How to Learn Chinese Pinyin

In 1958, the People’s Republic of China established Hanyu Pinyin (usually referred to as pinyin) as its standard romanization system. The system has widespread use of this in Chinese language teaching around the world. It is also how I write Chinese on my phone or laptop using the pinyin form and then choosing the appropriate character.

Mandarin is written with Chinese characters, but characters do not provide consistent information about pronunciation. Therefore Mandarin is typically studied via a transcription.

The syllable in Mandarin Chinese can be made up of three parts; an initial consonant, a final, and a tone. For example, the syllable má is made up of the initial m, the final a, and the rising tone [/]. Syllables need not have an initial consonant. In addition, a syllable may lack a tone. Syllables that do not have a tone are referred to as having neutral tone.

Initials and finals are presented in Pinyin romanized form.

Some rules about how to learn Chinese Pinyin:

‘u’ after the initials j, q and x is pronounced ü but is written as u.

When ‘i’ and ‘ü’ begin a syllable, they are written as yi and yu.

When ‘u’ begins a syllable it is written as w.

In two syllables words, when the boundary between syllables is not clear from the Pinyin spelling and more than one interpretation of the boundary is possible, an apostrophe is used to separate the syllables. For example, if the second syllable begins with a vowel, an apostrophe is used: Xi’an vs. xian

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