Learn the basics of Chinese pronunciation
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| Hi! |
| Welcome to Introduction to Chinese. |
| My name is Alisha and I'm joined by... |
| Hi everyone! I'm Rui |
| In this lesson, you'll learn the basics of Chinese pronunciation. We'll give you a brief introduction to the Chinese romanization system, demonstrate a few difficult sounds, and then talk about tones in Chinese pronunciation. |
| Introduction of Pinyin |
| Pinyin is a system that represents Mandarin Chinese by using the Roman alphabet. It's now the most common way to romanize Mandarin Chinese. It's the foundation for Chinese pronunciation. Learning Pinyin will benefit you in many ways. It shows you the proper way to pronounce a word. It also allows you to pronounce a word you've never seen. And if you'd like to type in Chinese on your phone or computer, Pinyin input is the easiest and most popular way. |
| A complete syllable in Pinyin is usually made of Initials, which are consonants, and finals, which are vowels. And lastly a tone mark. Sometimes though, a vowel by itself can make a syllable too. |
| 我 (Wǒ) “I” |
| 哦 (ó) |
| There are 20 consonant letters in Mandarin or Pinyin. Almost all same consonant letters as English, except for the letter "V." |
| b, p, m, f, |
| d, t, n, l, |
| g, k, h |
| and so on. |
| And there are combinations of consonants that are initial sounds as well. But don't worry, there are only three of these... |
| zh, ch, sh |
| And then we have vowels. There are 6 single vowels in Mandarin Chinese. |
| a, o, e, i, u, ü |
| By combining these single vowels with each other, or by combining them with "n," "ng," "r," we can make many compound vowels. Such as... |
| ia, ou, ei, ue, er, |
| an, ün, eng, ian, uan, iong |
| FULL LIST OF COMPOUND VOWELS: |
| ai, an, ang, ao, |
| ei, en, eng, er, |
| i, ia, ian, iang, iao, ie, in, ing, iong, iu, |
| ong, ou, |
| ua, uai, uan, uang, ue, ui, un, üe |
| It may look like a lot to remember. The trick is to memorize the ones that sound different from English or your native language. This will be emphasized in the next part of the lesson, so stick around. |
| Unique sounds in Pinyin |
| Some sounds in Chinese don't sound like their roman letters. We'll show you how they're pronounced in Chinese. |
| First let's look at some single vowel sounds. |
| "e" sounds like the "u" in the English "bud," only longer. Remember not to curl your tongue when there's no "r" around. |
| 车 (chē) "car", 喝 (hē) "to drink". |
| The only exception is when it comes after "y." Then, it sounds more like "e," as in "red." |
| 也 (yě) "also", 叶 (yè) "leaf". |
| The "i" sound is like "ee" in the English "see." |
| 一 (yī) "one", 西 (xī) "west". |
| When it comes after a c, ch, r, s, sh, or zh sound, it's more like a short "i" sound, as in "lip." |
| 知识 (zhīshi) "knowledge", 四十 (sìshí) "forty" |
| The "ü" sound is like the French "u" as in "tu." Your lips should be round and pouting. |
| 绿 (lǜ) "green color", 女 (nǚ) "female". |
| "U" and "ü" are different sounds. But when "u" comes after j, q, x, y, it makes the same sound as "ü." |
| 橘子 (júzi) "tangerine", 去 (qù) "to go", 玉米 (yùmǐ) "corn". |
| Now let's look at some compound vowel sounds. For all the compound sounds, you just need to make the first single vowel sound, and then slide into the next single vowel. For example... |
| the "üe" sound. Try to make the "ü" sound, then slide to "e." |
| 月 (yuè) "moon", 学(xué) "to study". |
| To make the "uan" sound, combine "u" with "an." |
| 酸 (suān) "sour"，圆圈 (yuánquān) "circle". |
| "ian" sounds like the word "Yen," the Japanese currency. |
| 咸 (xián) "salty", 钱 (qián) "money". |
| Consonants are pretty easy in Chinese. Just pay attention to the next couple of sounds.. |
| "j" is like "jeep" in English, but press your flat tongue tightly against the back of your upper teeth. |
| 姐姐 (jiějie) "older sister", 家人 (jiārén) "family". |
| "q" is like "ch" in "cheap," but, again, with a flatter tongue and a stronger puff of breath. |
| 请 (qǐng) "please", 气球 (qìqiú) "balloon". |
| "x" is like "sh" in "sheep." Again, you lay your tongue flatter and extend the two sides of your mouth wider. |
| 小 (xiǎo) "small", 新鲜 (xīnxiān) "fresh". |
| The Four Tones in Chinese |
| Now you know all the sounds in Pinyin, a total of over 400 sounds! What an accomplishment! Congratulations! Now let's move on to another important but also challenging part in Chinese pronunciation - tones. |
| Every syllable in Chinese pronunciation is stressed, with one of the four different tones. |
| The first tone is steady with a high pitch. |
| ā |
| The second tone starts with a middle pitch, then rises quickly. |
| á |
| The third tone goes down from a low pitch, then rises to the middle of the pitch range. |
| ǎ |
| The fourth tone falls sharply and quickly from a high pitch. |
| à |
| Besides the four stressed tones, there's a neutral tone. This is very light, weak and short. Pay attention to the second syllables of the next examples. |
| 爸爸 (bàba) "dad", 椅子 (yǐzi) "chair", 好吗? (hǎo ma?) "Is it ok?" |
| Let's recap what we've learned by breaking down a word in pinyin. |
| The pronunciation for the famous city "Shanghai" 上海 is... |
| Shànghǎi |
| The first syllable here is made of an initial... |
| sh |
| and a final... |
| ang |
| and a fourth falling tone. |
| Shàng |
| The second syllable is made of an initial... |
| h |
| and a final... |
| ai |
| and a third falling then rising tone. |
| hǎi |
| Well done! Let's wrap up this lesson by recapping what we've learned. |
| In this lesson, we introduced you to pinyin - the romanization method to help get you started learning Chinese. We also covered some of the unique and difficult sounds of Chinese and introduced you to the four tones in Chinese. |
| We've covered only the basics of Chinese pronunciation. If you're interested in learning more, check out the entire course we created named "The Ultimate Guide to Chinese Pronunciation". In that course, we cover and break down every single sound in the Chinese language, showing you mouth and tongue positioning, and giving you tips to help you perfect your Chinese Pronunciation. |
| In the next lesson, we'll introduce you to the basics of Chinese Grammar, where you'll learn about Chinese word order and how to build basic phrases in Chinese. |
| See you in next lesson! Bye! |
| Bye Bye! |
Comments
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Hello Leanne,
Thank you for letting us know, we'll fix it as soon as possible.
