Learn the perfect pronunciation of Chinese consonants
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| Hi everyone. |
| Welcome to The Ultimate Chinese Pronunciation Guide. |
| In this lesson, you'll learn 7 Chinese consonants. |
| f, g, k, l, m, n, ng |
| These consonant sounds are identical to the ones in English, so they should already be familiar to you. |
| Are you ready? Then let's get started! |
| The first consonant is... |
| f |
| 飞 fēi |
| 房子 fángzi "house" |
| 风水 fēngshuǐ "Geomancy/Feng shuey" |
| Like the F in the word 'find'. |
| f, f (slowly) |
| f, f (slowly) |
| The next consonant is... |
| g |
| 高 gāo |
| 给 gěi “to give” |
| 工作 gōngzuò "work" |
| Like the K in the word 'skim' or 'skip'. |
| Be very careful with this sound though because it's not like the K in 'kit' for example. |
| The K in 'skim' doesn't have a burst of air at the end of the sound, whereas 'kit' *does*. |
| Sounds that have a burst of air are said to be aspirated, while sounds that *do not* have a burst of air, like this one, are unaspirated. |
| Unlike English, Chinese differentiates between aspirated and unaspirated sounds, so be careful of this. |
| k, k (slowly) |
| k, k (slowly) |
| The next consonant is... |
| k |
| 口渴 kǒukě "thirsty" |
| 顾客 gùkè "customer" |
| 开关 kāiguān "switch" |
| This is the aspirated version of the K-sound, meaning there should be burst or release of air. |
| Like the K in the word 'kit'. |
| kʰ, kʰ (slowly) |
| kʰ, kʰ (slowly) |
| The next consonant is... |
| l |
| 老 lǎo |
| 龙 lóng "dragon" |
| 力量 lìliang "power" |
| Like the L in the word 'let'. |
| l, l (slowly) |
| l, l (slowly) |
| The next consonant is... |
| m |
| 母亲 mǔqīn |
| 门 mén "door" |
| 名字 míngzi "name" |
| Like the M in the word 'mouse'. |
| m, m (slowly) |
| m, m (slowly) |
| The next consonant is... |
| n |
| 难 nán |
| 您 nín "honorific term for 'you'" |
| 牛奶 niúnǎi "milk" |
| Like the N in the word 'nice'. |
| n, n (slowly) |
| n, n (slowly) |
| And the final consonant sound is... |
| ng |
| 北京 Běijīng |
| 上海 Shànghǎi "Shanghai" |
| 香港 Xiānggǎng "Hong Kong" |
| Like the ng sound in the word 'sing'. |
| ŋ, ŋ (slowly) |
| ŋ, ŋ (slowly) |
| Well done! You just learned your first 7 consonants in Chinese. |
| f, g, k, l, m, n, ng |
| In the next lesson, you'll learn 8 more consonant sounds that are identical to the ones in English. |
| Was seeing the pronunciation illustrations helpful? Please comment and share your thoughts. |
| See you in the next Ultimate Chinese Pronunciation Guide lesson! |
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