午夜剧场

I am currently creating Chinese language teaching materials for use at the Shonan Fujisawa Campus (SFC). In the process, I have rediscovered the fascination of the Chinese language, which I would like to introduce here. As is well known, Chinese is a tonal language, so even if the Romanized spelling representing the pronunciation is the same, if the tone is different, it refers to something completely different.

Example: mǎi 买 (to buy), mài 卖 (to sell)

yǎnjing 眼 (eye), yǎnjìng 眼镜 (glasses)

Furthermore, when speaking in sentences, it is necessary to pay attention to the position of stress in addition to the tones. This is because the connotative meaning of a sentence changes slightly depending on where the stress is placed. For example, if sample sentence (1) is uttered without placing stress anywhere, it is a sentence describing the fact that "He ate my cake." However, as in (a), if stress is placed on "tā (他)," it emphasizes that it was "he" and no one else who ate the cake. Also, as in (b), if stress is placed on "wǒ de (我的)," it means that "my" cake was eaten, rather than someone else's. And (c) is a slightly special case, but if stress is placed on "肠丑ī濒别 (吃了)," it implies that he ate something he was not supposed to eat.

(1) 他吃了我的蛋糕。

a 罢ā 肠丑ī濒别 wǒ de dàngāo. (He ate my cake)

b 罢ā 肠丑ī濒别 wǒ de dàngāo. (He ate my cake)

c 罢ā 肠丑ī濒别 wǒ de dàngāo. (He ate my cake [implying he shouldn't have])

In Chinese language education as a second foreign language, emphasis is placed on the acquisition of grammar and vocabulary, and content such as the above is rarely addressed. Consequently, learners either finish their studies without ever encountering these concepts, or they acquire them through actual communication with native Chinese speakers after traveling to China.

Of course, grammar and vocabulary are essential elements in learning Chinese. However, when communicating with native speakers, it is vital to understand the linguistic habits of the language, grasp the connotative meaning of utterances, and avoid unnecessary friction.

Therefore, it is necessary to create more practical Chinese teaching materials that allow students to learn about utterances and their connotative meanings from an acoustic perspective as well.