Chinese alphabet Pinyin:
Pinyin is the official phonetic system for transcribing the Mandarin pronunciations of Chinese
characters into the Latin alphabet, for example:
Wǒ shì Měiguó rén.
Meaning: I'm a American.
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Vowels used
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a e i o u ü
Sometimes the v is used to replace the ü (for ease of typing into a computer)
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Consonants used
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b c d f g h j k l m n p q r s t w y z
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Tone marks placed on vowels
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̄ ́ ̌ ̀
ā ē ī ō ū ǖ
á é í ó ú ǘ
ǎ ě ǐ ǒ ǔ ǚ
à è ì ò ù ǜ
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Pinyin rules:
- Tone marks are always placed on vowels (a e i o u ü)
- Syllable has one 1 vowel. The tone mark is placed on this vowel.
- Syllable has more vowels. The tone mark is placed on the a, o or e. If the a is available, the tone mark is placed on the a.
- Syllable has more vowels, the tone mark is placed on the i, u, or ü, the second vowel.
- There are tone marks on the second character of repetitive syllables, such as bàba (father) or māma (mother).
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