How I read and enjoy books in my target language
Please note that I write about what works for me and share advice based on my own experiences. If you have a different opinion or if you use other methods, that's absolutely fine. Do whatever works for you.
Since some people asked me how I read books in my target languages, I would like to describe my way of reading in this post. I focus on reading for some time now and I'm very happy with my progress so far. This doesn't mean that I won't change a few things in the future (I'm constantly gaining experience and changing my learning style accordingly).
1. Choosing a book
Before I start reading, I have to choose an appropriate book, obviously. After trial and error I realized how important this step is. My ideal book is:
not too easy (I won't learn much)
not too difficult (if I can't follow at least the rough story I won't enjoy it)
interesting (motivation to read it)
I try to choose a book that is slightly above my level so that I can follow the story without looking up too many words but also learn new words. I don't need to understand everything, but I don't want to feel lost either. Balance is important.
2. Trying the first chapter
After choosing a book that seems to be appropriate, I try to read the first chapter (and sometimes the first two chapters, if they are short). I pay attention to things like:
Can I follow the story?
Is the story interesting?
Do I like the writing style?
If I can answer (most) questions like these with "yes", I continue reading the book.
Do I only understand single words or sentences here and there? Do I have no clue what happens? Then I put the book aside for now and choose an easier one. There's no shame in admitting that this book is too difficult at the moment. Deciding what I don't read is just as important as deciding what I read.
3. Reading
If the level of difficulty is okay, I start reading the book. In my experience, the first few chapters are always the hardest. I need time to get used to the writing style, the used vocabulary and the story.
In the case of the japanese version of Harry Potter, the beginning was difficult because of the writing style. But after two chapters, I began to enjoy the story and so I continued. That's why I always try to read at least the first chapter. A book that seems difficult in the beginning can be very enjoyable once I've read enough pages.
When I come across an interesting word or a sentence I like, I highlight it. I try to not highlight too much stuff, though. Two, maybe three words per page is usually my maximum. Enjoying the story is my number one priority. I can read several pages without highlighting anything, even though there are words I don't know. As long as I don't feel the strong urge to look up a word, I just continue reading.
In many cases I can understand words from context and learn them over time just by seeing them again and again. That's why I don't look up words immediately. I wait to see if they come up more often.
After I finished one chapter, I look up all highlighted words and read the passages that contain these words a second time. This way, I can connect the meaning with the full context. I don't try to memorize the word; I just try to understand it in this particular context before I continue.
Most of the time, I learn words unconsciously. If the book is easy enough, it's not so difficult to guess the meaning of certain words. While reading, I don't focus so much on words I don't know. I just focus on following the story. I may not always understand every detail, but as long as I can follow and enjoy the story, everything is fine. I learn so much by engaging with the language in a meaningful way and enjoying the content. Sometimes, I even forget that I am reading a book in a foreign language!
I have to add, that I'm already familiar with basic sentence patterns and that I have experience with reading books in my target languages. I finished the book "Remembering the Kanji" which makes it easier to guess the meaning of words. Knowing lots of kanji is a great advantage.
I have still a long way to go, of course, but this natural way of learning vocabulary may not work well at very early stages because you need a foundation first. After you are familiar with the dialogues and example sentences in your textbook, graded readers are a good choice in my opinion. Graded readers can make the transition from textbooks to easy books aimed at (young) native speakers easier.
Tip: One thing that helped me is to take a card, write down words I looked up and put this card into the book. When I read it a second time, I don't need to look them up again. Reading texts more than once can help to get more familiar with new words. Plus, writing helps me to remember words better. Reviewing them in their original context is much more enjoyable to me than reviewing them with flashcards. In the picture below you can see how my cards look like:
4. Enjoy!
I made enjoying books my number one priority. This is what helped me to make much more progress than before. All I need is enough reading material at the right level and a dictionary. As soon as I get absorbed in a book, I don't think about learning a language. I just want to enjoy the story. The more experience I gain, the better I become at understanding the language as a result. There's no need to force it or to hurry.
What I like about just enjoying a book and learning words naturally is that it's so simple. I don't necessarily need my computer, a certain software, add-ons, ... All I need is something I can read. After reading a chapter, I only look up a few words as I described above and that's it. Then, I often feel so motivated that I want to read more. I read much more than before because I enjoy it so much.
