Hakka Chinese
This article needs additional citations for verification. (January 2024) |
Hakka | |
---|---|
客家话 Hak-kâ-va/Hak-kâ-fa | |
Bangka Belitung and West Kalimantan in Indonesia | |
Ethnicity | Hakka |
Native speakers | 44 million (2022)[1] |
Early forms | |
Dialects | |
Official status | |
Official language in | Taiwan[a] |
Recognised minority language in | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | hak |
Glottolog | hakk1236 |
Linguasphere | 79-AAA-g > 79-AAA-ga
(+ 79-AAA-gb transition to 79-AAA-h) |
Hakka | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Simplified Chinese | 客家话 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Traditional Chinese | 客家話 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hakka | hag5 ga1 fa4 or hag5 ga1 va4 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Hakka (Chinese: 客家话; pinyin: Kèjiāhuà; Pha̍k-fa-sṳ: Hak-kâ-va / Hak-kâ-fa, Chinese: 客家语; pinyin: Kèjiāyǔ) forms a language group of varieties of Chinese, spoken natively by the Hakka people in parts of Southern China and some diaspora areas of Taiwan, Southeast Asia and in overseas Chinese communities around the world.
Due to its primary usage in scattered isolated regions where communication is limited to the local area, Hakka has developed numerous
Taiwan designates Hakka as one of its national languages, thus regarding the language as a subject for its study and preservation. Pronunciation differences exist between the Taiwanese Hakka dialects and mainland China's Hakka dialects; even in Taiwan, two major local varieties of Hakka exist.
The Meixian dialect (Moiyen) of northeast Guangdong in mainland China has been taken as the "standard" dialect by the government of mainland China. The Guangdong Provincial Education Department created an official romanization of Moiyen in 1960, one of four languages receiving this status in Guangdong.
Etymology
The name of the Hakka people who are the predominant original native speakers of the variety literally means "guest families" or "guest people": Hak (Mandarin: kè) means "guest", and ka (Mandarin: jiā) means "family". Among themselves, Hakka people variously called their language Hak-ka-fa (-va), Hak-fa (-va), Tu-gong-dung-fa (-va), literally "Native Guangdong language", and Ngai-fa (-va), "My/our language". In Tonggu County, Jiangxi province, people call their language Huai-yuan-fa.
History
Early history
It is commonly believed that
Due to the migration of its speakers, Hakka may have been influenced by other language areas through which the Hakka-speaking forebears migrated. For instance, common vocabulary is found in Hakka, Min, and the She (Hmong–Mien) languages.[citation needed] Today, most She people in Fujian and Zhejiang speak She, which is closely related to Hakka.
Linguistic development
A regular pattern of sound change can generally be detected in Hakka, as in most Chinese varieties, of the derivation of phonemes from earlier forms of Chinese. Some examples:
- Characters such as 武 (war, martial arts) or 屋 (room, house), pronounced roughly mwio and uk (mjuX and ʔuwk in Baxter's transcription) in Early Middle Chinese, have an initial v phoneme in Hakka, being vu and vuk in Hakka respectively. Like in Mandarin, labiodentalisation in Hakka also changed mj- to a w-like sound before grave vowels, while Cantonese retained the original distinction (compare Mandarin 武 wǔ, 屋 wū, Cantonese 武 mou5, 屋 uk1).
- Middle Chinese initial phonemes /ɲ/ (ny in Baxter's transcription) of the characters 人 (person, people) and 日 (sun, day), among others, merged with ng- /ŋ/ initials in Hakka (人 ngin, 日 ngit). For comparison, in Mandarin, /ɲ/ became r- /ɻ/ (人 rén, 日 rì), while in Cantonese, it merged with initial y- /j/ (人 yan4, 日 yat6).
- The initial consonant phoneme exhibited by the character 話 (word, speech; Mandarin huà) is pronounced f or v in Hakka (v does not properly exist as a distinct unit in many Chinese varieties).
- The initial consonant of 學 hɔk usually corresponds with an h [h] approximant in Hakka and a voiceless alveo-palatal fricative (x [ɕ]) in Mandarin.
