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I consider English is a rhythmical language. In my opinion, its pronunciation
and the shape of the alphabet are rounded. When speaking, because of these features, it makes easier to go on to the next sentence. Are these things included in the phonetical feature of English language? :-)

I posted this one among the threads that I wrote before. I couldn't find any answers. I write it here again.
Thank you.
Bo-Kyung Choi

Usenet · Accepted Answer

[nq:1]I consider English is a rhythmical language.[/nq]
All languages have a rhythm.
[nq:1]In my opinion, its pronunciation and the shape of the alphabet are rounded. When speaking, because of these features, it makes easier to go on to the next sentence. Are these things included in the phonetical feature of English language? :-)[/nq]
On one of my satellite TV channels I occasionally see a Chinese lady reading the news. I don't know which Chinese dialect she is speaking, but each syllable seems to be pronounced separately from every other. There is no slurring and the words have a metronome-like regularity with no variation in length.
To my ear, a Chinese person who has an accent when speaking English, chops his words short. When he says "pork" it sounds like "poke", the 'r' gets dropped and the word is shortened. In other words his speech rhythm is different and that's what makes his accent distinctive.

To speak English better the Chinese needs to learn to drawl a bit. To linger longer over the vowels and run syllables together.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]On one of my satellite TV channels I occasionally see a Chinese lady reading the news. I don't know which ... separately from every other. There is no slurring and the words have a metronome-like regularity with no variation in length.[/nq]
Such is the characteristic of the language. In Chinese, every word (a written character) is pronaunced as one syllable. However, the Chinese accents are very diverse. A Beijinger cannot naturally understand even a word of Cantonese. The Japenese and Koreans seem to speak their language in the same kind of way.
[nq:1]To my ear, a Chinese person who has an accent when speaking English, chops his words short. When he says ... better the Chinese needs to learn to drawl a bit. To linger longer over the vowels and run syllables together.[/nq]
That's because they are tring to speak Engish with the native Chinese tougue. Same thing happens when some westeners try to speak Chinese. They make the "r" sound too floppy and just slip from word to word, wich sounds funny.

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Which suggests a technique I have mentioned previously in this newsgroup, and which several people seemed to think was a good idea. If you know someone who speaks Chinese with a bad English accent, see if you can learn to imitate them. Then use those same pronunciations when you speak English, becaue in English they'll be correct!

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[nq:2]Such is the characteristic of the language. In Chinese, every ... and just slip from word to word, wich sounds funny.[/nq]
[nq:1]Which suggests a technique I have mentioned previously in this newsgroup, and which several people seemed to think was a ... can learn to imitate them. Then use those same pronunciations when you speak English, becaue in English they'll be correct![/nq]
A really good idea, which I think I'll kick around with my students. I think I got back to you before with my 'only became comprehensible speaking French to French people when I started imitating Peter Sellers as Inspector Clouseau' story (not quite the same idea, but, bizarrely, it worked. A friend learning Spanish reported similar success with Speedy Gonzales as a model. Maybe this tells us something about English speakers' reluctance to 'go all the way' in attempting a realistic pronunciation).
The key to BK's observation may be the disputed stress-timing nature of English, whereby speech comes in equal time bites from stress point to stress point, rather than most other languages which are seen to be syllable timed, with each syllable having the same time value. I would think that the Chinese languages I hear daily would be a prime example for someone arguing for the existence of syllable timing. A much debated issue, I'm not sure I'm convinced one way or the other.

Pronunciation seems a particular issue for Chinese learners of English. I've just spent the afternoon with a 90% Chinese class. We were doing presentation skills practice. One student asked me if she could introduce her fellow presenters as 'my partners.' I said, yes that was OK, but 'colleagues' might be better in this particular context. "Yes", she said, she agreed, "but I can pronounce 'partners' and I can't pronounce ... colleagues"!
DC

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...
[nq:1]I consider English is a rhythmical language.[/nq]
MTV?

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