Thank you for your understanding, let us know if you have any questions.
Ngai
Team ChineseClass101.com
A bit annoying that the lesson translation of 车 is vehicle, but in the quiz it doesn't accept that answer, only car!! 😣
你好 Leslie,
谢谢 (Xièxie) for your kind comment. It's great to have you here! 😇❤️️
Let us know if you have any questions.
Kind regards,
雷文特 (Levente)
Team ChineseClass101.com
This is the most valuable lesson so far! My goal is to pick up a script in pinyin and read it aloud correctly. I could just study this video and accomplish my goal. Thanks!
你好 robert groulx,
谢谢 for posting and studying with us. If you have any questions, please let us know.😄
Kind regards,
雷文特 (Levente)
Team ChineseClass101.com
thank you for the lesson trnscript
请 (qǐng) "please", 气球 (qìqiú) "balloon".
robert
Hi Iskandar,
Thank you for posting.
Please let us know if you have any questions.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team ChineseClass101.com
Well done teachers _ you guys are great _ tks. xie _ xie; the beginners have got to set back on their knees and toes; not easy to get all that pronunciations _ memorized ; what more ?? the long journeys to master the Mandarin _ well so that can be used at schools of science tech cultures of china >> 5000 years civilizations _ in beijing etc at times to come; expecting to visit china with in the next 10 years to come _ the beginners are now aged 8 _ 12 years; good luck to all you guys _ the china cultures and the nations to excel the next 20 years _ 2040 way above the USA declining country and nation to date _ WHY ?? EXCEPT ?? scary guys ?? Hence the reasons the world _ hence global civilizations have no options but mastering the Mandarin ASAP _ starting to date June 2019, agree ??
Hi there,
Thank you for posting.
You can check out about the Chinese Radicals here:
https://www.chineseclass101.com/chinese-radicals/
Hope this helps! In case of any questions, please feel free to contact us.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team ChineseClass101.com
What about radicals?
Hi 南湘,
It's great that you're enjoying our lessons!
Let us know if you have any questions.👍
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team ChineseClass101.com
beautiful 🙏🖤✨😘
Hi Mathew,
Thank you for commenting! We are glad that you enjoyed the lesson!
Yes, you can download our audio and video lessons to study on the go!👍
Keep up studying well and in case of any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team ChineseClass101.com
This is exactly what I'm looking for! I've seen many video's on how to learn Chinese but it never explains the vows. its just like learning any language in school, you must understand the basic's to make it easy for yourself to know each word better. I do agree its a bit much for one lesson, but I'm guessing that's why they allow you to download it so you can keep replaying until you understand it. which I'm fine with that as long as you show the right way. (P.S. i was going to download it anyways either way. Power of the internet now a days) Hahaha. Sorry that's the truth, i need to be able to watch this offline on my tablet so i can learn better on the go no matter where I am.
Hello Marcus
I'm very glad that you enjoy the lesson.
Pinyin is the phonetic spelling for Chinese, which is not the language - not the words (unlike English). If you'd like to write to Chinese people, you have to use Chinese characters, not Pinyin. Pinyin is very helpful in learning Chinese, but most native Chinese people don't understand a long line of Pinyin. They use Pinyin in typing, but when reading, they read Chinese characters.
Thanks for learning with us.
Amy
Team ChineseClass101.com
I like the video very much to include the tones too. I have been hearing about tones but had it explained to me before. Since I have some ability on my american keyboard do I need to covert it so I can write chinese on the computer or When it comes to the Pinyin system can I do that on my computer? If I can do either of these mare especially Pinyin will anyone that speaks chinese understand what I am writing?
Marcus
Hello Carol
I understand you consider this lesson moves faster than you'd like.
It's very true that it's not so quick for any foreigner to accept and get a totally new phonetic system, especially it has tones, which doesn't exist in many languages.
I suggest you pause the lesson from time to time, and watch it many times. It takes weeks and months to get Chinese pronunciation well.
Thanks for learning with us.
Amy
Team ChineseClass101.com
It would be most helpful if the lesson was presented at a slower speed.
Hello Jonathan,
Thank you for your positive feedback!
Glad to know that the lesson was helpful!
Have you already checked out our special series Ultimate Chinese Pronunciation Guide:
https://www.chineseclass101.com/category/ultimate-chinese-pronunciation-guide/
In these video lessons, you'll learn the ins and outs of perfect Chinese pronunciation. You'll learn the common mistakes learners make, how to avoid them, and the nuances that only native speakers are aware of.
Hope you also enjoy it! :)
In case of any questions, please feel free to contact us.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team ChineseClass101.com
Hi! I liked so much this video because i did'nt know how to pronounce in the proper way some syllables and some compound vowel sounds. xiexie ni?