matt: Is English we say "zipper" or "zebra". |
| Nicole: In jyutping it is ze 姐, or zaa 渣, or zip 折. |
| Matt: Can you we hear that sound really slowly? |
| Nicole: （slowly）zip 折, or ze 姐, or zaa 渣. |
| Matt: A lot of people get this confused with the "c" sound. |
| Nicole: Right. The "c" sound is （saying c） as in the words ci 耻, ce 扯, and caa 查. |
| Matt: Let's hear these together so everyone can hear the difference. |
| Nicole: Ok. Z - zip 折, ze 姐, or zaa 渣.. C - ci 耻, ce 扯, and caa 查. |
| Matt: Linguistically, the difference is that the ‘c’ is aspirated while the ‘z’ is not. |
| Nicole: Right. So when you say the z sound zip 折, ze 姐, or zaa 渣. |
| Matt: you don't let air out of your mouth. Let's hear that again. |
| Nicole: zip 折, ze 姐, or zaa 渣 . |
| Matt: And when you say the "c" sound, air comes out. |
| Nicole: 耻 ci, ce 扯, and 查 caa |
| Matt: put your hand in front of your mouth and repeat after Nicole. See if you can feel the air coming out. |
| Nicole: 耻 ci, ce 扯, and 查 caa. |
| Matt: Let’s try it with z. And there's no air when you say z. |
| Nicole: Right. zip折, ze 姐, or 渣 zaa. |
| Matt: Ok, that’s not so hard. Now let’s take a loook at the second tricky thing. |
| Nicole: Actually this is easy. But a lot of people get it wrong. |
| Matt: It's the "j" sound |
| Nicole: Right. And it's easy! It sounds just like a Y in English!!!! |
| Matt: Right so don't get this wrong or people will look at you funny. Let's hear some examples of “j”. |
| Nicole: our phonetic system, jyutping, “days” is jat 日, and “leaves” jip 葉. |
| Matt: So remember that the J sounds like a Y in English. OK. What's next? |
| Nicole: We also walked to bring up this tricky "NG" sound. |
| Matt: Can you give us some examples? |
| Nicole: This is the sound you hear in 我 ngo “I”, 矮 ngai “short” and 咬 ngau “bite”. |
| Matt: This is a lot like the sound we have in the English word "sing". |
| Nicole: Right. |
| Matt: Say the word "sing" slowly. Right now. SING. Notice how your tongue touches the back of your mouth? That's the 'ng' sound in Cantonese. |
| Nicole: Right. ng....我 ngo, 矮 ngai and 咬 ngau. |
| Matt: A lot of people get this wrong. |
| Nicole: They need to listen to CantoneseClass101. |
| Matt: So four tricky consonants: |
| Nicole: zi, ci, ji and ngo. |
| Matt: And we have some tricky vowels for you too before you go. |
| Nicole: Right. A lot of people have trouble with the "oe" sound. |
| Matt: Yes they do. And it's really easy. It sounds just like the "ur" in "fur". |
| Nicole: That’s right, "ur" in "fur". “oe”. |
| Matt: Let's have some examples. |
| Nicole: hoe, soe, doe. |
| Matt: When you make the 'oe' sound your lips have to be round. |
| Nicole: Like you're about to throw up. |
| Matt: Perfect. |
| Nicole: hoe, soe, doe. |
| Matt: So that's our podcast for today. Three tricky consonants and a confusing vowel sounds. |
| Nicole: zi, ci, ji, and ngo, and the last but not least hoe. |
Outro |
|---|
| Matt: Before we let you go, we should tell you that this isn't all that we have. |
| Nicole: Not at all. |
| Matt: We have a lot of other tips and advice on tricky sounds in our premium lesson PDFs. |
| Nicole: In the premium learning center. |
| Matt: The PDF for this lesson has a lot more tricky words and sounds, and also suggestions on how to shape your mouth and how to make the sounds. |
| Nicole: So you'll sound like a Native Cantonese speaker. |
| Matt: Yes. A Native Cantonese-er. |
| Nicole: So thanks for listening and we'll see you on the site. |
| Matt: Bye bye! |
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