Meixian dialect

Meixian dialect (Chinese: 梅縣話; Pha̍k-fa-sṳ: Mòi-yen-fa; IPA: moi jan fa), also known as Moiyen dialect, as well as Meizhou (梅州話), or Jiaying dialect, is the prestige dialect of Hakka Chinese and the basis for the Hakka dialects in Taiwan. It is named after Meixian District, Guangdong.

Meixian
梅縣話
Native toSouthern China, Taiwan
RegionMeixian
Language codes
ISO 639-3
Glottologyuet1238[1]
Linguasphere79-AAA-gam

Phonology

Initials

There are two series of stops and affricates in Hakka, both voiceless: tenuis /p t ts k/ and aspirated /pʰ tʰ tsʰ kʰ/.

Labial Dental Palatal Velar Glottal
Nasal /m/ m /n/ n [ɲ] ng(i)* /ŋ/ ng
Plosive tenuis /p/ b /t/ d [c] g(i)* /k/ g (ʔ)
aspirated /pʰ/ p /tʰ/ t [cʰ] k(i)* /kʰ/ k
Affricate tenuis /ts/ z
aspirated /tsʰ/ c
Fricative /f/ f /s/ s [ç] h(i)* /h/ h
Approximant /ʋ/ v /l/ l /j/ y    

* When the initials /k/ g, /kʰ/ k, /h/ h, and /ŋ/ ng are followed by a palatal medial /j/ i, they become [c] g(i), [cʰ] k(i), [ç] h(i), and [ɲ] ng(i), respectively.[2]

Rimes

Moiyen Hakka has six vowels, i, e, a, ə, ɔ, and u, that are romanised as i, ê, a, e, o and u, respectively.

Front Central Back
Close i u
Mid e ə ɔ
Open a

Finals

Moreover, Hakka finals exhibit the final consonants found in Middle Chinese, namely [m, n, ŋ, p, t, k] which are romanised as m, n, ng, b, d, and g respectively in the official Moiyen romanisation.

Finals of Meixian dialect[3]
nucleus medial coda
-∅ -i -u -m -n -p -t -k
-a- ∅- a ai au am an ap at ak
j- ja jai jau jam jan jaŋ jap jat jak
w- wa wai     wan waŋ   wat wak
-e- ∅-   e̞u e̞m e̞n   e̞p e̞t  
j- je̞       je̞n     je̞t  
w-         we̞n     we̞t  
-i- ∅- i   iu im in   ip it  
-o- ∅- o oi     on   ot ok
j- jo       jon joŋ     jok
w- wo       won woŋ     wok
-u- ∅- u ui     un   ut uk
j-   jui     jun juŋ   jut juk
-ə- ∅- ɹ̩     əm ən   əp ət  
Syllabics   ŋ̩

Tone

Moiyen has four tones, which are reduced to two in a checked syllable. The Middle Chinese fully voiced initial syllables became aspirated voiceless initial syllable in Hakka. Before that happened, the four Middle Chinese 'tones', ping, shang, qu, ru, underwent a voicing split in the case of ping and ru, giving the dialect six tones in traditional accounts.

Moiyen tones
Tone numberTone name Hanzi Tone letters numberEnglish
1 yin ping 陰平 ˦ 44high
2 yang ping 陽平 ˩ 11low
3 shang ˧˩ 31low falling
4 qu ˥˧ 53high falling
5 yin ru 陰入 ˩ 1low checked
6 yang ru 陽入 ˥ 5high checked

These so-called yin-yang tonal splittings developed mainly as a consequence of the type of initial a Chinese syllable had during the Middle Chinese stage in the development of Chinese, with voiceless initial syllables [p- t- k-] tending to become of the yin type, and the voiced initial syllables [b- d- ɡ-] developing into the yang type. In modern Moiyen Hakka however, part of the Yin Ping tone characters have sonorant initials [m n ŋ l] originally from the Middle Chinese Shang tone syllables and fully voiced Middle Chinese Qu tone characters, so the voiced/voiceless distinction should be taken only as a rule of thumb.

Hakka tone contours differs more as one moves away from Moiyen. For example, the Yin Ping contour is ˧ (33) in Changting (長汀) and ˨˦ (24) in Sixian (四縣), Taiwan.

Entering tone

Hakka preserves all of the entering tones of Middle Chinese and it is split into two registers. Meixian has the following:

  • 陰入 [ ˩ ] a low pitched checked tone
  • 陽入 [ ˥ ] a high pitched checked tone

Middle Chinese entering tone syllables ending in [k] whose vowel clusters have become front high vowels like [i] and [e] shifts to syllables with [t] finals in modern Hakka[4] as seen in the following table.

Character Guangyun Fanqie Middle Chinese
reconstruction[5]
Hakka Main meaning in English
之翼切 tɕĭək tsit˩ vocation, profession
林直切 lĭək lit˥ strength, power
乗力切 dʑʰĭək sit˥ eat, consume
所力切 ʃĭək set˩ colour, hue
多則切 tək tet˩ virtue
苦得切 kʰək kʰet˩ carve, engrave, a moment
博墨切 pək pet˩ north
古或切 kuək kuet˩ country, state

Tone sandhi

For Moiyen Hakka, the yin ping and qu tone characters exhibit sandhi when the following character has a lower pitch. The pitch of the yin ping tone changes from ˦ (44) to ˧˥ (35) when sandhi occurs. Similarly, the qu tone changes from ˥˧ (53) to ˦ (55) under sandhi. These are shown in red in the following table.

Moiyen tone sandhi
+ ˦ Yin Ping + ˩ Yang Ping + ˧˩ Shang + ˥˧ Qu + ˩ʔ Yin Ru + ˥ʔ YangRu + Neutral
˦ Yin Ping + ˦.˦ ˧˥ ˧˥.˧˩ ˧˥.˥˧ ˧˥.˩ʔ ˦.˥ʔ ˧˥
˥˧ Qu + ˥˧.˦ ˥ ˥.˧˩ ˥.˥˧ ˥.˩ʔ ˥˧.˥ʔ ˥

The neutral tone occurs in some postfixes. It has a mid pitch.

References

  1. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Meixian". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  2. Zee, Eric; Lee, Wai-Sum (2008). "The articulatory characteristics of the palatals, palatalized velars and velars in Hakka Chinese" (PDF). Proceedings of the 8th International Seminar on Speech Production (ISSP2008): 113–116. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2016-03-05.
  3. Cheung, Yuk Man (2011). Vowels and tones in Mei Xian Hakka : an acoustic and perceptual study (Thesis). City University of Hong Kong.
  4. "Numerals - SE Asian Readings of Characters". dylansung.tripod.com. Archived from the original on 1 September 2017. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
  5. "廣韻入聲卷第五". kanji-database.sourceforge.net. Archived from the original on 24 April 2018. Retrieved 24 April 2018.

Further reading

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