A Study On The Dialects Of The Suburb Of Suzhou

Wu dialects are the earliest one studied with the modern linguistic theory in China. As the representative of Wu dialects, the Suzhou dialect has produced a wealth of research, much of it advanced. But most of these researches focus on dialects in the urban of Suzhou. Other than Ye Xiangling’s Gazetteer of the Dialect of Wu County, Gazetteer of the Suzhou Dialect, and Atlas of Suzhou Dialects, there is very little research that examines suburb of Suzhou(the area was originally Wu county). While Prof. Ye’s work was in the 1980’s, the passage of time and the changing of administrative boundaries will bring some changes in local dialects. So it is necessary to undertake a new, detailed, and comprehensive survey of the dialects in the suburb of Suzhou.This dissertation undertakes a phonetic and partial lexical investigation of 34 sites in 32 towns and villages in the suburb of Suzhou. This project endeavors to go beyond the static description that characterizes much contemporary research on dialects and seeks to integrate dialectology, sociolinguistics, linguistic geography and experimental phonetics in an analytic comparison of synchronic variation in different areas and historical variation in a given area over time in the suburb of Suzhou, as well as the differences between dialects of urban and suburb of Suzhou and nearby cities. This method highlights both latitudinal and longitudinal changes over time and allows for the collection of many types of evidence to answer the questions regarding linguistic change and guarantees the practicality and objectivity of the conclusions reached in this paper. On the basis of investigation and analysis, I undertake a theoretical exploration of the synchronic and diachronic evolution using the insights of language contact theory, linguistic variation theory, lexical diffusion theory and dialectic linguistic geography on the phenomenon of sound change.This dissertation consists of five chapters. The first chapter introductions the geography, history and dialects of Suzhou and explains the dissertation’s topic selection. It also introduces the investigation and research methods, as well as the distribution of survey locations and information on my survey subjects.Chapter 2 enumerates the systems of initials, finals, and tones of the 34 survey locations, and compares them combining traditional dialectology and experimental phonetics. With these results, I analyze differences in initials, finals, and tones of the different suburb of Suzhou and then, conduct a synchronic comparison with the urban of Suzhou and nearby cities. I also compare my results to those of Prof. Ye and explore the logic, processes and social factors behind the synchronic and diachronic evolution of the Suzhou dialect.Chapter 3 analyzes lexical variation among suburb of Suzhou, such as personal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns, time nouns, nouns of familial address, as well as some words relating to animals, crops, and aspects of daily life. Where the differences are relatively large, I create a dialect map and indicate the different forms and distribution of the word. Thereafter, I undertake a synchronic comparison with the urban of Suzhou and nearby cities and analyze the geographic distribution of these words. Many of them were the subject of Prof. Ye’s survey 30 years ago, which enable me to undertake a diachronic comparison of their form and distribution.Building on the analysis in chapters 2 and 3, chapter 4 summarizes the different characteristics of the dialects in the urban and suburb of Suzhou, though special attention is paid to the two areas of Dongshan and Xishan, whose phonetics and vocabulary differ significantly from other areas. This chapter makes use of the theory and method of dialect geography advanced by Belgian scholar Willem A. Grootaers to analyze the geographic distribution of dialects in Suzhou’s suburb. To that effect, I select ten phonetic characteristics of suburb dialects, compose a dialect map and isogloss map and use it to explain how historical change produces continuous development from layers of both new and old language, how changes are propagated from one area to another, and the process of synchronic and diachronic evolution.Chapter 5 is a summary of this paper. It is composed of three sections. First, it compares my dissertation to Prof. Ye’s Gazetteer of the Suzhou Dialect and indicates several strengths and weaknesses between both of them. Second, it uses statistical methods often adopted by social linguistics to summarize the changes and development of dialects in the suburb of Suzhou over the past 30 years. It also combines characteristic judgment and comprehensive judgment to divide dialects in the suburb of Suzhou into three parts: northern, eastern/western, and southern. The evolution of language in the northern part has been the fastest and most closely resembles the urban. The southern part is the most conservative; its evolution is slowest and differences with the urban are largest. The eastern and western part fall in between these two extremes. Finally, I propose three implications of my research on the dialects in the suburb of Suzhou:(1) It is possible to see diachronic change in linguistic development from the synchronic geographic distribution of a dialect;(2) Linguistic evolution is not unidirectional, but bidirectional;(3) Linguistic evolution is complicated and certain phenomena still require further exploration.The appendices discusses some problems encountered in my survey and writing, and some areas that require further improvement, and the derection of my next researches in the future.