Changshahua; Hunanhua; Xiang (Specific Languages) Language Learning Forum

Changshahua; Hunanhua; Xiang
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Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages

19 messages over 3 pages: 1 2 3

michaelyus
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Speaks: Mandarin, English*
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Message 17 of 19

08 October 2012 at 10:28pm | IP Logged

ZombieKing wrote:

In Chinese, we have something called 方言 (fang1yan2), which is not the exact equivalent of dialect in English. It's a special word that when describing Chinese, describes a certain kind of dialect. As in, not a dialect in the traditional sense. This is I guess a cultural as well linguistic difference that's hard for me to explain.

Hence 方言 = topolect. Yes, a coinage by Sinologists, but we're all language users here! See for example here

zhanglong wrote:

Now as for the original poster's concerns: a cute, inexpensive guide is published by The Lonely Planet. Entitled simply "China" (ISBN 978-1-74179-6), it lists fourteen different tongues spoken in China and contains very useful practical, geographical, phonological, and linguistic information. It covers "Mandarin, Cantonese, Chaozhou Hua, Dongbei Hua, Hakka, Hunanese, Shanghainese, Sichuanese, Xi'an Hua, Yunnan Hua, Zhuang Hua, Mongolian, Tibetan, and Uighur" and even includes the local script used to transcribe these languages --(it's not always 汉字.)

It's small enough to be placed in a back pocket and handy enough to use as a reference point for more serious or intensive study. It's fun to talk to people about their local tongues and evaluate how accurate the book is.

I totally forgot about that guide... I was pretty shocked to find something so beginner-friendly in my local bookstore when I first saw it! So yes, Xiang in the form of 湖南话 is covered.

Edited by michaelyus on 09 October 2012 at 8:41pm
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ZombieKing
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Message 18 of 19

08 October 2012 at 10:38pm | IP Logged

Your link didn't work for me michaelyus, but I'm going to see what I can find about topolects. Thanks :) I didn't know that 方言 had an equivalent in English.

I'm reading the paper you linked to Ari, about topolects, dialects and language.

I just want to clarify that everytime I mentioned dialect in my previous post, I meant 方言, the specifically Chinese version of dialect, which I now know is called a topolect in English.

:)

Edited by ZombieKing on 08 October 2012 at 11:02pm
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Ari
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Message 19 of 19

09 October 2012 at 7:39am | IP Logged

ZombieKing wrote:

I'm reading the paper you linked to Ari, about topolects, dialects and language.

I just want to clarify that everytime I mentioned dialect in my previous post, I meant 方言, the specifically Chinese version of dialect, which I now know is called a topolect in English.

Interestingly, as you'll see if you get through the entire essay (it's pretty long), languages like English, Japanese and French used to be considered 方言, which is part of the reason why the word "topolect" was coined. It simply means "the way people speak at a certain place", without regards to subdivisions into families, branches and so on. Victor Mair suggests 通言 as a better translation of "dialect", though I don't think that's gained traction in China the way "topolect" has in English.

But the word 方言 itself is far from unproblematic and I think it's used as a cop-out by Chinese authorities to allow them to suppress these languages. Yes, Cantonese is a 方言, a topolect. It's also a language. A full-fledged language with its own grammar, vocabulary and writing system, all of which differ from those of Mandarin. And talking about it as a 方言, like I said, does real harm. It gives it a lower status than Mandarin. It legitimizes punishing children for speaking it in school. It makes it harder to standardize its writing system. It propagates the myth that "Chinese is different" and doesn't work the same way other language families do. Speakers of non-Sinitic minority languages have rights in China that "方言" speakers don't have.

So I don't really use the word, because it doesn't really mean anything. Or rather, it means too many things. So if you want to call Minnanese a "fangyan" you're free to do so and I won't disagree. But that doesn't mean it's not a language. It's a language just like German or Hindi, no ifs and buts about it. Quoting Dr. Mair again (the entire article can be found here and it's well worth reading in its entirety):

Victor Mair wrote:

In conclusion, when writing original linguistic works in English and when translating into English, we must decide whether to adopt terminology that is commensurate with generally accepted linguistic usage or to create an entirely new set of rules that are applicable only to Chinese languages. Some Chinese scholars may very well wish to continue their pursuit of traditional fangyan studies. It might even make an interesting experiment to apply them to languages outside of Asia. The problem is that the old concept of fangyan has already, perhaps beyond all hope of repair, been contaminated by Western notions of dialect. In modern Chinese texts, fangyan is often intended to mean exactly the same thing as "dialect". Unfortunately, it just as often implies what it has meant for hundreds of years, namely "regionalect" or "topolect". Or it may be a confused jumble of the old and the new. Whether we are writing in Chinese or in English or in some other language, it is our duty to be scrupulously precise when using such fundamental and sensitive terms as fangyan and "dialect".

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