Re: [Espeak-general] espeak-zh multiple tone 3s

[Silas S. B. <ss...@ca...>]

Added a Native 4 to our data (and see below it):

(1) 我想请您 wǒ xiǎng qǐng nín
Natives 1 and 2: wó xiáng qǐng nín
Natives 3, 4 and SinoVoice: wó xiǎng qǐng nín

(2) 美语补习班 Měiyǔ bǔxíbān
Natives 1, 3, 4 and SinoVoice: Méiyǔ bǔxíbān
(4 says Měiyú bǔxíbān is also acceptable)
Native 2: Méiyú bǔxíbān

(3) 可以讨论 kěyǐ tǎolùn
Natives 1, 3, 4 and SinoVoice: kéyǐ tǎolùn

(4) 次力量给你保持忍耐 ..gěi nǐ bǎochí
Natives 1, 3, 4 and SinoVoice: ..géi nǐ bǎochí

(5) 教导你使你得益处 jiàodǎo nǐ shǐ nǐ dé yìchu
Natives 1, 3, 4 and SinoVoice (and previous
group): jiàodǎo nǐ shí nǐ dé yìchu

(6) 只有少数人 zhǐyǒu shǎoshùrén
Natives 1, 3, 4 and SinoVoice: zhíyǒu shǎoshùrén

(7) 可有可无 kěyǒu-kěwú
Native 1 and SinoVoice: kéyóu-kěwú
Natives 3 and 4: kéyǒu-kěwú

(8) 至少有两个 zhìshǎo yǒu liǎng ge
Natives 1, 3, 4 and SinoVoice: zhìshǎo yóu liǎng ge

(9) 令人难以理解的 lìngrén nányǐ lǐjiě de
Natives 1, 4 and SinoVoice: lìngrén nányǐ líjiě de
Native 3: lìngrén nányí líjiě de

(10) 可以怎样效法 kěyǐ zěnyàng
Native 1: kéyí zěnyàng
Natives 3, 4 and SinoVoice: kéyǐ zěnyàng

(11) 什么方法可以改善 shénme fāngfǎ
kěyǐ gǎishàn
Natives 1, 3 and 4 (and SinoVoice although it
seems to fault on the "me"): shénme fāngfǎ
kéyǐ gǎishàn
Native 2 and previous group: shénme fāngfǎ
kéyí gǎishàn

(12) 可以改善 kěyǐ gǎishàn
Native 1: kéyí gǎishàn
Natives 3, 4 and SinoVoice: kéyǐ gǎishàn

Native 4 thinks that the reason why
把保险取消 is "bǎ báoxiǎn qǔxiāo" is
that 把 (ba3) is *always* pronounced with a
3rd tone, and 我想请您 is "wó xiǎng qǐng
nín" because "wó xiǎng" always acts as a
single linguistic unit whose tones cannot be
further modified, as does "géi nǐ" (and
presumably "kéyǐ").  If we account for those
and then do the novice method around them (and
add that if something MUST be a tone 3 then
it's better to put tone 2 after it and have two
tone-3's later than it is to make it part of a
double tone-3 itself, "put off making double
tone-3's as long as possible"), then we'll have
native-acceptable renditions of everything except
cases 5, 6, and 7.  But that's still a worry,
especially cases 5 and 6 where all the natives
were in agreement (it's not obvious what
they're doing, but they must be doing SOMEthing!)

By the way, these people didn't talk to each
other (unless they're reading this thread, which
is extremely unlikely) .. the only source of
bias I can think of is in the fixed order that I've
been presenting the example renderings to them.
I should have shuffled both the questions and
the example answers before asking each new person.
But I can't imagine this would have very much
effect on ALL of them (and it would certainly
have no effect at all on SinoVoice), so there's
got to be something else going on.

Does anyone have a clearer idea on what the
rules are?

Silas


-- 
Silas S Brown http://people.pwf.cam.ac.uk/ssb22