Tone Study On Hengyang And Xiangtan Dialect Based On Acoustic Experiment

The current study aims to further investigate the monosyllable tones of Hengyang dialect and Xiangtan dialect through an approach based on acoustic experiments other than the traditional speak-and-listen approach. Hengyang City, the second largest city of Hunan, is located in the south central of Hunan Province. Hengyang dialect belongs to the Hengyang little patch of Hengzhou patch which belongs to Xiang dialect. Xiangtan City is located in the east central of Hunan Province, Xiangtan dialect belongs to the Changzhutan little patch of Changyi patch which belongs to Xiang dialect.The first part of the chapter states the main content and method of current study. A review on the current monosyllabic tone study is covered in the first part of chapter one. Then, the current status of the study on Hengyang dialect and Xiangtan dialect is briefly introduced with inclusion of the syllabus of the two dialects.The second chapter is focused on the detailed description of the tone experiment, which covers the experiment datum, experiment subject, recording equipment, recording process, speech analyzing software, etc. The study adopts Adobe Audition1.5 for voice recording and Praat for frequency analysis. Data processing and chart plotting are performed in Excel2003. The theoretical background underlying the processing method of experiment data is also covered in this chapter.The third chapter presents the study on Hengyang monosyllable tone from both the pitch perspective and the durational perspective. First, Praat is used to collect the acoustic data such as FO and duration, and then FO data are normalized using the T method. After that, the tone pattern chart and the monosyllable tone properties table are produced. It is shown that the experimental approach adopted in the current study and the traditional approach give similar results, except that Yinqu and Yangqu merges into the same pitch in the current study. The order of duration of Hengyang monosyllable tone is:Yangqu> Yangping= Rusheng> Yinqu> Shangsheng> Yinping.The fourth chapter is devoted to the study on Xiangtan monosyllable tone, again, from the pitch perspective and the durational perspective. The six enunciators'FO are normalized using T method. Based on the average T, the tone pattern chart is obtained. It is shown that the experimental approach adopted in the current study and the traditional approach give similar results. As for the durations, they are normalized against gender. It is found that gender does not make many differences on tone durations. The order of duration of Xiangtan monosyllable tone is:Yangping≈Yingping> Rusheng> Yangqu> Shangsheng> Yingqu, which is different from preceding studies by other researchers.The final chapter concludes the findings, lists the strengths and weaknesses of the current experimental approach, and proposes future study.