How To Have a "Taiwan Guoyu" Accent to Your Taiwan Mandarin

[Teddoman]

A heavy taiwanese accented mando is like hillbilly english. All in all, its better to learn to speak "taipei mando" then taike mando.

I don't know about Teddoman, but the only reason why I do this is for joking around. I don't go around all day speaking Taiwan guoyu. When I want to eat something, I might say to my girlfriend, "Ni yao cu suh-mo?"

I plan to run for president of Taiwan using the Chen Shui Bian accent

[Petrichor]

It should be more like the /e/ as in egg. The /e/ in Jen is the same as the e in the English 'Jenny'. But by itself. 'e' is like the /ə/ as in the. For example, e4 'hungry, starving' is quite different from the 'e' in Zhen, Wen, or Ben.

I notice that all of these problem words end in 'n'. The Mandarin 'n' ends earlier than the English n. The tongue stays on the palate and is not released.

Mandarin speakers with Taiwanese-inflected Mandarin pronounce these differently. But these speakers very rarely correct others since (a) they know their Mandarin is 'non-standard' and (b) they are either (1) proud of their non-standard pronunciation or (2) don't care.

Unless your pronunciation of egg and Jen is different from mine, zhen doesn't sound anything like Jen to me. That en sound sounds more like the un in under to me.

I found a website with all the sounds.
http://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn ... inyin.aspx

Go to the Mandarin pronunciation table and you can click on all of the sounds. Go to z and find zhen.
I've clicked that about 50 times now, haha.

Oh gosh, why did I think I'd come on here and get one straight answer?

[Teddoman]

Unless your pronunciation of egg and Jen is different from mine, zhen doesn't sound anything like Jen to me. That en sound sounds more like the un in under to me.

I found a website with all the sounds.
http://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn ... inyin.aspx

Go to the Mandarin pronunciation table and you can click on all of the sounds. Go to z and find zhen.
I've clicked that about 50 times now, haha.

Oh gosh, why did I think I'd come on here and get one straight answer?

Hey, at least they have websites for learning proper Mandarin pronunciation.

There are no websites for people trying to learn the improper Taiwan goyee of a heavily accented 70 year old.

[Petrichor]

Unless your pronunciation of egg and Jen is different from mine, zhen doesn't sound anything like Jen to me. That en sound sounds more like the un in under to me.

I found a website with all the sounds.
http://www.newconceptmandarin.com/learn ... inyin.aspx

Go to the Mandarin pronunciation table and you can click on all of the sounds. Go to z and find zhen.
I've clicked that about 50 times now, haha.

Oh gosh, why did I think I'd come on here and get one straight answer?

Hey, at least they have websites for learning proper Mandarin pronunciation.

There are no websites for people trying to learn the improper Taiwan goyee of a heavily accented 70 year old.

I don't think there is a proper way to pronounce Mandarin, is there? Despite what PAVC is trying to do to me. (I'm ditching that series at the end of this book, I swear.) There are just different accents, the same as English.

I think I'll learn to speak like a Taiwan goyee, just to confuse everyone.

Thanks to all who responded to my question.

[dahsiung]

My very first Mandarin teacher was my host father, a 50ish man born and raised in Tainan. Although I've had other teachers since then, every once and awhile, I'll pronounce a word like he would. To this day, my wife and her family will joke about how we were driving together in the country and I was giving directions and said, with a straight face, "Zu zu zou."
That is "drive straight" or "zhi zou" but I honestly believed that was how it was pronounced.