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Analyzing Chinese Names: Syllables & Tones
It’s been a while since my last post about Chinese names. In one previous post, I wrote that I wanted to explore tones and syllable structure in Chinese names. And now here we are. I ended up shifting my focus a bit throughout the process, but I’m still excited to be sharing my results.
These questions/ideas guided this post:
Sometimes you don’t know how a name is written because you’ve only heard it or seen a transliteration. Setting aside the written language (Chinese characters), what syllables/sounds are most common?
I have read about naming conventions regarding tones. For example, using a mix of tones (instead of reusing the same tone) gives names a dynamic flow. So how are tones distributed in names?
Buckle up, everyone. This is gonna be a long one.
About the Data
I started with the data from my previous in-depth post about Chinese names. Like before, most names are from contestants on idol shows or members of idol groups. I added more names in this category and also some names of athletes (since for athletes it is also relatively easy to discern gender). In total, there were 4361 names (2340 female, 2021 male). Most names belong to individuals from Mainland China, but there are also names belonging to people from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore. See my past post for more details.
I had to do a lot of work to process the name data for this analysis. I will add some details towards the end of this post for those who are interested. I just want to note here that:
I did some work to account for tone sandhi for yi 一. As a result, you may see this character labeled as 1st, 2nd, or 4th tone.
I also applied tone change rules when there were multiple 3rd tones in a row (but not for surnames as it shouldn’t change there).
I had to correct for duoyinzi 多音字. Most of the time, it’s pretty clear which pronunciation is used, but there are some ambiguous cases.
I use standard Mainland pronunciation, not Taiwanese pronunciation. Characters like 薇 are pronounced differently in these locations.
I’m an imperfect human and probably didn’t catch everything. So keep that in mind.
Given Names (Overall)
First we will examine the overall results for all syllables across all given names to get a nice overview. Then we will dive into single-character given names vs. two-character given names.
Top Given Name Syllables (w/ Tones)
Pictured: Some of the most frequent characters for the top 11 syllables.
List format:
Syllable / count
Corresponding characters that occurred more than once
Yǔ / 263
宇 雨 羽 语 予 禹 瑀
Xīn / 229
欣 鑫 馨 心 昕 新 歆 芯 薪
Jiā / 216
佳 嘉 家 加 珈
Yì / 201
一 艺 奕 逸 亦 毅 懿 翊 义 易 翼 忆 意 译 轶 熠 羿 亿 薏
Zǐ / 139
子 梓 紫
Qí / 134
琪 琦 奇 祺 麒 淇 齐 棋 其 岐 崎
Wén / 116
文 雯 闻 纹
Jié / 112
杰 洁 婕 捷 颉 倢
Yù / 102
玉 钰 煜 昱 郁 裕 喻 谕 毓 育 誉
Jùn / 99
俊 峻 珺 骏 浚 竣
Yáng / 99
洋 阳 扬 杨 炀 旸
Top Given Name Syllables (w/o Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
Corresponding characters that occurred more than once
Yu / 419
宇 雨 玉 羽 钰 语 瑜 予 妤 煜 禹 昱 郁 俞 渝 裕 于 喻 瑀 谕 余 娱 愚 毓 育 誉
Yi / 356
一 怡 艺 奕 仪 依 逸 亦 伊 毅 宜 懿 翊 义 祎 易 翼 苡 忆 意 译 轶 颐 乙 以 熠 羿 亿 倚 薏
Xin / 232
欣 鑫 馨 心 昕 新 歆 芯 薪 信
Jia / 217
佳 嘉 家 加 珈
Jun / 165
俊 君 峻 钧 军 珺 均 骏 浚 竣
Zi / 157
子 梓 紫 姿 兹
Qi / 151
琪 琦 奇 祺 绮 麒 启 淇 齐 棋 其 岐 崎
Hao / 141
豪 浩 昊 皓 灏 淏 濠
Wei / 139
伟 玮 威 维 薇 蔚 微 炜 唯 纬 葳 为 崴 巍 𬀩 苇 韦
Xiao / 136
晓 小 笑 筱 孝 潇 篠 箫 肖
Given Name Syllable Tones
List format:
Tone / count
2nd / 2729
1st / 1993
4th / 1885
3rd / 1167
Single-Character Given Names (单名)
There were 948 single-character names in total. That comes out to about 22% of all 4361 names.
