Rules of Tone Mark Placement

Link to related YouTube video:  Discussion 01 - Rules of tone mark placement Symmetry approach (with practice)

Simple Rules for Vietnamese Tone Mark Placement

Where do we place the tone mark in a Vietnamese word?  The symmetrical approach is quite simple:

• Absolute rule:  Tone mark is placed on the vowel of the rhyme
• When there are multiple vowels, the order of precedence is as follows:
  1. The special vowel with “hat” or “whisker” (ă, â, ê, ô, ơ, ư)
  2. The letter e (an old rule not often observed)
  3. The first vowel closest to the center of the rhyme (not center of the word)

Naturally there is no confusion when there is only one vowel in a word (tám, ấm, nghé, chó, trốn, ở, làng, etc…). Note that certain diacritic marks ("hats" and "whisker") are parts of the vowels and not tone marks.

When there are multiple vowels, the first rule is easy, we simply place the tone mark where there is already a special diacritic mark.  Example words include cuối, Huế, thuở, luận, xoắn.

The second rule is likely an influence of French, where the aigu accent appears only on e (such as é). The precedence on the letter e is found in only one Vietnamese rhyme, oe, in which e is not at the center of the rhyme. For example, khoẻ, loè. It seems that this rule is often not observed in contemporary writings.

The true confusion, however, starts when there are multiple vowels but either there is no vowel of precedence (ua, ay, oai, …) or there are multiple of them (ươi, ương, ...).   In such cases, Rule 3 must be applied (ie. first vowel closest to the center of the rhyme).  Even though Rule 3 is straightforward and consistent, there are two main causes for confusion:

• We misunderstand “center of the rhyme” for “center of the word”.

• We fail to identify where the rhyme is.

To avoid the unnecessary confusion, let’s discuss these two root causes.

Center of the Rhyme vs. Center of the Word:

A word consists of an optional onset, a rhyme, and a tone, in which the onset and the rhyme determine the length of a word.

Consider these words with the same rhyme but different onset (rhyme is underlined):

• ươn, vươn, trươn:  The first vowel closest to the center of the rhyme is consistently ơ, whereas the center of the word shifts from ơ to ư when adding the onset.

  • Adding tones:  ưỡn, vườn, trườn.  The tone mark should be consistently on the letter ơ, which is at the center of the rhyme ươn regardless of the word length.  If we misunderstand the rule and place the tone mark on the vowel closest to the “center of the word” instead, the tone mark will be placed wrongly on the letter ư when adding onset consonants to the same rhyme.

• oan, toan, ngoan:  Similarly, the first vowel closest to the center of the rhyme is consistently a.

  • Adding tones:  oán, toán, ngoãn.  The tone is consistently placed on the letter a as it is the center of the rhyme, regardless of the word length.

In brief, do not misunderstand “center of the rhyme” for "center of the word".  Once we remember that, the next challenge is to correctly identify the rhyme.

Identify the Rhymes:

By definition, the rhyme consists of all the letters that follows the consonant onset, basically all the letters to the right starting with a vowel.  Just disregard the starting consonant(s), you’ll get the rhyme.

At the first glance it is simple enough, tam has rhyme am, Nguyễn has rhyme uyên, nghe has rhyme e, nghiêng has rhyme iêng, etc…  However, confusions are inevitable in the two cases of onsets qu and gi, where the onset “consonant” has a vowel in it.

Case 1:  Onset “qu”

Similar to English, q does not stand alone as an onset, it is always used with u as the compound consonant qu.  Thus, let’s consider the letter u a part of the compound consonant qu.  Because we never place tone marks on consonants, tone marks must never be placed on the u following q.  The rhyme, therefore, starts with the vowel following the letter u.

