{"id":14109,"date":"2018-01-11T09:00:06","date_gmt":"2018-01-11T13:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/?p=14109"},"modified":"2021-08-02T17:27:07","modified_gmt":"2021-08-02T21:27:07","slug":"learn-the-chinese-tones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/learn-the-chinese-tones\/","title":{"rendered":"Learn the Chinese Tones"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Chinese can be an intimidating language to learn, what with the thousands upon thousands of intricate\u00a0<strong>characters<\/strong>\u00a0(\u6c49\u5b57 \u2013 h\u00e0n z\u00ec)\u00a0that take years and lots of effort to master. If you want to be able to read a newspaper in Chinese or write a letter by hand, you\u2019ll need a few thousand at your disposal. However, most people who find themselves learning the language are simply interested in being able to\u00a0<strong>speak Chinese<\/strong>\u00a0(\u8bf4\u4e2d\u6587 \u2013 shu\u014d zh\u014dng w\u00e9n). If your sole focus is on communicating in Chinese, you\u2019ll probably encounter the most difficulties with the\u00a0<strong>tones<\/strong>\u00a0(<strong>\u58f0\u8c03<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 sh\u0113ng di\u00e0o). The rising and falling of your voice can change the meaning of a word very easily \u2013 you could end up calling your\u00a0<strong>mother<\/strong>\u00a0(\u5988\u5988 \u2013 m\u0101 ma)\u00a0a\u00a0<strong>horse\u00a0<\/strong>(\u9a6c \u2013 m\u01ce)\u00a0if you\u2019re not careful. Here\u2019s a basic crash course to help you learn the Chinese tones.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">An Introduction to Chinese Tones<em>\u00a0<\/em><\/h2>\n<div id=\"attachment_8381\" style=\"width: 650px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter post-item__attachment\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2013\/01\/DSC_0352.jpg\" aria-label=\"DSC 0352\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8381\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8381\"  alt=\"Learn the Chinese Tones\" width=\"640\" height=\"428\" \/ src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2013\/01\/DSC_0352.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2013\/01\/DSC_0352.jpg 640w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2013\/01\/DSC_0352-350x234.jpg 350w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-8381\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">B\u011bi j\u012bng (3rd tone, 1st tone)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>In Chinese, there are four tones plus a neutral tone. Your voice rises and falls depending on the tone, but it\u2019s not always easy to tell which one to use. That\u2019s because\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/100-most-common-chinese-characters\/\">Chinese characters<\/a>\u00a0don\u2019t actually have any tone marks! You just have to know which tone it is, which can take lots of practice. Thankfully, there are tone marks used in the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/chinese-pinyin\/\">pinyin system<\/a>. This is basically the phonetic alphabet of Chinese and it\u2019s what little Chinese kids use as well as us confused and helpless\u00a0<em>lao wai<\/em>\u00a0who have no idea how to read a Chinese character. Let\u2019s take a closer look at each tone, where I\u2019ll give you a funny little description of what each one sounds like.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\" style=\"text-align: center\"><a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/kYjFB-MF1KU\">https:\/\/youtu.be\/kYjFB-MF1KU<\/a><\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">The 1st Tone (\u7b2c\u4e00\u58f0 \u2013 d\u00ec y\u00ec sh\u0113ng)<\/h3>\n<p>For tone #1, your voice starts high and stays that way, kind of like your hippie roommate in college. Do you remember singing do-ray-me-fa-so-la-ti-do in music class? Well, when pronouncing a syllable with the first tone, your voice should sound like it does when you hit that last \u201cdo.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">The 2nd Tone (\u7b2c\u4e8c\u58f0 \u2013 d\u00ec \u00e8r sh\u0113ng)<\/h3>\n<p>On to tone #2. The best way I can relate the second tone to something in English is the way you raise your voice when asking a question. You voice starts somewhere in the middle, and rises to the top. For a great cinematic example, look no further than Ron Burgundy\u2019s teleprompter mishap in \u201cAnchorman\u201d when someone adds a question mark and he ends up reading, \u201cI\u2019m Ron Burgundy?\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\" style=\"text-align: center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"I&#039;m Ron Burgundy?\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/UtVjRG7PB_4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>If you just pretend like you are asking a question every time you use the second tone, you\u2019ll do just fine.<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">The 3rd Tone (\u7b2c\u4e09\u58f0 \u2013 d\u00ec s\u0101n sh\u0113ng)<\/h3>\n<p>This one is by far the most difficult, if you ask me. Your voice needs to start in the middle, drop to the bottom, and then raise back up near the top. When I started out, the third tone was the bane of my existence, and I was constantly screwing it up. It\u2019s difficult to relate to English, but it\u2019s somewhat akin to the way you would give a very surprised \u201cWhhhhaattt?!\u201d in response to a shocking statement from a friend. For example, a few years ago, when I told friends I was moving to China, they would often reply as such \u2013 \u201cWhhhaaattt?! You\u2019re moving to CHINA?!\u201d<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">The 4th Tone (\u7b2c\u56db\u58f0 \u2013 d\u00ec s\u00ec sh\u0113ng)<\/h3>\n<p>Finally, there is the falling sound of the fourth tone. This one is pretty easy. Your voice starts high and drops all the way down. Basically, you sound like you are angry when using the fourth tone. Pretend like your dog just chewed up your favorite pair of Nikes (\u201cBAD dog!\u201d) or flash back to your younger years and your parents scolding you (\u201cYou\u2019re GROUNDED!\u201d). Harness that anger, and you\u2019ve got the fourth tone down.<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">The Neutral Tone (<strong>\u8f7b\u58f0 \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>q\u012bng sh\u0113ng \u2013 lit. gentle voice)<\/h3>\n<p>Oh, wait, you thought we were finished? Ha! Think again. In Chinese, there is also a neutral tone. When reading pinyin, you can spot this one by the lack of tone identifier. Some common places you will see the neutral tone are at the end of a sentence, when asking a question, or when a syllable is repeated (the second one will have the neutral tone). Just as it implies, your voice should be gentle, with no rising or falling.