For those who want to immerse themselves in Chinese culture fully – whether to be close to family, work abroad, read web novels and Chinese-based fantasy fiction, or for another reason – learning Mandarin Chinese can give you a richer experience. Heritage learners, too, often already have Chinese language skills, but may not feel confident in their abilities to excel on the mainland or in places like Singapore and Taiwan, where Mandarin is commonplace. Often it’s easier to understand one aspect of the language – like spoken Chinese, than the written language.
But how can you get started?
Like with any language, there are several resources and tools for those looking to learn Mandarin Chinese. I know because I’ve been there. And in this guide, I’ll set out some of the main things to know when starting your language learning journey and key resources to master Chinese grammar and vocabulary.
Decide on Simplified or Traditional Chinese Characters
Chinese characters are usually the most intimidating thing when it comes to studying Mandarin if you don’t have a background in another language that uses them. Called hanzi in Mandarin Chinese, hanja in Korean, Chữ Hán in Vietnamese, and kanji in Japanese, and you need to know about 2,000-3,000 to read the newspaper without much issue. If you have a background in these languages, it’s possible you’ll have a leg up here, especially if you know Japanese, which uses mainly Traditional characters.
Depending on which one you study, the characters can look quite different. For example, let’s take the character for vital energy, Qì (sometimes romanized as Chi). In Simplified, this character appears as 气 whereas in Traditional it looks like 氣. However, today in Japan it’s most often written as 気. Still, for someone who has learned Japanese first, neither the Simplified or the Traditional forms would seem so strangely different. Japanese speakers who use kanji to write to Chinese speakers find that they can get the main idea across, and vice versa!
In order to even begin studying Mandarin, you’re going to have to pick which writing system you’d like to study. Let’s take a look at the benefits to both.
Simplified Chinese
Used in Mainland China, Malaysia, and Singapore, this writing system is often considered the “easier”or “faster” way to learn how to read and write Mandarin. While the origins of simplifying complex characters date as far back as the Han Dynasty (202 BCE-220 CE) with a type of shorthand, cursive calligraphy called Caoshu, the system used today began standardization in the 1950s in an effort to increase the overall literacy rate in Mainland China, according to the Chinese government. (Your Mileage May Vary here, however; it has been pointed out that literacy rates weren’t low back then due to the complexity of Traditional characters but rather elitist gatekeeping from the upper classes and lack of centralized education.)
Pros of Learning Simplified Chinese:
- Much easier to read on screens such as smartphones, printed documents, or in handwriting due to being less complex and crowded.
- More widely used amongst the most native Mandarin speakers in the world, with only the smaller populations of Taiwan, Macau, or Hong Kong still using Traditional today.
Cons of Learning Simplified Chinese:
- Cultural significance of characters has been arguably lost in many simplifications. A rather famous example is the character for “love,” written Traditionally as 愛, still contains “heart” (心), whereas the Simplified version is written as 爱, containing “friend” (友) instead.
- Some Simplified characters correspond to more than one word, whereas Traditional characters typically do not. For example, the Simplified 后 (hòu) can mean both back/behind as well as monarch/empress, whereas 後 in Traditional wouldn’t be used to write monarch/empress.
Traditional Chinese
As mentioned, Traditional Chinese is used mainly in Taiwan, Macau, and Hong Kong today and is the version of the characters in their preserved form. Aside from trying to break into the Taiwanese market or consuming media from Taiwan, some students of classical subjects such as Chinese art, literature, or philosophy might benefit from learning Traditional, even though there are Simplified versions of the texts.
Pros of Learning Traditional Chinese:
- The historical context of the characters has remained, making it easier to understand the original meaning of words.
- Useful for studying any texts before 1950, especially if Simplified versions are not available.
- If you plan on learning Japanese in the future or wish to study older, classical texts in languages such as Korean or Japanese, knowing Traditional characters is helpful.
- Components in Traditional characters remain consistent and have not lost either the original meaning or phonetic elements. A lot of components are shared between characters that make guessing pronunciation easier, and some of this has been lost in the Simplification process.
