Changsha dialect

The Changsha dialect (Template:Zh; ) is a dialect of New Xiang Chinese. It is spoken predominantly in Changsha, the capital of Hunan province, China. It is not mutually intelligible with Standard Mandarin, the official language of China.

Classification

The Changsha dialect is what Chinese dialectologists would call a New Xiang variety, as opposed to Old Xiang; the distinction is mainly based on the presence of the Middle Chinese voiced plosives and affricates. The Old Xiang varieties, being more conservative, have in general kept them while the New Xiang ones have altogether lost them and changed them to voiceless unaspirated consonants. Although most Chinese dialectologists treat New Xiang as part of the group, Zhou Zhenhe and You Rujie classify it as Southwestern Mandarin.

Geographic distribution

The Changsha dialect is spoken in the city of Changsha and its neighbouring suburbs. However, there are some slight differences between the urban and suburban speech. For instance, the retroflex set is only heard in the suburbs, but not in the city. Further, some words have a different final in the two varieties.

Dialects

There are no substantial differences between dialects in the neighbourhoods of Changsha; however, age dialects do exist. For example, the distinction between alveolar and alveolo-palatal consonants is only made by the elderly while the younger generations do not normally distinguish them. The finals and have become and in the younger speech. Also, the initial consonant in the elderly's and middled-aged's speech is either dropped altogether or changed to .

Phonetics and phonology

The Changsha dialect, together with other New Xiang varieties, has lost the Middle Chinese obstruents, which are changed to voiceless unaspirated consonants. It has also lost all the final plosives found in the rù tone in Middle Chinese.

Consonants

Consonants of the Changsha dialect

		Labial	Alveolar	Alveolo- palatal	Retroflex	Velar
Nasal		Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link		Template:IPA link
Plosive	voiceless unaspirated	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link			Template:IPA link
	voiceless aspirated	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link			Template:IPA link
Affricate	voiceless unaspirated		Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link
	aspirated		Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link
Fricative	voiceless	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link	Template:IPA link
	voiced		Template:IPA link		Template:IPA link
Lateral approximant			Template:IPA link

Vowels

Vowels/Combinations of the Changsha dialect

	∅																Nasal
∅-
i-
u-
y-
ə-
a-
C-

Tones

Changsha has 6 tones, which are neutralized in syllables ending in a stop.

Tone chart of the Changsha dialect

Tone number	Tone name	Tone contour	Description
1	yin ping (陰平)	(3) or	mid
2	yang ping (陽平)	(13) or	rising
3	shang sheng (上聲)	(41) or	falling
4	yin qu (陰去)	(5) or	high
5	yang qu (陽去)	(21) or	low
6	ru sheng (入聲)	(24Template:Prime) or	checked

See also

• List of Chinese dialects

References

• Běijīng dàxué zhōngguóyǔyánwénxuéxì yǔyánxué jiàoyánshì (1989). Hànyǔ fāngyīn zìhuì. Běijīng: Wénzì gǎigé chūbǎnshè. (北京大學中國語言文學系語言學教研室. 1989. 漢語方音字匯. 北京: 文字改革出版社)
• Norman, Jerry (2002) [1988]. Chinese. Cambridge, England: CUP Template:ISBN
• Wu, Yunji (2005). A Synchronic and diachronic study of the grammar of the Chinese Xiang dialects. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Template:ISBN
• Yuan, Jiahua (1989). Hànyǔ fāngyán gàiyào (An introduction to Chinese regional speech varieties). Beijing, China: Wénzì gǎigé chūbǎnshè. (袁家驊. 1989. 漢語方言概要. 北京:文字改革出版社.)

External links

• Cantonese and other dialects (in Chinese)
• Classification of Xiang Dialects from Glossika

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