<p>I want to emphasize what @user3306356 says in a comment.  Hanyu Pinyin (漢語拼音) is an officially established system and has explicit rules which you can see  <a href="http://pinyin.info/readings/zyg/rules.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">here</a>. As @jdods remarks in a comment to this answer, that means tones are written as assigned and not as pronounced, while syllables are grouped as pronounced.</p>

<p>This is important because Hanyu Pinyin is not only a way to teach children in China to read, or a way to help foreign learners of Chinese.  It is also an international standard for rendering Chinese texts in a western alphabet.  </p>

<p>You should probably try to learn the actual international standard -- especially if you think you might later use Pinyin in transcribing anything for other people to read.</p>

<p>As to the question "why not write everything exactly as it is spoken?" Here are three answers.  But in fact Hanyu Pinyin is the outcome of nearly a century of efforts by many scholars and linguists, and I am probably missing many of their reasons.</p>

<p>First, so far as two or three third tones in a row are concerned, Hanyu Pinyin <em>does</em> tell you exactly how they are normally spoken because you know the Hanyu Pinyin rules.  What you really meant was "why not write each individual syllable exactly as spoken without relying on context?"</p>

<p>So, second, context is a very complex issue: As @michealyus notes, third tone sandhi on more than three successive third tones depends on how the sentence is meant to be broken into phrases.  More: the tone on a word may turn neutral at the end of a phrase, or may not if you want to emphasize that word for some reason (indeed even so common a phrase as 你好 can be spoken as ni3 hao3 in a context that calls for for special emphasis).  And the exact way a neutral tone is pronounced depends on the tone before it (see  <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/neutral-tone-in-mandarin-chinese-2279507" rel="nofollow noreferrer">this link</a>).  Thus, many words would have at least three spellings.  Now suppose you as writer want to quote something someone said.  You would have to choose how to spell each sentence by deciding how the sentence would have been broken into phrases (this is often ambiguous) and how much emphasis was intended (ditto).  </p>

<p>Third, from the reader's viewpoint, consider the writer whose pseudonym is spoken lao2 she3.  Is the first word there a second tone word?  Or is it a third tone word being written as second?  Better to write it as Lao3 She3, and use the rule for third tone sandhi.  The ambiguities of phonetic representation of Mandarin are bad enough intrinsically.  Let's not make them worse by giving single words multiple spellings.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-05-26T17:12:06.010Z
Says right there on the link posted: "Indication of Tones:
 Only the original tones are indicated; tone sandhi is not indicated." That answers the question.
jdods
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-05-30T10:36:27.813Z
The point on multiple third tones causing more complex sandhi patterns is very relevant.
Michaelyus
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-05-26T13:18:46.910Z
2017-05-30T12:11:30.860Z
2017-05-30T12:11:30.860Z
Colin McLarty
<p>As you already know it, there are five tones of Chinese character pronunciations, the level tone(阴平), the rising tone(阳平), the falling-rising tone(上声), the falling tone(去声), and the light tone(轻声).</p>

<p>For the problem of "你好", it's the problem that it's hard to pronounce a sequence of multiple falling-rising tones continuously, if you are not pronouncing it slow and carefully. All characters before the last one will be likely to pronounced as rising tones, and the last character, if you pronounce it shortly, it will likely to pronounced as a falling tone, and you can extend the length and complete a falling-rising tone. The reason is the falling-rising tone has the weight just a little greater than the light tone, the real pronunciation will effected by the tone before and after it. If you pronounce "你好" slow and clearly, you can pronounce both character as the correct falling-rising tone.</p>

<p>"不" is essentially pronounced as falling tone, but when using before another falling tone character, it pronounces as a rising tone, which is because of the classical Chinese feature of "rhyming", witch is almost lost at all on the character pronunciations in modern Chinese, but still exists in poems --the construct of characters, and a little of very frequently used characters.</p>

