This thread is inspired by an exchange in this one about handling an unusual name.
The following exchange occurred:
Can anyone offer any information that would help ease my confusion about how the sound system of Vietnamese works?
No takers?
acsenray, my response may not be appropriate to GQ given my lack of formal knowledge, but I’ll give it a try (Yoda, I can’t hear you, lalalala)…
(Disclaimer: I am not a fluent native speaker, depite my well-meaning relatives’ comments to the contrary. I speak Southern Vietnamese (Saigon dialect) with a tinge of a Central (Hue) accent. This is in contrast to language classes that emphasize the Northern Dialect (Hanoi) since it is the officially sanctioned language since reunification. I am not a linguist, so forgive me for using non-technical terms.)
Vietnamese pronunciation tends to become blurred when spoken at a conversational pace. When you pronounce “Nguyen” very slowly (as if you’re taking Vietnamese 101), you may hear three sub-syllables (dipthongs, I guess):
“ng” as in the final part of “sing”
“uy” as in “ouie” or “oowey” as in “Louie”
“n” just like “ng” only less enunciated
String together and you’ll get something like “ngweeeng”.
This site has sound files to help you pronounce some Vietnamese names, including Nguyen .
In rapid conversation, Southern Vietnamese tend to muddle dipthongs. It’s common to hear “Nguyen” pronounced as “win”.
What’s perhaps more important is that you get the correct tone (indicated by diacritical marks). I know it may sound bizarre, but if you don’t get the right tone or omit it entirely, native speakers will often have no clue as to what you’re saying. They can’t even take educated guesses, unless they’re used to talking with foreigners.
If you can say Nguyễn as “win” with the rising tone (indicated by the tilda mark ~), people are more likely to understand you regardless of how you muck up the dipthongs.
As an aside, using an English/Latin alphabet to replicate Vietnamese words (the way things are now) phonetically is an extreme challenge to the English speaker. Too many homophones, exceptions, and cross-coding letters (a “d” is pronounced “y” as in "yam) to consider. Also note that, similar to Chinese, some Vietnamese words just can’t be easily described, such as Tuyet , another common name.
It’s like saying “fook” without aspirating the “k” (swallow it). The bad news is that to most people, “Phuc” (happiness) and “phut” (minute) sound alike. It’s only when you slow down and hyper-enunciate (which sounds lame and unrealistic like the way some people say “DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH?” when they’re lost in Chinatown), that you can hear “phut” pronounced as “foot” (without an aspirated “t”).
At conversational speeds, “Bong” sounds like “Bom”.
What we hear when we talk is different from what the listener hears. It may sound like “Bongm” to you (the sound coming from his/her mouth), but he may be hearing something else since his voice is entering the brain through his headspace. Also, the speaker learned “Bong” as “Bong”, not as “Bongm”. The nazalized “gm” ending you hear simply registers as “ng” to the speaker.
It’s extremely difficult for native Vietnamese speakers to explain things in terms of orthography, because they didn’t learn the language that way. For the most part, they learned language as children with brains that simply aborbed words and sounds at an incredible rate simply through repeating what an adult says.
I may catch flak for saying this, but I’ll even go as far as to say that Vietnamese orthography is inconsistent. Native speakers may protest, but they’re actually internalizing the inconsistencies, much like the way some people insist that English spelling is mostly phonetic (“Spell it like it sounds!”)*
*Of course, Dopers know better.
Ask your Vietnamese friend to pronounce bóng (shadow) and see if the word is pronounced with a dangling mouth. When I say it, it comes out at “bom” and my mouth is completely closed.
On the other hand, bốn (four) ends on an open mouth…confusing, no?