When communicating online or in other informal settings, is there an accepted way that Chinese can express that a sylable is being drawn out? We can write “noooo” or “whaaat?” But how do you write “waaaaaah!” or “hooooo sailei!” in Chinese? Or can you?
aiya…
well, it probably depends which dialect you’re speaking… there’s some simple words of disbelief, like “ai,” “e,” “o,” “a” that you can stretch out that would be the equivalent of heyyyy, whaat? … to place emphasis in mandarin, it’s kinda hard to describe… you can kind of overpronounce the words, or maybe start the tone higher than you normally do to provide a larger contrast (since mandarin is tonal, some words you say rising or falling)… also if you’re asking a question or exclaiming something, you can add “a” (pronounced ahh) at the end…
I think he’s talking about writing though. In which case, it’s an interesting question, and my guess is that it just isn’t done (I’ve have a few Chinese comic books among other things, and have never seen it done there).
To convey emotions by varying how words are written in a purely textual context, no. There are other means, though.
By writing, no.
But punctuation makes a lot of difference, though. (At least that’s what I use)
“…” would indicate the voice trailing off
“!!!”,"?!" would adjust the tone the same way English does
“–” would indicate a sudden stop in reading (like English).
But Chinese is made up of monosyllabic morphemes - ie no long vowels, read quickly (about 2-4 per second), so there is really little use (or need) to draw out any syllable.
Well, that’s the way formal writing is read, but informal writing, like on message boards, is sometimes meant to reflect the way people speak, which in Chinese does definitely sometimes include drawn-out syllables. I guess it’s not a problem to do without it, but I’d like to be able to tell if other people are doing it; sometimes I’ve seen things punctuated this way: “~~” which, in the most recent case I remember, would make since as a drawn-out syllable. Anyone seen that?