Speak Authentic Chinese: 10 words that don’t mean much but you still need to learn

Posted By Carl ~ 16th July 2011

The title of this blog is a little misleading (sorry!) because the following list isn’t really made up of words as such but sounds. There are loads of these sounds in Chinese and they all have characters to represent them.

This list is composed of Chinese Mandarin speech particles that often could be omitted whilst the sentence still understood. That is not to say though that they are useless, quite the opposite, these sounds add flavour, context, and a depth of meaning. They regularly come up in speech, online and in text messages. Many of them can be said with different tonal values and therefore often have more than one meaning. If used correctly in natural conversation they will make you sound more like a native speaker.

1. 嗯
English equivalent: um, huh, yep, ok
Pinyin: ng/eng
Usage: surprise (2nd/3rd tone), agreement (neutral tone), often starts sentences and especially text messages (apparently some mobile phones can’t write this character so 恩 is used instead)
Example: Q. If its convenient can we meet up tomorrow? A. huh, ok, what time?
Example: Q. 如果你方便的话我们明天下午见面，怎么样？A. 嗯，好的，几点呢？

2. 啊
English equivalent: oh, ah? ah!
Pinyin: a
Usage: surprise (more so than 嗯) or admiration, often ends a sentence
Example: ah! How is your Chinese so good!
Example: 你的中文怎么这么好啊！

3. 哦
English equivalent: oh
Pinyin: o
Usage: doubt or realisation
Example: Person 1: He has already gone out. Person 2: Oh, I didn’t know!
Example: Person 1: 他已经出发了。Person 2: 哦，我不知道！

4. 啦
English equivalent: None – indicated by tone of voice
Pinyin: la
Usage: seems to indicate a happy mood, ends sentences, mainly used by females
Examples: Okay! Yeah sure! (i.e. no problem at all)
Examples: 好啦！可以 啦！

5. 吧
English equivalent: None – indicated by tone of voice
Pinyin: ba
Usage: used at the end of a sentence for suggestion, agreement, command
Example: Relax!
Example: 放心吧!

6. 呢
English equivalent: None – indicated by tone of voice
Pinyin: ne
Usage: can indicate a question although not as strong as 吗, can indicate a pause
Example: I leave tomorrow, what about you?
Example: 我明天走，你呢？

7. 喂
English equivalent: Hi, hey, hello
Pinyin: wei
Usage: Specifically used to answer the phone (or to beckon somebody you don’t know), most dictionaries normally have it down as a 4th tone but many people also seem to say it with a 2nd.
Example: Hey, hello, who are you after?
Example: 喂，你好，你找哪位？

8. 诶
English equivalent: hey, uh
Pinyin: ei
Usage: a greeting (1st tone), surprise (2nd tone), this is the odd one out on this list since it doesn’t have the 口 radical on the left
Example: uh, how did you not know that?
Example: 诶，你怎么不知到这个了？

9. 唉
English equivalent: mm, oh, ay
Pinyin: ai
Usage: can be used as sigh of sadness or regret, alas etc.
Example: ay, what are we going to do now?
Example: 唉, 那我们现在怎么办？

10. 嘞
English equivalent: None – indicated by tone of voice
Pinyin: lei
Usage: similar to 了, used to express approval
Example: Okay, (i.e. no problem, that’s fine)
Example: 好嘞!

Once you’ve memorised the characters on this list the next step is to try and use them in conversation. Its difficult to say exactly when they should be used because their usage seems to vary from place to place and person to person. Often, if it feels right to use them then it probably is. So our advice is to experiment. Throw one or two in to your conversations ever now and again and see if it gets noticed. You’ll quickly get the hang of them!

For some other useful speech particles check out Carl Gene Fordham’s post ‘Top 11 Mandarin Speech Particles’, and while you’re there check out his cool blog, 好吧？

Note: This list is by no means exhaustive and it is only a guide. There are many other speech particles out there and also many other uses of the ones listed above.