Comment on Why do all languages share the same intonation for questions?
friend_of_satan@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Vietnam’s doesn’t. The rising tone that you hear at the end of an English language question can change the literal meaning of a word in Vietnamese.
OmegaMouse@pawb.social 1 month ago
How does Vietnamese indicate when a question is being asked?
friend_of_satan@lemmy.world 1 month ago
They append the word “no” to the statement.
“How are you?” Is “you’re good, no?” But the word “no” does not have a rising tone.
Tonal languages are hard for non-tonal language speakers to pick up because of this. On the flip side, it can be tough for tonal language speakers to grasp the tonal inflections in English, and sometimes speak like robots before they understand how to use them.