Top Single-Character Given Names (w/ Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
All corresponding characters
Xīn / 41
鑫 欣 昕 馨 新 心 锌
Yáng / 29
洋 扬 杨 阳 旸 炀
Yǔ / 20
宇 雨 禹 羽 瑀 语
Lì / 18
丽 立 莉 俐 栎 栗
Yì / 18
艺 奕 逸 忆 易 毅 燚 羿
Yuè / 18
悦 玥 越 月 粤 跃
Jié / 17
洁 杰 倢 婕 捷 颉
Hào / 16
浩 昊 淏 灏
Jìng / 14
静 婧 靓* 竞 靖
Qiàn / 14
倩 茜**
*Can be pronounced jìng or liàng. I went with jìng.
**Can be pronounced qiàn or xī. I went with qiàn.
Top Single-Character Given Names (w/o Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
All corresponding characters
Xin / 41
鑫 欣 昕 馨 新 心 锌
Yu / 31
宇 雨 钰 煜 玉 瑜 禹 羽 昱 渝 瑀 语
Yang / 29
洋 扬 杨 阳 旸 炀
Yi / 23
艺 奕 怡 逸 一 忆 易 毅 燚 祎 羿
Wei / 22
伟 威 炜 维 蔚 薇 𬀩 玮
Hao / 19
浩 昊 豪 淏 灏
Jing / 19
静 晶 婧 靓* 璟 竞 菁 靖
Li / 19
丽 立 莉 俐 李 栎 栗
Ying / 19
颖 莹 影 滢 赢 瀛 盈
Yue / 18
悦 玥 越 月 粤 跃
*Can be pronounced jìng or liàng. I went with jìng.
Single-Character Name Tones
List format:
Tone / count
2nd / 308
4th / 264
1st / 253
3rd / 123
Full Name Tone Patterns for Single-Character Given Names
Look at the darker “stripes” for the 2nd tone. The 3rd tone’s low popularity also stood out to me.
List format:
Tone of surname, tone of given name / count
2nd, 2nd / 140
2nd, 1st / 127
2nd, 4th / 123
1st, 2nd / 80
1st, 4th / 73
1st, 1st / 68
2nd, 3rd / 52
4th, 2nd / 45
3rd, 2nd / 43
1st, 3rd / 39
3rd, 4th / 37
4th, 4th / 31
3rd, 1st / 29
4th, 1st / 29
4th, 3rd / 17
3rd, 3rd / 15
Two-Character Given Names (双名)
Now for two-character given names. There were 3413 total (about 78%). First I will look at these given names as a whole. Then I will separately examine the 1st syllable and 2nd syllable positions.
I was very interested to see the most common name going by sound and not characters. Living in the US, I often see transliterated Chinese names with no characters in sight. This effectively “merges” names that are distinct in Chinese. All I can do is guess what the characters (and thus tones) are.
Top Two-Character Given Names (w/ Tones)
Pictured: Character combinations that occurred more than once for the top 12 two-character given names.
List format:
Given name / count
All corresponding character combinations
Jiāxīn / 17
嘉欣 佳欣 佳薪 佳鑫 嘉新 嘉歆 嘉馨
Jiāyí / 12
佳怡 嘉怡 佳仪 嘉仪 家仪 家怡
Xīnyǔ / 10
心雨 新宇 心语 欣宇 欣雨 鑫宇 馨予
Xīnyuè / 10
馨月 心玥 昕玥 欣悦 歆玥 馨悦 馨玥
Hàorán / 9
浩然 皓然
Jùnjié / 9
俊杰 俊洁
Chénxī / 8
晨曦 晨熙 晨晞 晨晰 晨溪
Jiāqí / 8
佳琦 家齐 佳琪 嘉琪 嘉祺 嘉齐
Shānshān / 8
珊珊 杉杉 姗姗
Xīnyí / 8
心怡 欣怡 心仪 鑫怡
Yìwén / 8
一文 奕雯 艺文 译文 逸文
Yǔqíng / 8
雨晴 语晴 宇晴 雨情
Top Two-Character Given Names (w/o Tones)
List format:
Given name / count
All corresponding character combinations
Jiaxin / 17
嘉欣 佳欣 佳薪 佳鑫 嘉新 嘉歆 嘉馨
Jiayi / 16
佳怡 嘉怡 佳仪 佳依 加一 嘉仪 嘉艺 嘉谊 家仪 家怡 家毅
Xinyu / 15
心雨 欣妤 新宇 心妤 心玉 心语 欣宇 欣雨 鑫宇 馨予
Junjie / 12
俊杰 军杰 俊洁 钧杰
Xiaoyu / 12
小雨 晓玉 晓钰 小钰 晓宇 晓瑜 晓雨 笑语
Yifan / 12
一凡 艺凡 一帆 一幡 一璠 依凡 屹繁 怡凡 薏帆
Xinyi / 10
心怡 欣怡 心仪 欣佚 鑫一 鑫怡
Xinyue / 10
馨月 心玥 昕玥 欣悦 歆玥 馨悦 馨玥
Yuqing / 10
雨晴 语晴 宇庆 宇晴 钰清 雨情
Two-Character Given Name Tones
The grey square is due to the 3rd tone tone change rule.