<p>There are also polyphonic characters in Chinese, which has multiple pronunciations with difference meanings. Witch is similar to <a href="https://jakubmarian.com/english-words-that-change-meaning-depending-on-the-stress-position/" rel="nofollow">English words that change their meaning depending on stress position</a>. The different pronounces of a polyphonic character can't replace each other, most of them has different meanings on each pronunciations, there are often some relations between these meanings, but can't be replaced each other.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T17:08:56.807Z
regarding tones (cf. 一、七）＂现代汉语词典＂ 不 **［注意]** a）在去声字前面，＇不＇字读阳平声＇如＇～会＇，＇～是＇see also same dictionary: 本词典为简便起‌​见，条目中的＇一＇字，都注阴平, although it does not say so， 不 is treated analogously (same practice followed by CCG,bkrs), on the other hand "汉语水平考试词典＂ seems
to indicate tones after 不 correctly： búduì (unlike nǐ hǎo, no space)
user6065
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T17:14:04.507Z
@user6065 Yes you are right, I must update the answer.
a_a
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T16:06:43.620Z
2016-06-16T23:10:20.877Z
2016-06-16T23:10:20.877Z
a_a
<p>If it makes up the same "expression" (usually ranging from one to four words) in pinyin, such as "budui', "nihao", etc, it is put together. </p>

<p>If it is not the same "expression", they will be separated. 
For example: hen gaoxing renshi ni. 
Notice "hen" is separate from "gaoxing" and so forth.</p>

<p>This helps the reader read with ease rather than having to make sense of a bunch of random letters, which, for a beginner, they would not be used to yet.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T04:48:42.633Z
examples from CCG，bkrs：你好 nǐ hǎo，不对 bùduì，等于 děngyú, 不如 bùrú，不要 bùyào，不少 bùshǎo，
user6065
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T05:15:42.810Z
Yep. That's a better way to express it. i'll edit my answer.
Sulfly
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T00:31:28.700Z
2016-06-16T05:16:57.037Z
2016-06-16T05:16:57.037Z
Sulfly
<p>As in the title, should something like 不对 be <em>written</em> as bù duì (as in the individual characters) or as bú duì (the way it's actually spoken)?</p>

<p>I know that my teacher writes e.g. 你好 as nǐ hǎo (i.e. despite the ní hǎo pronunciation).  Google Translate seems to stick to writing it according to the individual character tones too.  Is this the standard way?  I'm confused because I thought of Pinyin as 'just' a pronunciation guide, so why not write everything exactly as it is spoken?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-15T23:48:10.873Z
Chinese, A Comprehensive Grammar (all Chinese is written in pinyin (likewise)) seems to write bùduì, níhǎo,just as Q suggests, more examples 杜鹃 dùjuān,地平线 dìpíngxiàn,母鸡 mǔjī,众议院 zhòngyìyuàn,参议院 cānyìyuàn,中国共产党,zhōngguó gòngchǎndǎng,中华人民共和国 zhōnghuá rénmín gònghéguó, 雪花在空中飞舞，xue3hua1 zai4 kong1 zhong1 fei1wu3, some dictionaries do not follow this practice and separate all syllables
user6065
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T02:11:52.657Z
this does not mean all words are written separately, e.g. 不对 still consists of 2 words, an adverb and an adjective, similarly 你好 is ２ words，but they are spoken as if they were one word, writing text using pinyin should follow this practice.
user6065
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T02:46:48.100Z
Also note my question here: http://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/17687/rule-tone-sandhi-in-topolectical-dictionaries topolectical dictionaries sometimes note the actual pronunciation : using 你好 for instance they would just record ni2 hao3 or some topolectical dictionaries will also include original tone to sandhi marks, e.g.: ni3-2 hao3.
Mou某
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T03:01:43.403Z
also see here: http://www.pinyin.info/readings/zyg/rules.html rules on pinyin - including rules of separation (spaces).
Mou某
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T15:16:41.177Z
Actually I think I see 'bu2dui4' but 'ni3hao3' used most often... It seems there are different standards. I think 不 just has too many variants so people  actually take care to spell out the actual tone used.
tvk
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T22:31:07.713Z
@FangJing Too many variants? It's _bù_ everywhere except right before another fourth tone… 一 _yī_ has one more, was that perhaps what you were thinking of?
Janus Bahs Jacquet
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-06-16T23:19:42.547Z
@JanusBahsJacquet My bad. I didn't think it through. You're absolutely correct. But somehow I remember seeing 'bu2' when I was like six-years-old reading books with pinyin annotated characters, but never 'ni2'. I can't come up with a satisfactory explanation.
tvk
<pinyin>
Should Pinyin be written as it is (collectively) pronounced or in terms of the individual syllables?
# Should Pinyin be written as it is (collectively) pronounced or in terms of the individual syllables?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2016-06-15)

As in the title, should something like 不对 be *written* as bù duì (as in the individual characters) or as bú duì (the way it's actually spoken)?

I know that my teacher writes e.g. 你好 as nǐ hǎo (i.e. despite the ní hǎo pronunciation). Google Translate seems to stick to writing it according to the individual character tones too. Is this the standard way? I'm confused because I thought of Pinyin as 'just' a pronunciation guide, so why not write everything exactly as it is spoken?

**Tags:** pinyin

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Chinese, A Comprehensive Grammar (all Chinese is written in pinyin (likewise)) seems to write bùduì, níhǎo,just as Q suggests, more examples 杜鹃 dùjuān,地平线 dìpíngxiàn,母鸡 mǔjī,众议院 zhòngyìyuàn,参议院 cānyìyuàn,中国共产党,zhōngguó gòngchǎndǎng,中华人民共和国 zhōnghuá rénmín gònghéguó, 雪花在空中飞舞，xue3hua1 zai4 kong1 zhong1 fei1wu3, some dictionaries do not follow this practice and separate all syllables  
> **username_1**: this does not mean all words are written separately, e.g. 不对 still consists of 2 words, an adverb and an adjective, similarly 你好 is ２ words，but they are spoken as if they were one word, writing text using pinyin should follow this practice.  
> **username_2**: Also note my question here: http://chinese.stackexchange.com/questions/17687/rule-tone-sandhi-in-topolectical-dictionaries topolectical dictionaries sometimes note the actual pronunciation : using 你好 for instance they would just record ni2 hao3 or some topolectical dictionaries will also include original tone to sandhi marks, e.g.: ni3-2 hao3.  
> **username_2**: also see here: http://www.pinyin.info/readings/zyg/rules.html rules on pinyin - including rules of separation (spaces).  
> **username_3**: Actually I think I see 'bu2dui4' but 'ni3hao3' used most often... It seems there are different standards. I think 不 just has too many variants so people  actually take care to spell out the actual tone used.  
> **username_4**: @FangJing Too many variants? It's _bù_ everywhere except right before another fourth tone… 一 _yī_ has one more, was that perhaps what you were thinking of?  
> **username_3**: @username_4 My bad. I didn't think it through. You're absolutely correct. But somehow I remember seeing 'bu2' when I was like six-years-old reading books with pinyin annotated characters, but never 'ni2'. I can't come up with a satisfactory explanation.  

---

## 3 answers

### Answer by username_5 on 2017-05-26. Score: 5

I want to emphasize what @user3306356 says in a comment. Hanyu Pinyin (漢語拼音) is an officially established system and has explicit rules which you can see [here](http://pinyin.info/readings/zyg/rules.html). As @username_6 remarks in a comment to this answer, that means tones are written as assigned and not as pronounced, while syllables are grouped as pronounced.

This is important because Hanyu Pinyin is not only a way to teach children in China to read, or a way to help foreign learners of Chinese. It is also an international standard for rendering Chinese texts in a western alphabet.

You should probably try to learn the actual international standard -- especially if you think you might later use Pinyin in transcribing anything for other people to read.

As to the question "why not write everything exactly as it is spoken?" Here are three answers. But in fact Hanyu Pinyin is the outcome of nearly a century of efforts by many scholars and linguists, and I am probably missing many of their reasons.

First, so far as two or three third tones in a row are concerned, Hanyu Pinyin *does* tell you exactly how they are normally spoken because you know the Hanyu Pinyin rules. What you really meant was "why not write each individual syllable exactly as spoken without relying on context?"

So, second, context is a very complex issue: As @michealyus notes, third tone sandhi on more than three successive third tones depends on how the sentence is meant to be broken into phrases. More: the tone on a word may turn neutral at the end of a phrase, or may not if you want to emphasize that word for some reason (indeed even so common a phrase as 你好 can be spoken as ni3 hao3 in a context that calls for for special emphasis). And the exact way a neutral tone is pronounced depends on the tone before it (see [this link](https://www.thoughtco.com/neutral-tone-in-mandarin-chinese-2279507)). Thus, many words would have at least three spellings. Now suppose you as writer want to quote something someone said. You would have to choose how to spell each sentence by deciding how the sentence would have been broken into phrases (this is often ambiguous) and how much emphasis was intended (ditto).

Third, from the reader's viewpoint, consider the writer whose pseudonym is spoken lao2 she3. Is the first word there a second tone word? Or is it a third tone word being written as second? Better to write it as Lao3 She3, and use the rule for third tone sandhi. The ambiguities of phonetic representation of Mandarin are bad enough intrinsically. Let's not make them worse by giving single words multiple spellings.

> **Comments:**
> **username_6**: Says right there on the link posted: "Indication of Tones:  Only the original tones are indicated; tone sandhi is not indicated." That answers the question.  
> **username_7**: The point on multiple third tones causing more complex sandhi patterns is very relevant.  

---

### Answer by username_8 on 2016-06-16. Score: 0

As you already know it, there are five tones of Chinese character pronunciations, the level tone(阴平), the rising tone(阳平), the falling-rising tone(上声), the falling tone(去声), and the light tone(轻声).

For the problem of "你好", it's the problem that it's hard to pronounce a sequence of multiple falling-rising tones continuously, if you are not pronouncing it slow and carefully. All characters before the last one will be likely to pronounced as rising tones, and the last character, if you pronounce it shortly, it will likely to pronounced as a falling tone, and you can extend the length and complete a falling-rising tone. The reason is the falling-rising tone has the weight just a little greater than the light tone, the real pronunciation will effected by the tone before and after it. If you pronounce "你好" slow and clearly, you can pronounce both character as the correct falling-rising tone.

"不" is essentially pronounced as falling tone, but when using before another falling tone character, it pronounces as a rising tone, which is because of the classical Chinese feature of "rhyming", witch is almost lost at all on the character pronunciations in modern Chinese, but still exists in poems --the construct of characters, and a little of very frequently used characters.

There are also polyphonic characters in Chinese, which has multiple pronunciations with difference meanings. Witch is similar to [English words that change their meaning depending on stress position](https://jakubmarian.com/english-words-that-change-meaning-depending-on-the-stress-position/). The different pronounces of a polyphonic character can't replace each other, most of them has different meanings on each pronunciations, there are often some relations between these meanings, but can't be replaced each other.

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: regarding tones (cf. 一、七）＂现代汉语词典＂ 不 **［注意]** a）在去声字前面，＇不＇字读阳平声＇如＇～会＇，＇～是＇see also same dictionary: 本词典为简便起‌​见，条目中的＇一＇字，都注阴平, although it does not say so， 不 is treated analogously (same practice followed by CCG,bkrs), on the other hand "汉语水平考试词典＂ seems to indicate tones after 不 correctly： búduì (unlike nǐ hǎo, no space)  
> **username_8**: @username_1 Yes you are right, I must update the answer.  

---

### Answer by username_9 on 2016-06-16. Score: 0

If it makes up the same "expression" (usually ranging from one to four words) in pinyin, such as "budui', "nihao", etc, it is put together.

If it is not the same "expression", they will be separated.
For example: hen gaoxing renshi ni.
Notice "hen" is separate from "gaoxing" and so forth.

This helps the reader read with ease rather than having to make sense of a bunch of random letters, which, for a beginner, they would not be used to yet.

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: examples from CCG，bkrs：你好 nǐ hǎo，不对 bùduì，等于 děngyú, 不如 bùrú，不要 bùyào，不少 bùshǎo，  
> **username_9**: Yep. That's a better way to express it. i'll edit my answer.  

---