For example:

1. Misidentify the rhyme as “ua”.

2. Misidentify the rhyme as “uy”

3. Misidentify the rhyme as “uan”.  Misunderstand “center of the rhyme” for “center of the word”

There are “qu” words that prompt strong debates regarding what the rhymes are, such as quỳnh, quân,quyên, quyết, quyệt, quốc.  In these instances, many scholars believe that the rhymes start at the u, not after it.  However, in the context of placing tone marks, the outcome of these debates do not change where the tone mark is.  In quân,quyên, quyết, quyệt, quốc, there is a special vowel with diacritic mark (â, ê, ô) which precisely dictates the tone mark position without having to figure out where the rhymes are.  In the special case of quỳnh, we can’t go wrong because the first vowel closest to the center of the rhyme is y regardless of whether the rhyme is uynh or ynh.  Therefore, there is no need to make quỳnh or quýnh a hard-to-remember “exception” of the rule.

While understanding and respecting the scholastic perspective of splitting the “q” and “u” to consider “q” as an independent onset in some cases, we discourage students to view “qu” this way, unless you are doing researches in phonetics and linguistics.  There is not one instance where q is not followed by u in Vietnamese.  Let’s always consider “q” and “u” together as the compound consonant “qu”.  When we do that, all rules will remain consistent.

In brief, in the case of onset qu, all we have to remember is that u is a part of the consonant qu and can not bare the tone mark.   

Case 2:  Onset “gi”

The onset gi is much trickier than qu, because there are a few exceptions.  Before getting into the exceptions, however,  let emphasize that i is a part of the compound consonant gi, similar to qu.  

Unlike q which is always followed by u, g is also a stand-alone onset and does go with other vowels to form Vietnamese words, and that is why it is harder to remember “gi” as one compound consonant. In Vietnamese, however, when the simple onset “g” goes with i, a silent h is added (ex. ghi, ghiền).  Thus, whenever we see g and i together, it’s the compound consonant gi, always.  

Let’s memorize it:  gi is a Vietnamese compound consonant.

Because i is a part of the consonant onset gi, it can not bare the tone mark.  For examples, in giỏ, giá, già, the tone mark is placed on the vowel after the i.

While similar to qu, there are a few cases of gi that will throw us off, most notably is the word gì.  If we consider gi to be the onset consonant, which we should, it looks as if the whole rhyme is missing in the word gì, and the tone is placed on the onset.  

In Vietnamese, whenever gi is combined with a rhyme starting with i, instead of writing gii, one i is omitted by convention.  Such words include gì, gìn (as in giữ gìn), gịa (as in giặt gịa, or giặt gỵa in old books), giễu, giết, giếng, and Giêng (as in tháng Giêng).  Fortunately, these are the only  few words in Vietnamese where the onset gi is combined with a rhyme starting with i.

Let’s analyze the words:

While it can be hard to decipher where the rhyme is in giết, giễu, or giêng, placing the tone mark is easy, since the letter ê (a vowel with diacritic mark) will automatically bare the tone mark.  That leaves the three words gì, gìn, and gịa.  Of these three words, gì and gìn have only one vowel, which will automatically carries the tone.  Thus, gịa becomes the only case that we need to memorize.  It should be also noted that the word gịa (as in giặt gịa or giặt gỵa) is very rare.  By itself it doesn’t have a meaning, it is used together with giặt only by Northerners, most often in verbal conversations.

The word gịa (as in giặt gịa or giặt gỵa) is tricky also because there exists the word giạ in Vietnamse (with tone mark on the a). Thus, where to place the tone mark depends on what rhyme we intend to write:  

• Giạ: the rhyme is a, the word is gi + a, tone mark should be on the a, as it is the one vowel in the rhyme.  

• Gịa: the rhyme is ia, the word will be gi + ia, one i will be omitted by convention, and i should bear the tone mark since it is the first vowel closest to the center of rhyme “ia”.

In brief, if we learn by heart that qu and gi are compound consonants in Vietnamese, and that by convention one i is omitted in the cases of “gii…”, we can correctly identify where the rhyme is  in order to place the tone mark correctly.

Conclusion:

If we identify the rhymes correctly, and don’t misunderstand center of the rhyme for center of the word, the rules of tone mark placement are consistent throughout with no known exception.   Confusions associated with tone mark placement are actually problems related to rhyme identification.

Như-Nguyện

01.2016

Edited 11.2017

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