An Investigation Of Language Contact About Chinese Dialect And The Bai Language Of Heqing County In Yunnan Province

Heqing County, a multiracial residential district, belongs to Dali Bai AutonomousPrefecture, which located on the northwestern of Yunnan Province. The whole county is aChinese dialect-Bai language bilingual area. The Chinese dialect belongs to sub-dialect ofwestern of Yunnan; the Bai language of Heqing belongs to central dialect of Bai Dialect. Thispaper is based on the material from the field research on Chinese dialect and the Bai dialect ofHeqing, and describes and analyses the system features of the two languages. Meanwhile, thispaper investigates the influence and permeation relation between the two languagesemphatically, and makes a further discussion about the cause of the language contact.There are five chapters and five addendums in the full text.Chapter one is a brief introduction of the research background, means, purpose of thispaper.Chapter two introduces Heqing’s human geography and language situation, especiallygives a detailed investigation and analysis on bilingual status from sociolinguistics.Chapter three depicts and analyses the essential feature of Heqing’s Chinese dialect andthe Bai language. The Chinese dialect of Heqing belongs to the Southwest Mandarin, and existscertain consistency and discrepancy with other Southwest Mandarin. Simultaneously, comparedwith other Bai dialect, the Bai language of Heqing also has some own characteristic which isremarkably different from others, particularly performing in pronunciation.Chapter four emphasizes language contact relation between Chinese and Bai language.This chapter reveals the contact, permeation and influence among the two languages. In theChinese-Bai language contact, the impact of Chinese on the Bai language has obviousadvantage. The influence of the Chinese on the Bai language concentrates pronunciation,vocabulary, grammar and so on. However, the impact of the Bai language on Chinese is limited,as having some change on different types when the Bai borrows the Chinese ingredients.Chapter five gives a short summary for the whole paper, and points out some shortcomingsin the investigation.It has become a general trend that more and more similarities emerge between minoritylanguages and Chinese in China. During this period, often Chinese is in a strong position which has an extensive and profound affect on minority languages. Relatively, the impact of minoritylanguage on Chinese is weak and concentrates on being mingled with minority nationality’saccent when the people use Chinese whose mother-language is the Bai language and makesChinese accompanies with minority language’s characteristic. The language contact andinfluence between Chinese dialect and the Bai language of Heqing in Yunnan Province fullyembodies this tendency and characteristic.