ABSTRACT
The so-called entering tones (known as rusheng in Mandarin or yahp-sīng in Cantonese) are those which occur in ‘checked’ syllables ending in an unreleased stop (‘-p’, ‘-t’ or ‘- k’). When Cantonese is described as having nine tones, these three are included in addition to the familiar six. In this book, as in Basic Cantonese, the entering tones are simply treated as instances of the high, mid and low level tones:
Note that only the three level tones generally occur in these ‘checked’ syllables. However, a rising tone can occur as a result of tone change (see Unit 3):
Tone contours
The diacritics used in the Yale romanization system indicate the tones clearly as level, falling or rising, with the silent ‘h’ indicating the three low register tones. While this makes the tones relatively easy to remember, learners should be aware that these tone markings tend to simplify the actual contours involved, as do the conventional names of the tones. Hence we revisit them here in greater detail.