Cons of Learning Traditional Chinese:
- More strokes per character, which makes it harder to memorize and increases writing time
- Some argue that certain Traditional characters look too similar to one another, for example 書 (book) and 晝 (daytime), with their Simplified counterparts (书, book; 昼, daytime), being more distinguishable.
So, which is right for you? If you’re politics or business-minded and you’re looking to break into the Mainland Chinese market or Singapore, then Simplified is probably the best way to go. If you’re looking to consume media from Taiwan or would like to study Japanese or Cantonese someday, then Traditional is for you. Regardless of which writing system you choose, you’re bound to make more headway than you think, even if Chinese characters seem scary right now. Why?
Pinyin Is There To Help
For absolute beginners in Mandarin, you can relax knowing that you’ll start out reading basic texts like this:
Pinyin is a romanization system of individual Chinese characters based on pronunciation. Above the vowels are tone markers, also there to assist in pronunciation. Mandarin has four tones plus a neutral fifth tone, and your voice will change pitch based on each one. When you start out learning Mandarin, the pinyin will be there as a guide, helping you adjust to learning how to recognize and read Chinese characters.
As you advance in your Chinese studies, Pinyin will be used less and less in the text, though some texts will keep the tone markers, like so:
The most common pinyin systems are Hanyu Pinyin, developed and formally standardized in Mainland China in 1958, and Wade-Giles. The pinyin in the first example is Hanyu Pinyin, which is what you’ll see in textbooks and apps if you study Simplified.
How does Pinyin work? Take the word Zhōngwén (中文; Chinese language). The first syllable, zhōng, consists of an initial (“zh”) and a final (“ōng”). The tone markers go over the finals. Same with wén, with the initial being “w” and the final being “én”. After learning how to properly pronounce the initials and finals, you can read Pinyin!
Some English speakers may be more familiar with Wade-Giles, as certain place names such as Peking (Beijing) and Nanking (Nanjing) were in the common lexicon at far earlier points in history. Furthermore, until 2009 the main form of Chinese romanization was Wade-Giles, and prominent politicians such as Tsai Ing-wen continue to use Wade-Giles romanization.
All Mandarin textbooks in Simplified will use Hanyu Pinyin, like the above photo. Textbooks from Taiwan are more varied; when I studied in Taipei, my textbook had both Hanyu Pinyin as well as Zhuyin, aka Bopomofo, named after the first four symbols: ㄅ(b)ㄆ(p) ㄇ (m) ㄈ(f) . The argument for Zhuyin is that foreigners who speak languages such as English will try to pronounce the roman letters in Pinyin like English, so it’s better not to use it. However, some people do not want to learn a brand new script just to learn to pronounce Chinese, and that can be a big turn-off for Taiwanese textbooks if they don’t have Hanyu Pinyin.
So, don’t worry! You’ll have plenty of help along the way when it comes to learning to read!
Chinese Grammar is Easier Than You Think
Most students of Mandarin Chinese who have no background in languages such as Japanese usually take one look at the hanzi and think, “No way can I possibly learn this language.” But if you’ve learned French or Spanish and wept over the complicated verb conjugation and tenses, then breathe easy! There’s no memorizing of verb tenses or worrying about gendered nouns in Mandarin. No plurals or articles such as “the” or “a/an” either. Basic sentence patterns are relatively fixed also, and the same as English (Subject – Verb -Object).
Take this example sentence: “I like apples.” To say this in Mandarin, it’s 我喜欢苹果 (wǒ xǐhuān píngguǒ), which is broken down as:
Subject: 我 (“I/me”)
Verb: 喜欢 (“to like”)
Object: 苹果 (“apple”)
Again, there is no plural form in Mandarin.
If we wanted to make this a negative statement, there’s no need to conjugate the verb “to like.” Remember, we don’t conjugate verbs directly in Mandarin! Instead, we make it a negative by adding bù 不 (“no/not”) before (“to like”).
Therefore, 我不喜欢苹果 (wǒ bù xǐhuān píngguǒ) is, “I don’t like apples.”
This means that getting to a level of daily conversation in Mandarin comes much quicker than most beginners think, and while this doesn’t mean that all grammar learning in Mandarin is easy, it certainly boosts your self-confidence if you’re able to feel confident having simple conversations with real Mandarin speakers. Once you start getting to the intermediate level, that’s when grammar starts to pick up a bit in difficulty. Still, you can rest assured that you’ll have a great foundation to work with, and the ability to chat with native speakers along the way helps!
