In Chinese there is four tones. The reason to those tones is probably that Chinese have very few possible syllables. In Chinese there is only approximately 400 syllables while for example English have 12.000 syllables. When you have only 400 syllables it is important to use them wisely.
How do you tell the difference between 
da1(
to hang over something) 
da2
(to answer) 
da3
(to hit)
da4 (big)?
The answer is that you have to learn to tell the difference between the
tones.
The numbers after the syllable indicates the tone. In
normal text this is indicated like this instead: 
.
In the diagram below you can see the tones. There are some rules that might
change the tone of a syllable in some situations. This is the characters
for mama
. Eeach
of the characters are pronounced ma1 ( ma in first tone ). When they are
put together like this the second "ma" loses its tone and become toneless.
This is often indicated in text with a small line under it or a ring. A
character can also have the tone changed if it comes after a character
with the same tone etc. We will not talk more about that now but don´t
be afraid because it is very few rules and they are simple to remember.
First
tone: This is the highest tone you can pronounce in a simple and
normal way. It is pronounced with a steady pitch.
Second tone: Rising pitch from low to
high.
Third tone: First
sinking pitch at the same time as the voice is lowered, followed by a rising
pitch and stronger voice.
Forth tone: fast sinking pitch with a
sharp end.
Toneless: Relax in your mouth and let
the tone fall where it is natural.
Chinese grammar is straight and rather simple. Due to the lack of many particles and all tenses it might feel a little confusing sometimes.
Take e.g. this sentence:
Word
for word it says: "Beijing University have student".
This could be interpreted like "There is a
student at Beijing University" or "there are
students at Beijing University". There
are many ways to express this sentence to make it more clear but this is
a very common way to express it in Chinese.
In
China they like to shorten sentences. This sentence says word for word:
"chicken
don´t eat ?" This could mean:
"Does
the chicken don´t eat?" or "do you/he/she/they
don´t eat chicken?" It is the circumstance
that explains what it means.
Other grammatically rules make it easy with Chinese:
=
I am China person = I am Chinese. All nationalities are built
this way. American are "America" + "person" etc.
The above sentence states that you are Chinese. If you instead want to make a question of it you do only have to add a question particle to the sentence.
=
I am China person ( question particle ). The same words order but
with one extra character added. This character is the same for all sorts
of questions. You can also if you like to construct a question by giving
the listener two answers to chose from like:
=
You have / Do not have milk? Now you have given the listener two
possible answers to choose from. The typical answer to this question is
"have" or "have not". In English we would like to say " I do not have milk"
or "Yes, I do have milk" but in Chinese it is very common to shortening
it down to one of the two possible answers instead.
In English we are used that a word is a verb or a noun etc. In Chinese a word can both a verb and a noun! Chinese words can be used in many more ways than the English equivalence. The Chinese word for word ice could be used when talking about ice but also when talking about " ice cold" etc.
The word order is very important in Chinese. While you in English can change the word order in a sentence it is not possible to do so in Chinese all the time. The sentence "I beat him" or "he beats me is" very clear in English. Since there are only one form to every Chinese word this sentence in Chinese would be "I beat he" or "he beat me". By changing the word order the meaning of the sentence is completely different.
This is a just a short introduction to the Chinese language.
We are working on many more pages to add to this site in the future. If
you want to learn some more Chinese on the net we recommend our link
page. There you can find links to more pages about Chinese. Our Forums
are also open for you to ask questions or discuss China / Chinese. We hope
you will enjoy it as much as we have. Good luck with your new language!