Our podcast for today is our second show in a new series we're launching to teach proper Chinese pronunciation. Our focus today is on a common problem a lot of learners have when they're new to mandarin: differentiating the sound "zi" from its aspirated rival "ci". Today we're going to clear this up once and for all.

And attention listeners: management is fully aware that Brendan's pronunciation of the letter zed in this podcast does not conform to international Canadian phonetic standards. We apologize for this oversight, and wish to assure you we have already commenced mandatory remedial training. Even if the continued references to "zee" (zed) may confuse, we hope you still find this a useful podcast for mastering proper pronunciation in Chinese.
 said on
May 18, 2009
漂亮! 谢谢啊!
 said on
May 19, 2009
technically you aspirate with 字 as well as with 次, it's just a lot less emphatic. looking forward to more of the intermediate/advanced podcasts.
 said on
May 19, 2009
good lesson...think this is much more in line with what AbBegs need...and im with the zee brigade...down with zed!
 said on
May 19, 2009
@nadasax,

哈哈哈, guys, this is only "zi" here, no zee or zed. Forget your English !

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
May 19, 2009
加油!
 said on
May 19, 2009
@Echo - 金石良言。
 said on
May 19, 2009
@doubt616,

:) 这话我爱听,哈哈。

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
May 20, 2009
@Echo - There are times when I would happily forgo my study of conversational Mandarin in favor of spending all my time studying these wonderful idioms. I am told that idioms feature quite largely in day-to-day speech in Beijing.

Would you agree with this?
 said on
May 21, 2009
@doubt616,

I would say if you can properly put the chengyus into your conversational Mandarin (like what you just did above), your Chinese would be amazing. Even a lot of native speakers can't do it. 再接再励! :)

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
August 5, 2010
Just wanna clarify, is zi a voiced or voiceless unaspirated sound?
 said on
August 5, 2010
@neehnahw,

It is a voiceless unaspirated sound.

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
September 30, 2010
Are you 100% sure it's voiceless?

I would say it's more voiced than voiceless. Especially foreigners "need" the voice to "stop" the sound from getting too aspirated (which is it definitely not). I think it sounds very unnatural taking all the voice out of it and makes it quite hard to distinguish it from "ci".

Interestingly enough when I checked Wikipedia it turns out [tʂ] AND [dʐ] are both possible pronunciations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinyin see Pron. of initials

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on this.

--陈德飞
 said on
April 5, 2013
Another mistake that I have noticed (especially with Cantonese speakers) is that they pronounce zi, or anything with z like zou, as "ji" or "jou". While c in ci or cai they pronounce as "chi" or "chai".
 said on
December 22, 2014
The 'puff of air' trick with holding your hand over your mouth I found to be very, very useful!
 said on
December 29, 2017
What's the name of the opening track?
 said on
January 1, 2018
Not actually sure, creaky.