學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

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學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by xinda »

:roc: :zho: Chinese (Mandarin)

Some interest has been expressed in Chinese (Mandarin), so I thought I'd try some basic teaching for y'all. This might be a bit awkward, since I haven't really taught Chinese before, but here goes.

First, a brief overview. Mandarin can probably be considered the preeminent member of the Sino-Tibetan family today, which consists of various Sinitic varieties (Cantonese, Min, Wu, Hakka, etc), Tibetan languages, and a couple Southeast Asian languages such as Burmese. Mandarin specifically is a Chinese language originating from Northeastern (Beijing) region of China, and has the distinction of being the official language in the PRC, ROC (Taiwan), and Singapore, with over 1,000,000,000 speakers.

Phonology
Mandarin phonology is most easily described as syllables consisting of initials, medials, and finals, as well as one of four obligatory contour tones associated with each syllable. It is romanized using a system called pinyin (漢語拼音/汉语拼音, hànyǔ pīnyīn), which will be used here. I'll introduce basic characters later.

Initials
Mandarin has a two-way distinction between aspirated and unaspirated plosives and affricates.

Labials /p pʰ m f/ <b p m f>
Alveolars /t tʰ n l/ <d t n l>
Velars /k kʰ x/ <g k h>
Alveopalatals /tɕ tɕʰ ɕ/ <j q x>
Retroflex /tʂ tʂʰ ʂ ʐ/ <zh(i) ch(i) sh(i) r(i)>
Alveolar Affricates /ts tsʰ s/ <z(i) c(i) s(i)>

Medials
The medials consist of three vowel/semivowel glides, which take on consonantal properties in the absence of an initial consonant. The first letter represents the pinyin spelling when the medial begins a syllable, while the second is used everywhere else.

/i, j/ <y-, -i->
/u, w/ <w-, -u->
/y, ɥ/ <yu-, -ü-/-u-*>

*The rounded front vowel is spelled <u> in pinyin when following <j q x>. So, /ly/ would be <lü>, but /tɕy/ would be <ju>.

Finals

Pure vowels: /a o ə e/ <a o e e> (Yes, /ə e/ are both <e>, but is predictable in that the /e/ pronunciation is always found following the medial /i/)
Diphthongs: /aɪ eɪ aʊ oʊ/ <ai ei ao ou>
Nasal final: /an ən aŋ əŋ/ <an en ang eng>
Rhotic: /əɹ (also realized as syllabic /ɹ/)/ <er>
There is technically another vowel /ɨ/ <i> which is only found after <zh ch sh r z c s>. This essentially makes the consonant syllabic, so /ts(ɨ)/ <zi>. The <i> is obligatory if there is no other final following the aforementioned initial consonants.


The following orthographic rules should be noted as well. These deal with reducing the number of vowels written after an initial consonant.
ie=i+e /e/
iu=i+ou
in=i+en
ing=i+eng
ui=u+ei
un=u+en
ong=u+eng
ue=ü+ê
un=ü+en
iong=ü+eng

Exercise 0a:
Now that you have a basic grasp on some basic pinyin (minus tones), try romanizing the following words.
真 'real' /tʂən/
夢 'dream' /məŋ/
龜 'turtle' /kueɪ/
六 'six' /lioʊ/
詞 'phrase' /tsʰɨ/
區 'neighborhood' /tɕʰy/
雲 'cloud' /yn/
Spoiler:
zhen
meng
gui
liu
ci
qu
yun
----------------------------------

Tones
On to the bane of the Chinese learning student's existence. Mandarin has four contour tones, one of which is applied to each syllable. This means that not only is there a relative pitch associated with each word, but the pitch also changes along the course of the word. All tones have a corresponding pinyin diacritic, and will be described in terms of a five level pitch notation.

Tone 1: high flat (55), macron /a˥/ <ā>
Tone 2: mid rising (35), acute accent /a˧˥/ <á>
Tone 3: low falling then rising (214), hacek /a˨˩˦/ <ǎ>
Tone 4: high falling (51), grave accent /a˥˩/ <à>

All tone diacritic markings are placed above the first vowel character in a syllable that is not a medial vowel. The diacritic mark is only placed above a medial vowel if it is the only vowel present in the syllable.

Although these diacritics are technically obligatory, they are frequently omitted for convenience or replaced by their corresponding tone number. So /xa˥/ <hā> is often written <ha1>.

It's difficult for me to teach you how to pronounce these through text, but I think this video provides a pretty good overview of things.


Exercise 0b:
Transcribe the following:
水 'water' /ʂueɪ˨˩˦/
佛 'Buddha' /fo˧˥/
電 'electricity' /tian˥˩/ [tiɛn˥˩]
窗戶 'window/tʂʰuaŋ˥xu˥˩/
Spoiler:
shǔi

diàn
chuānghù
----------


Greetings and Such
I will be introducing some characters here, so if you would like to follow along it might be useful to install an IME capable of inputting Chinese characters. Another alternative is using the pinyin input on Google translate. Currently, most Chinese input methods use pinyin as the preferred method of input. Basically, enter the pinyin for a word/phrase/sentence, and the IME will try to predict the appropriate characters based on context. If you have the wrong character, you will be able to select from a list of homophonous characters (of which there potentially are many) before proceeding.

I grew up learning Traditional characters, so there is a bit of prejudice on my part against simplified characters. However, in these examples, I will provide both, Traditional first and Simplified second, for those who would like to learn the latter. This course is not necessarily intended to teach characters, since they would require quite a bit of practice and rote memorization on your own time.

Anyways, some greetings. (Trad/Simp/pinyin)

:roc: 你好 :zho: 你好 nǐhǎo
Hello, Good day

:roc: 早安 :zho: 早安 zǎo ān
Good morning

:roc: 午安 :zho: 午安 wǔ ān
Good day (actually midday, or noon)

:roc: 晚安 :zho: 晚安 wǎn ān
Good evening/night

:roc: 再見 :zho: 再见 zàijiàn
Goodbye
Last edited by xinda on 22 Nov 2012 09:08, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Zontas »

Spoiler:
真 'real' /tʂən/ zhen
夢 'dream' /məŋ/ meng
龜 'turtle' /kueɪ/ kuei
六 'six' /lioʊ/ liou
詞 'phrase' /tsʰɨ/ ci
區 'neighborhood' /tɕʰy/ qu
雲 'cloud' /yn/ ün
Hey there.
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Thakowsaizmu »

Helios wrote:
Spoiler:
真 'real' /tʂən/ zhen
夢 'dream' /məŋ/ meng
龜 'turtle' /kueɪ/ kuei gui
六 'six' /lioʊ/ liou liu
詞 'phrase' /tsʰɨ/ ci
區 'neighborhood' /tɕʰy/ qu
雲 'cloud' /yn/ ün yun
[:)]
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by xinda »

Thanks, Thakowsaizmu :)

@Helios: when medials begin a syllable, they should be romanized with a consonant, so /yn/ > yun as per the rule below.
Medials
The medials consist of three vowel/semivowel glides, which take on consonantal properties in the absence of an initial consonant. The first letter represents the pinyin spelling when the medial begins a syllable, while the second is used everywhere else.

/i, j/ <y-/yi-, -i->
/u, w/ <w-/wu-, -u->
/y, ɥ/ <yu-, -ü-/-u-*>
Also, note the orthographic 'contractions'.
The following orthographic rules should be noted as well. These deal with reducing the number of vowels written after an initial consonant.
iu=i+ou
ui=u+ei
Very close though! I remember making the same mistakes when I first learned pinyin :P
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by xinda »

Basic Grammar
On to some more juicy stuff. Chinese is an isolating language, so there aren't any declensions or conjugations to be memorized. What there is a lot of, however, is verbal auxiliaries, particles, and other guff like that.

Nouns/Pronouns
:roc: 我 :zho: 我 wǒ :eng: I 1.SG
:roc: 你 :zho: 你 nǐ :eng: you 2.SG
:roc: 他 :zho: 他 tā :eng: he 3.SG.MASC
:roc: 她 :zho: 她tā :eng: she 3.SG.FEM
:roc: 它 :zho: 它tā :eng: it 3.SG.INAN
*Third person pronouns are distinguished for gender/animacy only in writing. They are all pronounced .

Plurals are formed by appending the suffix men to the singular pronoun.
:roc: 我們 :zho: 我们 wǒmen :eng: we 1.SG
:roc: 你們 :zho: 你们 nǐmen :eng: you guys 2.SG
:roc: 他們 :zho: 他们 tāmen :eng: they 3.SG.MASC
:roc: 她們 :zho: 她们tāmen :eng: they (female) 3.SG.FEM
:roc: 它們 :zho: 它们tāmen :eng: they 3.SG.INAN

*Note that men does not actually have a tone diacritic. This is because some words, especially sentence final particles, take a so-called fifth tone, which is essentially toneless with a slightly shortened vowel sound.

The pluralizing suffix 們/们 men can actually be applied to many human nouns, including various occupations. For example, 同學/同学 tóngxúe 'student' can pluralized- 同學們/同学们 tóngxúemen 'students'. Below is a short list of some more common nouns.
同學/同学 tóng xúe - student
老師/老师 lǎo shī - teacher
醫生/医生 yī shēng - doctor
爸爸/爸爸 bà ba - dad, father
媽媽/妈妈 mā ma - mom, mother
哥哥/哥哥 gē ge - older brother
弟弟/弟弟 dì di - younger brother
姐姐/姐姐 jiě jie - older sister
妹妹/妹妹 mèi mei - younger sister


Verbs
Let's start forming some basic sentences. The following vocab will be used:

:roc: 吃(飯) :zho: 吃(饭) chīfàn :eng: eat(rice)
:roc: 讀(書) :zho: 读(书) dú(shū) :eng: read(book)
:roc: 睡(覺) :zho: 睡(觉) shuì(jiào) :eng: sleep(sleep)
:roc: 游(泳) :zho: 游(泳) yóu(yǒng) :eng: swim(swim)
:roc: 説(話) :zho: 说(话) shuō(huà) :eng: speak(speak)

You might have noticed that each verb has two parts. This is because, to be reductive, Chinese verbs are by default transitive, meaning that they must always take an object. When trying to express an intransitive construction, there is often an associated object that acts as a dummy object for the action. Although 吃 吃 chī means 'eat', the default associated dummy object is 飯 饭 fàn 'rice'.

Basic word order is SVO, and since nouns are not declined for case, the subject is simply placed before the verb.
我吃飯。
我吃饭。
wǒ chī fàn
1.SG eat rice
I eat (rice).

Unfortunately, this is not the kind of sentence you would find in normal speech. Rather than offering a declarative expression, an stative construction would be more appropriate here. This is formed by simply adding the stative/locative particle 在/在 zài before the verb.

我在吃飯。
我在吃饭。
wǒ zài chī fàn
1.SG STAT eat rice
I'm eating.



--

Exercise 1
Translate the following:
1)
他在吃飯。
他在吃饭。
tā zài chī fàn

2)
你們在睡覺。
你们在睡觉。
nǐmen zài shuì jiào

3)
她們在讀書。
她们在读书。
tāmen zài dú shū

4) You (pl) are swimming.
5) (My) little sister is speaking.
6) The students are reading.
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Xing »

Spoiler:
1) He is eating.
2) You (pl) are sleeping.
3) They (f) are reading.
4) 你们在游泳。/ 你們在游泳。
5) 我的妹妹在说话。 / 我的妹妹在說話。
6) 同学们在读书。 / 同學們在讀書。
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Ossicone »

Nice lessons.
While I don't intend to learn Chinese, I have learned a bit about the language from reading this. Keep it up. [:D]
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by xinda »

Xing wrote:
Spoiler:
1) He is eating.
2) You (pl) are sleeping.
3) They (f) are reading.
4) 你们在游泳。/ 你們在游泳。
5) 我的妹妹在说话。 / 我的妹妹在說話。
6) 同学们在读书。 / 同學們在讀書。
:)
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by xinda »

Just a heads up, if a sample text written in Chinese has only one option, it should be assumed that the simplified and traditional characters are identical. When there are two options, the first will be traditional followed by simplified.

Noun Phrases

Adjectives and other descriptive vocabulary can be formed very easily in Chinese. There are two main ways of using adjectives.

A. Concatenation
The adjective is placed directly before the noun it modifies.
黑狗 / 黑狗
hēi gǒu
black dog
black dog

年輕人 / 年轻人
niánqīng rén
young person
young person

快車/快车
kuài chē
fast car
fast car

These can easily replace simply nominal arguments in a sentence.

黑狗在吃飯。
黑狗在吃饭。
hēi gǒu zài chī fàn
black dog STAT eat rice
The black dog is eating.

B. Genitive Construction
The second method uses a more general genitive construction. This is used to essentially turn other nouns into adjectival modifiers. Only nouns can be used in with this construction, but many adjectives have associated nominal lexical entries, as highlighted below. The genitive particle is 的 de, and is placed after the descriptor, and before the noun being modified.

幸福的家庭 / 幸福的家庭
xìngfú de jiātǐng
happiness GEN family
'happy family' (lit. family of happiness)

樹的葉子 / 树的叶子
shù de yèzi
tree GEN leaf
'the tree's leaves'

A more powerful application of this construction is its usage as a possessive marker. Possessives are formed in exactly the same way as any other genitive noun phrase, with the possessor preceding the particle的. Thus we can easily form phrases such as: 狗的毛gǒu de máo 'the dog's hair'. Pronouns are not exempt, so 我的 wǒ de 'my', 你的 nǐ de 'your', etc.

Vocab:

Colors
紅 / 红 / hóng - adj - red
紅色 / 红色 / hóngsè - n - red
橘紅色 or 橘色 / 橘红色or 橘色 / júhóngsè or júsè - n - orange
黃 / 黄 / huáng - adj - yellow
黃色 / 黄色 / huángsè - n - yellow
綠色 / 绿色 / lǜsè - n - green
藍色 / 蓝色 / lánsè - n - blue
紫色 / 紫色 / zǐsè - n - purple
白 / 白 / bái - adj - white
白色 / 白色 / báisè - n - white
黑 / 黑 / hēi - adj - black
黑色 / 黑色 / hēisè - n - black

Some colors have both an adjectival and nominal form (compounded with 色 sè 'color') depending on usage. Adjectives should be inserted directly before the noun being modified, while noun descriptors must always use the genitive 的.

More adjectives
大 / 大 / dà - big, large, great
小 / 小 / xiǎo - small
長 / 长 / cháng - long
短 / 短 / duǎn - short (length)
高 / 高 / gāo - tall
埃 / 埃 / ǎi - short (height)
年輕 / 年轻 / niánqīng - young
新 / 新 / xīn - new
老 / 老 / lǎo - old


------


Exercise 2:
Translate the following:

1) big dog
2) big black dog
3) the car's wheel (輪胎 / 轮胎 / lúntāi)
4) older brother's new car
5) The old big white dog is sleeping
6) My mother is reading an old book.
7) She is eating my rice.
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Valosken »

Loving these. Never had a real oppurtunity to look at the language. Keep going!
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Dann lernte ich Deutsch.
Y ahora aprendo Español.
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Xing »

Spoiler:
1) 大狗 (大狗)
2) 大黑狗 (大黑狗)
3) 车的轮胎 (車的輪胎)
4) 哥哥的新车 (哥哥的新車)
5) 老大白狗在睡觉。 (老大白狗在睡教。)
6) 我的妈妈看老书。 (我的媽媽在看老書。)
7) 她在吃我的饭。 (她在吃我的飯。)
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by xinda »

Xing wrote:
Spoiler:
1) 大狗 (大狗)
2) 大黑狗 (大黑狗)
3) 车的轮胎 (車的輪胎)
4) 哥哥的新车 (哥哥的新車)
5) 老大白狗在睡觉。 (老大白狗在睡教。)
6) 我的妈妈老书。 (我的媽媽在老書。)
7) 她在吃我的饭。 (她在吃我的飯。)
:P
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by abi »

Why are the nouns of the verb section in parentheses "eat(rice)" and why is it translated as just "eating" if the word rice is involved?
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Ossicone »

It's right there in the paragraph below.
xinda wrote:You might have noticed that each verb has two parts. This is because, to be reductive, Chinese verbs are by default transitive, meaning that they must always take an object. When trying to express an intransitive construction, there is often an associated object that acts as a dummy object for the action. Although 吃 吃 chī means 'eat', the default associated dummy object is 飯 饭 fàn 'rice'.
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Sequor »

xinda wrote:Velars /k kʰ x/ <g k h>
I think it'd be good to point out that /x/ is actually pronounced as a voiceless uvular fricative or trill, [χ ~ ʀ̥], in Beijing Mandarin, and as [h] in Taipei Mandarin. The symbols "x" is used for the sake of symmetry with the other velars. (*inserts a reminder that IPA symbols are meant to be vague, and their use can vary a lot from linguist to linguist even when describing the same accent*)
This is because, to be reductive, Chinese verbs are by default transitive, meaning that they must always take an object.
Actually, in terms of transitivity, Chinese linguists generally use five categories. Not all verbs are purely transitive.

Purely intransitive verbs (never take an object): 死 sǐ 'to die'
Purely transitive verbs (must take an object): 吃 chī 'to eat sth'
Ambitransitive verbs (may take an object, subject of intr. = subj. of tr.): 看 kàn 'to see, to see sth'
Labile ambitransitive verbs (may take an object, subject of intr. = obj. of tr.): 摔 shuāi 'to fall, to drop sth'
Ditransitive verbs (can take two objects): 给 gěi 'to give sb sth'
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Re: 學中文/学中文 - Learn Chinese

Post by Tomos »

I find it amazing having these teaching threads!
:eng: [tick]
:jpn: :cym: [B)]
:bre: :cor: [:)]
:kor: :fra: :ita: [:S]
:zho: :tha: [:(]
:ryu: [:'(]
:ain: Want to learn,no resources
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