List format:
Tone of given name 1st syllable, tone of given name 2nd syllable / count
4th, 2nd / 560
1st, 2nd / 421
3rd, 2nd / 373
2nd, 2nd / 304
4th, 1st / 282
3rd, 1st / 191
1st, 1st / 183
2nd, 1st / 177
1st, 4th / 169
2nd, 4th / 152
1st, 3rd / 134
2nd, 3rd / 130
4th, 4th / 121
3rd, 4th / 120
4th, 3rd / 96
Full Name Tone Patterns for Two-Character Given Names
Pictured: The top 10 full name tone patterns for two-character given names.
I found these results very interesting. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve read about how using certain sequences of tones creates a pleasant-sounding flow. I had some fun saying aloud names that fit these patterns and judging the dynamic ups-and-downs of how they flow.
List format:
Tone of surname, tone of given name 1st syllable, tone of given name 2nd syllable / count
2nd, 4th, 2nd / 273
2nd, 1st, 2nd / 179
2nd, 3rd, 2nd / 179
2nd, 4th, 1st / 138
1st, 4th, 2nd / 135
2nd, 2nd, 2nd / 129
1st, 3rd, 2nd / 98
2nd, 3rd, 1st / 95
2nd, 1st, 4th / 92
1st, 1st, 2nd / 89
These are only the top 10 patterns. See the bottom of the post for the full list.
Two-Character Given Names: First Syllable
Top First Syllables for Two-Character Given Names (w/ Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
Corresponding characters that occurred more than once
Jiā / 171
佳 嘉 家 加 珈
Yì / 138
一 艺 奕 逸 亦 翊 易 义 懿 翼 译 亿 忆 毅 羿 薏 轶
Zǐ / 123
子 梓 紫
Yǔ / 115
雨 宇 语 羽 禹 予
Xīn / 95
欣 心 馨 鑫 新 昕 歆 薪 芯
Xiǎo / 79
晓 小 筱
Jùn / 69
俊 峻 珺 竣 骏
Sī / 63
思 斯
Yù / 53
玉 钰 煜 昱 郁 裕 喻 毓 育 誉
Mèng / 49
梦 孟
Top First Syllables for Two-Character Given Names (w/o Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
Corresponding characters that occurred more than once
Yi / 201
一 艺 奕 怡 依 逸 亦 翊 伊 宜 易 苡 义 乙 以 懿 翼 译 亿 忆 毅 祎 羿 薏 轶
Yu / 188
雨 宇 语 玉 钰 羽 禹 煜 俞 昱 郁 于 渝 裕 予 喻 毓 瑜 育 誉
Jia / 171
佳 嘉 家 加 珈
Zi / 133
子 梓 紫 姿
Xiao / 118
晓 小 笑 孝 潇 筱
Xin / 98
欣 心 馨 鑫 新 昕 歆 信 薪 芯
Jun / 84
俊 峻 君 钧 军 珺 竣 骏
Jing / 67
静 婧 景 敬 靖 晶 京 竞
Zhi / 61
智 志 芷 之 治 知 祉
Si / 60
思 斯
First Syllable Tones for Two-Character Given Names
List format:
Tone / count
4th / 1059
1st / 907
2nd / 763
3rd / 684
Two-Character Given Names: Second Syllable
Top Second Syllables for Two-Character Given Names (w/ Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
Corresponding characters that occurred more than once
Yǔ / 128
宇 雨 羽 予 语 瑀 禹
Qí / 100
琪 琦 祺 奇 淇 齐 棋 麒 岐
Xīn / 93
欣 鑫 馨 昕 心 新 歆 芯
Jié / 83
杰 洁 婕 捷
Wén / 68
文 雯
Yí / 63
怡 仪 宜 颐
Lín / 61
霖 琳 林 麟 淋
Tíng / 61
婷 廷 庭
Yuán / 59
源 元 媛 圆 园 缘 原
Yáng / 58
阳 洋 扬 杨 炀
Top Second Syllables for Two-Character Given Names (w/o Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
Corresponding characters that occurred more than once
Yu / 200
宇 雨 玉 羽 瑜 妤 予 钰 语 昱 煜 谕 郁 余 瑀 禹
Yi / 132
怡 仪 一 毅 依 艺 逸 亦 伊 宜 懿 颐 义 奕 意 祎 熠 翼 轶
Qi / 105
琪 琦 祺 奇 淇 绮 齐 棋 麒 岐
Xin / 93
欣 鑫 馨 昕 心 新 歆 芯
Jie / 83
杰 洁 婕 捷
Wei / 75
伟 玮 薇 维 威 微 炜 蔚 葳 崴 纬
Hao / 74
豪 昊 浩 皓 濠
Jun / 72
君 俊 钧 峻 军 均 珺 骏
Wen / 68
文 雯
Yuan / 68
