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Chinese is an ancient and interesting language, and the benefits of mastering it these days are numerous. Understanding this unique language, however, isn’t easy, mainly due to the fact that it lacks a phonetic alphabet. Don’t worry. I have lived, and studied, in China for several years, and I am going to share some knowledge that will help you achieve your Chinese language learning goals. To be good at mastering Mandarin Mandarin it’s essential to follow these three crucial steps.
Step One: Grasping Pinyin
What is Pinyin? As I mentioned above, Chinese characters, generally, are not phonetic, meaning they’ve got no sounds attributed to them. Instead, they are pictographs, symbols that represent unique thoughts and ideas. These pictographs work nicely for the purpose of communicating visually, through reading and writing. For instance, if I draw a stick figure in the shape of the human form, we can both view it and realize that I’m communicating something about a person. The trouble occurs anytime individuals from different geographical territories meet up and try to communicate verbally.
Why is there an issue? Because in my community people may see the above mentioned stick figure and pronounce it “person.” In your community, however, people may see the same figure and pronounce it “potato,” making it quite challenging for us to communicate verbally. Pinyin was developed to resolve this problem, and it is the only way for you to understand how to accurately pronounce words in Mandarin Chinese. Consequently, before studying how to read, write or pronounce Chinese characters, you have to learn pinyin.
Step 2: Learning to Communicate Verbally
As soon as you figure out pinyin, you need to use it, accompanied by a native Chinese speaker, to learn how to correctly pronounce Chinese, including getting the hang of Chinese tones. I know, you don’t have time to visit Asia and learn with a native Chinese person. Don’t worry. There are plenty of software programs and online courses out there that contain recordings made by Chinese speakers.
You have got to make use of these programs. It is extremely hard to sit and learn how to pronounce Chinese tones without hearing them spoken by a native Chinese speaker. Exactly how crucial is it to get the tones right? A lot of Chinese words have four different meanings, each of which is expressed by a change of tone. Unless you master your tones, you won’t have the ability to communicate effectively using the Chinese language.
Step Three: Tackling Chinese Characters
After you have learned pinyin, you can proceed to studying Chinese characters. Why should you do this last? Because when you memorize the meaning of a Chinese character, you will naturally assign a sound to it. Of course, in the early stages, you’ll just translate the meaning directly into your own native language. As you improve, though, you will want to develop the ability to “hear” the proper sound, in Chinese, in your head. Furthermore, if you plan on utilizing your ability to read Chinese characters in a functional environment, in a restaurant, for example, you will have to have the ability to pronounce them properly, and the only way to do that is to first master pinyin and pronunciation.
Conclusion
Mandarin is the most spoken language worldwide, and, with the financial and political rise of Mainland China, learning the language has many practical advantages. Sure, it’s a fairly difficult language to understand, but if you follow the three steps outlined above, your improvement will be quick and painless.
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