Phonetic features of the Hakka dialect of the Chinese language of Mei County

Skomorokha Eva ORCID: 0009-0003-0822-9408 Student, Department of Oriental Languages, Siberian Federal University 660041, Russia, Krasnoyarsk Territory, Krasnoyarsk, Svobodny Ave., 82a Skomorokha10@mail.ru

Chzhan Yui Senior Lecturer, Department of Oriental Languages, Siberian Federal University 660041, Russia, Krasnoyarsk Territory, Krasnoyarsk, ul. Pr. Svobodny, 82a yuzhang0829@foxmail.com

The current dialect situation in China is ambiguous. Based on the opinion of Russian scientists, it becomes clear that with the emergence of a policy aimed at spreading putonghua, the idea of neglecting the interests of individuals for the sake of the "common good" is clearly being traced ^[3]. In particular, the number of speakers of the Hakka dialect as a non–native has changed over the decades - there is a downward trend from 3.6% to 3.5% ^[4]. And although there is an article in the Constitution of the People's Republic of China confirming the right of the population to "use their languages and develop their writing," the process of replacing dialects with the national language is actively underway in the country ^[2]. In recent years it has become the slogan of "" / shu? p?t?nghu?, gu?f?n y?ng z?, w?nm?ng zu? r?n, which means "speak Putonghua, use the standard characters and be a cultured person". It is implied that anyone who does not use putonghua everywhere becomes a person of low social or educational level ^[3].

At the same time, examining the works of Chinese authors, we observe the opposite situation: dialects are not only not being displaced, on the contrary, they are given special attention. There is a document confirming this position on the website of the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China. The message of this paper is the following: "" / f?ngy?n y? p?t?nghu? h?b? g?ng r?ng, which translates as "dialects and Putonghua complement each other and flourish together". Chinese schools and universities are hosting "dialect lessons" aimed at spreading and introducing the younger generation to the use of dialect vocabulary. In addition, in the Chinese Internet space, there are such lexemes as "" / f?ngy?ng?ng – a joke based on differences in dialects, "" / f ? ngy ? n b ? oh ? – the people's policy of supporting dialects, "" / f ? ngy ? n w?ish? - a nickname for the defender dialects , etc . All this indicates a positive trend in maintaining the development of dialects.

Dialects contain many stable expressions or lexemes specific to a particular region. With the loss of language, a part of culture is also lost, which is so important in describing the diversity of Chinese civilization. According to S.A. Barov, the disappearance of a part of culture will become a serious problem for the country, since China lacks a unifying religious principle, "it is culture for the Chinese that becomes a kind of common source of their historical uniqueness" ^[3]. Among the achievements in the "battle" for the preservation of dialects can be attributed Cantonese opera or musical performances in South Fujian dialects included in the list of intangible cultural heritage of the People's Republic of China and UNESCO. Nevertheless, there are still many gaps in the field of Chinese dialectology that need to be filled.

Dialectology is a science dealing with the study of territorial varieties of a language, that is, dialects, in their synchronous state and historical development. The term "dialectology" goes back to the Greek roots: dialektos – dialect, dialect; logos – teaching, knowledge ^[5]. Speaking of Chinese dialectology, it has a number of features. Firstly, in the Chinese language there is a special term for "dialect" - ? / / f?ngy?n. The history of this term, which literally translates as "local words", goes back deep into antiquity. Initially, it was opposed to the term /zh?ngy?n "correct pronunciation". In addition, Chinese dialects, according to Alexey Nikolaevich Aleksakhin, are so different that representatives of different dialect groups have great difficulty interacting with each other, or their oral communication is completely impossible ^[1].

When choosing a dialect, we considered the least studied dialects in the Russian-speaking space. In preparation for the study, it was found that the Hakka dialect of Mei County is included in the list of the most popular, but at the same time, the percentage of research on this dialect is small. Therefore, we chose him. The choice of the county is justified by the following factors: the territory of this county is home to the largest number of people who speak this dialect. Moreover, the dialect variant of this area is considered the official model of Hakka.  

The phonetic system of the Hakka dialect has 17 initials, including 1 zero initial sound. The dialect is characterized by such a phenomenon as aspiration:  ? [t?u?18] [t?u?] [t?uk31]. Initials, finals are divided into four categories: "verchneyaickaya consonants" (/ sh?sh?ngy?n), "perednezadny consonants" ( / ch?t?uy?n) and vowels of the second and third categories of Chinese phonology ( / zh?ngch?y?n – science that analyzes the pronunciation of Chinese characters with a table of syllables as the primary method, is a branch of Chinese phonology). So, being originally sounds [?],[ts?],[s], during the transformations they became fixed in the Hakka dialect in the following form: [t?],[t],[t],[?]. The sound of iniziale [k]?[k?]?[h]?[?] due to the influence of other southern dialects such as Cantonese, the dialect of the province of Minya: ? [k?i18] [kian] [hian] [?a18]?as [?iu18] [?i18]. An interesting process is the formation of the initials [f] and [v], which appeared as a result of the fusion of different sounds: initially, the sounds [x] and [h] were combined, after which only the sound [h] remained, and then, forming the syllable "hu" with the vowel [u], the sound [h] was gradually ousted. Thus the Chinese of the Hakka dialect is fixed to the sounds [f] and [v]: ? [f?n304] [fa] [fi] [fi18]?mobile [fan18] [v?n] [va].