源 元 媛 圆 远 园 渊 缘 原
Second Syllable Tones for Two-Character Given Names
List format:
Tone / count
2nd / 1658
1st / 833
4th / 562
3rd / 360
Surnames
Because the majority of the population shares a relatively small number of surnames, I decided to only look at tones.
Surname Tones
List format:
Tone / count
2nd / 2047
1st / 1072
3rd / 640
4th / 602
Just take a look at the top 20 surnames in China. Clearly, the 2nd tone is dominating. There’s only one 4th tone surname!
Data Processing
I segmented the names so each character was alone. I just did this in Google Sheets, because that’s where I store the names I’ve gathered. Then I exported the data in CSV format.
I discarded names longer than 3 characters—because these are less common, I decided not to address them to make things easier for myself.
I used the pinyin library for Python to obtain pinyin for each character. I used the numerical format (ie. “ni3”) so that I could easily obtain the syllable w/o tone, the syllable w/ tone, and the tone. I also utilized pandas and numpy. This was done in Google Colabs. I made the unfortunate mistake of not commenting my code, and I wrote it a while ago, so I now I have no idea what is going on (whoops).
Next I dumped this data into a tibble in R for the real analysis.
For as many 多音字 as I could identify, I had to check and potentially fix the pinyin transcription. For example, I had to make sure that 曾 was going to zeng1, not ceng2. Honestly, I’m sure I missed something, but this was so, so tedious. This is also the step where I accounted for the 3rd tone tone change and yi 一 tone change rules.
I used a Python script to convert the toneless pinyin to my own syllable notation system. This was tricky to figure out, but fortunately I was able to use some code I already had from a project I was involved in during college.
I added the syllable info to my giant tibble in R. Because everything was separated into surname, given name 1st character, and given name 2nd character, I also had to create some new columns to combine information to get information for whole given names and full names.
Then it was basically a lot of pipes. Here’s an example:
names %>%
filter(nchar(names$name) > 2) %>%
group_by(given_struc) %>%
summarise(count = n()) %>%
arrange(desc(count)) %>%
view()
Bonus Lists
There were some other things I was curious about but felt didn’t have a place in the main body of this post.
I wanted to see which syllables were represented by the most unique characters in my dataset. If the number of unique characters is high, that’s a sign that I would probably have trouble guessing which character someone’s name contains.
I was also curious about open vs. closed syllables and closed syllables ending in /n/ vs. /ŋ/. For instance, take a pair of names like Yixin and Xinyi or Xinling and Lingxin. These names consist of the same syllables in a different order. I wanted to know which order is more common.
