* Mong Leng Used Only

The Hmong language has three parts. The first part is the consonants.The second part is the vowels and the last part is the pitch or tone markers, in linguistics world it is called tonemes. Therefore, the preferred learning method is to first learn the consonants, the vowels,and then the tonemes or the tones. Furthermore, the Hmong language does not have chroneme -- words having the same sound but varies in duration to mean different in meanings.

There are eight tones, forteen vowels, and fifty-seven consonants. Therefore, once you have learned and remembered the three parts mentioned above, you can easily sound out the word without difficulty. The Hmong language is unlike English that spell the same but read differently, like the present tense of "read" and past tense of "read - RED." I have provided sounds for all of these parts to help you learn, however, you must know how to put them together, similar to the English "D + ad = dad, p + ick = pick, f + ear = fear, Th + ai = Thai, F + ish = fish."

Below are some examples:D + ev = dev (dog), d + aj = daj (yellow), d + eb + deb (far), f + awm = fawm (noodles), f + aib = faib (divide), s + au = sau (write), k + ab = kab (insects).

Below I have provided the sounds for the eight tones. The "J" is the equivalent of the Hmong word "Koj." The "S" is the equivalent of the word "Mus" like the English word "Zoo, two etc..." Click on the word to hear its tone or pitch. One last thing I want to mention is that the Hmong language is very consistent. By that I meant the tone marker "B" will always have the highest pitch no matter what and where you see it. For example, if you have the word "niam", mother, and you put a tone marker "b" instead of the "m", it will be not mean mother any more because it change the pitch from "niam" to "niab."

Is it really that consistent? Well, just like any other language, there are always exceptions to the rule, and what are those exceptions? Little grasshopper, when you have mastered hopping through what I have asked you to do above, I will be glad to share those secrets with you. Until then, just keep on clicking and learning until you can fly like a bird :)

Click on the two words below to hear the difference:
iam and iab