Pinghua

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Pinghua
平话
San Chay
Native speakers
7+ million (2016)[1]
Dialects
  • Northern Pinghua
  • Southern Pinghua
Language codes
Hanyu Pinyin
Pínghuà

Pinghua

trade language in some areas of Guangxi, spoken as a second language by speakers of Zhuang languages. Some speakers are officially classified as Zhuang, and many are genetically distinct from most other Han Chinese.[2] The northern subgroup is centered on Guilin and the southern subgroup around Nanning. The Southern dialect has several notable features such as having four distinct checked tones, and using various loanwords from the Zhuang languages, such as the final particle wei
for imperative sentences.

Classification

Language surveys in Guangxi during the 1950s recorded varieties of Chinese that had been included in the Yue dialect group but were different from those in Guangdong. Pinghua was designated as a separate dialect group from Yue by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in the 1980s[3]: 15  and since then has been treated as a separate dialect in textbooks and surveys.[4]

Since designation as a separate dialect group, Pinghua has been the focus of increased research. In 2008 a report by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences of research into Chinese varieties noted an increase in research papers and surveys of Pinghua, from 7 before the 1987 publication of the Language Atlas of China based on the revised classification, and about 156 between then and 2004.[5]

In the 1980s the number of speakers was listed as over 2 million;[3]: 21  and by 2016 as 7 million.[6]

Dialects

Pinghua is generally divided into two mutually unintelligible languages:[7]

  • Northern Pinghua (Guìběi 桂北平话) is spoken in northern Guangxi, around the city of
    Southwest Mandarin
    dialects.
  • Southern Pinghua (Guìnán 桂南平话) is spoken in southern Guangxi, around the city of Nanning. These varieties form a dialect continuum with Yue varieties spoken in that part of Guangxi (excluding enclaves of Cantonese, such as in Nanning).[8] Yu Jin subdivides this group into three types:[9]

The Zheyuan people of Funing County, Yunnan speak a form of Pinghua. They are located in Dongbo and Guichao, and they migrated from Nanning.

Phonology

ɬ] for Middle Chinese /s/ or /z/, for example in the numbers /ɬam/ "three" and /ɬi/ "four".[10][11] This is unlike Standard Cantonese but like some other Yue varieties such as Taishanese
.

Tones

Southern Pinghua has six contrasting tones in open syllables, and four in checked syllables,[12] as found in neighbouring Yue varieties such as the Bobai dialect.

Tones of Nanning Pinghua
Tone name Level
píng
Rising
shàng
Departing
Entering
Upper
yīn
52 [˥˨] 33 [˧] 55 [˥] 5 [˥]
3 [˧]
Lower
yáng
21 [˨˩] 24 [˨˦] 22 [˨] 23 [˨˧]
2 [˨]

The split of the lower entering tone is determined by the initial consonant, with the low rising contour occurring after sonorant initials.[13]

Genetic profile

Genetically, Pinghua speakers have more in common with non-Han ethnic groups in southern China, as opposed to other Han groups.[2]

Notes

  1. ^ simplified Chinese: 平话; traditional Chinese: 平話; pinyin: Pínghuà; Cantonese Yale: Pìhng Wá; sometimes disambiguated as 广西平话; 廣西平話

References

Further reading

  • Xie Jianyou [谢建猷], et al. 2007. Studies on the Han Chinese dialects of Guangxi [广西汉语方言研究]. Nanning: Guangxi People's Publishing House [广西人民出版社].
  • 《广西通志·汉语方言志》(续编)课题组 (2013). 广西通志·汉语方言志:续编.第二篇,平话. Nanning: 广西人民出版社.
  • 《广西通志·汉语方言志》(续编)课题组 (2013). 广西通志·汉语方言志:续编.第五篇,桂北土话. Nanning: 广西人民出版社.
  • Sousa, Hilário de (2017). "Pínghuà 平話 Dialects" (PDF). In Sybesma, Rint; Behr, Wolfgang; Gu, Yueguo; Handel, Zev; Huang, C.-T. James; Myers, James (eds.). Encyclopedia of Chinese language and linguistics. Vol. 3. Leiden: Brill. pp. 425–431. .
  • Sousa, Hilário de (2015). "The Far Southern Sinitic languages as part of Mainland Southeast Asia" (PDF). In Enfield, N.J.; Comrie, Bernard (eds.). Languages of Mainland Southeast Asia: The state of the art. Pacific Linguistics. Vol. 649. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 356–439. .

External links

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