Phonology
Dialects
Hakka has as many regional dialects as there are counties with Hakka speakers as the majority. Some[
Tones also vary across the dialects of Hakka. The majority of Hakka dialects have six tones. However, there are dialects which have lost all of their
province. They contain a yin-yang splitting in the qu tone, giving rise to seven tones in all (with yin-yang registers in ping and ru tones and a shang tone).In
- Huizhou dialect (not to be confused with Huizhou Chinese)
- Meixian dialect (otherwise known as Meizhou)
- Wuhua dialect
- Xingning dialect
- Pingyuan dialect
- Jiaoling dialect
- Dabu dialect
- Fengshun dialect
- Hailu dialect
- Sixian dialect
- Raoping dialect (a.k.a. Shangrao)[10]
- Zhaoan dialect
- Changting dialect
Ethnologue reports the dialects of Hakka as being Yue-Tai (Meixian, Wuhua, Raoping, Taiwan Kejia: Meizhou above), Yuezhong (Central Guangdong), Huizhou, Yuebei (Northern Guangdong), Tingzhou (Min-Ke), Ning-Long (Longnan), Yugui, and Tonggu.
Vocabulary
Like other southern Chinese varieties, Hakka retains many single syllable words from earlier stages of Chinese; thus, a large number of syllables are distinguished by tone and final consonant. This reduces the need for compound words. However, like other Chinese varieties, it does have words of more than one syllable.
Character | Pronunciation | Gloss |
---|---|---|
人 | [ŋin˩] | 'person' |
碗 | [ʋɔn˧˩] | 'bowl' |
狗 | [kɛu˧˩] | 'dog' |
牛 | [ŋiu˩] | 'cow' |
屋 | [ʋuk˩] | 'house' |
嘴 | [tsɔi˥˧] | 'mouth' |
𠊎 | [ŋai˩] | 'I', 'me'[b] |
渠[11] or 𠍲[12] | [ki˩] | 'he', 'she', 'it'[c] |
Character | Pronunciation | Gloss |
---|---|---|
日頭 | [ŋit˩ tʰɛu˩] | 'sun' |
月光 | [ŋiɛt˥ kʷɔŋ˦] | 'moon' |
屋下 | [ʋuk˩ kʰa˦] | 'home' |
屋家 | ||
電話 | [tʰiɛn˥ ʋa˥˧] | 'telephone' |
學堂 | [hɔk˥ tʰɔŋ˩] | 'school' |
筷子 | [kai zi˩] | 'chopsticks' |
Hakka, as well as numerous other Chinese varieties such as Min and Cantonese, prefers the verb [kɔŋ˧˩] 講 when referring to 'saying', rather than the Mandarin 說; shuō (Hakka pronunciation: [sɔt˩]).
Hakka uses [sit˥] 食, like Cantonese [sɪk˨] for the verb 'to eat' and 飲 [jɐm˧˥] (Hakka [jim˧˩]) for 'to drink', unlike Mandarin which prefers chī 吃 (Hakka [kʰiɛt˩]) as 'to eat' and 喝; hē (Hakka [hɔt˩]) as 'to drink' where the meanings in Hakka are different, 'to stutter' and 'to be thirsty' respectively.
Character | Pronunciation | Gloss |
---|---|---|
阿妹,若姆去投墟轉來唔曾? | [a˦ mɔi˥, ɲja˦ mi˦ hi˥ tʰju˩ hi˦ tsɔn˧˩ lɔi˩ m˦ tsʰɛn˩] | Has your mother returned from going to the market yet, child? |
其老弟捉到隻蛘葉來搞。 | [kja˦ lau˧˩ tʰai˦ tsuk˧ tau˧˩ tsak˩ jɔŋ˩ jap˥ lɔi˩ kau˧˩] | His/her younger brother caught a butterfly to play with. |
好冷阿,水桶个水敢凝冰阿。 | [hau˧˩ laŋ˦ ɔ˦, sui˧˩ tʰuŋ˧ kai˥˧ sui˧˩ kam˦ kʰɛn˩ pɛn˦ ɔ˦] | It's very cold, the water in the bucket has frozen over. |
Writing systems
Chinese script
Hakka Chinese is typically written using
Latin script
Various dialects of Hakka such as Taiwanese Hakka, is sometimes written in the Latin script or Pha̍k-fa-sṳ.
