The Yanchuan Dialect Evolution Of The Voice Level,

The research object of this thesis is the Yanchuan dialect, which belongs to the northern Shaanxi Jin language. In northern Shaanxi Jin language, the dialects along the Yellow River are featured for its long history and complexity. As one branch of those dialects, Yanchuan dialect bears its unique characteristics in terms of phonology, lexis and grammer etc.. Besides, Yanchuan's geographic location at the crossing point of Lvliang zone, Wutai zone and Zhiyan zone of the Jin language enable it to incorporate the features of the three zones, which make it of special research significance to study the Yanchuan dialect and greatly facilitate the research of the phonetic transformations and layers of the dialect.Based on the field research approach and the traditional description approach, the thesis mainly adopts the historical comparison approach and the historical layer-analysing approach to complete the study. With the medieval Qieyun phonological system and the phonological system of the northwestern dialects during Tang and Song dynasties as the historical reference point, the thesis combines relative dialect (the Lvliang zone of Jan language) comparison and internal (literal and colloquial pronunciation, difference between old and new dialects) comparison in the Yanchuan dialect, while at the same time absorbs the research methodology and achievements from experimental phonetics, geographic linguistics and language variation theory etc., trying to provide a sensible explanation of the diachronic transformations and the synchronic variations of the phonetic layers and phonology in the Yanchua dialect, to find out the rules and direction of its transformation and outline its characteristics.The thesis is consisted of four chapters: Chapter One serves as the introduction, in which the author will briefly introduce the geographic position, the history, and the dialect of Yanchuan County and the research of the northern Shaanxi Jin language and the Yanchuan dialect, as well as the significance, the methodology and the material sources of the thesis etc.Chapter Two Phonological Generalization of the Yanchuan Dialect. In this chapter, the author will give a detailed description of the old and the new phonetic system in Yanchuan dialect, compare the two systems to find out their phonetic differences, describe and analyse phenomenons such as tone snadhi, phonetic severity models and retroflex vowels etc., and at the same time compare the present pronounciation of the Yanchuan dialect and its medieval counterpart in order to lay a materialistic foundation for the research of the phonetic layers and phonetic variations in the next chapter.Chapter Three Literal and Colloquial Pronunciations and Phonetic Layers in Yanchuan Dialect. In this chapter, the author will classify the literal and colloquial pronunciations in the Yanchuan dialect into ten categories, try to list out all the samples in each category, calculate the proportions of the literally pronounced samples and the colloquially samples in each category, show the competitive situation between the literal and the colloquial pronunciations, and generalize the characteristics of the literal and colloquial pronunciations in the Yanchuan dialect. Through these abundant sources of literal and colloquial pronunciations and the research of the similar phenomenons in others counties' dialects along the Yellow River, with the phonological system in Qieyun and the phonological system of the northwestern dialects during Tang and Song dynasties as the historical reference point, the author will adopt the historical comparison approach to identify and analyse the historical layers in the initial consonants and vowels of the Yanchuan dialect.Chapter Four Phonetic Transformations in the Yanchuan Dialect. In this chapter, through sources of literal and colloquial pronunciations and previous and present pronuciations etc., with the similar phenomenons in others counties' dialects along the Yellow River as a reference the author will base his study on the phonetic system in Guangyun and the phonological system of the northwestern dialects during Tang and Song dynasties, conduct systematic synchronic comparison of the initial consonants, vowels and tones in the Yanchuan dialect, state in detail its transformation process, paying special attention to the phonetic variations that took place or are takeing place in the recent decades, such as the apicalization of high vowels in Zhixie-She (止蟹摄) etc.