Syllables with the Most Unique Characters (w/ Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
All corresponding characters
Yì / 27
一 艺 奕 逸 亦 毅 懿 翊 义 易 翼 忆 意 译 轶 熠 羿 亿 薏 佚 佾 埸 屹 异 弋 怿 燚 翌
Qí / 15
琪 琦 奇 祺 麒 淇 齐 棋 其 岐 崎 圻 祁 祈 骐
Yú / 14
瑜 妤 俞 渝 于 余 娱 愚 宇*** 愉 榆 舆 雨*** 鱼
Yù / 14
玉 钰 煜 昱 郁 裕 喻 谕 毓 育 誉 寓 浴 芋
Xīn / 12
欣 鑫 馨 心 昕 新 歆 芯 薪 妡 忻 锌
Yuán / 12
源 媛 元 园 圆 缘 原 嫄 沅 湲 芫 袁
Líng / 11
玲 灵 凌 翎 绫 伶 羚 铃 龄 苓 陵
Xī / 11
希 熙 曦 溪 晞 惜 熹 兮 浠 晰 西
Hóng / 9
宏 红 弘 鸿 泓 虹 洪 闳 汯
Lì / 9
丽 莉 立 力 俐 利 俪 栎 栗
Zhēn / 9
珍 真 臻 蓁 祯 桢 榛 甄 贞
***3rd tone character that is pronounced as 2nd tone due to appearing before another 3rd tone character.
Syllables with the Most Unique Characters (w/o Tones)
List format:
Syllable / count
All corresponding characters
Yi / 45
一 怡 艺 奕 仪 依 逸 亦 伊 毅 宜 懿 翊 义 祎 易 翼 苡 忆 意 译 轶 颐 乙 以 熠 羿 亿 倚 薏 佚 佾 埸 壹 夷 屹 异 弋 怿 沂 洢 燚 翌 谊 铱
Yu / 33
宇 雨 玉 羽 钰 语 瑜 予 妤 煜 禹 昱 郁 俞 渝 裕 于 喻 瑀 谕 余 娱 愚 毓 育 誉 寓 愉 榆 浴 舆 芋 鱼
Qi / 20
琪 琦 奇 祺 绮 麒 启 淇 齐 棋 其 岐 崎 圻 期 柒 栖 祁 祈 骐
Wei / 20
伟 玮 威 维 薇 蔚 微 炜 唯 纬 葳 为 崴 巍 𬀩 苇 韦 卫 惟 未
Yan / 19
妍 言 燕 彦 艳 岩 延 谚 嫣 琰 雁 晏 研 颜 砚 衍 严 炎 焱
Yuan / 16
源 媛 元 远 园 圆 渊 缘 原 嫄 愿 沅 湲 芫 苑 袁
Xi / 16
希 熙 曦 汐 溪 晞 玺 喜 惜 熹 兮 浠 习 晰 禧 西
Xiao / 15
小 笑 筱 孝 潇 篠 箫 肖 宵 效 枭 校 萧 霄
Yun / 15
云 芸 韵 昀 赟 允 匀 沄 筠 韫 妘 澐 蕰 蕴 运
Zhen / 15
振 珍 真 臻 蓁 祯 震 镇 朕 桢 榛 甄 贞 轸 圳
Two-Character Given Name Syllable Structures
This is the top 10 out of 14 (the bottom 4 were very rare).
List format:
Structure of given name 1st syllable, structure of given name 2nd syllable — example / count
Open, open — ex: Jiayi / 821
Open, closed-n — ex: Yijin / 701
Open, closed-ng — ex: Yijing / 468
Closed-n, open — ex: Jinyi / 450
Closed-ng, open — ex: Jingyi / 308
Closed-n, closed-n — ex: Jinyan / 206
Closed-ng, closed-n — ex: Jingyan / 157
Closed-n, closed-ng — ex: Jinyang / 141
Closed-ng, closed-ng — ex: Jingyang / 139
Open, closed-er — ex: Xue'er / 14
Full Name Syllable Structures for Two-Character Given Names
This is the top 29 out of 36 (the bottom 7 were very rare).
