Your Ultimate Vietnamese Pronunciation Guide

Vietnamese Pronunciation

When one hears the Vietnamese language spoken fluently, it has a fast pace and a singsong quality to it. Those wanting to learn the Vietnamese language may believe that learning proper pronunciation is going to be difficult, or even impossible, since they haven’t spent their lives learning and listening to the language. Fortunately, that’s not the case. Even though the sounds of the language might be a bit different from English, it is possible to learn proper Vietnamese pronunciation so you can speak like a native speaker in no time.

Sounds and Syllables

The Vietnamese alphabet is large and can seem cumbersome when one first tries to learn the language. You will have to learn consonants, consonant clusters, final consonants, and vowels, each of which has a specific pronunciation. One of the other things that you will need to know when you are learning Vietnamese pronunciation is that the dialect can change based on where you are in the country. This means that some of the words that you pronounce might sound a bit different when you speak in a different dialect. In addition, you have digraphs and trigraphs, which are groupings of letters.

Even though most speakers of the language in the country will be able to understand a different dialect, you have to be aware of the dialect changes when you are listening to speakers in the country so that you will be able to grasp their words. With practice and when it comes to Vietnamese grammar, you should be able to understand other dialects.

The letters “f”, “j”, “w”, and “z” are not a part of the Vietnamese alphabet, but you will find those letters in foreign loan words. In some cases, the letter “w” instead of “u” in abbreviations when you see someone write Vietnamese.

Tones

Vietnamese is a tonal language, and it has 6 separate tones within it. Understanding tones is another area that might seem difficult at first, but you can get the hang of it. Being able to understand the tones is going to help you understand the speakers much better. The six tones include ghost, cheek, but, tomb, horse, and rice seedling.

When you are learning Vietnamese pronunciation, it is in your best interest to take things slowly at first and to practice whenever you have the opportunity. Practice is going to help make sure that you have the right inflection and the right sound.

1) Use voice recording tools to perfect your pronunciation

VietnamesePod101 has plenty of resources to help you with your Vietnamese pronunciation, so be sure to make thorough use of our recordings with native Vietnamese speakers. These are available not only to demonstrate to you how you should pronounce Vietnamese vocabulary, but also sentences and dialogues. Watch and listen to these over and over again to train your ear, and watch the teacher’s mouth as she speaks in the video lessons. Then, copy the speech as best you can. Later, you can record yourself to hear if you sound like a native speaker and compare yourself with native speakers. Great for self-motivation.

2) Practice in front of the mirror.

And see that you’re copying the correct lip and mouth movements.

3) Use our VietnamesePod101 dictionary!

Use the Vietnamese dictionary provided by VietnamesePod101 to look up words and listen to the audio pronunciation. This will go a long way towards giving you an idea of how to pronounce a word or letter correctly.

4) Train your ear to the language!

Make an effort to often listen to Vietnamese music and recorded books, and watch plenty of Vietnamese movies and/or TV shows in Vietnamese. This will train your ear to the language, and you’ll be surprised how quickly you pick up the accent. Remember, this is the way we learned to speak when we were young - mostly by listening to the adults talking, and repeating what they say!

5) Practice, practice, practice…

Repetition of the same thing may be boring, but in learning a new language, you’re creating new pathways in your brain. For these to remain and become habitual, you will need to repeat the correct pronunciation often.

6) Make friends with a native Vietnamese speaker.

Don’t be shy to address them in Vietnamese! Ask them to correct you when you make a pronunciation mistake - this is a wonderful way to practice and learn the language first-hand, and also to make new friends.

7) Practice your pronunciation with your Vietnamese teacher!

If you’re a serious student and don’t know where to meet native Vietnamese speakers, consider investing in VietnamesePod101’s Premium PLUS plan. This means you will have your own native Vietnamese teacher available to practice your pronunciation with, and much more! Send recordings of yourself speaking Vietnamese and get feedback from your Vietnamese teacher.