Chinese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "狗" in Chinese?

Q: How do you pronounce 狗 in Chinese?

狗 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /koʊ˨˩˦/. It means “dog.” go with no puff of air, low and sagging. The vowel starts less rounded than English "go".

go with no puff of air, low and sagging. The vowel starts less rounded than English "go".

狗 /koʊ˨˩˦/

gǒu

A dipping tone, so the next syllable decides. Its close neighbour is 够 gòu, "enough", which shares the segments and falls instead — one of many pairs where a dog and an abstract quantity are separated purely by pitch direction.

Listen: 狗

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Sound it out

g- Raise the back of the tongue to the soft palate, released silently with no gust of breath. English g buzzes; this one does not.

-ou Begins at a mid, fairly unrounded position and closes toward "oo". Rounding from the start, as English does, darkens the vowel too early.

gǒu (dip) The voice settles at the bottom and rests. The glide gives the low stretch enough length to be heard properly rather than rushed.

Hear it in a sentence

狗在大声叫。

Gǒu zài dàshēng jiào.

The dog is barking loudly.

Listen: 狗在大声叫。

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狗在大声叫。 keeps gǒu at a full dip because zài falls. Then zài, dà, shēng and jiào give a run of falls broken only by shēng, which is level. So the sentence sinks at the start and then drops repeatedly, each descent needing its own reset rather than sliding on from the last.

Where English speakers slip

Aspirating the g gives kǒu, a real word meaning mouth. Keep the release silent. The vowel is often fully rounded from the beginning, giving English "go". And because the word so often starts a sentence, learners give it an English-style mid pitch rather than letting it sink to the floor.