A Phonetic Study Of Gan Dialect In Xupu, Hunan

Xupu country lies in the west of Hunan Province, northeast of Huaihua City. The languagein Xupu is quite complicated, containing Chinese dialects and minority language. Xiang dialect,Gan dialect and Xianghua are three main dialects in this area. They coexist and cross each other,especially in fringe reign, many neighbor dialects influence each other, making the dialect morecomplicated and changeable. Longtan town, Gangdong town and Dizhuang town are located infringe region, and the dialects there show significantly differences with Xiang dialect and haveobvious Gan dialect color. Their phonetic features and belonging are necessary to systematicallystudy.This work studied the Longtan dialect, Gangdong dialect and Dizhuang dialect by fieldsurvey. The theory and methods of phonology, phonetics and statistics were used to explore thefeatures of each dialect from synchronic and diachronic perspectives. Moreover, the featureswere compared with Xiang dialect and Gan dialect. It was found that the dialects in these threetowns belonged to Gan dialect, with Xiang dialect features.This thesis consists of six chapters.The chapter one was introduction. It mainly introduced the basic conditions of Xupu, theresearch status of Xupu dialect, the basis of the research, meaning, analysis methods and talkers.From the chapter two to chapter four, the phonetic features of each dialect were discussed indetail from synchronic and diachronic perspectives. In the Chapter five, the generality anddifference of the three dialects were analyzed. And the conclusion that there were moredifference than similarity among them was obtained. In the chapter six, it was found that thethree dialects belonged to Gan dialect by comparing them with the Xiang dialect and Gan dialect.Finally, in chapter seven, the thesis was concluded by pointing out some further researchdirections on Gan dialect in Xupu.