Chinese courses online, lesson 2: politeness

Phonetics and vocabulary

Phonetics

lǎo is pronounced as it is in English but with a low tone: :

lǎo means to be old or old.

However shī, which means master is not pronounced as it is in English: the i is pronounced like ea in English after the so-called hissing consonants: sh, s, ch, c, z (dz) and r (r is similar to 'z' in the English azure:

lǎoshī : professor, teacher (literally old master, old has the meaning of honorable)

tóng : similar. The t is what is called an aspirated consonant. We pronounce it by exhaling the air with a small explosion, more than in english. In ong, do not pronounce the g which remain in the throat.

xué : study. The x is pronounced like an s in English but with the back of the tongue (the tip of the tongue is behind the lower teeth) as we have seen in the previous sequence with the word thank you xièxie. ue is pronounced like the French ué :

tóngxué : student, classmate.

men (the plural) is in neutral tone:

wǒmen we

nǐmen : you

tāmen : they

menworks primarily with personal pronouns (we, you, they), and when addressing to human: for example, a teacher who speaks to his students will say: tóngxué men !

yě : Also, too. After the y or i, e is pronounced as é in French :

qǐng : invite, please. The q is pronounced as ts with an air exlosion (that is one of the six aspirated consonant of Mandarin Chinese) and with the back of the tongue (like x):

zuò : sit down:

bú kèqi : you're welcome (kèqi : be polite). bú which is the second tone is actually the same as the negation bù: it changes tone when it precedes a syllable with the 4th tone (falling tone) and takes 2nd tone. This is one of two syllables that changes tone (with the number one). Finally, the k is an aspirated consonant, so you have to pronounce it with a little explosion of air. As we have seen above with qǐng, q is pronounced like an ts with an air blast: