Mastering the Chinese Phonetics (Mastering the Pronunciation of Chinese Characters)

Hi everybody,\nI’m just starting this course and I first thing I’d like to start is to master the Chinese phonetic (Characters alone or as group). \nCould you help in mastering the pronunciation of Chinese Characters? I don’t want to start any conversation without knowing how to say Chinese words perfectly.\nYour help in this regards is highly appreciated.\n\nSalem\nSaudi Arabia, Dhahran\n[redacted]

Chinese is not a phonetic language. Each word (syllable) has its own unique character. Rocket Chinese presents the Chinese in Pinyin and Hanzi. Pinyin is the romanized text that helps us read Chinese. In China, they use Hanzi. Pinyin: Nǐ hǎo ma? Wǒ hěn hǎo, xièxiè. Hanzi: 你好吗？我很好， 谢谢。 As for learning how to properly pronounce Chinese, i.e. Mandarin, you first need to be aware and pay close attention to the different tones. Then learn how to pronounce the Pinyin. You can use Rocket Chinese to practice speaking. Just be aware that the Pinyin does not read exactly like English and in many ways is quite different.

Salem, A 37 character Chinese phonetic character set was developed in China in the early 20th century and is currently used in Taiwan to teach in all the public schools. An introduction to this character set can be found at the following Youtube location: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVkJgEUcY6w. (This link will also provide many other supporting Youtube links.) In Taiwan children use this phonetic alphabet to both read and write Chinese through the 4th grade. Most early textbooks are written in both "Zhuyin" and traditional Chinese in Taiwan which greatly aids the reading of the traditional characters by Taiwanese children. If you learn this basic Chinese phonetic set, you will have have taken a major step in training your ear and brain to understand Chinese. (The complicating factor that I omitted is the application of the tones to this phonetic set!) Good luck!

Nong Fu, Taiwan has adopted the Hanyu Pinyin phonetic system since 2009 for romanization alone rather than for educational and computer input purposes. So I think the traditional Zhuyin may still be used.