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">Examples<\/h2>\n<p>The most common example that is given to differentiate between the tones is the many pronunciations of the word\u00a0<em>ma<\/em>:<\/p>\n<div class=\"threecol-one last\"><div class=\"threecol-one\">\u5988<br \/>\n\u9ebb<br \/>\n\u9a6c<br \/>\n\u9a82<br \/>\n\u5417<\/div> <div class=\"threecol-one\">m\u0101<br \/>\nm\u00e1<br \/>\nm\u01ce<br \/>\nm\u00e0<br \/>\nma<\/div> <div class=\"threecol-one last\">mom<br \/>\nhemp<br \/>\nhorse<br \/>\nto scold<br \/>\nused to make a question<\/div><div class=\"clear\"><\/div><\/div>\n<div class=\"clear\"><\/div>\n<p>As you can see, tones are super important! After all, you wouldn\u2019t want to call your mother a horse, would you?!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Speak Chinese - Tones\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/HJFG98o7aLM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><em>Here\u2019s a good video to help you practice.<\/em><\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">A Personal Story<\/h2>\n<div id=\"attachment_1542\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter post-item__attachment\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2010\/07\/Picture-822.jpg\" aria-label=\"Picture 822\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1542\" class=\"wp-image-1542\"  alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"450\" \/ src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2010\/07\/Picture-822.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2010\/07\/Picture-822.jpg 3264w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2010\/07\/Picture-822-350x263.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2010\/07\/Picture-822-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2010\/07\/Picture-822-1024x768.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1542\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Yours truly, in Q\u012bng d\u01ceo on my first trip in China.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>As a native English speaker, I was completely befuddled by the concept of a tonal language when I first arrived in China. Needless to say, constantly raising and lowering my voice in order to be properly understood took some getting used to. When I finally got fed up with relying on friends, phrasebooks, and charades to be understood, I decided to get a Chinese\u00a0<strong>tutor<\/strong>\u00a0(<strong>\u8f85\u5bfc \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>f\u01d4 d\u01ceo \u2013 lit. coach). We spent the first few weeks entirely on learning the\u00a0<strong>pinyin<\/strong>\u00a0(\u62fc\u97f3 \u2013 p\u012bn y\u012bn \u2013 lit. \u201cspelling sound\u201d)\u00a0system and drilling the tones. During those few weeks, there were plenty of times when I was ready to give up hope all together, as I was convinced that I would never be able to properly utilize the tones.<\/p>\n<p>Thankfully, with loads of encouragement from my tutor, I chose to persevere. I listened to her\u00a0<strong>pronunciation<\/strong>\u00a0(\u53d1\u97f3 \u2013 f\u0101 y\u012bn) carefully, as well as people outside, my audio books, and Chinese\u00a0<strong>TV programs<\/strong>\u00a0(\u7535\u89c6\u8282\u76ee \u2013 di\u00e0n sh\u00ec ji\u00e9 m\u00f9), always trying my best to mimic the sounds. With time, utilizing the tones started to come more naturally, and I even started getting compliments on my pronunciation, which, to be honest, still isn\u2019t very good at all. But that\u2019s the thing with learning Chinese \u2013 if you make a concerted effort, and come close, people will for the most part understand you, and will often compliment you. Although you can get away with mixing up your tones (believe me, I do it a lot), it\u2019s still vital for new learners to focus their attention on learning to recognize and use the tones.<\/p>\n<p>To get you started, why don\u2019t you try and master this Chinese tongue twister:<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">\u5988\u5988\u9a91\u9a6c,\u9a6c\u6162,\u5988\u5988\u9a82\u9a6c<br \/>\nm\u0101 m\u0101 q\u00ed m\u01ce, m\u01ce m\u00e0n, m\u0101 m\u0101 m\u00e0 m\u01ce<br \/>\n\u201cmother rides a horse; the horse is slow; mother scolds the horse\u201d<\/h3>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Do you have any comments or tips on learning the Chinese tones? Or perhaps you have a funny experience you\u2019d like to share? Let us know by leaving a comment below!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<img width=\"350\" height=\"235\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2014\/04\/DSC_0350-350x235.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2014\/04\/DSC_0350-350x235.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2014\/04\/DSC_0350-768x515.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2014\/04\/DSC_0350.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><p>Chinese can be an intimidating language to learn, what with the thousands upon thousands of intricate\u00a0characters\u00a0(\u6c49\u5b57 \u2013 h\u00e0n z\u00ec)\u00a0that take years and lots of effort to master. If you want to be able to read a newspaper in Chinese or write a letter by hand, you\u2019ll need a few thousand at your disposal. However, most&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/learn-the-chinese-tones\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":9934,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[481672,481673,481674,481675,272697,272694,272696,481677,481668,481665,272695,481676,481671,481667],"class_list":["post-14109","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-vocabulary","tag-1st-tone-in-chinese","tag-2nd-tone-in-chinese","tag-3rd-tone-in-chinese","tag-4th-tone-in-chinese","tag-chinese-pronunciation","tag-chinese-tones","tag-four-tones-in-chinese","tag-guide-to-the-chinese-tones","tag-how-to-pronounce-the-chinese-tones","tag-learn-the-chinese-tones","tag-mandarin-tones","tag-neutral-tone-in-chinese","tag-tones-of-chinese","tag-what-are-the-chinese-tones"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14109"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14109\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16761,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14109\/revisions\/16761"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}