Southwestern Mandarin
Encyclopedia
Southwestern Mandarin also known as Upper Yangtze Mandarin , is a primary branch of Mandarin Chinese spoken by Han Chinese
people throughout many regions of central and southwestern China, such as Sichuan
, Yunnan
, Chongqing
, Guizhou
, most parts of Hubei
, the western part of Hunan
, the northern part of Guangxi
, and some southern parts of Shaanxi
and Gansu
.
Varieties of Southwestern Mandarin are spoken by roughly 200 million people. If removed from the larger "Mandarin Chinese" group, it would have the 6th-most native speakers in the world, behind Mandarin, Spanish
, English
, Hindi
, and Bengali
.
and Qing Dynasties
. Because of this comparatively recent move, these dialects show more similarity to modern Standard Mandarin
than to languages like Cantonese or Min Nan
. For example, like most southern Chinese languages, Southwestern Mandarin does not possess the retroflex consonants (zh, ch, sh, r) of Standard Mandarin, but nor does it retain the entering tone
, as most southern languages do. The Chengdu
-Chongqing
and Hubei dialects are believed to reflect aspects of the Mandarin lingua franca spoken during the Ming Dynasty. However, some scholars believe its origins may be more similar to Lower Yangtze Mandarin
.
Though part of the Mandarin language group, Southwestern Mandarin has many striking and pronounced differences with Standard Mandarin, such that until 1955 it was generally categorized alongside Cantonese and Wu Chinese as a group of non-Mandarin dialects.
. However, the entering tone has completely merged with the light-level tone in most Southwestern dialects, while in Standard Mandarin it is seemingly randomly dispersed among the remaining tones. A few varieties, such as the Min River dialect, do preserve some of the final -p, -t, -k stops of the entering tone.
/n/ and the lateral consonant
/l/ and the nasal finals /-n/ and /-ŋ/. For example, the sounds "la" and "na" are generally indistinguishable, as well as the sounds "fen" and "feng". Some varieties also lack a distinction between the labiodental sound /f/ and the glottal /h/.
Han Chinese
Han Chinese are an ethnic group native to China and are the largest single ethnic group in the world.Han Chinese constitute about 92% of the population of the People's Republic of China , 98% of the population of the Republic of China , 78% of the population of Singapore, and about 20% of the...
people throughout many regions of central and southwestern China, such as Sichuan
Sichuan
' , known formerly in the West by its postal map spellings of Szechwan or Szechuan is a province in Southwest China with its capital in Chengdu...
, Yunnan
Yunnan
Yunnan is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the far southwest of the country spanning approximately and with a population of 45.7 million . The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders Burma, Laos, and Vietnam.Yunnan is situated in a mountainous area, with...
, Chongqing
Chongqing
Chongqing is a major city in Southwest China and one of the five national central cities of China. Administratively, it is one of the PRC's four direct-controlled municipalities , and the only such municipality in inland China.The municipality was created on 14 March 1997, succeeding the...
, Guizhou
Guizhou
' is a province of the People's Republic of China located in the southwestern part of the country. Its provincial capital city is Guiyang.- History :...
, most parts of Hubei
Hubei
' Hupeh) is a province in Central China. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Lake Dongting...
, the western part of Hunan
Hunan
' is a province of South-Central China, located to the south of the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and south of Lake Dongting...
, the northern part of Guangxi
Guangxi
Guangxi, formerly romanized Kwangsi, is a province of southern China along its border with Vietnam. In 1958, it became the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China, a region with special privileges created specifically for the Zhuang people.Guangxi's location, in...
, and some southern parts of Shaanxi
Shaanxi
' is a province in the central part of Mainland China, and it includes portions of the Loess Plateau on the middle reaches of the Yellow River in addition to the Qinling Mountains across the southern part of this province...
and Gansu
Gansu
' is a province located in the northwest of the People's Republic of China.It lies between the Tibetan and Huangtu plateaus, and borders Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, and Ningxia to the north, Xinjiang and Qinghai to the west, Sichuan to the south, and Shaanxi to the east...
.
Varieties of Southwestern Mandarin are spoken by roughly 200 million people. If removed from the larger "Mandarin Chinese" group, it would have the 6th-most native speakers in the world, behind Mandarin, Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, Hindi
Hindi
Standard Hindi, or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi, also known as Manak Hindi , High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, and Literary Hindi, is a standardized and sanskritized register of the Hindustani language derived from the Khariboli dialect of Delhi...
