Hengyang dialect

The Hengyang dialect of Xiang Chinese (Simplified Characters: 衡阳方言, Traditional Characters: 衡陽方言, Standard Mandarin: Héngyáng fāngyán /xəŋ˨˦.jaŋ˨˦ faŋ˥.jɛn˨˦/) is the variety of Chinese native to the city of Hengyang, Hunan province. It is a member of the Xiang Chinese (湘语) group of Sinitic, usually subgrouped with the 'New' Xiang (新湘) dialects (along with Changsha 长沙 and Yiyang 益阳) owing to its lack of voiced obstruent initials.

More recently the dialect has been grouped independently under the 'Hengzhou Group' (衡州片), with the following lexical items as definitional criteria: /tɕi˧/ as the third person pronoun, /lai˧-tɕi˧/ for 'boy', and /ma˧-ko˨/ for 'what'. The Hengzhou grouping also includes closely related dialects such as Hengdong (衡东) and Hengshan (衡山).

The dialect is typical of Xiang varieties in its lack of retroflex initials, 6 lexical tones (including a reflex of the Middle Chinese entering tone ), and use of diminutive and nominative affixes not found in Standard Mandarin (普通话), among other distinctive features (see Wu 2005 for an overview).

Subgrouping
The Hengyang dialect is a variety of Xiang Chinese, which is spoken primarily in central Hunan and northern Guangxi, China. Xiang is traditionally divided into two large subgroups based on shared retention or loss of the voiced obstruents of Middle Chinese; the 'Old' Xiang varieties (primarily spoken in the southwest of Hunan and northern Guangxi) preserve voicing to varying degrees, while the 'New' Xiang varieties (primarily spoken in the northeast or Hunan) have merged the voiced obstruents into the unaspirated series. The Hengyang dialect is usually treated as belonging to the second group owing to its loss of these voiced initials. This taxonomy was first proposed by Yuan Jiahua in 1960.

The following examples from Chen (2006: 26-32) illustrate the criteria for classification, with Middle Chinese forms from Baxter & Sagart (2014):

More recent work has complicated this dichotomy. In particular, Chen and Bao (2007, 2012) have proposed a five-way subgrouping of Xiang based on novel lexical criteria, which posits that the Hengyang dialect belongs to its own Hengzhou grouping. This approach implies that Hengyang and other members of the Hengzhou grouping represent a transitional region within Xiang Chinese.

Phonology
The phonology is summarized below, following Li (1986) and Peng (2005). As per convention in Sinitic dialectology, the phonological analysis is organized into Initials (声母), Finals or Rhymes (韵母), and Tones (声调).

Initials
Where symbols appear in pairs, the one on the left is unaspirated, while the one on the right is aspirated. This applies for every symbol pair except [j]/[ɥ]; these represent a lip rounding distinction, where [j] is plain and [ɥ] is rounded.

The two sources do not include the plain and labial approximants (collectively, the 'semivowels'), instead marking these as vowels in the inventory of finals. Examples (from Peng 2005): 药 [jo] 'medicine' = [io]; 远 [ɥen] 'far' = [yen]; 王 [wan] 'king' = [uan]; etc. An ancillary consequence of this is the need for a null initial ('ø') for syllables that begin with semivowels, in order for all syllables to conform to the syllabic format: [initial + final + tone].

The palatal obstruents are alveopalatal, involving simultaneous articulation at the hard palate and at the alveolar ridge.

The alveolar and velar obstruents are in complementary distribution with the palatal obstruent series, with the palatals occurring only before high front vowels or the palatal approximants.

Finals
In addition to the above, there are also two syllabic nasals which may also function as finals; namely [m̩] and [n̩].

Peng (2005) has [ər] for final [ə], but this final is more likely a non-rhotacized schwa, which is what is found in Li (1986). This is also the analysis adopted in other more recent works mentioning the Hengyang dialect.

Li (1986) has [ŋ̩] for the syllabic alveolar nasal [n̩].

The symbol [ɿ] represents the apical vowel, which occurs exclusively following the alveolar fricative [s] or affricates [ts] and [tsʰ]. It is produced by maintaining the apical constriction of [s] against the alveolar ridge while vibrating the vocal folds to produce voicing, and could therefore also be transcribed as [z̩].

Tones
Tone 5 tends to shorten from a three-point to a two-point contour in certain contexts; consider 冇 /maw˨˩˧/ 'not' → 冇得 [maw˨˩te˨] 'existential negative'. In addition to the six tones listed above is a default 'neutral' tone found on affixes and clitics, where the pitch contour is supplied by context; this is indicated by simply not adding tone markers.

Grammar and lexicon
This section provides a brief overview of grammatical features of the Hengyang dialect, focusing on features which distinguish the Hengyang dialect from Standard Mandarin and other Xiang varieties.

Lexical features
Certain lexical features found in the Hengyang dialect are common in other northeastern varieties of Xiang but are uncommon in Standard Mandarin (MD): 晓得 /ɕiaw˧te˨/ 'to know' (compare MD 知道 zhīdao)

讲 /kwan˧/ 'to say' (MD 说 shuō)

冇得 /maw˨˩˧te˨/ 'existential negative' (MD 没有 méiyǒu)

啰 /lo˧/ 'final particle indicating suggestion' (MD 吧 ba)

Other items are specific to the Hengyang dialect or the Hengzhou group: 吗咯 /ma˦˥ko˨/ 'what' (MD 什么 shénme)

吗理 /ma˦˥li˧/ 'why' (MD 为什么 wèishénme)

俫 /lai˧/ and 阶 /ka˧/ 'boy' (MD 男孩 nánhái) The diminutive affix 几 /tɕi/ is a common feature of the Hengyang dialect, discussed in the following section.

Morphosyntactic features
Personal pronouns include the following (Peng 2005: 118):

The personal pronouns are pluralized by adding a suffix /-nin/ to the root, which may also be pronounced /-ni/. Reflexive pronouns are formed by following any of the personal pronouns with 自家 /tsɿ˨˩˧-ka/. An additional pronoun that may be added to the list is 别个 /pje˩-ko/ 'other, others'. Demonstrative pronouns include: 咯 ko˨ 'proximal'; 那 na˨˩˧ 'distal'.

The Hengyang dialect marks perfective aspect with the aspectual particles 哒 /ta˨/ and 咖 /ka˧/, which is typical of many other northeastern ('New') Xiang varieties, such as Changsha and Yiyang. Consider the following examples from Peng (2005: 293-4): 去哒 /kʰe˨˦ ta˨/ 'went/have gone'; 卖咖 /mai˨˩˧ ka˧/ 'sold/have sold'. These particles can also occur in combination in the ordering [ka˧ + ta˨], occurring after the verb:

Wu (2005) and Peng (2005) remark on the extensive use of the diminutive/nominalizing affix 几 /tɕi/, most often used to mark terms for small humans and animals, but also extended to various other semantic domains as well. It can also occur in combination with the other common nominalizing affix 崽 /tsaj/, which is more widespread in Xiang. Examples:

These examples illustrate the use of these affixes on terms for small humans, on adjectives, and time words. In each case, we can see that the accompanying morphology nominalizes the root, allowing it to occupy a nominal slot. This is most clearly evidenced in the third example: the addition of the affix /-tɕi/ allows the time adverbial 'before' to occur within a demonstrative phrase headed by /na˨˩˧/.