<p>I think if you mispronounced 莎士比亚 (Shā shì bǐ yǎ) with a lighter tone, it could become something like 啥是逼呀 (Shà shì bī ya), where 逼 carries a meaning of female's genital which is quite rude. The whole sentence might turn out to be misheard as “啥是逼呀？” which means "What is a pxsxy(逼)?". Then it makes sense for your teacher not explaining that.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-24T08:35:02.123Z
2018-08-24T08:35:02.123Z
Khahoe Tan
<p>I don't want to explain it to you either, it'd lower the tone of this very serious Q&amp;A site, but if you read as far as the second last paragraph of this <a href="http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=15171" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=15171</a> you'll get a very strong hint. The only thing I'd add to that is that 傻 is a very natural prefix, probably the single most common one, and 呀 is a natural suffix to almost everything.</p>

<p>Enjoy.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-23T14:40:10.073Z
2018-08-23T14:40:10.073Z
steveLangsford
<p>It's hard to pinpoint <em>for sure</em> what you're saying and what your teacher is hearing, but we can make an educated guess.</p>

<ul>
<li><p>莎士 is very easily confused with 吓死 for non-native speakers.</p></li>
<li><p>比 can easily become 屄, especially without proper tone mastery.</p></li>
<li><p>亚 could, like @steveLangsford pointed out, change to 呀 without much effort.</p></li>
</ul>

<p>So now we've got something like the neologism 吓死宝宝了 (scared little baby me to death) but which you've said as 吓死屄呀 (scared (little) cunt me to death). This would explain your teachers discountenance and subsequent refusal of explanation. </p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-23T21:00:26.083Z
2018-08-23T21:12:52.280Z
2018-08-23T21:12:52.280Z
Mou某
<p>Apparently, when I pronounce the tones wrong on 莎士比亚 I've said something that my teacher refuses to explain to me. It should be Shāshìbǐyǎ. What am I doing wrong?</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-23T16:29:20.240Z
Please elaborate the tone you use in Pinyin. Probably you are using the same flat tone for all the word.
mootmoot
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-24T04:24:55.503Z
Please be careful not to swap the first and second character, as the sound of first and third character together means a pretty dirty word that you'd never want to call somebody.
Kevin. Fang
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-24T16:57:37.780Z
Might not be relevant, but should it be  shāshìbǐyà [1434]?
xbh
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-08-26T11:40:39.090Z
Becareful with any bi word...
sfy
<pronunciation>
"Shakespere" Pronounced wrong upsets my teacher
# "Shakespere" Pronounced wrong upsets my teacher

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-08-23)

Apparently, when I pronounce the tones wrong on 莎士比亚 I've said something that my teacher refuses to explain to me. It should be Shāshìbǐyǎ. What am I doing wrong?

**Tags:** pronunciation

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Please elaborate the tone you use in Pinyin. Probably you are using the same flat tone for all the word.  
> **username_2**: Please be careful not to swap the first and second character, as the sound of first and third character together means a pretty dirty word that you'd never want to call somebody.  
> **username_3**: Might not be relevant, but should it be  shāshìbǐyà [1434]?  
> **username_4**: Becareful with any bi word...  

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## 3 answers

### Answer by username_5 on 2018-08-24. Score: 3

I think if you mispronounced 莎士比亚 (Shā shì bǐ yǎ) with a lighter tone, it could become something like 啥是逼呀 (Shà shì bī ya), where 逼 carries a meaning of female's genital which is quite rude. The whole sentence might turn out to be misheard as “啥是逼呀？” which means "What is a pxsxy(逼)?". Then it makes sense for your teacher not explaining that.


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### Answer by username_6 on 2018-08-23. Score: 0

I don't want to explain it to you either, it'd lower the tone of this very serious Q&A site, but if you read as far as the second last paragraph of this <http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=15171> you'll get a very strong hint. The only thing I'd add to that is that 傻 is a very natural prefix, probably the single most common one, and 呀 is a natural suffix to almost everything.

Enjoy.


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### Answer by username_7 on 2018-08-23. Score: 0

It's hard to pinpoint *for sure* what you're saying and what your teacher is hearing, but we can make an educated guess.

* 莎士 is very easily confused with 吓死 for non-native speakers.
* 比 can easily become 屄, especially without proper tone mastery.
* 亚 could, like @username_6 pointed out, change to 呀 without much effort.

So now we've got something like the neologism 吓死宝宝了 (scared little baby me to death) but which you've said as 吓死屄呀 (scared (little) cunt me to death). This would explain your teachers discountenance and subsequent refusal of explanation.


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