Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Transcript

Intro

Michael: What types of Chinese romanization are there?
Dehua: And which one is the most common?
Michael: At ChineseClass101.com, we hear these questions often. Imagine the following situation. Ben Lee is confused about Chinese romanization. He asks a teacher, Lin Li,
"What is the Chinese romanization system called?"
李 本: 中文的罗马化系统叫什么? (Zhōngwén de luómǎ huà xìtǒng jiào shénme?)
Dialogue
李 本: 中文的罗马化系统叫什么? (Zhōngwén de luómǎ huà xìtǒng jiào shénme?)
李 琳: 主要的一种叫做汉语拼音。 (Zhǔyào de yī zhǒng jiàozuò hànyǔ pīnyīn.)
Michael: Once more with the English translation.
李 本: 中文的罗马化系统叫什么? (Zhōngwén de luómǎ huà xìtǒng jiào shénme?)
Michael: "What is the Chinese romanization system called? "
李 琳: 主要的一种叫做汉语拼音。 (Zhǔyào de yī zhǒng jiàozuò hànyǔ pīnyīn.)
Michael: "The main one is called Chinese Pinyin."

Lesson focus

Michael: Pinyin is the Chinese phonetic alphabet. It is designed to spell out the pronunciation of Chinese characters with Roman letters. When you look up a character in a Chinese dictionary, you can always find Pinyin next to it. For example, you encounter the character,
Dehua: 太 (tài).
Michael: By looking at the character, you won't know how it is pronounced. When you look up its Pinyin, it is spelled T-A-I with a dropping tone mark on the letter A. If you have learned Pinyin, you'll know this character is pronounced as
Dehua: /tài/.
Michael: The Pinyin of a character usually consists of three elements, the consonant, the vowel, and the tone mark. For this character, the consonant is "T," which in Pinyin should be pronounced as
Dehua: /t/.
Michael: Then, we have the vowel "AI," which in Pinyin should be pronounced as
Dehua: /ai/.
Michael: Finally, we have a tone mark placed on top of the vowel. The character has a 4th tone. To combine all three elements together, we have
Dehua: t-ài, tài.
Michael: Unlike the English alphabet, which has 26 individual letters, Pinyin uses 25 of these letters and an extra special sign. The English letter that is not included in Pinyin is V, and the extra special sign is the letter U with two dots on top. It is pronounced as
Dehua: ü.
Michael: When you master Pinyin, you will be able to type Chinese characters easily on the keyboard. It is helpful to know that, when you need to type the vowel
Dehua: ü,
Michael: you use the letter V instead. It seems that V can be useful after all!
Michael: Pinyin has a total of 23 consonants and 24 vowels. The number of combinations is limited. For example, you can combine the consonant
Dehua: /d/
Michael: with the vowel
Dehua: /u/,
Michael: and you have
Dehua: /du/.
Michael: If you combine the consonant
Dehua: /d/
Michael: with the vowel
Dehua: /un/,
Michael: then you have
Dehua: /dun/.
Michael: Once you master Pinyin, you will be able to read all of the tens of thousands of Chinese characters without any problem!
Practice Section
Michael: Let's review the sentences we've heard in this lesson. I'll say the sentence in English, and then I want you to try and reply in Chinese. Dehua will then model the correct answer—listen to her carefully and repeat, with emphasis on your pronunciation.
Do you remember how to say "What is the Chinese romanization system called?"
[Beep. Pause 5 seconds.]
Dehua: 中文的罗马化系统叫什么? (Zhōngwén de luómǎ huà xìtǒng jiào shénme?)
Michael: Did you get it right? Listen again and repeat.
Dehua: 中文的罗马化系统叫什么? (Zhōngwén de luómǎ huà xìtǒng jiào shénme?)
[Beep. Pause 5 seconds.]
Dehua: 中文的罗马化系统叫什么? (Zhōngwén de luómǎ huà xìtǒng jiào shénme?)
Michael: Now for our next sentence. Do you remember how to say "The main one is called Chinese Pinyin."?
[Beep. Pause 5 seconds.]
Dehua: 主要的一种叫做汉语拼音。 (Zhǔyào de yī zhǒng jiàozuò hànyǔ pīnyīn.)
Michael: Listen again and repeat.
Dehua: 主要的一种叫做汉语拼音。 (Zhǔyào de yī zhǒng jiàozuò hànyǔ pīnyīn.)
[Beep. Pause 5 seconds.]
Dehua: 主要的一种叫做汉语拼音。 (Zhǔyào de yī zhǒng jiàozuò hànyǔ pīnyīn.)
Cultural Insight/Expansion (Optional)
Michael: As you learn the Pinyin system, you may see some Pinyin combinations spelled like English words, but don't be influenced by the English pronunciation. For example, how do you read the Pinyin for this word, spelled W-O-M-E-N? It's not "women." The correct pronunciation is
Dehua: /wǒ men/
Michael: and this word means "we" or "us."
Michael: Another interesting example is a metro station in Shanghai. It's written as Boxing Road. You might read it as Box-ing, but the correct pronunciation is
Dehua: Bó Xīng.
Michael: So, the correct way to say that station name is...
Dehua: 博兴路 (Bóxīng Lù)

Outro

Michael: Do you have any more questions? We're here to answer them!
Dehua: 再见! (zàijiàn!)
Michael: See you soon!

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