Difference between revisions of "Language/Mandarin-chinese/Pronunciation/Alphabet-and-Pronunciation-Pinyin"

The system includes four diacritics denoting tones. Pinyin without tone marks is used to spell Chinese names and words in languages written with the Latin alphabet and also in certain computer input methods to enter Chinese characters.

In 1958, China embarked on a language reform that replaced China’s original 1919 zhuyin alphabet with the Roman alphabet. Pinyin uses Roman alphabet to represent the sound of Zhuyin alphabet letters. Pinyin also uses the Zhuyin tone mark systems. China changed from Zhuyin to Pinyin because they wanted to use alphabet system, that is already familiar with the rest of the world. Furthermore, Chinese scholars realized that it is important to standardize the pronunciation of Chinese characters, because there are 56 ethnic groups speaking different dialects all across China. So Pinyin was created as a replacement of Zhuyin to help people pronounce Chinese characters in a united way. This standardization of Pinyin also makes it much easier for Chinese learners around the world to read Mandarin Chinese.