Getting the Hang of Tones
Unless you are familiar with languages such as Vietnamese and Thai, the concept of tones may be a terrifying one. As mentioned earlier, there are four main pitch tones in Mandarin plus a fifth neutral tone. These tones are known as 四声 (sìshēng) and they are:
- High and flat
- Rising
- Falling-rising/dipping
- Falling
In Pinyin, there will be markers over the vowels indicating tone, such as shī (first tone), shí (second tone), shǐ (third tone), and shì (fourth tone). The neutral tone has no vowel markers, and would be written simply as shi.
This fact can be a bit intimidating when you consider that the tone changes the word; mā (妈) means “mother” but mǎ (马) means “horse.” It can then be tempting for beginners to want to skip learning tones when they figure out that their basic conversation can be easily understood with native Mandarin speakers without them. Trust me: in the long run, this will only do more harm than good, especially as your ability to express yourself becomes more naturally complex.
Starting out, please read the Pinyin out loud as much as possible, and read slowly, in an exaggerated voice. It can be tempting to try and read the same speed as normal, or even embarrassing to read so slowly and dramatically, but the more you get used to memorizing the sound, the more it will come out naturally when you’re having a real conversation.
How do you know if your tones are correct? A great, simple, and free way to test: use your smartphone! If you have a Mandarin keyboard on your phone, try using the Voice-to-Text function and speak a basic sentence. If the AI is able to understand the tones you’re using to input the right Chinese character, you’re probably on the right track.
Another great way is to use a free program such as Audacity. Import an audio track from your textbook, ideally a dialogue, and create a separate track to record yourself reading along with the text. When you listen to it back, you’ll be able to hear which tones you’re getting correctly and which ones you’re not. I know, I know- I hate hearing my voice too, but trust me when I say it’s worth it.
The Best Resources for Starting Mandarin
So, now you’re ready to jump into Mandarin. Great! But what sources are best for a new Chinese learner?
All of these have been personally used by me, and I received my MA in Chinese Philosophy at a university in Shanghai, where I was a Mandarin student for one year and did all of my graduate classes in Mandarin.
Recommended Textbooks:
- New Practical Chinese Reader: This is a great textbook for building the fundamentals for reading and writing in Chinese. The exercises are helpful for getting students to make their own sentences in a practical manner.
- Integrated Chinese: Probably one of the most popular textbook series in North America for learning Mandarin; I used it myself in undergrad, many editions ago, and I highly recommend it. Both Simplified and Traditional versions available.
- HSK Standard Course 1: If you’re planning on taking the HSK (Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì), this is one of the most popular textbook courses out there for Mainland China’s proficiency test.
- A Course in Contemporary Chinese: If you’re learning Traditional, this textbook by National Taiwan Normal University’s incredible Mandarin Training Center is definitely my go-to. It also helps prepare for Taiwan’s version of the HSK, the Test of Chinese as a Foreign Language (TOCFL).
Online and App Dictionaries:
- Pleco: For a decade this has been my absolute favorite dictionary app. It even has a flashcard system and you can add on other dictionaries (I added on one for Classical Chinese for reading philosophical texts). There are audio functions, you can handwrite characters, and it even has a document reader! I can’t recommend it enough.
- HanziCraft: A web-based dictionary that does a great job of breaking down strokes and radicals and provides hanzi study lists
Learning Apps and Websites:
- Du Chinese: A wonderful app that provides excellent reading resources for all levels of Mandarin learning. From looking up individual words to providing full translations of sentences, this is an excellent way to start to immerse yourself in Chinese.
- SuperTest (formerly HSK Online): While this is clearly focused towards the HSK exam, it has a lot of resources! Don’t. be fooled into thinking it’s only good for those preparing for the test.
- Skritter: For both Japanese and Mandarin Chinese learners, this is a great app for learning how to write hanzi, and it not only utilizes spaced repetition and active recall to get the characters firmly in your brain, but it also is a great help for getting stroke order down.
