Comparison between Bai language and English

By Charlotte

  In fact , I began to learn and touch mandarin formally when I was a primary student, and mandarin is my second language. My first language is Nai language. I think I'm pround of my nationality, because I know a language more than Han people. Bai language is an interesting language, and there also some coincidental linguistic phenomenon between English and Bai language. Such as the pronunciation of "day" in English, there are also the same pronunciation in Bai language, but the meaning is "pig". In addition, the pronunciation of phonetic symbol /kɜː/ is same as the pronunciation of "grasp" in Bai language, etc. In a word, it is easier for Bai people to learn English in some degree because of the coincidental pronunciation. Of course， there are still some difficulties for Bai people to learn English. Because they have accustomed to speaking themselves' accent and some pronunciations can not be changed in a short time. The most representative pronunciation is about distinguishing between level-lingual and cacuminal. Bai people  don't like to distinguish them, whether it is level-lingual or cacuminal, Bai people are used to pronounce the level-lingual. So it's also in English pronunciation, there are some phonetic symbol that need us to differentiate level-lingual and cacuminal, such as the pronunciation of  /tʃ/ /tr/ /dr/ and so on. Therefore Bai people can't speak English accurately  on some phonetic symbols because of the effects of accent of Bai language.

  But no matter what happened, now that we have become a Bai people. We should love and respect our nationality including our language. As long as we practice them diligently, I believe we can speak the pronunciation of English accurately.