The Research On Speech Sounds Of Hakka Dialects Of Longchang

At the beginning of Qing Dynasty, some Hakka inhabitants immigrated to Longchang County of Sichuan province from Mei County and Wuhua County of Guangdong province. While retaining their basic linguistic features, the Hakka dialects of Longchang have changed a lot since the immigration because of the influence of the southwest dialects there. That is to say the Hakka dialects of Longchang are influenced both by the Hakka dialects and by the southwest dialects.There are 25 initials, 48 finals and 6 tones in the Hakka dialects of Longchang. This thesis compares the Hakka dialects of Longchang with Guangyun from the diachronic point of view. The findings suggest that these dialects do have the laws of phonetic evolution, which include 9 initials' features, 11 finals' features and 5 tones' features. This thesis also compares the Hakka dialects of Longchang with the Hakka dialects of Mei County, Guangdong province and the southwest dialects from the synchronic point of view. The findings suggest that the initial, final and tone of the Hakka dialects of Longchang have their own characteristics both related to the Hakka dialects and the southwest dialects. On the other hand, being a speech island, the Hakka dialects of Longchang also have certain influence on the southwest dialects there.Longchang, Longtanshi, Yilong, Panlong, Xindu, Huanglianguan are the Hakka dialects islands of Sichuan province, which are located in the east, north, south and west of this province. These six speech islands have something in common, but also have their own characteristics. While retaining some important features of the Hakka dialects, these speech islands are different from one another for the influence of the southwest dialects of each place. After exploring the phonetic features of the Hakka dialects islands of Sichuan (including Chongqing), it is hard to say which speech island has experienced a slow process of phonetic evolution, and which speech island has experience a fast one. The phonetic phenomena of each speech island are complicated, which results not only from the influence of society on its phonetic system, but also from the interaction of different phonetic factors themselves.