A Phonological Study Of The Siqian Dialect In Xinhui, Guangdong

The Siqian dialect is not quite the same as the dialect spoken in Siyi area, Guangdong, where Siqian is located. This dissertation utilizes the method of comparison of phonological characteristics between dialects and analysis of the rules of phonetic change so as to substantiate the unique phonological characteristics of the Siqian dialect. Although the Siqian dialect has two of the three characteristics of the Siyi dialects, including the ancient voiceless aspirated dental stop initial or Tou-mu, and the ancient voiced dental stop initial or Ding-mu in the Ping-tone and Shang-tone of today having become h- and the Yin-ping tone and the Yin-qu tone having merged, the tonal values which affect the degree of mutual intelligibility, are very different. In addition to having the phonological characteristics of the Yue dialect and the Siyi dialects, it has some similarities to the phonological characteristics of Hakka dialect, Gan dialect and southern Min dialect. Moreover, the large number of finals and tones of Siqian dialect are mainly affected by Cantonese and the Xinhui dialect of Siyi which are the dominate dialects in the neighbouring areas. The unique phonetic characteristics of Siqian dialect are the result of the more recent phonetic changes. They are Tou-mu, Ding-mu in the Ping-tone and Shang-tone of today, the ancient voiceless aspirated velar stop initial of Xi-mu in open rimes and the ancient voiceless velar fricative initial or Xiao-mu in open rimes having become f- when the nucleus vowel of the finals is w and the guttural stop initial or Ying-mu in open rimes and Division I having become ν- when the nucleus vowel of the finals is w.