hubba-hubba

[Mark_Mandel at DRAGONSYS.COM]

Lynne Murphy <lynnem at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK> wrote:

>>>>>
Robert Kelly said:
> when I was took a term of Chinese in the 1950s, the tutor, from
> Shanghai, used hao bu hao (lit. good not good) exactly as an ordinary
> how-are-you greeting`  -- so it might serve as hubba hubba origin -- but
> hubba is a very strange vocalic reading of the hao of hao bu hao (how
> boo how or something like it, how boo, how 'bout that, etc,. you'd
> expect)

The intonational character of 'hao bu hao' is really different from
hubba-hubba, though.  When I've heard it, the _bu_ is pretty salient, but
in _hubba-hubba_, it's the "hu" that get the stresses.
<<<<<

There are regional differences. I've heard (from native speakers) that Taiwan
Mandarin-speakers tend to give much fuller pronunciation to 5th-tone (atonic)
words than Beijing speakers do. Something similar may be going on here; I seem
to recall hearing "hao3 bu hao3" with a very destressed "bu". Conversation may
also produce much more variety, and more destressing, than a tutor's
instructional pronunciation.


-- Mark A. Mandel
      Support the Hawaiian-Welsh Cultural Exchange Program
      Bringing vowels and consonants to those in need