Penang Hokkien Vocabulary Questions

[amhoanna]

綫頂詞典 -> I would pronounce 頂 in sandhi/running tone.
人民共和国 -> Here I am inconsistent, as I usually (subconsciously) pronounce 民 in citation/standing tone. Someone at ispeakmin.com (quite a long while ago, I hardly visit that forum nowadays) said 民 should be in sandhi/RT, and logically he was right.

Interesting. I think logically he'd be right too, but after yrs of observation, I think 民 would be citation in TW. Strange but maybe true: I think certain tones actually take citation more often, and some less. T3 in particular seems to take citation a lot in TW. Maybe T5 as well. 共產共和国: my "sense" says only 国 takes citation here, in TW at least. What do U think, Niuc?

[niuc]

Are you sure it's kā and not ka ? I only know "gātái (gatal)" as in ka...... ^^

Yes, Aokh. In my variant it is kā (ka7), somehow with "visualization" (for me) that the itchiness is the sensation of being bitten by some super-tiny bugs at that very moment.

Interesting. I think logically he'd be right too, but after yrs of observation, I think 民 would be citation in TW. Strange but maybe true: I think certain tones actually take citation more often, and some less.

Hmmm, I never paid attention to this before! I pronounce 民 in 民國 in RT/sandhi.

T3 in particular seems to take citation a lot in TW. Maybe T5 as well.

The "funny" thing is that I often (subconsciously) pronounce 華 & 民 in in ST/citation for 中華人民共和國, but in RT/sandhi for 中華民國.

共產共和国: my "sense" says only 国 takes citation here, in TW at least. What do U think, Niuc?

Yup!

[amhoanna]

The "funny" thing is that I often (subconsciously) pronounce 華 & 民 in in ST/citation for 中華人民共和國, but in RT/sandhi for 中華民國.

This is in line with my "sandhi sense" too, except I might have just 民 (and 国) in citation, then look back and ask myself why. Hoklo sandhi just seems to like to "come up for air" during these kind of long strings... I wonder what academia has to say about Hoklo sandhi groups.

[niuc]

Hoklo sandhi just seems to like to "come up for air" during these kind of long strings...

Sounds true! It's amazing how young children can effectively learn a language "subconsciously". When I started to learn English, I used to wonder how its native speakers, who learned English since young, could remember and know how to use the past tense verbs, especially the irregular ones. Not until during my teens that I came to realize the existence of nasal vowels and sandhi in Hokkien. I guess many native speakers don't know either, they just sandhi the tones by "instinct".

From some citation samples by my Teochew friends, I found out that TC T5 is high & level like T1 in Amoy/TW/Bagan, while TC T1 is (mid-)low & level like T7 in Amoy/TW/Bagan. So both TC 陽平 & 陰平 are level as the name 平 suggest. Could this be the "original"? Btw, should 陽 pitch higher ("brighter" but high pitch also more "feminine") or lower ("darker" but low pitch also more "masculine")?

Many years ago I read somewhere about sandhi/RT as more "original" than citation/ST, citing as proof that Hokkien sandhi tones are closer to Cantonese tones. Any further info about this?

I wonder what academia has to say about Hoklo sandhi groups.

I'd love to know also.

[SimL]

I guess many native speakers don't know either, they just sandhi the tones by "instinct".

It's even stronger than that. Many "linguistically naive" native speakers of Hokkien will insist that the sandhi rules are "natural", i.e. "it's much easier to say the words with the shifted sandhi", or "it sounds more elegant to say the words with the shifted sandhi". They don't realise that Hokkien sandhi rules are "arbitrary" - a result of the historical development of the language.

This is a very common phenomenon for "linguistically naive" native speakers. The rules which are part of their language (but are otherwise "arbitrary") are seen as "natural" / "it must be like that".

For example, in German and Dutch, voiced stops at the end of a word become unvoiced. So, in German, "baths" - "Bäder" - is pronounced with a "-d-" (i.e. voiced), but the singular "bath" - "Bad" is pronounced with a "-t" (i.e. unvoiced). This means that "Bat" (a word meaning "to ask / to request") and "Bad" are pronounced identically in German. Similarly for "-b-" vs "-p" and "-g-" vs "-k": the voicing disappears, if the voiced consonant is at the end. Now, this "rule" doesn't exist in English, so "God" and "Got" are not pronounced identically in English. But, German speakers feel that this "rule" is so "natural", that when they speak English, they will pronounce "God" and "Got" identically. As with linguistically naive Hokkien speakers thinking that "tone sandhi is natural", linguistically naive German speakers think that "devoicing of voiced consonants at the end of words is natural". In both cases, they are simply arbitrary (but essential) rules for good pronunciation.

[amhoanna]

Many years ago I read somewhere about sandhi/RT as more "original" than citation/ST, citing as proof that Hokkien sandhi tones are closer to Cantonese tones. Any further info about this?

I posted a link on this forum just a few weeks ago linking to an old paper (1984) saying just this. Tadpolenese also talks about this pretty thoroughly, I think this is the right page, altho I'll have to check it later. http://www.tadpolenese.com/theory/runni ... ed-default

Cantonese is interesting b/c, at least in the mainstream kind, all the 阳 tones are low, and all the 阴 tones are high, and the two sets loosely mirror each other.

[Ah-bin]

Just a question about Penang Hokkien vocabulary....

How do you say "confuse" or "to mix up"?

I was wondering how to say
1) "I got them mixed up"
2) "I got this one mixed up with that one" or "I confused this one with that one."

[SimL]

Hi Ah-bin,

I haven't got a "single term" for "confused" or "mixed-up". I would paraphrase according to the situation, with a "be-hiau" (= "not know how to"), in order to indicate the confusion.

"i tioh-chEN-kiaN, liau sua(h) be-hiau kong/siauN khi" (= "he got a fright, and so didn't know how to speak/think")

"wa ci(t)-E mui i, i sua(h) be-hiau in" (= "I asked him abruptly, so he didn't know how to answer")

"ci(t)-(l)e lO uan-lai, uan-khi, i sua(h) be-hiau kiaN" (= "the road twisted and turned, so he didn't know (which way / how) to walk")

But others with wider vocabulary may know of a single term.

[Ah-bin]

thanks Sim. It was particularly the mixing up of one thing with another, perhaps it is "chham chham kā-liáu" or
some other way of using "chham"?

[Ah-bin]

FInally I can get back to asking some Hokkien questions!

A week or so ago Sim mentioned the word khàu-pē•, meaning to complain or grumble, there is another vulgar word I have seen written in Penang Hokkien sí-pē•, 死爸. What does it actually mean and how is it used? I have heard sí-pē•-hó which seems to mean "really good". What other meanings does the word have?