This page serves as a guide for utilizing Pinyin on Pleasant Goat Wiki. As the official romanization system for Mandarin Chinese, Pinyin is used for Chinese names, titles, and terms on this wiki. To ensure consistency and clarity, our wiki follows specific rules regarding the application of Pinyin.
These rules are generally in accordance with the national standard Basic Rules of the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet Orthography (GB/T 16159-2012; PDF).
It does not specify title case but requires each word in proper nouns to be capitalized.[note 1] In contrast, the earlier standard, Transliterating Rules of Chinese Phonetic Alphabet on Titles for Books and Periodicals in Chinese (GB/T 3259-1992; PDF), applied title case with function words in lowercase.[note 2] On Pleasant Goat Wiki, we have integrated the requirements of both standards[note 3] for convenience of use.
This page only provides guidelines on Pinyin for Mandarin. Refer to Help:Pinyin for more related content. If you are certain that a content is in Cantonese, please refer to Pleasant Goat Wiki:Jyutping Guidelines.
Pronunciation
Pleasant Goat Wiki follows the standard Mandarin (or Putonghua) pronunciation used in the Chinese mainland, where the show is made, for Pinyin transcription. If you are unsure about the pronunciation of any word, please refer to Xiandai Hanyu Cidian (7th Edition) published by The Commercial Press.[note 4]
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 攻击 | attack | gōngjī | not gōngjí |
| 微笑 | smile | wēixiào | not wéixiào |
Only the original tone is annotated; the tone sandhis of “一 yī” and “不 bù” are not annotated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Actual pronunciation | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|---|
| 一起 | together | yìqǐ | yīqǐ |
| 不要 | don’t | búyào | bùyào |
The rhotacizd final -r sound[note 5] of “儿 r” is represented by a single letter r. However, if the post-affixed “儿 ér” manifests as an independent syllable in the actual audio, use ér. When the Chinese character notation does not include the character “儿”, the rhotacized sound should not be marked, even if the actual audio suggests its presence.
| Chinese | English meaning | Actual audio | Pinyin spelling | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 去哪儿 | where to go | qù nǎr | qù nǎr | not qù nǎ’ér |
| 去哪 | where to go | qù nǎr | qù nǎ | not qù nǎr |
| 羊儿 | goats | yáng’ér (in the song “Biekan Wo Zhi Shi Yi Zhi Yang” etc.) |
yáng’ér | not yángr |
Notation for some words with alternative pronunciations: use shéi for “谁”, zhè for “这”, nà for “那”, nǎ for “哪”.
For characters that can be pronounced with either their original tone or in a neutral tone, the tone marking should reflect the actual audio.
For stressed pronunciations that may appear in lyrics, such as “的 de” and “地 de” being sung as di[note 6], annotate based on the actual audio.
Only use the basic Latin letters “a” and “g”, as the Pinyin-specific forms “ɑ” and “ɡ” are not commonly used and are less accessible for input. The former is already displayed in a single-storey form in the default font of this wiki.
Even for transliterated words, Pinyin is used if they have a Chinese character representation.[note 7]
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 嘉年华 | Carnival | Jiāniánhuá | not Carniüal |
| 巧克力 | chocolate | qiǎokèlì | not chocolate |
| 马拉松 | marathon | mǎlāsōng | not marathon |
| 咖啡豆 | coffee beans | kāfēi dòu | not coffee dòu |
| 蛋挞 | egg tart | dàntà | not dàntart or dàn tart |
| 耳麦 | headset | ěrmài | not ěrmicro or ěr microphone |
| 卡拉OK | karaoke | kǎlā OK | not karaoke or kara orchestra |
| T恤 | T-shirt | T xù | not tīxù or T shirt |
| 魔王 | demon king | mówáng | not mārawáng or māra wáng |
| 伦敦 | London | Lúndūn | not London |
| 首尔 | Seoul | Shǒu’ěr | not Seoul or Sŏul |
| 希腊 | Greece | Xīlà | not Hellas or Elláda |
| 德国 | Germany | Déguó | not Deutschguó or Deutsch guó |
Spacing
Pinyin adheres to specific spacing conventions. Generally, there are no spaces between syllables within a complete word. Between different complete words, do insert a space.
When representing a holistic conceptual notion with two or three syllables, these are concatenated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 狼性草 | Wolf Herb | Lángxìngcǎo |
| 飓风刃 | Hurricane Blade | Jùfēngrèn |
For names consisting of four or more syllables denoting a single concept, they are spaced by word or yujie[note 8]. However, if the concept cannot be divided based on words or yujie, do not space.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 能量种子 | Energy Seed | Néngliàng Zhǒngzi | spaced by word |
| 净化疗程 | Purification Treatment | Jìnghuà Liáochéng | spaced by word |
| 碧蓝战狙 | Aquamarine Battle Rifle | Bìlán Zhànjū | spaced by yujie |
| 奇云锁链 | Magic Cloud Chains | Qíyún Suǒliàn | spaced by yujie |
| 世界之匙 | World’s Key | Shìjiè zhī Shi | spaced by word |
| 二舅姥爷 | mother’s mother’s second eldest brother | èrjiùlǎoye | cannot be divided by word or yujie |
| 巨里咕噜 | Glee-Gulu | Jùlǐgūlū | cannot be divided by word or yujie |
Single-syllable word reduplications (AA) are concatenated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 羊羊 | goats | yángyáng |
| 天天 | every day | tiāntiān |
Two-syllable word reduplications (ABAB) are spaced between words.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 啪嗒啪嗒 | pitter-patter | pādā pādā |
| 考虑考虑 | think over more | kǎolǜ kǎolǜ |
Single-syllable word reduplications in pair (AABB) are concatenated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 开开心心 | happy | kāikāixīnxīn |
| 兢兢业业 | meticulous | jīngjīngyèyè |
Single-syllable pre-affixed components or post-affixed components are concatenated with other words.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 超声波 | ultrasound | chāoshēngbō |
| 果子 | fruit | guǒzi |
Nouns paired with locational descriptors are spaced. But when the noun and the locational descriptor form a compound word, they are concatenated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 树下 | under the tree | shù xià |
| 空中 | in the air | kōng zhōng |
| 空中 | aerial | kōngzhōng |
Verbs followed by dynamic auxiliary particles like “着 zhe”, “了 le”, “过 guò” are concatenated. However, the final “了 le” at the end of a sentence is spaced.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 看了电视 | watched TV | kànle diànshì |
| 我回来了。 | I’m back. | Wǒ huílai le. |
Space verbs from their objects unless they form a fixed compound word.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 读书 | to read a book | dú shū |
| 读书 | reading | dúshū |
Verbs and their complements are concatenated only when both are monosyllabic; otherwise, they are spaced.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 走进 | to walk into … | zǒujìn |
| 创造出 | to create … | chuàngzào chū |
| 跑过去 | to run over there | pǎo guòqù |
Adjectives followed by “些 xiē”, “一些 yīxiē”, “点儿 diǎnr”, “一点儿 yīdiǎnr” are spaced from them.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 快点儿 | faster; hurry up | kuài diǎnr |
Demonstrative pronouns “这 zhè”, “那 nà”, and interrogative pronoun “哪 nǎ” followed by nouns or quantifiers are spaced. However, when combined with “点儿 diǎnr”, “般 bān”, “边 biān”, “时 shí”, “会儿 huìr”, they are concatenated. Certain pronouns like “各 gè”, “每 měi”, “某 mǒu”, “本 běn”, “该 gāi”, “我 wǒ”, “你 nǐ”, etc., followed by nouns or quantifiers are also spaced.
If a number is written in Arabic numerals, it should also be represented using Arabic numerals in Pinyin. However, if the original text is in Chinese characters, then use Pinyin to transcribe the Chinese numerical characters. Integers between eleven and ninety-nine are concatenated. “百 bǎi”, “千 qiān”, “万 wàn”, “亿 yì” combined with single-digit numbers are concatenated. However, “万 wàn”, “亿 yì” paired with numbers in the tens or above are spaced. When the preceding numeral is “十 shí”, they can also be not written without spacing. Hyphens are used between numerals representing months and days. Numerals and quantifiers are spaced. Numerals, quantifiers, and terms like “多 duō”, “来 lái”, “几 jǐ” are spaced. “十几 shíjǐ” and “几十 jǐshí” are concatenated. When two adjacent numbers are listed as approximate, a hyphen is added between them.
Adverbs are spaced from the words they modify.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 最爱 | to love most; favorite | zuì ài |
| 很好 | very good | hěn hǎo |
Prepositions are spaced from the words they connect.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 在家 | at home | zài jiā |
Conjunctions are spaced from the words they link.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 羊和狼 | goat and wolf | yáng hé láng |
Structural particles like “的 de”, “地 de”, “得 de”, “之 zhī”, “所 suǒ” are spaced from the word following. When “的 de”, “地 de”, “得 de” are preceding a single-syllable word, they can also be concatenated. On Pleasant Goat Wiki, we conventionally separate all.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling | Alternative spelling |
|---|---|---|---|
| 我们的书 | our book | wǒmen de shū | N/A |
| 我的书 | my book | wǒ de shū | wǒde shū |
| 新的书 | new book | xīn de shū | xīnde shū |
Tonal particles are spaced from other words.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 好美啊！ | How beautiful! | Hǎo měi a! |
Interjections typically stand independently of sentence structure and are spaced from other words.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 啊！是你！ | Oh! It’s you! | À! Shì nǐ! |
| 嗯，可以。 | Yes, it’s okay. | Ǹg, kěyǐ. |
| 不理你了，哼！ | I don’t want to talk to you, humph! | Bù lǐ nǐ le, hng! |
Four-character idioms are predominantly written with a hyphen between two two-syllable structures. If the structure cannot be divided into two two-syllable parts, it is concatenated. Refer to examples in #Hyphens section. Non-four-character idioms and other idiomatic expressions are spaced by words obeying the above rules.
Space according to the actual meaning of the words, rather than mechanically converting.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 再见 | goodbye | zàijiàn |
| 再见 | to meet again | zài jiàn |
Surnames and given names in Chinese personal names are spaced, with the surname preceding the given name. Compound surnames are concatenated. For double surnames, a hyphen is added between them. The initial letters of both surname and given name are capitalized. Pen names, aliases, etc., follow the same conventions as regular names. For Pleasant Goat characters, we regard “羊羊 Yángyáng”, “羊 Yáng”, “太狼 Tàiláng”, “狼 Láng”, etc. as a name to be spaced from other parts. Names with three or fewer syllables, where the surname cannot be distinguished, should be written as a single word. Hyphenated surnames should use a hyphen between the parts, with each part capitalized. These rules also apply when Pinyin is used to spell names of people from regions that do not use Pinyin to romanize names.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 灰二太太狼 | Wonky | Huī’èrtài Tàiláng |
| 羊果果 | Gogoa | Yáng Guǒguǒ |
| 烈羊羊 | Blazey | Liè Yángyáng |
| 皓月 | Haoyue | Hàoyuè |
| 马帅 | Ma Shuai | Mǎ Shuài |
| 祖晴 | Zu Qing | Zǔ Qíng |
| 高全胜 | Gao Quansheng | Gāo Quánshèng |
| 晴天 | Qingtian | Qíngtiān |
| 欧阳敏仪 | Ouyang Minyi | Ōuyáng Mǐnyí |
| 刘付新鸿 | Liu-Fu Xinhong | Liú-Fù Xīnhóng |
| 李紫昕 | Purple Lee Chi Yan | Lǐ Zǐxīn |
If a name has already been divided by separator marks or spaces, there is no need to further divide the internal name structure.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| 欧阳瓜瓜·普拉花·飞天嘎嘎 | Ouyangguagua Pulahua Feitiangaga | Ōuyángguāguā Pǔlāhuā Fēitiāngāga | not Ōuyáng Guāguā Pǔlāhuā Fēitiān Gāga |
Personal names and titles or appellations are spaced, with the initial letters of titles or appellations in lowercase.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 慢羊羊村长 | Village Chief Slowy | Màn Yángyáng cūnzhǎng |
| 剔博士 | Doctor T | Tī bóshì |
| 白教练 | Coach White | Bái jiàoliàn |
Prefixes like “老 Lǎo”, “小 Xiǎo”, “大 Dà”, “阿 Ā”, etc. are spaced from other parts of a name. The initial letters of the separate portion are capitalized.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 小馨 | Xiao Xin | Xiǎo Xīn |
| 阿眯 | A Mi | Ā Mī |
Proper nouns and generic terms within place names are spaced, with the initial letter of each separated part capitalized.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 青青草原 | Green Green Grassland | Qīngqīng Cǎoyuán |
| 发明星球 | Invention Planet | Fāmíng Xīngqiú |
Monosyllabic additional components in proper nouns and generic terms are concatenated with their related parts.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 羊村后山 | Back Mountain of Goats’ Village | Yáng Cūn Hòushān |
Once place names have been formalized as proper nouns, the distinction between proper nouns and generic terms is no longer made, and is concatenated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 愿望之城 | The City of Wishes | Yuànwàngzhīchéng |
Place names that do not require differentiation between proper nouns and generic terms are also concatenated.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 古古怪界 | Bizarre World | Gǔgǔguàijiè |
| 毒荆棘林 | Poisonous Thorn Forest | Dújīngjílín |
Capitalization
The first letter at the beginning of a sentence is capitalized.
The first letter of proper nouns is capitalized. Proper nouns consisting of several words have the first letter of each word capitalized.
When the components of a proper noun, combined with ordinary noun components, form a proper noun or are considered as such, the initial letters are capitalized. However, if the combination forms a common language term or is considered as such, the initial letters are lowercase.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 狼族 | Wolf Clan | Lángzú |
| 粤语 | Cantonese language | Yuèyǔ |
| 藏羚羊 | Tibetan antelopes | zànglíngyáng |
| 黔驴技穷 | the Guizhou donkey has exhausted its tricks | qiánlǘ-jìqióng |
The title case requirements on Pleasant Goat Wiki are as follows: the first letter of each word should be capitalized, except for tonal particles like “啊 a”, “了 le”, “吧 ba”, structural particles like “的 de”, “之 zhī”, “所 suǒ”, conjunctions like “和 hé”, “与 yǔ”, “以及 yǐjí” and prepositions like “在 zài”, “对于 duìyú”, “为了 wèile”, which remain in lowercase. However, if any of these words appear at the beginning of a title or immediately after a sentence-ending punctuation mark, their first letter should be capitalized.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 就在身边 | Right by Our Side | Jiù zài Shēnbiān |
| 希望之篮 | The Basket of Hope | Xīwàng zhī Lán |
In title case, words following hyphens do not need initial capitalization unless they are proper nouns or other terms that require initial capitalization, as demonstrated in the examples in the following section.
Hyphens
Hyphens may be used between certain parallel words, morphemes, or within certain abbreviations.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 狼羊和平 | peace between the wolves and goats | Láng-Yáng hépíng |
| 云海隧道 | Cloud Sea Tunnel | yún-hǎi suìdào |
Four-character idioms are predominantly written with a hyphen between two two-syllable structures. However, if the structure cannot be divided into two two-syllable parts, no hyphens are needed. Modifications to four-character idioms, such as “狼假虎威 lángjiǎhǔwēi” derived from “狐假虎威 hújiǎhǔwēi”, should still be spelled in accordance with the rules for four-character idioms.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 调虎离山 | lure the tiger down the mountain | diàohǔ-líshān |
| 龙潭虎穴 | dragon’s pool and tiger’s den | lóngtán-hǔxué |
| 如临大敌 | as if facing a major enemy | rúlíndàdí |
| 不速之客 | unwanted guest | bùsùzhīkè |
| 狐假虎威 | a fox exploiting the tiger’s might | hújiǎhǔwēi |
| 狼假虎威 | a wolf exploiting the tiger’s might | lángjiǎhǔwēi |
Hyphens are also used between numerals representing months and days.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 零八零三 | August 3 | língbā-língsān |
| 六一 | June 1 | liù-yī |
When two adjacent numbers are listed as approximate, a hyphen is added between them.
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling |
|---|---|---|
| 两三个 | two or three [universal classifier] | liǎng-sān gè |
| 亿万年 | a hundred million or ten thousand years | yì-wàn nián |
Apostrophes
Apostrophes are used in Pinyin to indicate a separation between certain syllables within a word. Specifically, they are employed only in continuous words where a syllable beginning with a vowel (a, o, or e) is followed by another syllable.
It’s important to note that this rule applies consistently, even in cases where potential confusion might arise. In these instances, apostrophes are not added, as the second syllable do not begin with a vowel.[note 9]
| Chinese | English meaning | Pinyin spelling | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| passionate love | rè’ài | The first letter à in the second syllable is a vowel, so an apostrophe is needed. | |
| gannet | táng’é | The first letter é in the second syllable is a vowel, so an apostrophe is needed. | |
| awkward | gāngà | The first letter g in the second syllable is not a vowel, so no apostrophe is needed. | |
| cashier | chūnà | The first letter n in the second syllable is not a vowel, so no apostrophe is needed. | |
| disgusted | fǎngǎn | The first letter g in the second syllable is not a vowel, so no apostrophe is needed. | |
| plan | fāng’àn | The first letter à in the second syllable is a vowel, so an apostrophe is needed. |
Punctuations
Pinyin largely adheres to common Latin alphabet punctuation rules. The convention is to convert full-width punctuation marks in original Chinese text to half-width and add a space afterward. The period (。) is replaced by a dot (.).
Chinese ellipses (……) can be substituted with the version with three dots (…). Although the ideographic comma (、) has a half-width version (､), it can also be replaced with a regular comma (,).
In Basic Rules of the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet Orthography, the book title marks (《》) in Pinyin still appear in full-width form. For aesthetic purposes, we use similar-looking half-width guillemets («») instead in Pinyin contexts on this wiki.
Tones
Tone marks are essential in Pinyin to indicate the tonal variations of Mandarin Chinese. The four fundamental tones—flat (1), rising (2), dipping (3), and falling (4)—are denoted using diacritical marks: macron (ˉ), acute (ˊ), caron (ˇ), and grave (ˋ), respectively. For the neutral (0) tone, no diacritical marks are added. Note that the acute in Pinyin is written with a bottom-left to top-right stroke (↗), unlike in Western scripts where it is often written top-right to bottom-left (↙).
Tone marks should be placed over the primary vowels. Specifically, when applying tone marks to the letter “i”, its dot is omitted. Notably, Unicode already includes precomposed characters for the basic six vowels (a, o, e, i, u, ü) with their four tones, so do use those characters for them rather than base characters with combining marks.
Apply tone marks to Pinyin only when expressing Chinese content. When using Pinyin in English text like listing staff names, omit the tone marks, and add back the dot for the letter “ı”, which was omitted when applying tone marks. An exception is that “陕西 Shǎnxī” is spelled as Shaanxi when omitting tone marks, to distinguish it from Shanxi or “山西 Shānxī”.
Note that the diaeresis (¨) above the standalone vowel “ü” do not represent a tone. Toned versions for “ü”, i.e. ǖ, ǘ, ǚ, and ǜ, are used only to express Chinese content. For example, it is correct to use Xin de Lücheng or Lü Tailang in English context, whose Pinyin versions are respectively Xīn de Lǚchéng and Lǜ Tàiláng.
See also
Notes
- ↑ The interpretation of this standard, written by the Department of Language Information Management of the Ministry of Education, further reflects an approach where all words in a title, regardless of whether they are content or function words, are capitalized.
- ↑ In Chinese, function words include adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, auxiliary words, interjections, and onomatopoeiae. Among them, the requirement that adverbs and onomatopoeiae always remain lowercase does seem somewhat odd.
- ↑ In other words, our approach does not strictly follow either standard but is more reader-friendly and aligns with some common conventions.
- ↑ Please note that Google Translate may provide gōngjí or wéixiào, which are commonly used in Taiwan, so do not use machine-generated Pinyin results directly without verification.
- ↑ Also known as the erhua sound (儿化音).
- ↑ This also occurs with words like “了 le” pronounced as liao, “谁 shéi” as shuí, “着 zhe” as zhuo, etc. in some Mandarin songs. Although these pronunciations, except for “谁” as shuí, are not typically recorded in dictionaries, they can be found in some songs, including China’s national anthem. While more common in 20th-century songs, such phenomena occasionally appear in 21st-century songs recorded on this wiki, so this rule is stated here.
- ↑ Some common rules for converting Japanese to Romaji will transcribe transliterated words into corresponding words in Latin letters, such as “カーニバル” being written as Carnival instead of Kānibaru, and some occasions apply similar rules to Chinese Pinyin (Vocaloid Lyrics Wiki spells Dí’àonísuǒsī Chóngbài as Dionysus Chóngbài). This is also a convention of Gwoyeu Romatzyh, another system to romanize Mandarin, where even its own name is not spelled as Gwoyeu Luomaatzyh but retains the word “Roma”, showcasing this feature. However, this Pleasant Goat Wiki does not use such rules for Pinyin transcription. Even if the word “嘉年华” is a transliteration from the English word “Carnival”, it still needs to be written as Jiāniánhuá in Pinyin.
- ↑ “语节”. Also known as “word phrase”. It refers to segments within words that are divided by pauses in speech.
- ↑ Words like “反感 fǎngǎn” and “方案 fāng’àn” actually eliminate confusion as the latter always uses apostrophes with the second syllable beginning with a vowel.