Small technical comment - we've had some users at Popup Cantonese complain about difficulties opening the PDF links with our new system. In order to solve this problem, we've just made the file name EXPLICITLY point to a .pdf file. The files themselves still automatically-generated, but hopefully the name change will solve any problems older browsers have identifying file types from the content header itself.

If anyone is still having problems getting our PDFs, please send us an email with details on your operating system and browser so we can try to replicate the problems over here. Without information on what software you are using it is going to be difficult for us to solve the problem.

Thanks,

--david

@thaunta,

Thanks for the catch. Slipped by in all the New Years exhilaration... fixed. :)

--dave

@robsonmic,

You might want to double check your assumptions.... I don't know about 分儿 and 班儿 offhand, but I'm pretty sure that 玩儿 is actually the standard pronunciation. The presence of the 儿化音 and the neutral tone are pretty much the two major differences between 普通话 and 国语.

When people talk about the Beijing dialect and its fondness for erhuaization, they're talking about stuff like people using 根儿 as a measure word for pens and that sort of street slang, not 玩儿 versus 玩. The government is pushing standardization to the point of making broadcasters actually study which words to erhuaize, so you'll hear the difference pretty clearly if you listen to a lot of Chinese television and are outside Beijing.*

*edit: this is probably the one reason that if you study in Beijing you'll be told that your Chinese is "better" than locals when you travel. They don't usually mean you speak better Chinese than they do (although maybe you do). They usually mean that your accent sounds a lot more like the people on television. That said, I've heard that Harbin is actually a bit more standard than Beijing when it comes to where and when they add the 儿化音, so it is sort of ironic that the subject came up with this lesson.

robsonmic,

People write Chinese all the time without including the 儿, but that doesn't mean you don't need to pronounce it. You can search in the 现代汉语词典 for which words should and should not have the suffix if you want a fairly authoritative reference. I don't have my copy handy but think 半 is supposed to have it too FWIW.

There's no reason you can't prefer the Nanjing dialect (Taiwan is a nice place) or any other regional dialect. You should be aware that talking about erhuaization as "rare" and "crazy" and "not normal... bastardization" is factually wrong and will make you sound ignorant to anyone who has actually studied the language and knows the difference.

"People write Chinese all the time without including the 儿, but that doesn't mean you don't need to pronounce it."

Oh? Sounds like a Beijing Thing. Check your nearest Beijing Taxi driver and get back to me. (Hint. The Sarcasm Meter is going crazy right now.)

"You should be aware that talking about erhuaization as "rare" and "crazy" "

Not what I said, you can use it now and then, just not every other word.

"Same with the difference between 金 and 京 and 是 and 四, etc."

Not quite, since I'm talking about not adding something which is beyond the written Chinese. Knowing the difference between 金 and 京, is just knowing the written Chinese.

Heuw ever would we kneu heuw to proneunce these thing correctly witheut David areund to point it eut for us. :D

Thanks for the lesson.

@palafx

Haha! Was thinking exactly the same :P

Run EUT, come EUT, blurt EUT, sing EUT!

Really enjoyed this lesson!

@jolleycraig,

Thanks -- we should have caught that. Fixed w/ everything reuploaded.

My personal approach to these problems is well reflected in the old saying "when in Rome, do as the Romans do".

Right from starting to learn chinese i have noticed that there are about a million areas where different people say different things. I personally think that there is no true standard for languages, especially languages like Chinese and English. I know that certain jobs require "standard" pronunciation. But my aim is just to talk to people and for them to know what i am talking about. So when in beijing throw in a few 儿's, when somewhere else don't.

Otherwise as foreigners learning you always end up with some local lecturing you on their opinion on what is right. I have no time for that so it's just "yep ok", then carry on with whatever.

@Echo, i've thought of a sentence to understand my difficulty with adding a word at the end of a sentence.

my nemesis with 'dehua' and 'chulai'

you've explain clearly that i can leave out 'dehua' with 'ruguo' is this the same case with 'chu' versus 'chulai'? the use and translation of 'chulai' in translation sofar has giving me problems

i'm definitely lacking exposure and practice.

how many ways to say the following:

i don't know your thoughts if you don't speak(call) them out

> do i use shuochu - shuochulai and ruguo..dehua for more kouyu

@Echo, na how would you translation the sentence

'i don't know your thoughts if you don't speak them out'

is 'chulai' and 'ruguo..dehua' use in this context?