The Phonological Study Of Nan County Dialect In Hunan Province

Nan county which lies in northern Hunan province was once a part of Lake Dongting .It was formed by sand and soil deposits. Nan county has a complicated immigrants history. The languages of immigrants have a big impact on the formation of Nan county dialect. Nan county dialect belongs to Changzhutan cluster of Changyi subgroup in Xiang group. To date,the study on Nan county dialect is relatively weak. It not only lacked the specific and single report,but also lacked the systematic and thorough research. Considering that and on the basis of investigating in the locality, we mainly describe the phonetic system of Hehuazui dialect——the representative of Nan county dialect. In addition, a comparison will be made among Nan county dialect and the peripheral dialects (Changsha dialect,Yiyang dialect). We try to explain why Nan county dialect belongs to Changzhutan cluster of Changyi subgroup. We also try to analyze and explain why Nan county dialect forms the present unique appearance from the respect of dialects contact. We hope all those efforts will be helpful to enrich the study on Nan county dialect which is relatively weak.The full thesis falls into seven parts altogether.The Introduction Part shows us the geography, the history, the population, the condition of language uses of Nan county dialect briefly. It also introduces the present studies on Nan county dialect and the emphasis and the main purpose of our research. The first chapter describes an account of the phonetic system, the features of initial consonant, compound vowel and tone of Nan county dialect.The second chapter describes and analyses literary reading and colloquial reading of Nan county dialect.The third chapter is the syllabary of Nan county dialect.The fourth chapter makes a comparison among Nan county dialect and the peripheral dialects (Changsha dialect,Yiyang dialect)by using comparative and analytical methods. It tries to give a reasonable explanation why Nan county dialect belongs to Changzhutan cluster of Changyi subgroup.The fifth chapter explores the formation of phonetic characteristics in Nan county dialect from the respect of dialects contact.The Conclusion Part analyses the above material synthetically and predicts that Nan county dialect is still changing. It probably will continue to be close to authoritative dialect——Changsha dialect.