Dialects of Hakka have been written in a number of Latin orthographies, largely for religious purposes, since at least the mid-19th century. The popular The Little Prince has also been translated into Hakka (2000), specifically the Miaoli dialect of Taiwan (itself a variant of the Sixian dialect). This also was dual-script, albeit using the Tongyong Pinyin scheme.[citation needed]
Media
See also
- Varieties of Chinese
- Hakka culture
- Hakka Transliteration Scheme
- Pha̍k-fa-sṳ
- Hagfa Pinyim
- Protection of the Varieties of Chinese
- Taiwanese Hakka
Notes
References
- ^ Hakka at Ethnologue (27th ed., 2024)
- ^ Fan, Cheng-hsiang; Kao, Evelyn (2018-12-25). "Draft National Language Development Act Clears Legislative Floor". Focus Taiwan News Channel. Central News Agency. Archived from the original on 2018-12-25.
- ^ "Dàzhòng yùnshū gōngjù bòyīn yǔyán píngděng bǎozhàng fǎ" 大眾運輸工具播音語言平等保障法 [Act on Broadcasting Language Equality Protection in Public Transport] (in Chinese) – via Wikisource.
- ^ Article 6 of the Standards for Identification of Basic Language Abilities and General Knowledge of the Rights and Duties of Naturalized Citizens Archived 2017-07-25 at the Wayback Machine
- ISBN 0-7007-1129-5.
- ^ "The Hakka People > Historical Background". edu.ocac.gov.tw. Archived from the original on 2019-09-09. Retrieved 2010-06-11.
- ^ "[Insert title here]". edu.ocac.gov.tw (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2004-08-30. Retrieved 2014-10-12.
- ^ Sagart (2002).
- ^ Deng, Xiaohua 邓晓华 (1999). "Kèjiāhuà gēn Miáo-Yáo-Zhuàng-Dòngyǔ de Guānxì wèntí" 客家话跟苗瑶壮侗语的关系问题 (PDF). Mínzú yǔwén 民族语文 (in Chinese). 3: 42–49. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2019-03-27. Retrieved 2021-07-03.
- ^ Zhan, Bohui 詹伯慧 (1993). "Guǎngdōng Shěng Ráopíng fāngyán jì yīn" 广东省饶平方言记音. Fāngyán 方言 (in Simplified Chinese) (2): 129–141.
- ISBN 962-201-750-9.
- ^ 𠍲. Jiàoyùbù yìtǐzì zìdiǎn 教育部異體字字典 [Dictionary of Chinese Character Variants of the Ministry of Education] (in Chinese). Retrieved 2021-11-04.
- ^ "Méizhōu diànshìtái kāishè quán kèjiā huà píndào (24 xiǎoshí bō chū)" 梅州电视台开设全客家话频道(24小时播出) [Meizhou TV Station Opens an All-Hakka Dialect Channel (24 Hours Broadcast)]. Luófú shān pùbù de bókè 罗浮山瀑布的博客 (in Chinese). blog.sina.com.cn. 2011-07-21.
Further reading
- Branner, David Prager (2000). Problems in Comparative Chinese Dialectology – the Classification of Miin and Hakka. Trends in Linguistics series, no. 123. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ISBN 978-3-11-015831-1.
- Hashimoto, Mantaro J. (2010). The Hakka Dialect: A Linguistic Study of Its Phonology, Syntax and Lexicon. Princeton/Cambridge Studies in Chinese Linguistics. Vol. 5. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-13367-8.
- Lee, Wai-Sum & Zee, Eric (2009). "Hakka Chinese". Illustrations of the IPA. Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 39 (1): 107–111. doi:10.1017/S0025100308003599), with supplementary sound recordings.
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- O'Connor, Kevin A. (1976). "Proto-Hakka". Ajia Afurika Gengo Bunka Kenkyū / Journal of Asia and Africa Studies. 11 (1): 1–64.
- JSTOR 23756757.
- ——— (2002). "Gan, Hakka and the Formation of Chinese Dialects" (PDF). In Ho, Dah-an (ed.). Dialect Variations in Chinese: Papers from the Third International Conference on Sinology, Linguistics Section. Taipei: Academia Sinica. pp. 129–153.
- Schaank, Simon Hartwich (1897). Het Loeh-foeng-dialect (in Dutch). Leiden: E.J. Brill. Retrieved 11 February 2015.
- Taiwan Language Tool (including Hakka)