, and Bengali
Bengali language
Bengali or Bangla is an eastern Indo-Aryan language. It is native to the region of eastern South Asia known as Bengal, which comprises present day Bangladesh, the Indian state of West Bengal, and parts of the Indian states of Tripura and Assam. It is written with the Bengali script...
.
Overview
Modern Southwestern Mandarin was formed by the waves of immigrants brought to the regions during the MingMing Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
and Qing Dynasties
Qing Dynasty
The Qing Dynasty was the last dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China....
. Because of this comparatively recent move, these dialects show more similarity to modern Standard Mandarin
Standard Mandarin
Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Chinese, also known as Mandarin or Putonghua, is the official language of the People's Republic of China and Republic of China , and is one of the four official languages of Singapore....
than to languages like Cantonese or Min Nan
Min Nan
The Southern Min languages, or Min Nan , are a family of Chinese languages spoken in southern Fujian, eastern Guangdong, Hainan, Taiwan, and southern Zhejiang provinces of China, and by descendants of emigrants from these areas in diaspora....
. For example, like most southern Chinese languages, Southwestern Mandarin does not possess the retroflex consonants (zh, ch, sh, r) of Standard Mandarin, but nor does it retain the entering tone
Entering tone
A checked tone, commonly known by its Chinese calque entering tone , is one of four syllable types in the phonology in Middle Chinese which are commonly translated as tone. However, it is not a tone in the phonetic sense, but rather describes a syllable that ends in a stop consonant, such as p, t,...
, as most southern languages do. The Chengdu
Chengdu
Chengdu , formerly transliterated Chengtu, is the capital of Sichuan province in Southwest China. It holds sub-provincial administrative status...
-Chongqing
Chongqing
Chongqing is a major city in Southwest China and one of the five national central cities of China. Administratively, it is one of the PRC's four direct-controlled municipalities , and the only such municipality in inland China.The municipality was created on 14 March 1997, succeeding the...
and Hubei dialects are believed to reflect aspects of the Mandarin lingua franca spoken during the Ming Dynasty. However, some scholars believe its origins may be more similar to Lower Yangtze Mandarin
Lower Yangtze Mandarin
Lower Yangtze or Xiajiang Mandarin. also called Jianghuai Mandarin after the Yangtze and Huai Rivers, is one of the most divergent of the Mandarin dialects, as it neighbors the Wu, Hui, and Gan Chinese languages.-Features and Location:...
.
Though part of the Mandarin language group, Southwestern Mandarin has many striking and pronounced differences with Standard Mandarin, such that until 1955 it was generally categorized alongside Cantonese and Wu Chinese as a group of non-Mandarin dialects.
Tones
Most Southwestern Mandarin dialects have, like Standard Mandarin, only retained four of the original eight tones of Middle ChineseMiddle Chinese
Middle Chinese , also called Ancient Chinese by the linguist Bernhard Karlgren, refers to the Chinese language spoken during Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Sui, Tang, and Song dynasties...
. However, the entering tone has completely merged with the light-level tone in most Southwestern dialects, while in Standard Mandarin it is seemingly randomly dispersed among the remaining tones. A few varieties, such as the Min River dialect, do preserve some of the final -p, -t, -k stops of the entering tone.
| Name | Dark-level | Light-level | Rising tone | Departing tone | Entering tone | Geographic Distribution | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sichuan | Chengdu dialect | 55 | 21 | 42 | 213 | light-level merge | Main Sichuan Basin Sichuan basin The Sichuan Basin is a lowland region in southwestern China. Despite its historical name, it is not only synonymous to Sichuan province, comprising its central and eastern portions as well as part of Chongqing Municipality... , parts of Guizhou |
| Luzhou Luzhou -History:The history of Luzhou dates back to Xia and Shang Dynasties. Luzhou became a prefecture level city in 1983.-History of Luzhou:... dialect |
55 | 21 | 42 | 13 | 33 | Southwest Sichuan Basin | |
| Luding County Luding County Luding County is a part of the Garzê Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in the Chinese Province of Sichuan. Luding County covers an area of 2,165 km² and has a population of approximately 80,000... dialect |
55 | 21 | 53 | 24 | dark-level merge | Ya'an Ya'an Ya'an is a prefecture-level city in the western part of Sichuan province of Southwest China, located just below the Tibetan Plateau.-History:... vicinity |
