Saturday, December 31, 2011

Yelling in Chinese!

Since the beginning of the year, I have made great progress in my ability to yell and sound angry in Chinese. Chinese has four tones, and so making each of those tones clear while also expressing anger is difficult if you're not a native speaker. If you don't pay attention to tones, the meaning of something like "Why are you not listening to me?" can change to something like "Why aren't you stopping chemistry?!!" which is not quite the meaning I'd be wanting to get across. The kids will figure it out, but tones are important.

At the beginning of the year, I had a very hard time expressing emotion, while at the same time communicating my tones clearly. It's hard enough to express emotion in a foreign language because you're constantly having to translate in your head, and it's not natural, and then Chinese has the added difficulty of dealing with tones. Thankfully, I'm to the point now where I don't have to think about how to say what I want to say (in the classroom, at least), and I'm able to actually express my emotions. So, I can yell in Chinese, and I sound scary rather than just loud, which is a good thing. 

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