zhuyin

Chinese language    General Chinese    Singapore Mandarin For Standard Mandarin     EFEO     Gwoyeu Romatzyh     Hanyu Pinyin     Latinxua Sinwenz     Lessing-Othmer     Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II     Postal System Pinyin     Tongyong Pinyin     Wade-Giles
Including:

• Pinyin - Pronunciation
• Pinyin - Initials
• Pinyin - Finals
• Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation
• Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials
• Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals
• Pinyin - Orthographic features
• Pinyin - Tones
• Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark
• Pinyin - Miscellanea
• Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan
• Pinyin - Other languages
• Pinyin - Controversy
• Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia - Pinyin

The standardized phonology of Standard Mandarin is reproduced below. Actual reproduction varies widely among speakers, as everyone (including national leaders) inadvertently introduces elements of his/her own native dialect. By contrast, television and radio announcers are usually chosen for their pronunciation accuracy. Below is the phonology of Standard Mandarin. Standard Mandarin - Initials. The following is the initial inventory of Standard Mandarin as represente ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Phonology

Chinese characters and Japanese kana can be written horizontally or vertically, although there are some styles of calligraphy, such as the Grass script, that are not suitable for horizontal writing. There are some small differences in orthography. In horizontal writing it is more common to use Arabic numerals, whereas Chinese numerals are more common in vertical text. In both Chinese and Japanese, the positions of punctuation marks, for example the relative position of commas and full stops, differ between horizontal and vertical writ ...

See also:

Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Differences between horizontal and vertical writing, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Right-to-left horizontal writing, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - History, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Japanese, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Chinese, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Usage, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Simplified Chinese, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Japanese and Traditional Chinese

Read more here: » Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts: Encyclopedia II - Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Differences between horizontal and vertical writing

The standardized phonology of Standard Mandarin is reproduced below. Actual reproduction varies widely among speakers, as everyone (including national leaders) inadvertently introduces elements of his/her own native dialect. By contrast, television and radio announcers are usually chosen for their pronunciation accuracy. Below is the phonology of Standard Mandarin. Standard Mandarin - Initials. The following is the initial inventory of Standard Mandarin as represente ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Grammar, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Phonology

The Pinyin system also incorporates suprasegmental phonemes to represent the four tones of Mandarin. Each tone is indicated by a diacritical mark above a non-medial vowel. Many books printed in China mix fonts, with vowels with tone marks rendered in a different font than the surrounding text, a practice that tends to give such Pinyin texts a typographically ungainly appearance. This style, most likely rooted in early technical limitations, has led many to believe that Pinyin's rules call for this practice and also for the use of "See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Tones

Pinyin-like systems have been devised for other variants of Chinese. Guangdong Romanization is a set of romanizations devised by the government of Guangdong province for Cantonese, Teochew, Hakka (Moiyen dialect), and Hainanese. All of these are designed to use Latin letters in a similar way to Pinyin. In addition, in accordance to the "Regulation of Phonetic Transcription in Hanyu Pinyin Letters of Place Names in Minority Nationality Languages" (《少数民族语地名汉语拼音字母音译转写法 》) promulgated in 1976, place ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Other languages

All rules given here in terms of English pronunciation are approximate. Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials. Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals. The following is an exhaustive list of all finals in Standard Mandarin. Those ending with a final -r are listed at the end. To find a given final: Remove the initial consonant. For zh-, ch-, sh-, both consonants should be removed. However, y- or w- are part of the final; do not remove those. Sy ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation

Since ancient history, the Chinese language has always consisted of a wide variety of dialects; hence prestige dialects and lingua francas have always been needed. Confucius, for example, used yǎyán (雅言)), or "elegant speech", rather than colloquial regional dialects; text during the Han Dynasty also referred to tōngyǔ (通语), or "common language". Rime books, which were written since the Southern and Northern Dynasties, may also have reflected one or more systems of standard pronunciation during those times. However, ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - History

The national standard can be very different from a local Mandarin speech, to the point of being unintelligible. In addition, since standard Mandarin is taught as a second language across all China, it is also very common for two people who both believe themselves to be speaking standard Mandarin to require a translator. Nevertheless, efforts by the PRC, ROC, and Singapore to promote standard Mandarin as the stan ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects

From an official point of view, standard Mandarin is theoretically something like a lingua franca — a way for Han Chinese and non-Han ethnic groups speaking a wide variety of mutually unintelligible of languages to communicate with each other. The very name of "Putonghua", or "ordinary speech", reinforces this idea. In implementation, however, standard Mandarin is sometimes given the aura of the "only right language", and other languages or dialects, both Chinese and non-Chinese, have shown signs of greatly losing ground to stan ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

By the official definition of the People's Republic of China, standard Mandarin uses: The phonology or sound system of Beijing. A distinction should be made between the sound system of a dialect or language and the actual pronunciation of words in it. The pronunciations of words chosen for Standard Mandarin -- a standardized speech -- do not necessarily reproduce those of the Beijing dialect. The pronunciation of words is a standardization choice and occasional standardization differenc ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect

Chinese language    General Chinese    Singapore Mandarin For Standard Mandarin     EFEO     Gwoyeu Romatzyh     Hanyu Pinyin     Latinxua Sinwenz     Lessing-Othmer     Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II     Postal System Pinyin     Tongyong Pinyin     Wade-Gile ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Romanization

From an official point of view, standard Mandarin is theoretically something like a lingua franca — a way for Han Chinese and non-Han ethnic groups speaking a wide variety of mutually unintelligible of languages to communicate with each other. The very name of "Putonghua", or "ordinary speech", reinforces this idea. In implementation, however, standard Mandarin is sometimes given the aura of the "only right language", and other languages or dialects, both Chinese and non-Chinese, have shown signs of greatly losing ground to stan ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Grammar, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Japanese. Horizontal text originally came in to Japanese in the Meiji era when the Japanese tried to print dictionaries for Western languages. Initially the dictionaries were printed in a mixture of horizontal Western and vertical Japanese text, which meant the book had to be rotated ninety degrees in order to read the Japanese. Because this was unwieldy, the idea of yokogaki came to be accepted. One of the first publications to partially use yokog ...

See also:

Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Differences between horizontal and vertical writing, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Right-to-left horizontal writing, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - History, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Japanese, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Chinese, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Usage, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Simplified Chinese, Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - Japanese and Traditional Chinese

Read more here: » Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts: Encyclopedia II - Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts - History

Chinese language    General Chinese    Singapore Mandarin For Standard Mandarin     EFEO     Gwoyeu Romatzyh     Hanyu Pinyin     Latinxua Sinwenz     Lessing-Othmer     Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II     Postal System Pinyin     Tongyong Pinyin     Wade-Gile ...

See also:

Standard Mandarin, Standard Mandarin - History, Standard Mandarin - Phonology, Standard Mandarin - Initials, Standard Mandarin - Finals, Standard Mandarin - Tones, Standard Mandarin - Romanization, Standard Mandarin - Grammar, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and Beijing dialect, Standard Mandarin - Standard Mandarin and other dialects, Standard Mandarin - Accents, Standard Mandarin - Role of standard Mandarin

Read more here: » Standard Mandarin: Encyclopedia II - Standard Mandarin - Romanization

An umlaut is placed over the letter u when it occurs after the initials l and n in order to represent the sound [y]. This is necessary in order to distinguish the front high rounded vowel in lü (e.g. 驴/驢 donkey) from the back high rounded vowel in lu (e.g. 炉/爐 oven). Tonal markers are added on top of the umlaut, as in lǘ. However, the ü is not used in other contexts where it represents a front high rounded vowel, namely after the letters j, q, x an ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Miscellanea

Pinyin differs from other romanizations in several aspects, such as: w is placed before syllables starting with u. y is placed before syllables starting with i and ü. ü is written as u when there is no ambiguity (such as ju, qu, and xu), but written as ü when there are corresponding u syllables (such as lü and nü) When preceded by a consonant, iou, uei, and uen are simplified as < ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Orthographic features

All rules given here in terms of English pronunciation are approximate. Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials. Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals. The following is an exhaustive list of all finals in Standard Mandarin. Those ending with a final -r. are listed at the end. To find the pronunciation of a final: Look for the entire combination rather than the individual letters. For example, look for ian, not i + a + n. For ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation

The primary purpose of pinyin in Chinese schools is to teach Mandarin pronunciation. Many in the West are under the mistaken belief that pinyin is used to help children associate characters with spoken words which they already know, but this is incorrect as many Chinese do not use Mandarin at home, and therefore do not know the Mandarin pronunciation of words until they learn them in elementary school through the use of pinyin. Pinyin uses the Roman alphabet, hence the pronunciation is relatively straightforward for Westerners. A pitf ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Pronunciation

The Republic of China on Taiwan adopted Tongyong Pinyin, a modified version of Hanyu Pinyin, on the national level in October 2002. The adoption of Tongyong Pinyin has also resulted in political controversy. Much of the controversy centered on issues of national identity, with proponents of Chinese reunification favoring the Hanyu Pinyin system which is used on the People's Republic of China, and proponents of Taiwanese indepe ...

See also:

Pinyin, Pinyin - Pronunciation, Pinyin - Initials, Pinyin - Finals, Pinyin - Rules given in terms of English pronunciation, Pinyin - Pronunciation of initials, Pinyin - Pronunciation of finals, Pinyin - Orthographic features, Pinyin - Tones, Pinyin - Rules for placing the tone mark, Pinyin - Miscellanea, Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan, Pinyin - Other languages, Pinyin - Controversy, Pinyin - Accessibility note

Read more here: » Pinyin: Encyclopedia II - Pinyin - Pinyin in Taiwan