Wuhan dialect
| Wuhan dialect | |
|---|---|
| 武汉话 | |
| Native to | China |
| Region | Wuhan, Hubei |
|
Sino-Tibetan
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | – |
cmn-xwu | |
| Glottolog | None |
Wuhan dialect (simplified Chinese: 武汉话; traditional Chinese: 武漢話, local pronunciation: [u⁴²xan¹³xua³⁵]; pinyin: wǔhànhuà), also known as Hankou dialect, belongs to the Wu–Tian branch of Southwestern Mandarin spoken in Wuhan, Tianmen and surrounding areas in Hubei. Wuhan dialect has limited mutual intelligibility with Standard Chinese. Grammatically, it has been observed to have a similar aspect system with Xiang Chinese.[1]
Phonology
Tones
Like other Southwestern Mandarin varieties, there are four tones in the Wuhan dialect. Words with the checked tone in Middle Chinese became the light level tone.
- Dark level 55 (also 44）
- Light level 312
- Rising 42
- Falling 35
- Neutral
| Middle Chinese tone class | Wuhan | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Dark level | āōēīūǖ | 拉 (la55) |
| Light level | ǎǒěǐǔǚ | 爸 (pa213) |
| Rising tone | àòèìùǜ | 走 (zou42) |
| falling tone | áóéíúǘ | 叫 (tɕiau35) |
| neutral tone | . | |
Morphology
The morphology of the Wuhan dialect shows both strong features of Southern Chinese and phenomena of language contact with neighbouring languages, particularly Xiang language.
References
- ↑ Zhang, Shiliang (2015). The Wuhan dialect : a hybrid Southwestern Mandarin variety of Sinitic (Thesis). The University of Hong Kong.