Table 1. Initials of the Hakka dialect of Mei County

If we talk about the finales inherent in the dialect, then there are much more of them. The following table shows the 74 finals included in the Hakka phonetic system of Mei County.

Table 2. Finals of the Hakka dialect of Mei County

 It is necessary to distinguish between the sounds [?] and [i], which are indicated as "ii" and "i" respectively when writing pinyin. If the vowel sound acts as a final, the sound "y" is placed before it, in the recording it looks like this: yi,ya,yo,y?,yai,yau,yu,yui,yam,yim,yan,yin,yun,yang,yong,yung,yab.yib,yad,yid,yud,yag,yog,yug. Special attention should be paid to the fact that Hakka lacks the "final of the constricted mouth" (the last of the four degrees of vowel openness), that is, the sound [?] familiar in Putonghua. Nevertheless, in the phonetic system of the dialect, 6 finals [-p][-t][-k][-m][-n][-?][-?] have been preserved, originating in the Middle Chinese language: ? [kap12] [tt31] [siak12]? [ [kam]? [ [tn18]? [ [t18]. In many words that came from the middle Chinese language, the sound [-?] replaced by the sound [n]: ? [t?n32] [s?n] [kin32].

The tone system of the Hakka dialect is noteworthy in that it does not include the 4 tones familiar to Putonghua speakers, it includes 6 tones.

Table 3. The tonal system of the Hakka dialect of Mei County

 Unlike putonghua, in which a large number of words are pronounced in the fourth tone, the first tone prevails in Meixian Hakka. For example, the conventional reading of the characters ? / zh?, ? / zu?, ? / b?i, ? / d?, ? / ji?, ? / Shi, ? / zh?ng, ? / b? characterized by a fourth tone, while in Hakka they will read the first tone. The distinctive characteristic of the dialect is the last 2 tones indicated in the table. They go back to the terminology of ancient phonetics, represent the incoming tone and are associated with the ancient tradition of preserving rhyme, they are indicated on the letter as follows: / y?nr? – the lower incoming tone, the lowest; ? / y?ngr? – the upper incoming tone, the highest.  These tones are pronounced very quickly, much shorter in shape than the previous ones. Their feature is the construction of the syllable: the initial is the vowel sound (a, o, i, e), in place of the final is the consonant sound (b, d, g). Thus, we get the following combinations of sounds: ab, ad, ag, od, og, ib, id, eb, ed. When reading, the consonantal sound is not pronounced, however, it limits the attempt to pronounce a vowel sound, which is why the tone is short. In modern Chinese, the preservation of rhyme is not particularly important, but this tradition is still present in southern dialects ^[9].

The phonetic features of the Hakka dialect of Mei County are more clearly manifested in examples taken from the oral speech of native speakers of the dialect.

Table 4. Examples from the oral speech of Hakka speakers

          These sentences are examples of the live speech of a native speaker of the Hakka dialect. Based on them, we can clearly observe significant differences in the phonetic structure. The above features are determined by the rules of grammar and phonetics of the ancient Chinese language. Thus, the Hakka dialect is still sometimes called the term "" / t ? ng y ? "language of the Tang era", which indicates a direct connection with the linguistic structure of those times. Thus, by studying the peculiarities of this dialect, at the same time there is an acquaintance with the history of one of the most significant periods of cultural development in the history of China.

Summing up all of the above, it is worth highlighting the main points of the study. Firstly, the article highlighted the real dialect situation in China. As we can see, it is currently ambiguous, since there is a difference of opinion regarding the present situation of dialects and Putonghua between the Chinese and Russian scientific community. Secondly, the work was devoted to the study of the phonetic component of the dialect. The systems of initials and finals of the dialect were described and systematized, and the Hakka tone system of Mei County was considered. It was concluded that in many ways the phonetic system is built according to the rules of the ancient Chinese language, and the influence of neighboring southern dialects is observed. Thirdly, the difference between the Hakka dialect and the official language was once again emphasized. It reflects the historical and cultural component of the Chinese people, so the authors consider it necessary to pay attention to the issue of preserving dialects.