There are also non-Chinese based languages spoken in other parts of China. Uighur, a Turkish based language, is spoken in Xinjiang province. Tibetan, a language based on the ancient Indian Brahmi script, is the main language in Tibet. In Inner Mongolia the language is based on ancient Turkish.
Chinese has a large number of words that are pronounced the same but have different meanings. Tones are used to differentiate between the words; for example, ma can mean mother, hemp, horse or scold, depending on the tone used. In Mandarin there are four tones - flat, rising, falling-rising and falling. The Chinese language has no tenses or plurals so the pronunciation of words does not change. There are no definite (the) or indefinite (a) articles in the Chinese language either.