“Just give me the basics!” That’s what this Chinese pronunciation guide is all about. It's all that you need to know Chinese pronunciation to get by. The 80% that’s important. To continue with the basics of Chinese pronunciation...
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“So where do I place the tone marks?”To place the tone marks, just follow these simple rules: - In simple vowels the tone mark is placed over the vowel
Exception: If the letter “i” has a tone mark over it, the dot is removed.” A1 e2 I3 o4 u1 ü3 - In compound vowels, the “a” always carries the tone mark. If “a” is not present, then the tone mark is placed over “o” or “e”
Examples: Ai1 ao2 ia3 ua4, Ou1 uo2 ei3 ie4 - When “I” and “u” are found in a compound (two or three) vowel, the tone mark is always placed over the second vowel.
Iu1 ui2 uai3
See, I told you that was easy! What? What else is there to know about Chinese pronunciation using pinyin? Introducing the “umlaut”... This strange looking and sounding word – it’s derived from German and means “changed sound” – refers to the two dots .. over “u” like in ü and is pronounced like the “u” in French rue. The two dots only appear after “n” or “l” like in nü3, lü2, lüe4 When it is preceded by “j, q, x or y”, the two dots may be omitted. One more thing to wrap up this 80/20 guide to Chinese pronunciation i.e. this information covers the 80% of vital information you need to get by and see effective results. The 5th tone… What? Didn’t you say there are only 4 tones? Yes, I did. The 5th tone, known as a neutral tone is unlike the other 4 tones. It is found only in a few characters and carries no meaning of their own. They function as suffixes to give a relaxed (light, soft and short) ending sound. The best examples are “ma ma” 妈妈and “pa pa” 爸爸. The second syllable is always pronounced softly. Other examples are Le 乐
Na 哪
De 的
Zi 子
Ma 嘛
A 啊
Ne 呢
Me 么
De 得
Ba 吧
De 地
Lie 咧
Men 们
Zhe 着
And, there is no tone mark for the neutral tone. Here’s a list of two syllable words, in which the first syllable is stressed, and the second syllable is neutralized. First Ge1 ge1 = ge1 ge 哥哥 elder brotherMa1 ma1 = ma1 ma 妈妈 mother Second Peng2 you3 = peng2 you 朋友friend
Ming2 bai3 = ming2 bai 明白understand
Third tone Jie3 jie3 = jie3 jie 姐姐 elder sister
Fourth tone Ba4 ba4 = ba4 ba 爸爸 father
Di4 di4 = di4 di 弟弟 younger brother
Mei4 mei4 = mei4 mei 妹妹 younger sister
Tai4 yang2 = tai4 yang 太阳 sun
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