Saying Chinese wrong (spoonerisms) A common error for native English speakers in speaking English is a spoonerism. A "spoonerism" in English is when you say it wrongly, by swapping first letters. "Hou

Nanren888- 新西兰

Saying Chinese wrong (spoonerisms) A common error for native English speakers in speaking English is a spoonerism. A "spoonerism" in English is when you say it wrongly, by swapping first letters. "House & garden" is said "gouse & harden". The first sounds are swapped between words. This happens all the time, by accident when speaking. Usually you can just tell what they mean without thinking. A native Chinese speaker told me that spoonerisms never happen in Chinese. Even happen? Maybe a little like wanting to say Hen Re (很热) & saying "RenHe" by mistake, or dage (大哥)--> ga de Any comments?

Aug 10, 2010 7:05 AM

Answers · 11

This mistake is rare in Chinese because English words are made up of letters but Chinese characters are made up of strokes!

August 10, 2010

sometimes we cannot distinguish between ‘L' and 'N'. for example we want to say "ni3"(你) but make a mistake to say "li3"(里) and some Cantonese might get involved in 'F' and 'H' like saying "hua"(花) instead of "fa"(发)

August 15, 2010

this is rare in China unless we speak too fast

August 15, 2010

The answer is yes! Of course yes! It never happen frequently in Chinese so many people may neglect it. But it do exist! I have encountered that for serveral times. For example: “吃一堑(pit)长一智(wit)”(A fall into the pit,a gain in your wit.) once was said so fluently without thinking that it became:“吃一智(wit)长一堑(pit)””(A fall into the wit,a gain in your pit.) ! That's really an interesting phenomenon in language! O(∩_∩)O~

August 11, 2010

That's not true. We have this "spoonerism" anyway. I know because I have this kind of experience. Usually it happens we you speak too fast. But this is really rare.

August 10, 2010

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