A Study On Written Cantonese And Its Diachronic Development

Written Cantonese can be defined as a written form which has been developed from written records of different language hierarchy units with Cantonese features and communication functions, based on which it can also be deemed as a character, a word, a phrase, a sentence, a paragraph, or a discourse.From a synchronic perspective, the existing forms of texts of written Cantonese appears to be a mixture of vernacular Chinese and Cantonese colloquial words and the vernacular Cantonese. And there are two varieties of this mixture form:one is combined with Cantonese words and phrases in modern standard Chinese, and another, is a combination of bookish words in narration and colloquial words in direct speeches, that is, a variety of modern Chinese in narration, while Cantonese in dialogues or direct speeches. And the Vernacular Cantonese form is the text based on Cantonese colloquial words.Based mainly on the most commonly used Chinese characters and by retaining a certain number of rarely applied ancient original characters, modern written Cantonese has its own script writing system constructed through the phonetic loan characters and the meaning loan characters and the self made Characters of Cantonese formed by word using ways and word formation. The diction of written Cantonese has characters of phonetic function of Chinese character and phonogram word formation. Phonetic function of Chinese character is originated from a number of rare ancient original characters and the substratum of Zhuang and Dong nationalities in Cantonese. Due to the complexity of the strokes of most rare ancient original characters, they are replaced by homophones with simple strokes. The substratum of Zhuang and Dong nationalities of Cantonese is a part of loanwords, which is also manifested by way of transcription. Semantic radicals like "口" and "扌" account for a large proportion of phonogram word formation. Especially, the radical "口" has become a symbolic feature of Characters of Cantonese. The phonetic indicator of phonogram is based on Cantonese phonetic sound. Some indefinite forms of words remain as existing problems in written Cantonese. Since 1980s, code switch between English and Chinese is a variation item of diction in written Cantonese, which is a manifestation of English loanwords in Cantonese and their social function in the written text.There are two important parameters in the construction of written Cantonese text: one is feature words of Cantonese; the other is lexical and syntactic markers of Cantonese. The manifestation of Cantonese feature word can be divided into core feature words and basic feature words. Core feature words have three key characteristics:dialect colloquialism, diachronic development, high-frequency use. Basic feature words are Cantonese words of synchronic high-frequency use of past generations, which develop in fluctuation state. For modern written Cantonese, words which are preserved with force and used with core feature words become core feature words, while newly words with high-frequency use become basic feature words. Lexical markers with Cantonese features are mainly reflected in:prefix and suffix of nouns, classifier’s definite function in classifiers+ nouns, the overlap mode of nouns and adjectives, structural particles. Syntactic markers are mainly reflected in:aspect markers of verbs, mood and the markers in written texts, the postposition markers of adverbs, common patterns markers.The diachronic development of written Cantonese is mainly divided into five periods:the first period is from the end of the Ming Dynasty to the Kangxi period; the second period is from 1828 Daoguang period to 1873 the late Qing Dynasty; the third period is from 1905 the late Qing Dynasty to 1928 the Republic of China; the fourth period is from 1930s to 1950s; the fifth period is from 1960s to 1980s. Through the analysis and study of written Cantonese in the perspectives such as the basic feature words, lexical and syntactic markers, characteristics of diction, and the analysis of degree of Cantonese written in texts, the main feature words of Cantonese and evolution path of lexical and syntactic markers are depicted. Based on the above studies, it is concluded that the diachronic development of written Cantonese is also a record of the evolution of lexical and syntactic Cantonese. The first three periods play an significant role in the maturity of written Cantonese, namely, the wooden fish books in Ming and Qing Dynasty, the Bible Cantonese translation of the late Qing Dynasty and Cantonese writing in newspapers and Magazines during the Vernacular Movement in late Qing Dynasty. The written texts during these time periods propelled and laid the foundation to Cantonese written, the appearance of core feature words and the identification of lexical and syntactic markers. The mingle of classical Chinese words in the fourth period and English in 1980s in written Cantonese texts occurred shows the application of variation means in the development of written Cantonese, which is also a manifestation of register diffusion and diversification of written Cantonese.The distinctive features of written Cantonese are key criteria in the measurement of the degree of written Cantonese. Under the influence of classical Chinese and modern vernacular Chinese, the distinctive features’ quantity of written Cantonese is directly proportional to the degree of written Cantonese. Through the quantitative analysis of the extracted distinctive features markers’frequency of use in synchronic text, this dissertation obtains 20 high-frequency markers which manifest the most distinctive features of written Cantonese.