Sun Lu tang pronounced?

[vvanesse59]

Looking for pronounciation of Lu tang. As I understand it Sun is "Soong". Looked all over google for actual verbal pronounciation. Found Hsing-i "shing yee" spelled out and some time back found a dictionary site or something that you could click on the "speaker" icon and hear the word. Anyone know of site like that?

[Takuan]

I'd assume 'Tang' would be pronounced like 'Yang'; "Yawng" (For lack of a better phonetic representation), and 'Lu' like 'Bu'; "Loo"

I hope that's right ,

[bredmond812]

As I understand it Sun is "Soong".

No it is not. It is more like Swun. and lu is going to be more like Loo like the restrooms in England. Tang is more like Ang Lee the director but with a T at the front.

But just as important is the tones, but i dont know the characters right off, so i cant answer to the tones.

[cjurakpt]

in Mandarin it's Sun (like "son") Lu (like in lute) Tang (the "a" as in "ah")

in Cantonese it's pronounced something like Sheung Low Tong

[CFT]

in Cantonese it's pronounced something like Sheung Low Tong

Well, in Cantonese it actually sounds more like "Soon Look Tong".

Soon as in grandchild (sounds the same as "sour")
Look as in prosperity (sounds like "green" or "six")
Tong as in hall (sounds like "sugar")

[vvanesse59]

I appreciate the answers....

[bredmond812]

in Mandarin it's Sun (like "son")

You are wrong. It is more like Swun. It is very subtle, but they w sound is there.

[Justaguy]

Looking for pronounciation of Lu tang. As I understand it Sun is "Soong". Looked all over google for actual verbal pronounciation. Found Hsing-i "shing yee" spelled out and some time back found a dictionary site or something that you could click on the "speaker" icon and hear the word. Anyone know of site like that?

There are two ways of spelling out Chinese words - Wade Giles and Pinyin. Wade Giles was developed in the late 1800s - early 1900s, and pinyin was developed in the 1950s.
If you know the method to the madness, Wade Giles makes sense enough - the problem comes when people who haven't studied it see a word like Peiking and assume that its pronounced Peiking, when its really pronounced Beijing. WG uses P for the English B, and P' for the English P sound. Why? No idea. But thats why we have Daoism and Taoism, qigong and Chi Kung, etc.

So Sun Lutang is the Wade Giles spelling - in pinyin its Sun Ludang. Sun is pronounced kinda like a compressed "soon" - I can't think of any other way to describe it. As if you were saying Soon in half the time it normally takes in English by compressing the "oo".
Lu is pronounced like the name "Lou". Dang is English is pronounced with and A as in Hanger. In Chinese it is pronounced with the same A sound as the first A in Avacado.

Hsing I or Xingyi in pinyin is harder because it has distinctions between sounds that we don't make in English. Sh is a single sound for us, but say "shoot the Sh*t" out loud and pay attention to the way that the SH sounds in each word, and the position of your tongue in your mouth when you say it. The two different SH sounds come out because of the different sounds that follow it. Xingyi is pronounced with a SH that sounds more like sh*t than shoot.

I hope I haven't confused anyone too much, but its the sort of thing that could be said in two seconds, but takes a lot to write out.

And, of course, China is a big place, and pronunciation varies alot between people and places.

[scholar]

Reproducing Chinese sounds in western letters is not easy. The systems we use were designed for specialists, and they each have their own weirdnesses for laypeople.

The correct way to spell his name (the way he would have recognised) is 孫祿堂.

The tones of the syllables are important. Without them few, if any, Mandarin speakers will understand what you are saying, even if you get the consonants and vowels just right. Using pinyin with tone diacritics, you get Sūn Lùtáng. Wade-Giles uses a different representation of the consonants, Sun1 Lu4-t'ang2.