Chinese Learning

All Chinese words have a tone of some sort. The Chinese language has four pronounced tones, which in pinyin are marked with a little symbol above the vowel to which they relate, and a short, less pronounced tone, called the ‘light tone’, which is given no tonal marker (see table below).Tone plays a very important role in the meaning of the characters. Different tones in pinyin will lead to different character and meaning of each Chinese word.