List format:
Structure of surname syllable, structure of given name 1st syllable, structure of given name 2nd syllable — example / count
Open, open, open— ex: Li Jiayi / 370
Open, open, closed-n— ex: Li Yijin / 336
Closed-ng, open, open— ex: Wang Jiayi / 273
Open, open, closed-ng— ex: Li Yijing / 228
Open, closed-n, open— ex: Li Jinyi / 225
Closed-ng, open, closed-n— ex: Wang Yijin / 223
Closed-n, open, open— ex: Chen Jiayi / 178
Closed-ng, closed-n, open— ex: Wang Jinyi / 165
Open, closed-ng, open— ex: Li Jingyi / 151
Closed-ng, open, closed-ng— ex: Wang Yijing / 146
Closed-n, open, closed-n— ex: Chen Yijin / 142
Open, closed-n, closed-n— ex: Li Jinyan / 104
Closed-ng, closed-ng, open— ex: Wang Jingyi / 97
Closed-n, open, closed-ng— ex: Chen Yijing / 94
Open, closed-ng, closed-n— ex: Li Jingyan / 86
Open, closed-ng, closed-ng— ex: Li Jingyang / 75
Open, closed-n, closed-ng— ex: Li Jinyang / 66
Closed-ng, closed-n, closed-n— ex: Wang Jinyan / 62
Closed-n, closed-n, open— ex: Chen Jinyi / 60
Closed-n, closed-ng, open— ex: Chen Jingyi / 60
Closed-ng, closed-n, closed-ng— ex: Wang Jinyang / 45
Closed-ng, closed-ng, closed-ng— ex: Wang Jingyang / 45
Closed-ng, closed-ng, closed-n— ex: Wang Jingyan / 43
Closed-n, closed-n, closed-n— ex: Chen Jinyan / 40
Closed-n, closed-n, closed-ng— ex: Chen Jinyang / 30
Closed-n, closed-ng, closed-n— ex: Chen Jingyan / 28
Closed-n, closed-ng, closed-ng— ex: Chen Jingyang / 19
Open, open, closed-er— ex: Li Xue'er / 8
Closed-ng, open, closed-er— ex: Wang Xue'er / 4
Extended List(s)
Full Name Tone Patterns for Two-Character Given Names
2nd, 4th, 2nd / 273
2nd, 1st, 2nd / 179
2nd, 3rd, 2nd / 179
2nd, 4th, 1st / 138
1st, 4th, 2nd / 135
2nd, 2nd, 2nd / 129
1st, 3rd, 2nd / 98
2nd, 3rd, 1st / 95
2nd, 1st, 4th / 92
1st, 1st, 2nd / 89
2nd, 1st, 1st / 88
2nd, 2nd, 1st / 84
3rd, 1st, 2nd / 83
3rd, 4th, 2nd / 81
1st, 2nd, 2nd / 73
4th, 4th, 2nd / 71
4th, 1st, 2nd / 70
1st, 4th, 1st / 69
2nd, 3rd, 4th / 68
2nd, 2nd, 3rd / 64
2nd, 1st, 3rd / 59
3rd, 2nd, 2nd / 59
2nd, 2nd, 4th / 56
4th, 3rd, 2nd / 56
2nd, 4th, 4th / 54
2nd, 4th, 3rd / 47
1st, 2nd, 4th / 43
4th, 2nd, 2nd / 43
1st, 1st, 3rd / 42
4th, 4th, 1st / 42
1st, 3rd, 1st / 41
3rd, 3rd, 2nd / 40
1st, 1st, 1st / 35
1st, 2nd, 1st / 35
1st, 2nd, 3rd / 35
1st, 1st, 4th / 34
4th, 1st, 1st / 34
3rd, 4th, 1st / 33
1st, 4th, 4th / 31
3rd, 2nd, 1st / 30
1st, 3rd, 4th / 29
4th, 2nd, 1st / 28
4th, 3rd, 1st / 28
3rd, 2nd, 4th / 27
3rd, 3rd, 1st / 27
3rd, 1st, 1st / 26
4th, 2nd, 4th / 26
1st, 4th, 3rd / 23
3rd, 1st, 4th / 23
3rd, 2nd, 3rd / 21
3rd, 4th, 4th / 20
4th, 1st, 4th / 20
4th, 1st, 3rd / 19
3rd, 4th, 3rd / 18
4th, 4th, 4th / 16
3rd, 1st, 3rd / 14
3rd, 3rd, 4th / 14
4th, 2nd, 3rd / 10
4th, 3rd, 4th / 9
4th, 4th, 3rd / 8
If you made it to the end, I am seriously impressed by your dedication. Thanks for checking out my nerdy ramblings about Chinese names! Don’t forget to check out my past posts on this topic for more. I hope they will help demystify Chinese names and make learning about Chinese names less intimidating.
A Closer Look at Chinese Names
Reading Chinese Names: Female Names
Reading Chinese Names: Male Names
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