Language/Mandarin-chinese/Pronunciation/The-5-Tones-of-Mandarin-Chinese

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The 5 Tones of Mandarin Chinese
Chinese Tones Polyglot Club.jpg

你好 Chinese Learners! 😃

There are 5 ‘tones’ in Mandarin Chinese. A tone 声调 ( shēng diào) refers to the way a character should be spoken. Tones can often be one of the difficult parts of learning Chinese, but the most important reason why you need to learn tones, is because pinyin + tone = a word. So, if either the Pinyin or tone changes, it creates a new word.

Don’t panic! It’s not as crazy as it sounds. Remember that Pinyin is just the basis of your Chinese learning. Once you’ve grasped these concepts, you can begin to introduce Chinese characters and much of what you’ve learned won’t be so intimidating!

‘ma’, the 5 tones[edit | edit source]


Chinese Tones Polyglot Club.jpg


Using the Pinyin ‘ma’, the 5 tones are as follows: mā má mǎ mà ma

  • mā/ma1 – if a vowel has a flat line above it, the pinyin is spoken with a flat high tone. This is know as the first tone.
  • má/ma2 – if a vowel has a upward line above it, then the pinyin is spoken with a rising tone. This is known as the second tone.
  • mǎ/ma3 – if a vowel has a ‘v’ shape above it, then the pinyin is spoken with a dipped tone and this is known as the third tone.
  • mà/ma4 – if a vowel has a downward line above it, then the pinyin is spoken with a down tone and this is known as the fourth tone.
  • ma/ma5 – if the pinyin has no line, then the pinyin has no tone. This is known as the fifth tone.

Technically, a fifth tone pinyin does have a tone, but it is dependent on the character that comes before it. As a beginner, this is something to be aware of, but not something to panic about!

Listen to this video[edit | edit source]

Test your tones[edit | edit source]

Once you’ve listened to the different tones, you can test yourself using our tone trainer. Even if you’re brand new to Chinese, this can help train your ear to hearing the five different tones.

https://mandarintonetrainer.com/

Sources[edit | edit source]

https://www.writtenchinese.com/wp-content/uploads/woocommerce_uploads/2017/05/Chinese-Beginner-Bundle.pdf

Other Lessons[edit | edit source]

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