|
| Neijiang Neijiang Neijiang is a prefecture-level city in the Southeast of Sichuan Province, in southwest of China, with a population of about 4,200,000. It is located on the Tuo River and is a transportation and food-processing center... dialect |
55 | 21 | 42 | 213 | departing merge | Lower Tuo River Tuo River Tuo River is a river in Sichuan province of China. It is one of the major tributaries of the upper Yangtze River and its length is about 655 km. Tuo river is originates from the northwest edge of Sichuan basin and runs through places like Jintang, Jianyang, Ziyang, Zizhong, Neijiang before it... area |
|
| Hanzhong Hanzhong Hanzhong is a municipality in southwest Shaanxi Province, China, occupying a historically significant valley in the mountains between the Xi'an area, home to many Chinese capitals, and the fertile but isolated Sichuan Basin... dialect |
55 | 21 | 24 | 212 | level tone merge | Southern Shaanxi Shaanxi ' is a province in the central part of Mainland China, and it includes portions of the Loess Plateau on the middle reaches of the Yellow River in addition to the Qinling Mountains across the southern part of this province... |
|
| Kunming dialect Kunming dialect The Kunming dialect is an official dialect of Southwestern Mandarin Chinese. Luo Changpei describes it as having "simple phonemes, elegant vocabulary, and clear grammar. "-Beginnings:... |
44 | 31 | 53 | 212 | light-level merge | Central Yunnan Yunnan Yunnan is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the far southwest of the country spanning approximately and with a population of 45.7 million . The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders Burma, Laos, and Vietnam.Yunnan is situated in a mountainous area, with... |
|
| Gejiu dialect | 55 | 42 | 33 | 12 | light-level merge | Southern Yunnan | |
| Baoshan dialect | 32 | 44 | 53 | 25 | light-level merge | Western Yunnan | |
| Huguang Huguang Huguang was a province of China during the Yuan and Ming Dynasties. It was partitioned in the late Qing Dynasty, becoming the provinces of Hubei and Hunan.... |
Wuhan Wuhan Wuhan is the capital of Hubei province, People's Republic of China, and is the most populous city in Central China. It lies at the east of the Jianghan Plain, and the intersection of the middle reaches of the Yangtze and Han rivers... dialect |
55 | 213 | 42 | 35 | light-level merge | West-central Hubei |
| Hanshou dialect | 55 | 213 | 42 | (light) 35/ (dark) 33 | dark-level/light-departing merge | Northwest Hunan | |
| Xiangfan Xiangfan Xiangyang is a prefecture-level city in Hubei Province of the People's Republic of China. It was formed from two famous ancient cities, Xiangyang and Fancheng... dialect |
34 | 52 | 55 | 212 | light-level | Northern Hubei | |
| Guilin Guilin Guilin is a prefecture-level city in the northeast of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of far southern China, sitting on the west bank of the Li River. Its name means "forest of Sweet Osmanthus", owing to the large number of fragrant Sweet Osmanthus trees located in the city... dialect |
33 | 21 | 55 | 35 | light-level | Northern Guangxi, southern Hunan, southern Guizhou |
Syllables
Southwestern Mandarin dialects do not possess the retroflex consonants of Standard Mandarin, but otherwise share most Mandarin phonological features. Most have lost the distinction between the nasal consonantNasal consonant
A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :...
/n/ and the lateral consonant
Lateral consonant
A lateral is an el-like consonant, in which airstream proceeds along the sides of the tongue, but is blocked by the tongue from going through the middle of the mouth....
/l/ and the nasal finals /-n/ and /-ŋ/. For example, the sounds "la" and "na" are generally indistinguishable, as well as the sounds "fen" and "feng". Some varieties also lack a distinction between the labiodental sound /f/ and the glottal /h/.
Subdivisions
- Sichuanese MandarinSichuanese MandarinSichuanese Mandarin , commonly known as Sichuanese, Szechuanese or Szechwanese , is a branch of Southwestern Mandarin, spoken mainly in Sichuan and Chongqing, which was part of Sichuan until 1997, and the adjacent regions of their neighboring provinces, such as Hubei, Guizhou, Yunnan, Hunan and...
- Minjiang dialectMinjiang dialectMinjiang dialect , is a branch of Sichuanese, spoken mainly in the Minjiang River valley or along the Yangtze River in the southern and western parts of the Sichuan Basin...
(divergent; represented by Luzhou above) - Chengdu–Chongqing dialect
- Renshou–Fushun dialect
- Ya'an–Shimian dialect
- Minjiang dialect
- Kunming dialectKunming dialectThe Kunming dialect is an official dialect of Southwestern Mandarin Chinese. Luo Changpei describes it as having "simple phonemes, elegant vocabulary, and clear grammar. "-Beginnings:...