Chinese characters are monosyllabic -- each consist of one syllable thhat has a meaning (or several meanings) but does not necessarily constitute a word. Words comprise one or more syllables, that is why it is correct to think that a Chinese character represents a morpheme - a distinctive combination of sounds with a distinctive meaning.
Each syllable consists of an initial (always a consonant) and a vowel. Some also contain a final (always a semi-consonant). Each syllable also has a distinctive tone. Mandarin has 5 tones.
The Pinyin (pronounced peen-een) Romanization System is used to transcribe Standard Chinese using the Roman script.
Consonants:
Initials: b- p- m- f- d- t- n- l- g- k- h- j- q- x-zh- ch- sh- r- z- c- s- y- w-
Finals: -i -u -ng -er
Vowels:
a o e i u v (or ü)
ai, ei, ao, ou, ia, ie, iao, iou,
ua, uo,uai, uei, ve
It is a very consistent system, yet the tricky part of it is that some letters are not pronounced the way they are in English. This puzzles English speakers when they are confronted with such improbable (in English) combinations as xiong qiang or zhong cai. The following letters may pose a problem.
- b is like the English p but without aspiration (puff of air)
- d is like the English t but without aspiration
- g is always hard (never pronounced like in George)
- h is more fricative, halfway to the Dutch ch
- j is like very soft j pronounced with the tip of the tongue close to the teeth
- q sounds like soft ch in cheer (in fact, it is the above j aspirated)
- x sounds like soft s in seal
- zh is retroflexed j in jar
- ch is like the zh above but aspirated (with a puff of air)
- sh is more voiced than the English sound
- r sounds somewhat like s in pleasure
- z is a voiced dz
- c is the z above but aspirated
There are only 4 finals in Modern Mandarin: -ng, -i, -u and -r. The last one is especially characteristic of the Beijing-style Mandarin.
Not all combinations of the above consonants and vowels occur in Mandarin. This is the list of all possible combinations.
Each syllable has tonal value, or a tone (pitch). Different tonal value gives a different meaning to a syllable, that is why it is important to learn to pronounce and comprehend them. There are 4 main and one additional (light tone -- qing sheng) tones in Standard Mandarin:
- 1st flat or level
- 2nd rising
- 3rd falling-rising or low
- 4th falling or departing
- light tone sometimes called the 5th tone
Mastering tones is not that difficult even for tone-deaf people (think, not all Chinese are perfect musicians!), but it is virtually impossible to do it on your own. You may try to mimic the voices from audio course tapes or from the audio files here, but you will need to find a native speaker (preferably an educated Northern Chinese, even better -- an educated Beijinger) or a qualified teacher of Chinese to check just how close your copying falls on the mark.
The rest (save characters) is a piece of cake! Chinese grammar is so structural and systematic -- it is not even taught in schools in China.
